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 11 Oct 2004 @ 11:44
How to use spirituality as a tool to improve the life of a damaged man?
In no particular order:
1) Men of today are closer to a right of center political viewpoint. This is purely a safety/comfort issue easily understood by all political commentators: Those on the right are willing to listen to men. Those on the left reject a man’s right to have feelings by defining all mens’ feelings as whatever the nearest woman wants them to be. As this is a function of today’s gender politics, it will eventually change.
Therefore, any spiritual path must include sensitivity to rightist viewpoints without driving the left away.
What overall guiding portion of spirituality allows such inclusion? The answer must be honor. That portion of spirit which focuses on honor is relatively free of political overtones while being easily seen by those with rightist views.
2) Men of this and the previous century who create a spiritual path seem to include Jungian views as a core component of the path. When Bill W. created the twelve step program of AA he used Jungian concepts as the core of the spiritual path.
Therefore, the Jungian view of spirituality and personal growth must also be a core component of the spiritual tool.
3) Men of today are very interested in the appearance of power. Not appearing weak is more important than life itself for the average man.
Therefore, my spiritual tool must include a means of controlling a man’s own view of power and weakness.
4.1) Most men will sacrifice a significant portion of their own best interest for the apparent best interest of their wife and children. These men will not think this through in order to see the actual best interest of their family; it is only the apparent best interest as he sees it which matters to him.
Therefore, my spiritual tool must include a means of identifying the actual best interests of the man and his family.
4.2) Further to the above: Almost without exception men of today have stopped listening to gender based reporting. As all of today’s gender based reporting is either “blame the man” or “woman only” he has an active interest in not listening to it. Hearing the gender reporting hurts him....
Therefore, my spiritual tool must include a means of interesting the man in what is, within gender, and this must be done without even the least hint of blame.
5) In today’s society male-only is directly equated with discrimination and evil: It’s corollary female-only is considered to be good and part of a fair society. This confuses and annoys almost the entire male population. Furthermore, this is a direct function of the path we choose to correct women’s problems. It must change and will, sometime....
Therefore, my spiritual tool must be fully inclusive of women even as it focuses on men.
6) All efforts over to create gender equity over the last century and a fifth have used blaming men and shaming men as the only tools to create change. While blame and shame are powerful tools for creating short term change, when used long term they are disastrous.
Therefore, my spiritual tool must reject both blame and shame.
7) The overriding problem of misandry must be dealt with: This form of contempt infests and controls all of today’s society. In genocide, where more than three in four victims are young men, and society’s only response is “Men can run. All effort goes to women.” Few see this as the extreme and dangerous form of contempt and devaluation of male life that it is. That is a threat to us all.
My spiritual tool must include counter-contempt as a core component.
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These seven points are a starting place. Here I put them in order of importance:
1. My spiritual tool must include counter-contempt of men as a core, heart and soul component. This must be done without contempt of women.
2. My spiritual tool must reject all shame and blame.
3. My spiritual tool must increase a man’s feeling of personal power.
4. My spiritual tool must focus on honor.
5. My spiritual tool must include Jungian views as a core component of the path.
6. My spiritual tool must include a means of identifying the actual best interests of the man and his family.
7. My spiritual tool must be fully inclusive of women even as it focuses on men.
I now have my starting point. As in the earlier article I find I must focus on both spirituality and gender. I now know how to do that.
As these seven points match nicely with my epistle, I can say that in writing this starting point I am correctly interpreting the will of God.
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9 Oct 2004 @ 10:31
Knowledge or what is and what may be.
In this article I seek to answer the question: “Why do I believe what I believe?” This is a key question; one which must be answered by anyone seeking to teach and more importantly, by anyone seeking to add to the overall pool of knowledge.
Knowledge is in some ways like c, the speed of light:
In physics we see that as we approach the speed of light it takes ever greater energy to create ever smaller accelerations, until, at the speed of light, it takes infinite energy to create any acceleration. We cannot go faster than light.
In knowledge we see that as we approach truth, it takes ever greater thought to make ever smaller improvements in our model, until, at truth, it takes infinite thought to create any improvement. When our model accurately reflects truth, no improvement is possible.
Knowledge is in other ways more like an electron:
Every now and then in knowledge, a person has an Einstein moment. Einstein saw that Newton’s Laws of Motion apply only under normal circumstances, which lead others to Quantum Physics. At that moment, as the electron makes its quantum leap to a higher or lower state, knowledge as a whole, made a quantum leap into a new and advanced state.
We know from studies of evolution that these two rules apply to the evolution of species. There is slow change from natural selection and every now and then, rapid change from special selection. As we can say these two rules apply to several areas of science, we may apply them as a part of the theory of knowledge. From this we say “Knowledge normally grows slowly as thought is applied and errors are corrected. At unpredictable times, knowledge grows rapidly as an individual applies a previously unknown concept to the knowledge base.”
ONE: We can now say that the velocity of knowledge growth is lumpy except when arbitrarily near to the current model of truth.
