To continue from 1991

Perhaps inevitably, I came to resent God for making me feel so guilty all of the time, and for throwing so much garbage at me and then blaming me for it (as I understood it at the time). I felt betrayed by God. And as I began to take college classes and to read more widely, I became more aware of the oppression of women in our society and throughout history. I got more and more disgusted with Christianity for the structural and symbolic violence the church has committed against women and other peoples.


I began to read the Bible with a more critical eye, and found a lot of other things I could not understand nor stomach. I began to really question the nature of God. My parents had taught me about the inerrancy of scripture (no, they weren’t absolute literalists, but they did believe that God protected the Bible from mistranslation, etc.), and they had, wisely, taught me the dangers of picking and choosing what you like from the Bible and discarding the rest. What that meant in my late teens, though, was that I was going to have to discard the whole Bible, because there were things in it with which I simply could not bring myself to agree.


March 4, 1991
What if there is a god whose idea of a good time is burning and torturing people in eternal hell fire, and he just threw down Jesus to make the game more challenging? Put God in the role of the devil, trying always to entice people to his hell. It makes as much, if not more, sense than does the idea of a loving God. Maybe it is all a game and God threw Jesus in for confusion, and the object of the game is to see who can figure out which stuff is true and which stuff God was just kidding about.
When I read the Bible now, all I find are things to disagree with. I was just reading it, the one I’ve had for years, and so many of the passages are marked. I know that at one time I derived comfort, guidance, euphoria, excitement, terror, guilt, etc. from those pages. The only feelings that book now provokes in me are contempt and indignation, and confusion.
I’ve always liked to think of Jesus as a great man. A good man, I guess, seeing as he’s been around for so long, he must have been “great” in some definition of the word. But what is troubling me now, is: was he good? I would think he was a lot better if he hadn’t gone around proclaiming himself better than everyone else. Sin free. And not offering the hope that any could be like him. If you believe he was the son of God, then his attitude is proper and fitting. But I don’t. So he just seems pretentious. Maybe even bad. He said a lot of things about hell and eternal condemnation that as a mortal he had no business saying. Was he just using cheap tactics to scare people? Why? How would he gain?
No, I think he really believed what he was saying. Was he insane? Or was he just putting things into words that stupid people would understand? Which they don’t seem to, anyhow, as evidenced by their continual disagreements about what he meant. Perhaps that is what he was trying to do [stir up disagreements]. Yet somehow I can’t believe that. That makes him no better than the best of the TV evangelists who serve us their watered down versions of the gospel grossly distorted by their own interpretations. I think he must have been crazy. That’s the only way I can have respect for him.
Mom used to say that you either have to believe Jesus was the son of God, or that he was nuts. But that’s not true. You could believe he was evil. You could believe he was power-hungry in a weird way. You could believe that he was one of those people (like L. Ron Hubbard) who couldn’t handle being ordinary so he made up a good story. But I want to like Jesus a little bit. So I’m going to see if I can.

March 5, 1991
I would really like to write a convincing “Why I am Not a Christian” book someday. The subject is so huge, though. Whenever I start thinking about it after a short time my mind begins to boggle. The problem is that the whole thing is a big spider web. As soon as you follow one strand just a little way, it connects with another one and the fifty little off-shoots and before you know it you have ten books open in at least two places each and it could just drive you nuts if it wasn’t so much fun.
I guess I need to compile all my questions and set up an appointment to interview Dad to get a Christian point of view. Maybe Mom, too. Some of my questions would be:
1. What is his belief about evolution?
2. Why did Jesus let the demons have their way and sent them into a bunch of innocent pigs that then died?
3. Why did Jesus curse an inanimate object (the fig tree) just because it didn’t have fruit when he wanted it? Wouldn’t it have been more to the point to make it bear fruit?
4. What is his outlook on all the wars that have been fought in Jesus’ name? The Inquisition?
5. What are the ingredients that make a good Christian?
6. What is Christianity supposed to do for them? Why is it good? Does it accomplish these goals?
7. Do you truly believe there is no place in heaven for Gandhi?
8. If no to the above, what about all the little, unpublicized Gandhis?

