Rethinking God: Undoing The Damage, Securing The Love

Many people have been harmed by toxic views of God and Spirituality. These toxic ideas keep us from trusting our deepest selves and from accessing the Love that lives in us.

In this talk, you will: Deepen your understanding of some harmful views of God, learn how what you were taught about God can impact your inner world and how you care for yourself, and discover how deep self-love and compassion can connect you to more Loving Presence.

Please note: This track may include some explicit language.

Transcript

For years I cringed when I heard the word God because the word represented this controlling,

Punishing figure who loved me but would also damn me to hell.

That is not a healthy relationship.

I'm still not sure the word God is my favorite word to describe the open,

Still,

And compassionate presence I have come to know.

Part of me wants to use the word on purpose to reclaim it,

But another part still thinks the word is too attached to some really harmful views and I don't want to create confusion or perpetuate harm.

So now that I've cleared that up or maybe I've muddied the waters,

I'd like to address some of these views that are still so popular today.

Please understand that I am not telling you what to believe about God or whatever name you might use.

I'm simply inviting you to this exploration along with me.

I am also not in any way claiming that I know what God is.

I don't think anyone could know that for sure and I am skeptical of anyone who tries to impose a clear definition.

The way we define God is so specific to our own experiences and our experiences should be welcome.

So let's take a look at some of these popular yet harmful views of God.

First,

God is a white male sitting on a cloud controlling everything.

This view is still so wildly popular and as long as we keep perpetuating a God that is only male and only white,

We continue to perpetuate sexism and racism.

The damage done by this point alone is too big to even capture.

To designate God to any gender at all makes God far too small.

To designate God to any specific race makes God far too small.

To designate God as only male and only white contributes to a white male supremacy.

In the Catholic Church,

Which is the church I was raised in,

Only men are allowed to be priests.

Only men can anoint and absolve.

The implication is that men are the authorities on God.

God's work is man's work and because of this many women can feel like imposters when speaking and teaching on spiritual topics.

How awful.

Women were never given the same spiritual authority as men.

This can take a lifetime to undo in those of us who wish to teach and speak about spiritual healing and growth.

It took the Catholic Church close to 2,

000 years to correct its error in making Mary Magdalene the penitent whore rather than the apostle to the apostles that she was.

Think about that and what kind of culture that creates.

Next,

This idea that God controls everything has been so damaging to so many people.

In a way,

This can make people feel safe and protected as long as they agree with all the rules,

Follow the rules,

And things are going well.

But when things start to go wrong or we start to question and suffering happens,

Many people wonder if they're being punished in some way.

They wonder what they might have done wrong.

What kind of cruel God have we allowed to exist for so very long?

God is not a puppet master in the sky pulling strings based on how good we have been or how much we have prayed.

God is not taking prayer role and deciding who lives and who dies based on a prayer count.

Have we reduced God to some sort of election process?

We've made God into some sort of cosmic Santa,

Making a list and checking it twice,

Always watching,

Always judging.

The truth is that good and bad things happen to good and bad people.

That's not God calling each specific shot,

That's nature.

I've never heard a human look at an injured animal and say,

I wonder what he or she did to cause that.

But we've created a different sort of order for us humans.

We've made ourselves better than nature.

We've made a different way for us.

This too has caused tremendous problems in the way we care for our earth.

We are nature.

The idea of a controlling God is also a scapegoat that potentially keeps us from two things.

One,

Our responsibility and two,

Our power.

The controlling God concept keeps us from the grand consciousness that we have access to.

Rather than a God in charge of all,

We co-create with God.

We are much more entangled with God than the concept of a distant God out there far away.

This alone can be so healing to realize.

I imagine many of you have big and small moments you could tell me about where you felt the presence of God or something bigger.

God consciousness is so much closer and so much more creative and open.

It can be a painful process to unlearn some of those harmful views of God.

It can bring with it a true loss of innocence and certainty for so many people.

But that certainty was never really certain to begin with.

I realized that doesn't make it any less painful to lose a certainty even if it's false.

And that pain deserves and needs to be witnessed,

Honored,

And cared for.

Another way harm is caused by some of these views is that we often internalize these views,

This view of a punishing,

Wrathful God.

And our image of God can mirror how we treat ourselves.