From history and statistics we can now import the concept that the overall growth of knowledge is accelerating. As our current model approaches objective truth the lumpiness will average out, the acceleration will slow and knowledge growth will eventually stop: That is, unless an Einstein moment occurs. Should one occur, as seems likely, then the entire knowledge base will change and the lumpy acceleration will once more start; new growth towards a new and better model of truth occurs once more in normal mode.
TWO: This constant jumping to ever better models of reality is the most accurate theory we have for answering the overriding question “What is truth?”
Therefore, we have a test for the question “Are we close to the current model of truth?” The lumpiness of growth in the knowledge base is an objective standard measuring how close we are to the current model of truth. The closer to the current model of truth, the fewer new concepts are being added and therefore the flatter the curve of knowledge growth.
Now we must apply the known statistical corrections in order to remove anti-knowledge as we use our theory. The corrections are:
a) Is there any political pressure being applied to supporting the current model? From our knowledge of fear in groups we can say: The more political pressure being applied in favor of the model, the greater the odds are that the model is wrong.
b) Are there any data points in the current model which are wrong or probably wrong? From history of science we can say: The greater the chances of one or more error points, the greater the odds that the model is wrong.
c) What do our elderly and distinguished experts say about alternate views of the model? Again from history of science we can say: The greater the pressure from experts deriding an alternate view as impossible, the greater the odds are that an alternate view is the correct one. This comes from the observed concept that when an elderly and distinguished scientist says something is possible, he is almost always right: When the same scientist says something is impossible, he is almost always wrong.
Now we can use our theory of knowledge to look at individual models of reality.
From my point of view, wishing to understand spiritual growth as a tool of healing for damaged men, two of the models I most desperately wish to know about are the current model of gender and the current model of spirituality.
So I ask “How lumpy is the current growth of knowledge in gender?” That will tell me how close we are to the current model. After spending almost a year searching for scholarly articles on gender I can give as my opinion the statement that “knowledge growth in the field of gender is virtually flat.” All articles are rehashing of previous knowledge and do not include testing for concept errors.
Next I ask “Is there political pressure being brought to bear to support the current model?” The answer, based on the rather extreme damage done to people questioning the current model, is a resoundingly loud “YES.” The problems which Murray Strauss and Doris Lessing faced are only tiny examples in the sea of bigotry thrown at anyone disagreeing with the current model of gender.
Next I ask “Are there any wrong or probably wrong data points in the current model of gender?” As the theory of Patriarchy is a center point in the current model of gender and the theory of Patriarchy has a great many error points I can say “Yes, there are error points in the current model.”
Next I ask “What do our elderly and distinguished experts say about alternate views of the current model?” Almost without exception the experts deride and disdain all alternate views of the current gender model.
Therefore, I can say with reasonable assurance that we are, knowledge wise, arbitrarily close to an incorrect model of gender. We need a breakthrough to a new and better model of gender.
So I now ask “How lumpy is the current growth of knowledge in spirituality?” After looking at a great many articles and books I can offer my opinion that the growth of knowledge in spirituality is quite lumpy. In fact, knowledge of spirituality is so severely fractured that I can go further and say that there is no currently accepted model of spirituality.
I now ask “Is there political pressure being brought to bear to support the current model of spirituality?” As the growth of knowledge in spirituality is so very lumpy and political pressure is being brought to bear on a great many models of spirituality I can say that this question is not answerable.
“Are there any wrong or probably wrong data points in the current model of spirituality?” It seems to be clear that there are error points in a great many of the models of spirituality.
“What do our elderly and distinguished experts say about alternate views of the current model?” Our experts are of a great many opinions.
Therefore, I can say with some assurance that there is no currently acceptable model of spirituality.
I now have a starting point. I know that the current model of who and what the two genders are is fundamentally wrong and that there is no generally acceptable model of exactly what spirituality is. More >
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8 Oct 2004 @ 13:11
An Epistle to the New Church
May these words and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight oh Lord my God.
Greetings and peace to you. May God in heaven smile on your path and receive your spirit into everlasting joy.
You have heard it said that there are neither male nor female in heaven.
I say unto you, there are neither husbands nor wives, neither mothers nor fathers, neither rich nor poor, neither conservative nor liberal, neither masculinist nor feminist, neither straight nor gay within the unending Kingdom of the Living God. All are the children of God and each is called to his or her own purpose under heaven. All are worthy of the love of God and their fellow humans, even those who reject that love.
You have heard it said that the Kingdom of God is spirit and that all in heaven are spirit.
I say unto you that we on Earth are both spirit and flesh. The spirit which starves cannot understand your pretty words as the body which starves cannot act. Treat then in all matters the spirit and the flesh. Above all, do not destroy the spirit of another, for that is the essence of evil.
You have heard it said that the bible says this...
The ideas behind the words in the bible are perfect; the words themselves cannot be. If this were not so, we could read the bible only in its original languages. I say unto you that the spirit of the word of the Living God is more important than any person's petty interpretation of the words in any book. We are called to a relationship with the Living God: Christ Jesus freed us from the law for that purpose. Do not spit upon Christ's death and resurrection by using your own love of the law to destroy the spirit of another.
You have heard it said that this person or this group is not of God and therefore not saved.
I say unto you, it is written that we will be judged by the same standard we use in judging. How dare you judge the spirit of another! We who cannot see the spirit may judge fairly the actions of the other, only God may judge the spirit. We who cannot see the spirit may judge fairly the words of another, only God may judge the spirit behind those words. Moreover, any person using contempt of the other as a weight in their judgement is in danger of hell fire. Purge your own heart first: Only then may you see clearly in judging the other's words or actions.
You have heard it said that evil is that which destroys the spirit.
I say unto you, any person who through their own prejudice and hard heartedness destroys the spirit of another behaves as the enemy of God. The friend of the enemy is that person using pretty words with foul meanings to destroy the spirit of another. The enemy tries through all means to destroy the spirit: Do not help the enemy.
You have heard it said that this person is more evolved than that person and that this group is further evolved than that group.
I say unto you, any person who claims superiority over another proves their personal inferiority. Love them and teach them as lost children, for they are lost in their own twisted mind.
You have heard it said that men are violent and abusive.
I say unto you, people are violent: Violence comes in male and female bodies. People who see gender as the prime component of abuse speak from their own fear and not from a love of the victimized. Pray for them. Teach them that all are children of the Living God. Think then beyond the violence which destroys the body to the violence which destroys the spirit. All people abuse others through their own ignorance, lack of faith and hard heartedness. In this matter there are no innocents; no, not one.
You have heard it said that we are to treat others as we ourselves would be treated.
I say unto you, we are also to treat ourselves as we would treat others; for we too are children of God. The man who says to himself "I am a man, I have no right to speak of my own feelings" spits in the eye of God. The woman who says to herself "I am a woman, I have no right to speak of my own need for leadership" spits in the eye of God. Cast out your fears and doubts: Know that God loves you as well as the other. Follow then the path of God and not the path of the law or of the enemy.
You have heard it said that all must be responsible for their own actions.
I say unto you, carry that concept further: When we call for responsibility from one and not from the other, we attack the spirit of both. When we call mothers the great angels of the home, we attack the spirit of both mothers and fathers. When we call men defenders of our civilization or tyrants out to destroy civilization, we attack the spirit of all people. When we spout racism or other hate we attack all of civilization. How then are we different from the enemy? Destroy not the spirit of any. I say to you once more: "All are the children of the living God: How dare you destroy any."
You have heard it said that we must love the sinner while hating the sin.
I say unto you, take this one step further. Love all people while always fighting error. The path to the Lord given each person is straight, narrow and difficult: Walk your path with pride and deep lasting love for God. You say "How then shall I know error?" To which the Lord your God replies "Error is that which destroys the spirit." Have great care to build the spirit of the other, by doing so you fight all error.
You have heard it said that we must protect the children.
I say to you, among many there is an old adage which reads "No amount of prosperity is worth the life of one child." Hear the message of these words. Furthermore, I say unto you, that which kills the children, kills us all. Those who savage this planet for their own purposes are as much child killers as those who kill by their own hand. Those who see their own profit as more important than the life of a child are child killers as are those who put their politics in front of a child's life.
Please pray for your brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus. Pray also for those doing the work of God in all parts of God's kingdom, with no regard to the label they bear. The last days of this age are coming to their end: Pray deeply that we follow God, speak the truth and reject malice.
Greg
Aylmer, ON, Canada: October 2004
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8 Oct 2004 @ 11:14
Spirituality:
The Western Insight:
Knowledge of the Spirit comes from the educated and powerful and is passed to the individual through collective action. Knowledge is unlimited, series and from the top down: Knowledge and anti-knowledge flow through the same path without restriction.
The Eastern Insight:
Knowledge of the Spirit comes from the individual and is passed through the individual to all others. Knowledge is unlimited, series and from the bottom up: Knowledge and anti-knowledge flow through the same path without restriction.
The Integrated Spiritual Insight:
Knowledge of the spirit flows bidirectionally from the top and bottom to the individual, the group and the species. Knowledge is unlimited, series and bidirectional: Knowledge and anti-knowledge flow through the same path without restriction.
The Engineer Insight:
Knowledge of the Spirit comes about through the collective actions of individuals proving each small step along an ever increasing pathway of knowledge. Knowledge is parallel and bi-directional, but limited to the this-can-be-proven-using-math; through this limitation some forms of anti-knowledge are always being destroyed.
The 3-fold Integrated Insight:
Knowledge of all forms comes about through the collective actions of groups and individuals defining and proving each step along an ever increasing pathway of knowledge. Knowledge is both parallel and series, bidirectional and unlimited: Anti-knowledge is removed from the knowledge pathway by the collective actions of the individuals and groups which add knowledge to the system. More >
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It's not what you know that hurts you: It's what you know, that just ain't so, that really lays the whopping on" - Kin Hubbard |
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