I began to search for a religion I could believe in. I flirted with Wicca, because I desperately wanted a faith that did not demean or denigrate my femininity. If I had been able to hook up with a good group of women, I might have pursued Wicca more fully. But most of those I knew who were interested were only practicing at a superficial level. They wanted to do magic; wanted to be able to work their own miracles, but they weren’t interested in it as a way of life, a way of honoring the environment and the human body and spirit and finding balance and peace. So that just did not seem like the right answer for me. But I was still pursuing the notion of god as female. I went through a period of consciously referring to the Goddess, always in the feminine, and praying to God the Mother. I already had figured that Ultimate Reality must be genderless, or be all genders at once. But it seemed important to me to redress 2000 years of referring to God only in the masculine. What are the feminine qualities of god that get ignored because we speak only of the male side, and the qualities or characteristics we associate with men? How much more might we see God as nurturing and caring if we emphasized God’s feminine aspect? These questions became important to me (see more to come).

Faith has always been such a huge part of my life, that I really felt its absence. I had an inarticulate belief that there must be a God, even if Christianity was a bunch of bunk, and even if I didn’t always like God. I was sure He/She/It must still be there. In fact, the main reason I went to college at all was because I was reading a lot of philosophy, looking for answers, and realized I needed help to understand what I was reading. I continued to read a lot outside of class, and some of the things I found were very exciting! Such as my introduction to Buddhism and Hinduism via Alan Watts (although I didn’t know it was a blend of those religions at the time).

July 23, 1991
I am so excited about this book! The Book, by Alan Watts. I’ve been trying to read it carefully to make sure I understand every point and don’t miss anything. I want to recap it and see if I really “get it.” Also, by putting it into my own words I can make it more “mine.”

1. The universe and all its organisms are “god” playing hide and seek with itself. Since there is nothing outside of god, it has no one to play with but itself. So to make the game really interesting it hides from itself in individuals (and animals and rocks, etc.) and forgets who it is, so that the seeking part of the game will be more interesting. The ramifications of this are as follows:
a. there is no such thing as “me” as a separate being. There are no separate parts. We’ve just forgotten who we really are.
b. The object is to remember that we are God, or Self, or just one part, one section of the wiggle that is the Universe.

2. The game we play of binary opposition, black-and-white should really be called black vs. white. The point here is that we should learn to see things as black and white, as if they were two sides of the same coin. To see matter and space not as separate parts but as “goingwith” each other. To throw out even such ideas as cause and effect for the idea of “goeswith”. Like there can’t be a mountain if there is no valley. The mountain is not the cause of the valley, or vice versa. They “gowith” each other. What people are trying to do by making ‘good’ conquer ‘evil’ is make everything mountains. It’s impossible. Learn to see what we call ‘things’ are just glimpses of a unified process.

3. You cannot explain what anything is without explaining what it does. Therefore you cannot explain a thing without explaining its environment. Things must be viewed in their own context. And necessarily, you cannot explain one thing without contrasting, comparing, or relating it to another. Even ourselves. I can’t explain who or what I am without comparing myself to others. No one can. If I say, “I am honest,” I am implying that there are people who are not. If I say, “I talk a lot,” compared to whom? How do I know what ‘a lot’ is without knowing what a little is? Even saying “I talk” wouldn’t make sense without describing the point of talking, which includes other people, or organisms. So, we do not even exist except in relation to our environment.

4. A rainbow requires 3 parts. Sunlight, moister in the air, and an observer. Without all three, there is no rainbow. Take away the observer, there is nothing. Same thing as like the tree falling in the forest. With no ear to hear, it makes no sound. Therefore not only do we not exist without the universe, it does not exist without us. We are not separate things. We ‘gowith’ each other.

