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re: "Divine imminence" is terminology
azstrummer — (archived)

You had related this story before. I still fail to see though what Christianity has to do with your Grandmother appearing to you. I can see you getting a link to God and an afterlife but where does Jesus enter this picture? Most major religions have some reference to a soul and spirits that appear after death. Doesn't seem to make any sense that just cause your Grandmother chose Christianity that it had anything to do with her appearance.

I think that's what nags me here. It's not so much that you became spiritual because of your experience, it's that, in order for you to embrace this spirituality, you had to equate it with one particular sect and all the hooplah and overhead associated with it. I think one particular hint is your statement that your parents were Christian. I've always believed that for most people that I consider intelligent and rational to make that leap of faith into a particular religion, the major motivating force is not necessarily the message of the faith (since it often doesn't square with science and logic) but instead this huge peer pressure we feel from knowing almost every relative and friend we've looked up to in our lives has a membership.

That was one of the toughest parts about embracing atheism for me was to suddenly realize that my mother, father, grandparents, most aunts and uncles, etc. were victims of a centuries-old scam. It's a hard hurdle to see gullibility in ones you've spent a lifetime looking up to but I firmly believe that today. Yet, I don't look down on them by any means because in many ways they had even more oppressive peer pressure than I did and a media and educational system that helped perpetuate the myths.

Obviously, you see things differently and I have no problem with that. Just fascinating to see how our experiences shape our views and beliefs. Now if you show up at my door with a Watchtower, we've got a problem.....

Art

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