Me and religion

For some of us, this part might get a little boring or maybe a little disturbing. I thought it best to cover this before getting into our visit to the Rastas' compound so we'd agree from the outset that one's view of any belief system will be influenced by those beliefs which one has or has not adopted for one's self. And, it can't hurt to share some of what has shaped my beliefs.   First of all, know that for most of my life the word "believe" is one which I've avoided using. It means accepting or adopting as fact, stuff that you know  dag well isn't. And to many practitioners of various faiths it means a pretense of piousness motivated by a miriad of personal, professional or even political goals. I gotta admit though, finding a spouse, a good-paying job or a bunch of future constituents as a result of that sort of pretense could be seen as the positive side of believing the unbelievable.
     I grew up in the care of a mom and a step-father that loved me and wanted me to have the best. They regularly attended one of the protestant churches in our town (twice a year) and delivered my siblings and I to Sunday school just about every Sunday. Most of what I remember about that church experience is my DISbelief. The Scripture seemed mostly inscrutable and when understood, mostly  unbelievable. (if not wholly): God tells 'em not to look back. Some do. He turns 'em into salt and probably (considering the price of salt in those days)made those who had obeyed God, quite wealthy, still in human form and able to spend! Hallelujah! How 'bout the guy of "burning bush" fame? Some time before that incident, he had surfaced as the leader of his people on their trip out of Egypt. Due perhaps to a planning problem of some sort he found himself looking out on the Red Sea, accompanied by some thousands of refugees, all without so much as a canoe, a surfboard or an inner tube and they all wanted to be on the Mount Sinai side of the sea. (Check a map of that area and you wonder why they didn't just walk a few score of leagues   to the north and essentially walk around the sea).Too Easy. Not consistent with the Moses Legend. As we well know this is no ordinary man. He wants to cross the sea where they are. And why not? He's able to face east across the sea, put the palms of his hands together,arms extended straight out. He slowly pulls his palms apart and, as he does so there appears a fissure atop the sea a fathom deep and all the way across it. And that's just the very beginning....I'm sure you are familiar with the rest of it. An interesting side note: in a work of non-fiction by Professor Immanuel Velikovski, titled "Worlds in Collision" the author posits his theory involving a near-collision of the earth with another heavenly body and how this event might have caused the Red Sea to part not un-like the events described in the Scripture and, then some, according to Velikovski
    But, I digress. The point here is that not being able to feel comfortable  with the protestants I was with, I stopped attending their church completely and began to visit other churches infrequently ( 2 or 3 times a year). Probably looking, at least early-on, for something comfortable. But before my visiting churches became visiting churches, synagogues and mosques I abandoned the idea of actually finding the faith that fit me. It really had not been a serious issue for me anyway. I remember at that time the thing that delighted me was that my parents had not a word (pro or con) to say about the end of my church attendance. I really didn't expect a problem but you never know. At the time of my first meeting with the Rastas I had no religion but a still-strong fascination with religion and those individuals who are the worshipping kind. I've never said no to a missionary whether Mormon, Jehova's Witness or Children of God to name a few and I truly cannot remember a single person among them all that I didn't like. A lot.
    Now, the Supreme Being thing: It's just that all the technologies that our scientists have had at their disposal in the last couple hundred years have allowed them to reveal so much of the heavens, inner space and outer space, that it's easy to "see" no supreme being in any of it.  Everything really is everything and nothing exists without everything else.
    One evening some years ago a visiting missionary was telling me how the highest officer of her church (Not the Pope but the equivalent in her church)
has exclusive access to a room in which he (and all of his predecessors) has (and have had) conversations with God Himself. I had previously heard about this room from another missionary and later thought,"Shees' I shoulda asked that guy if he knew any of the details of some recent conversations between the Highest Priest and the Heavenly Host. Given a second chance though, I did ask.
    "Well",she said "I don't remember the exact instructions but it had to do with changes He wanted made to the Choir's costumes".
    I know. With this Guy, expect Micro Management.      
                                      end of Me and religion






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To Jamaica II

Unless it's possible to somehow bring along my personal sleeping, cooking and sanitary  facilities, I'm very reluctant to travel. Even in  a well-equiped motorhome with sufficient funds at my disposal I would, more often than not, prefer to be home. I,m not saying that I don't enjoy the people, places and things that we encounter when traveling. It's the different and mostly unknown cultures, customs and laws combined with the possibility that facilities might be found wanting to an extent beyond our personal level of preference. Let's just say that if an "opportunity" will take me out of the U.S. I'm going to think more than twice before visiting thetravelry.  And to me, Jamaica is WAY out of the U.S. The Rasta's compound is way outside Kingston but, I'm told their facilities are quite good, even by my measure. Chalk up one (a BIG one) for the "yes" side.
But we're still unable to state what it is we hope to accomplish by this trip. It goes without saying that we do not seek, nor do we offer salvation. We recognize that it might very well be that they'd like to have us as members of their church; perhaps operating as their S.F. congregation. Unlike Gates of Eden Congregation, the Rastafarians belong to a real church. In fact, they are one of the most recent manifestations of the oldest Christian Organization, the Coptic Church. (details at Marcus Garvey and Haile Selassie) GofE is a legal congregation of Universal Life Church, chartered in 1970 as ULC6054 and was active in community services often associated with churches but, while you might catch one-or-another of us in what seemed like prayer you were just as likely to hear some names taken in vain. While some there could very well have been devoutly religious, my take was that the great majority (asked about their  religion) would say "agnostic". 
     To be sure, we held no religious services at GofE. We provided our "congregants" with most of what they needed to feel human, and if not  "at home"at least welcome and comfortable and looking forward to hopefully better days. But our church had no facility to impart God's messages and while I'd say all of us loved what is called "the creation" it was not our work to glorify any one person or entity for having created it. Considering the differences between the Rastas and ourselves we were all having some misgivings about a trip to the Rastafarian compound.          
                                   end of To Jamaica II