5. To sum up, and use a term of Alan Watts’ “Each organism is the universe experiencing itself in endless variety.

6. What we do with this information once we have accepted it, and stopped believing in the idea of ‘ego, or being separate from what is outside of our skins, is to become capable of living in that present, to start enjoying life. We begin to see that our ‘enemies’ are really enemy/friends, because without them we don not exist. And, happily, he repeats over and over that life must be played as a game. Lived in the spirit of playing! Also, without this spirit, and without being able to enjoy the present, we have nothing to give. To anyone. Gifts given under our current system of seeing things in parts, and everyone separate and alone and struggling to survive, are more like punishments.
Part of the idea here is Stop Struggling. If life is really a game of hide and seek with the other aspects of oneself, why do we take it so damn seriously?
I’m feeling really good. Like I’m on the right track. I’ll just have to keep reminding myself of what I know and who I am. Cause I’ve been pretty well programmed to think a different way. And it is just so easy to slip back into old patterns.
There were some other things that I don’t want to forget that he (Watts) said. Actually, one of them was what de Chardin really said, “The only real atom is the universe.” Because nothing in the universe could be taken out and still have the universe be the universe. Also, he says the only way of beating the ego is to do an egoistic thing: become more aware of it. Self-knowledge. Also, self-knowledge leads to universe-knowledge, which is wonder. This can only happen when we are content to just be. Which we [M and I] learned from LSD. Correlative vision – one sees that all explicit opposites are implicit allies.
I love that man! I just finished “The Book.” I can’t remember ever identifying with a book so much before. I’m exhilarated and informed and maybe a tiny bit enlightened. I know I should take some time to absorb things, but I want More! I guess the real point is living what I believe, or know. And not forgetting. But I don’t think that can be done by an act of will. I think it just happens when you really know. So how can I know more? I don’t know. Maybe just letting it sit. Spend more time being. Reading more.
I feel like gradually, over the years and months the picture is getting clearer. Sharper. I mean, I remember writing in 1988 that “God is when there is nothing outside of it." So, I’ve known little parts for awhile. They keep coming clearer. IT does. But it takes time for new ideas and realizations to become fact in your head. There are so many older, ingrained “facts” that have to be uprooted and pushed out.
It is such a long process because, I suppose, “That which must be learned cannot be taught.” I hope it does keep going on and on. Another thing Watts said that I really like is, “There is nothing to be gained.” What a relief! On the surface, I think that statement would frighten many people, give them a feeling of hopelessness. But to me, what a relief. It means there is nothing to work for. That means there is no reason to work. And that enables me to live life in the spirit of playfulness. In theory, anyway. You know, this may sound odd but it holds a lot of meaning: I feel like reading Alice in Wonderland. That book gives me the same feeling of wonderfulness and even enlightenment. I think they both say the same type of thing, which is, “Everything you thought was, isn’t; and everything you thought wasn’t, is.” Or – everything you know is wrong. This is how you feel on acid, too.

As this jouranl entry indicates, I had been having a few insights here and there for awhile, but Watts helped me pull a lot of things together for the first time, and laid a foundation that I realize now I am still building on.
Becoming familiar with other religious traditions and alternative philosophies allowed me to view Christianity with more objectivity. Instead of being hostile to the entire religion in general, I gradually became more able to separate out doctrine from polity, and to appreciate the beauty of the faith, even while I still hated much of what passed for Christianity around me.

September 16, 1991
My alarm just went off. It somehow got set to a religious station. Oh brother! is all I have to say to that. Poor Christians. It must really suck to all those honest, Jesus following Christians to have these load-mouthed fundamentalists presenting such a false image of what Christianity is. People who didn’t have a background like mine think the TV Christianity is how it is. Many more people would probably be Christians if it weren’t for those idiot media preachers. Even though I don’t believe in Christianity any more, it still angers me to see people being misled. Not to mention cheated out of their money. It is so sad to see people clinging to a belief that is so obviously untrue. I mean, at least the teachings of Jesus are worth believing in. Worth dying for maybe, for those who really live them. But who am I to judge? Maybe a lot of these people are truly comforted by the TV version, and I suppose that would make it worth it to them to give their money. Still, no one should have to pay for comfort, or peace. I think it is wrong to tell people that it is possible to pay with money for something that can only be bought with the soul. Again, who am I to judge? We all have our own lessons to learn in our own way and at our own times.

September 18, 1991
My mom and I had an interesting talk last night. We talked about prayer. She said that she’s still praying that I’ll find Jesus. That in Jesus I will find my place in the Universe. I told her that I understood that is what she believes, and that I respect it. Sometimes I wish I could believe it just to make her and Dad happy. But that would be wrong. I’m thinking about how she was saying something about knowing God and Jesus, and I said it was almost the same thing as I believe, except the Jesus part. She said Jesus is the fundamental part. But I’m realizing again that the concepts of God and Goddess are not interchangeable. They are not “almost the same thing.” I should start working out the differences, so I can tell her when I need to.
God Goddess
Male Female
Outside Inside
“Good” “Good” and “Evil”/Balance
Trinity – father, son, spirit Trinity – crone, mother, maid
Linear – life, heaven or hell cyclical – life, death, life

She also said she prays that God will reveal the truth to me in whatever way “He” chooses. I said I did, too, and she said, “I know.” At least they give me credit for really trying to find the truth.
I just thought of an analogy for death. The way I believe it. It’s like a huge pot of coffee. You pour a cup, and that represents one life. Without drinking, you pour the contents of the cup back into the pot. That’s death. At some point, you pour another cup, and that’s another life. Maybe needs more explaining but I don’t have time. Oh, maybe Leggos would explain it better! Yes! But time for school.

December 4, 1991
I was thinking the other day that sometimes it seems as if I am waiting for Christianity to be proved true. Even though intellectually I am absolutely sure it isn’t true, the religion is so ingrained in me that I can’t quite get away from it. It still shocks me when I meet people who so completely disbelieve it that there is no room for considering it in them. I admire and even envy such people. Like Laura. Especially when I understand that it is fear that makes me cling to the shreds of my belief. I’m still afraid of being wrong. I still talk to Jesus occasionally, trying to explain why I don’t believe in him. Asking him to please understand and intercede for me if it turns out I was wrong, on the basis that I am looking for truth.
I guess it isn’t that silly when you know how thoroughly the religion penetrated into my head, and at what an early age. I mean, I was three years old when I knew enough about not wanting to go the hell that I asked Jesus into my heart. 3!!! It was a very spiritual experience, too. I knew exactly what I was doing.
Have I ever told you about the blackness that exists, like right behind me? It’s this vast, timeless void. I especially feel it when I’m on acid. I can actually see it sometimes. I am afraid of it. I don’t know if it is my contact with infinity, or what. I’ve always thought that everyone had that. That everyone, particularly everyone who has done LSD, could feel it there. But guess what? Everyone doesn’t. Nobody else does, except maybe M. I don’t remember talking to him about it, but I can almost see it behind his eyes. Anyway, I wonder if it was put there by Christianity. It could also have been from early traumatic experiences, I suppose. Especially something that made me feel guilty, and bad. Or perhaps it was a combo of both.
I remember that as far back as I can think of I was looking out of this black hole. Sometimes it is like only my eyes could peer out of it, the rest of my body was lost in it. Now that I know that not everyone has it I don’t want it either. Not that I wanted it before, I didn’t realize you could be without it.
It frightens other people when I talk about it, so it makes me wonder just what kind of fear I’ve been living with all my life. I don’t even know if the blackness would represent God or Satan. To me they both seem as uncaring as the other. It seems like neither one of them would mind putting a yawning black hole into a little girl’s head.