Epiphanies About God and Souls
Let's Talk about Atheists and Firm Believers in the God of Abraham
Although their beliefs stand in stark opposition, each exhibits behaviors akin to the other, including shortfalls in critical thinking
I absolutely and with all my heart and soul believe in “God” as I have come to understand him/her/them/it. One of the most delicious ironies I have realized on my spiritual journey is that religions’ false constructions of God have contributed to the growth of “Nones” — those that identify as atheist, agnostic, or religiously unaffiliated have nearly doubled in number over the last 15 years (See Pew Research Report discussion below).
Humans designed the Abrahamic religions for both positive and negative reasons and to appeal to the masses they sought to control. Thus, they described God as a deliverer of human wants if we do as we are told, which God is not. So people either blindly believe in God because the lie of what God is is believable or reject God because the God defined by religions cannot co-exist with the reality that a) even good, observant, ethical, and moral people do not get what they want, or b) are not happy, and c) that the world is full of seemingly senseless tragedy and really bad things happening to good people.
Many choose not to believe in these religions’ depiction of God because the human-constructed religious teachings regarding fairness do not hold water, and people see well-intentioned and spiritual people suffering tragic circumstances that do not correspond to religious explanations — they feel abandoned by God.
By trying to rationalize how a benevolent God allows suffering and evil with band-aids like original sin and platitudes such as “God’s plan will be revealed” instead of teaching the value of acceptance and that life is neither fair nor unfair— your life is your life — your life just is — now live it, a concept with which I’m sure materialists will agree, the major Western religions and Islam have constructed an image of a God that intervenes and rewards good behavior and punishes bad actors, which can only prove a disappointment to people who rely on it.
Because it is wrong.
What I Realized About God and Related Matters After My Spiritual Awakening
Not long after, my spiritual journey exploded into an instantaneous awakening upon my discovery of my lover Lindsey’s death on March 19, 2020; I had an epiphany. I realized through intuition that “God” does not care anything about money, politics, war, famine, or even who lives or dies, and to the extent God affects any such outcomes through various levels of “angels,” it is only to keep things from going too far off the improv-scripts (my term for soul contracts as it encompasses the reality of paramount free will).
God does not give a hoot about religions (There Is No Religion in Heaven by Laxaa), does not care whether or what anyone believes, and God does not want nor need our worship.
The need to be worshipped is a human character defect. Appreciation is nice, though (for both God and humans). In his book Conversations with God, An Uncommon Dialogue, Neale Donald Walsch says:
“The correct prayer is therefore never a prayer of supplication, but a prayer of gratitude. When you thank God in advance for that which you choose to experience in your reality, you, in effect, acknowledge that it is there…in effect. Thankfulness is thus the most powerful statement to God, an affirmation that even before you ask, I have answered. Therefore, never supplicate. Appreciate.”
I see God as unconditionally loving and omnipotent but not omniscient (does not necessarily know what the future holds), due to our free will. Others, such as the great writer and thinker Gavin Sher, believe in infinite alternate realities, which puts omniscience back on the table in the scheme of the multiverse but not in any one reality.
I see God’s unconditional love as entirely consistent with the existence of suffering, particularly at the hands of another. Concerning suffering that is caused by random events or by free will and outside of anything in a soul contract, as God loves each person unconditionally, getting involved would be showing favorites and be inconsistent with unconditional love.
Religions, Including Atheism, Suffer from Groupthink and A Lack of Critical Thinking, Whereas Spirituality Embraces Individuality and Nuance
Many atheists, militant or otherwise, abhor religion, viewing it as contrary to rational thought and science. In many ways, they are correct. They fancy themselves as critical thinkers and assert that devotees of any religion lack critical thinking ability or are too lazy to practice it. This exemplifies the proverbial “pot calling the kettle black.”
Except for the minority of lifelong atheists, ironically, atheism exists because of the erroneous teachings designed to create faith and because many adherents to atheism only partially engage in critical thinking. Critical thinkers solve problems, propose alternative theories, and are capable of the related concept of nuanced thinking. Sure, atheists exercise critical thinking in rejecting the Abrahamic religions’ conceptions of God and in not taking the Bible literally (many religious people also do not take the Bible literally). Still, many atheists fall into the false dichotomies trap that critical and nuanced thinkers avoid.
In an essay titled Nuanced Thinking for a Better World, James Vermillion reminds us, “Beware of false dichotomies — false dilemmas are everywhere. This fallacy oversimplifies reality, reducing options to either-or scenarios despite the existence of many alternatives. When we reduce complex situations to black or white, we risk a rise in extremism.”
Spirituality, as opposed to religion, embraces and epitomizes both critical thinking and nonconformity. As God also said to Neale Donald Walsch, “Religion cannot stand Spirituality. It cannot abide it. Spirituality may bring you to a different conclusion than a particular religion, and no known religion can tolerate this. Religion encourages you to explore the thoughts of others and accept them as your own. Spirituality invites you to toss away the thoughts of others and come up with your own.”