In other words,

If I believe in a punishing God,

And if I was raised to believe in that kind of God,

I may have developed a mean inner critic that punishes me when I screw up.

We may witness ourselves and our growth with the same wrath we were taught about God.

If God's love is conditional,

Then our self-love might be too.

I might only be loving to myself when things are good.

When things go wrong,

I look for what I must have done wrong rather than give myself the loving care that I need.

I might blame and punish myself with mean words,

Words that create an inner hell and torment.

And if this rings true for you,

Then chances are I might be doing that to others as well,

Even if I don't realize it.

If you find yourself relating to this,

Please do not judge yourself harshly.

Growth is best when founded on compassion.

And you can practice that right now in this moment.

And that might sound like this.

How could it not be true?

How could it not be true that I've internalized this mean critic,

Given what I've learned about a violent God and a punishing God?

I need to be gentle with myself.

I was never supposed to be perfect,

And I was never supposed to be punished or abused in this way.

Right now,

In this moment,

I am disrupting that meanness with compassion.

I am refusing to perpetuate to perpetuate that abuse.

When I find myself thinking about what I believe in,

And let's be honest,

That might be daily,

I remind myself to believe in compassion.

That's the place I can always go back to with confidence.

And start with self-compassion,

Especially given that you are the person you are with the most.

Self-compassion helps bring clarity.

I also remind myself that what I believe in is far less important than how I live,

How I treat myself,

And all of creation.

I read something once that said,

The earliest Christians did not call themselves believers.

They called themselves seekers.

They didn't have to land on any specific belief.

I liked that.

I also learned that the earliest Christians didn't call themselves Christians,

Either,

But that's a story for a different day.

Compassion,

Self-compassion,

Brings me to inviting you to explore an alternative God.

Maybe you already know that God,

One that loves you without any condition whatsoever.

No matter who you are,

Who you love,

What you do or don't do,

What you believe or don't believe,

What you look like,

Whether you have children or not,

Or any other criteria at all.

If you exist,

The presence and the love is there for the taking.

And I know firsthand,

This is easier said than done.

But you may have spontaneously felt this when you saw a beautiful sky,

Sat under a grand tree,

Dipped your feet in an ocean,

Or even caught a glimpse of a star when you took your dog out to potty at night.

The love is expansive.

Cultivating it inside of you also helps you meet it.

And it was learning how to have more real deep compassion for myself that saved me in many ways.

When I could wrap my struggles in tenderness and my difficult feelings in tenderness,

Care,

And reverence,

Rather than blame,

Analysis,

And attempts to hurry up and fix,

I began to meet a softness and a stillness and openness and an expansiveness that I could only call God.

It was so open and so free.

I remember thinking,

This must be God in that place,

All is well,

Even when it isn't.

I'm not suggesting that every time I have compassion for myself,

I've reached that level of infinite stillness.

But I do encounter it.

And even when I don't encounter and even when I don't encounter that eternal level of stillness,

Radical self-compassion helps my inner world.

It helps my body.

It helps my relationships.

It brings many benefits.

It seems to me that the world desperately needs more compassion.

Start on the inside.

Now,

How do we do this?

Start small.

And in this moment,

Ask yourself,

What is one way that I could have more compassion for myself right now?

The smallest of things are perfectly wonderful and often the most impactful.

Try not to think too hard about the answer.

Try not to go searching for it with your mind as if there's one single right answer.

Allow yourself to pause and breathe.

And then ask the question,

What is one way I could have compassion for myself right now?

And see what arises.

I can also offer you one small beginning practice,

If you need a little idea.

And it's just one simple question.

And that question is,

How are you?

And then you would fill in your name.

So for me,

It would be,

How are you,

Julie?

And write that question down.

And allow yourself to answer the question without any analysis,

Without trying to talk yourself out of how you feel,

Without telling yourself that you should be more positive or more grateful,

Without anything that says you shouldn't feel this way,

Or you're not okay,

Based on how you are right now.

In other words,

You're answering the question on the page and the page becomes a safe container,

A safe place to feel.

That's a compassionate act.

Of course,

If any of that feels too overwhelming,

Always seek the support of a friend,

A therapist,

Spiritual director,

Because you're important.

We are important.

And the world needs us.

And it needs our compassion.

Thank you for exploring with me today.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts.