Dear Pneuma,

One thing I hate about Christian religion: its bent toward control. So often, the religious start defining themselves and their beliefs. When they realize how many others share those definitions and beliefs, they start to band together. They feel so wonderful about no longer being alone, they make a fatal error: they start to think that the validity of their religious experiences comes from this very communal uniformity. The next step is to develop conformity, and those that do not share the same definitions and beliefs become "others." Once there are "others," the religious start to worry about them. Those "others" need to be "taught." Their lifestyles, beliefs, definitions and ways of seeing the cosmos need to be controlled. In other words, the religious seek power over "others."

Being religious, I can say that I believe this kind of movement always starts out for the best. I believe that most religious people are genuinely worried about the fate of the "others." They genuinely convince themselves that because they believe in Hell, it must be real. Once it is real, it is an extremely loving goal to try and "save" folks from it. They genuinely believe that God needs to be named, and so they wrangle and natter about how God/ess is to be addressed so people can know It, as if, without a Name, the Nameless cannot know us. When being known is a promise of Christian religion, then sharing that promise, naming to be known, is an act of gracious kindness.

As though the Divine were defined by the beliefs of the believers. As though reality is the dream of us. As though the constant newness of creation and the individual in the creation of change are the forces of evil which keep humanity fettered to death and destruction. If we can just control this one group's behavior, creeds, and sense of self, say the religious, the Divine will continue to speak to us, but if we fail, we will be cast into "the outer dark;" but control is power, and I distrust human politics, a venture wherein the currency is power over other people, more than I distrust anything else on this earth. So when religion seeks to control, I distrust it. When religious goals become goals of power over the free being of persons, I distrust them. In fact, when my institutions tell me that they are bigger than the Nameless Known, I know they are lying. When concern over my creed or my sexual organs outweighs the need to provide love, shelter, medicine and food for the starving, crying, dying in the world, a world given for us, I know we Christian religious are getting it wrong.

Love Always,
Cobalt Dreams