Seeking to build a bridge between atheists and theists, I came up with an alternate definition of spirituality that I hoped all could buy into.
When I use the term spiritual, I use it in a manner that transcends the binary of theism versus atheism. One can act entirely spiritually with or without a belief in “god,” however one understands that term. Spirituality only requires love, empathy, compassion, humility, honesty, and courage.
As I define spirituality, there is a flip side to the coin and all those positive feelings — accountability, both personally and holding others accountable for their words and deeds.
There are many alternatives to rejecting the existence of the Abrahamic religions’ God that one can adopt (or at least be open to) other than religiously and dogmatically asserting that there is no form of “God” whatsoever. My truth of what God is is one (pun intended). It solves the problem of suffering that many have with Abrahamic descriptions of God, and my view shares characteristics with deist views.
Many I have encountered think of “God” as a self-aware infinite intelligence. Interestingly, some atheists believe in synchronicity (as do I), which belief implies 1) that not everything is a random occurrence and 2) the presence of a supreme intelligence behind the veil, and thus is difficult to square with the basic materialist tenets associated with atheism.
One atheist who generally engages in much critical and nuanced thinking is the maverick, politically independent supporter of stamping out injustice yet no fan of how wokeism has devolved, and someone who I enjoy reading across many topics and sharing our differing perspectives is Colby Hess.
Atheism is not just a belief in the absence of any kind of supreme being but also a rejection of the totality of all religions, which many atheists would like to see disappear entirely. I recently commented to Colby that while he and I both have expressed disdain for religion, perhaps we should recognize its positive aspects and not suggest that the baby be thrown out with the bathwater.
I also noted that “to many of its adherents, Atheism is their religion, and they are just as dogmatic as many devout Catholics, and just as insulting toward people that believe in God as adherents of one religion may be to those of another.”
Colby responded that he used to dismiss such observations with a pithy retort. He has since realized that “Many atheists do seem to become rather dogmatic and cruel.” While his beliefs have not wavered at all, he became disillusioned with the militant atheist movement and realized that “getting along with others is more important … than demonstrating why their beliefs seem foolish or wrong.” He suggested I might enjoy this essay of his, How I Grew Utterly Disillusioned with the Atheist ‘Movement’.
I did, and I hope that you will, too.
Recent Research on Atheists, Agnostics, and Other “Nones”
Let’s take a moment to look at the Pew Research Center’s January 24, 2024 report, Religious ‘Nones’ in America. The “Nones” now represent about 28% of the population (16% in 2007, mostly increasing every year until it peaked last year at over 30%), comprised of atheists (17%), agnostics (20%), and religiously unaffiliated (63%). I would fall in that latter category, identifying as Jewish ethnically and culturally but not religiously — I was just never into it.
Regarding what I said to Colby about not throwing out the baby with the bathwater, the bathwater includes causing division and intolerance (80% of all Nones feel religion causes a great deal/fair amount — 94% of atheists feel this way) and encouraging superstition and illogical thinking (69% of all Nones feel religion causes a great deal/fair amount — 91% of atheists feel this way). On the other hand, the baby includes religion, helping society a great deal/fair amount by giving people meaning and purpose in their lives (58% of all Nones, 41% of atheists), and encouraging people to do the right thing and treat others well (53% of all Nones, 33% of atheists).
Fifty-six (56%) percent of Nones believe in a higher power that is not the Biblical God, including twenty-two (22%) percent of atheists. That surprised me — maybe I should have been gentler in my earlier criticism. Perhaps some who identify as atheists define it differently. Sixty-seven (67%) percent of Nones believe humans have souls or spirits, including thirty-one (31%) percent of atheists — another surprise.
Interestingly and also encouraging to me is that while eighty-six (86%) percent of atheists responded that spirituality is not important to their lives, and while only three (3%) percent said spirituality is very important to them, twenty (20%) percent said “yes” when asked if they consider themselves spiritual.
Life Review without Judgment — Every Soul Returns to Heaven Where There’s No Punishment and Souls Work to Help Those Still Incarnated
One thing atheists and I agree on is that no supreme being in the sky judges us and keeps score. Once, a reader asked me to tell her what I believe as if I were talking to a six-year-old child. I came up with the following:
“You know those participation trophies that every kid gets for playing T-ball instead of awards for the best hitter and best fielder, and how does that annoy Grandpa? Well, that’s actually how life and heaven work. Everyone gets to go to heaven as a reward for participating in the game of life. Some will play it really well, some okay, and some terribly, but they all get to go to heaven.
