Summary

The author reflects on a personal spiritual journey, grappling with a sense of displacement from both cultural and religious communities, and ultimately finding solace in an inner, transcendent connection with the divine.

Abstract

The author, a former Evangelical minister, shares their struggle with feeling distant from God in environments that stifle individuality and diversity. After migrating to the United States and experiencing cultural dissonance, they underwent a transition away from the church, influenced by personal trauma and disillusionment with dogmatic beliefs. The article discusses the author's realization that their longing for community is more about the idea than the actuality, and how the COVID-19 pandemic facilitated an inward spiritual journey. They emphasize the importance of an interior dwelling, or consciousness, that transcends physical senses and provides a reliable inner guidance system. The author describes moments of connection with the eternal through nature, pets, and meditation, suggesting that the true self exists beyond thoughts and feelings, in a state of awareness akin to panentheism.

Opinions

The author feels alienated from religious communities that enforce narrow cultural prescriptions and silence diverse voices.
They express a sense of homelessness due to their religious incarnations and the inability to fully integrate into American culture.
The author believes that the church rejects those who question its doctrine and cultural beliefs.
They value personal experiences of consciousness and inner wisdom over dogma-bound beliefs.
The author equates the true self with a deeper level of consciousness that connects with the transcendent world.
They describe their spiritual journey as one that leads to a direct connection with the divine, which is beyond intellectual understanding.
The author endorses the concept of panentheism, distinguishing it from pantheism, and acknowledges the difficulty in articulating mystical experiences.

God — Where are You?

(An excerpt from my memoir “Heart Wide Open”)

Where is god?

Why does she feel so distant?

I don’t feel her in an environment where I experience the jarring impact of criticism, violation of the human Spirit, and pressure to conform, like those places where women and same-sex folks are silenced and marginalized.

I do not fit in with communities that give narrow cultural prescriptions for what they consider “Christian” behavior.

My sense of homelessness shows up in my many religious incarnations.

As an Evangelical minister in South Africa, I always seemed to have had one foot out the door. For years my eyes glanced toward the United States as a place for personal and professional growth. It was where I would launch my psychology career.

After I arrived in California in the late 1970s, when the first excitement of the new culture wore off, I continued to feel like a fish out of water. My accent was different. I could not identify with American sports like baseball, basketball, and football. And how I longed for a good game of cricket.

And when I referred to an eraser as a rubber, folks cracked up.

Three passports later and a migration away from the church, I sometimes mused, what’s wrong with me? But that’s the wrong question. My studies of cross-cultural migration tell me that tri-cultural people like myself always feel displaced.

I’ve had a somewhat idealized idea of community.

In the past, this connection came through an affiliation with some church. The first thing I often did when moving to a new town was to search for a congregation where I hoped to experience a spirit of togetherness. At times this was partially realized but eventually, I stopped the search for a church.

Personal trauma (death, divorce, disease, debt, depression) and my questioning of the dogma of the Tribe shaped my exit.

But, unfortunately, the new wine of my emerging person did not hold up in the old wineskins of a religious congregation. The church does not take a shine towards those who reject its doctrine and cultural beliefs.

I now live in exile from both cultural and religious communities.

I have not entered a house of worship for decades. I sometimes still tear up when I hear an old hymn and wonder why this happens. However, I now realize that it is the idea of community that I long for rather than the actuality of a group.

The advent of Covid, with its demand for social distancing, was a blessing in disguise. During this period of relative isolation, we went on an inward spiritual journey and started to find refuge deep within.

That inward journey needs to precede the outward venture.

The place that I now seek is an interior dwelling.

Some refer to it as Soul or consciousness. It’s quite distinct from my once head-oriented dogma-bound beliefs. It’s the same place I point to when I ask my patients, “What does your inner wise person tell you about the challenge you face?”

That level of consciousness is beyond our five physical senses. I find it to be a reliable inner GPS that connects me with the transcendent world.

The shift to my inner awareness occurs in several ways.

When I stop to contemplate the hundreds of cottonwood trees that border the river where we live, I experience the Eternal. I get a hint of Transcendence when my dogs intuitively know what I am feeling. They respond in a way that mirrors my innermost thoughts. I also approach awareness when I transcend some of my ego identifications. I’m a psychologist. That’s my profession.

But now that I’m retired, what am I? Where is my true self? In moments of blissful connection with the Source of all being in my pre-dawn meditation, my self expands access to the depths of love.

The True self is a place of awareness beyond all feelings and thoughts.

Such experiences confirm the phenomena of panentheism, God in everything, which is very different from pantheism, or the universe is God.

Occasionally I hear the faint strains of the Divine melody in my inner depths. The Oxford Dictionary describes this knowing state as “The spiritual apprehension of knowledge inaccessible to the intellect may be attained through contemplation and self-surrender.”

It’s challenging to explain mysticism. The brain cannot wrap itself around infinity. Direct connection with a deep inner or other world is mindless. Such encounters come and go seemingly beyond our will, vanish pretty quickly, but leave an indelible impression on our lives.

My mystical moments have been few and far between. In the words of St. Teresa of Avila, every time I have such an encounter with the next world, I am like a drop of rain falling into a great ocean of the love of the Eternal One. I feel the splash, and then I’m absorbed in the vast expanse of salt water.