God loves everyone equally and is like your coach. When the game is over, and you are in heaven, you and God will discuss the game and come up with a plan for you to learn to play better next time. Anyway, things don’t always go well in the game, and that’s okay. Sometimes, other players cheat, and that can hurt you physically and your feelings. Learning how to react to that without cheating yourself is part of playing the game.
If things don’t go your way, that doesn’t mean God doesn’t love you, and it doesn’t mean God is punishing you.”
Beyond what I could explain to a young child, each soul undergoes an extensive life review upon returning home from each incarnation. The concept that the soul would be judged for the actions or inactions on the part of the human when the soul could only try to influence the human through subtle clues like a knot in the gut or arranging a synchronicity but had no control over anything befuddled me. At the time, Lindsey’s soul (Sitara) (my soul’s name is Marcus) was engaged in the process, so this was weighing heavily on me.
My Meyers Briggs personality type is INTP. INTPs utilize both logic and intuition to process information and make decisions. We tend to be flexible and good at thinking outside of the box. I had to fully engage these tools to square or eliminate my preconceived notions of judgment, penance, and punishment with the actual process — and to wrap my head around the fact that it never results in punishment.
Finally, probably long after the completion of her review, and she was assigned her level in Heaven and her work, I understood the process. Our souls are not judged in the afterlife/time in between incarnations and assigned a vibrational residence level upon the behavior of their human symbiote, which, due to the supremacy of free will, souls cannot control. In life review, when our lives pass before our eyes, the jury of our guides and peers simply ask us and challenge us to assess what we learned from our latest incarnation and whether we learned all that we sought to learn when we wrote our soul contracts/improv scripts.
Yet, there is nothing simple about it. It’s a painstakingly thorough and arduous process. The panel asks the soul about every single decision ever made. “Why do you think Lindsey said that/did that/decided that, and what did you learn about the human experience for each matter discussed?”
Then the team, including the reviewed soul, recommends to God for its signoff what level in heaven the soul will reside and work in until the next incarnation. Her primary work assigned in heaven (this story by Laxaa describes heaven and aligns with what I have learned) was guiding home the souls of people who pass under similar and young (36) and upsetting circumstances as she did (accidental OD — she naively never imagined that her dealer would sell her counterfeit oxycodone that had fentanyl in it).
So, life is not about a battle between the forces of good and evil, and we are not vested by God with inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (though for creating laws to protect people from other people and governments, that’s a meaningful provision). Evil exists because otherwise, we couldn't fully appreciate good. Some malevolence may occur due to free will running amok, but much of it is improv-scripted. Some souls may want to learn what it’s like to be a victim, and others may want to experience committing bad acts to know what that feels like. Others may not want to but agree to because those roles need actors to play the parts.
Conclusions
One can gain knowledge through intuition and life experiences. That’s how I arrived at all my understandings that I shared with readers today and why I am qualified to do so. I have recounted many of those experiences throughout my profile, most completely here: My Understanding of God, Life, Death, and the Between Lives We Experience with Our Many Soulmates.
That some knowledge is not provable does not reduce the knowledge to mere belief. As I noted recently, 1) Einstein said, “The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift,” and 2) Tesla said, “Instinct is something which transcends knowledge. We have, undoubtedly, certain finer fibers that enable us to perceive truths when logical deduction, or any other willful effort of the brain, is futile.”
I hope any member of any religion who reads my story may take away that you can form your own understanding of God and possibly stay a member of your religion — only fundamentalists would care that you’ve formed your alternate view.
I hope any atheist reading this will take away that there is an alternative, probably several alternatives, to believing in nothing without offending logic and critical thinking and without implicating superstition, but you can forget about proof. That does not mean taking it on faith. You can intuit a belief.
I am not proselytizing. I don’t care if you stay rock solid in your present belief system, and I do hope you find contentment and serenity there, as I realize Colby and many others do. As I commented to Colby recently when I read in one of his essays that there is no afterlife, “When we meet in the afterlife, we can laugh about this. As you can laugh now at me saying, as I have in many essays and my bio, that this is my soul’s 17,043rd human incarnation.”
I’ve also observed that others are not content in their belief system, born out of anger that still simmers or worse, and perhaps this will nudge them to where they need to be.
Lastly, I hope everyone across the spectrum of beliefs realizes that our attitudes and reactions are the only matters over which we can have absolute control. We cannot impose our beliefs on others. We can respectfully share and explain our views with others, and in this way, everyone may grow and evolve. Whether or not one believes in God or what that term means to them, let’s do our best to be the best people we can be, with progress, not perfection, and live in and treat others with love, empathy, and compassion.
Getting along with others is more important than demonstrating why their beliefs seem foolish or wrong.
Peace out, Cub Scouts.
In Rama I create, with soul energy surging through my body, inspiring me and breathing wind into my sails. Marcus (Gregory Maidman)
