Article 15: Rescuing God From Religion
by Wendell Krossa

(From the series "Creating A Horizontal God", Copyright, W. Krossa)

Part 2
The Fear Of Freedom | Law and Play | The Bible as Law
| Further Comments On Law | Sacralization

The Fear Of Freedom

 Many people simply resist moving out from under enslaving law control and into genuine freedom. Freedom is full of uncertainty, chance, and the often frightening consequences of personal responsibility (34). Most people prefer instead the security of institutions or ideologies which carefully define what is permissible and what is prohibited. Such people prefer having all their duties defined by a system of law. Freedom allows greater spontaneity and creativity but it demands far greater responsibility. Rather than accept the responsibility of making unique personal responses in freedom, many people would prefer the security of rule book ethics, Brinsmead says.

 In rule book existence there is a blueprint to follow on all issues. There is no guessing at right and wrong, says Brinsmead, for everything is clearly defined. It is an appealing approach because it offers security and predictability. Also, others are responsible for the consequences of choices made.

 But such rule book systems are dehumanizing. They deprive people of freedom of thought and choice. They deprive people of the freedom and personal responsibility essential for developing into true human persons.

 Jacques Ellul makes some important and insightful comments on why most people fear freedom and prefer the bondage of law instead. We quote him at length. He says that "Very quickly the church found intolerable and inapplicable features in what Jesus Christ demanded and proclaimed. Freedom is an example. Jesus and Paul tell us that those who are led by the Spirit are completely free in every respect... the freedom acquired in Christ presupposes self-control, wisdom, communion with God, and love,... (This freedom) devastates us by demanding the utmost in (commitment). Free, we are totally responsible. We constantly have to choose. We are in constant danger of corruption. Freedom is indeed intolerable. The work of moralists and expositors thus begins. Freedom in Christ will very soon be forgotten" (37).

 This freedom in Christ, says Ellul, was so intolerable that it was soon set aside by Jesus' followers and when Luther resurrected it, it was soon again banished, excluded, moralized, and subdued by the churches of the Reformation.

 Such freedom is so radical that it is intolerable in its implications, according to Ellul. "It is psychologically unbearable. It carries frightening social risks and is politically insulting to every form of power. It was not possible. On every social level and in every culture, people have found it impossible to take up this freedom and accept its implications. This is the basic impossibility, the unanimous refusal of all people, which has resulted in the rejection of such freedom" (38).

 In rejecting the freedom in Christ, people choose instead the security of another religion- Christianity. In fabricating Christianity, says Ellul, Christians have known what they were doing. They have freely chosen to forsake the gospel and the Lord and have opted for a new bondage. They have refused the Spirit that would have enable them to take the new way Christ opened up.

 The freedom and life that Jesus taught is subversive in every respect, argues Ellul, but Christianity has become conservative and antisubversive. Jesus' life is subversive to every kind of power. One kind of power, for instance, is money. But there is a radical incompatibility between money and Jesus, according to Ellul. "Jesus recommends to his disciples that they have none. Paul shows that it is there simply to give away. James argues that the money heaped up by the wealthy inevitably results from theft that victimizes the worker. Money is in itself a force of deviation" (39).

 Then there was the problem of many new converts joining the early Jesus movement. The followers of Jesus could not bring themselves to continue to offer radical freedom to them. It seemed too risky. "How could they (the new converts) be told that they were completely free to choose their way of life and decide their own conduct? They had to be incorporated and put under the authority of a head of each group, and the more numerous they became, the more sacred and complex this authority had to be. Hierarchy could not be avoided if only because the number of priests officiating among the groups became so great... Ecclesiastical superiors were thus necessary to supervise, control, and instruct the priests. The glorious freedom that is in Christ could not be tolerated. It was replaced by clear and strict commandments" (40).

 Further, Ellul argues, Jesus brought a new and radical freedom, a radically new lifestyle which challenged all domination and control in society and its institutions. But Christianity emerged out of the reaction to this new freedom and became a religion of conformity, of integration into the society. "The church itself becomes a legal and administrative organization. It organizes itself on the model of the state, fashions its own law in imitation of Roman law, and carefully sets up an institution and hierarchy... the church has preferred law to the fugitive and nontemporal truth of Jesus Christ" (41).

 But the true freedom or life that Jesus taught can not be organized, says Ellul. When we organize it, then quite simply the gospel is no longer there. To organize it is to pervert its essential nature. This freedom and life "must permeate the social body and become an active, life-giving, critical, disturbing, inadequate, or stimulating factor, but never an institution belonging to the social body, never a principle by which to organize society" (42).

 Ellul concludes that the relation between the freedom of Christ and society is one of conflict. Such freedom is exhausting, wearing, and intolerable. It is easier and more satisfying for most Christians to build an organized church, Christian institutions, and a Christian society and politics. But that is no longer the freedom of Christ, the gospel or the life Jesus intended. That is a perversion of all that Jesus taught and lived, says Ellul (43). It is a return to the bondage of law.

 Ellul has stated well the fact that organized religion is on all points the exact opposite of what Jesus intended...

 Also, as noted earlier, the blueprint or rule book approach to life is also dehumanizing because it upholds principles and laws which produce a deadening conformity rather than inspiring the diversity and spontaneity of human freedom. Even more so, a rule book approach is destructive of true humanity because it fosters loyalty to abstract principles and thereby hinders the freedom to respond the needs of people in diverse and unique ways.

 Also important to remember in this regard is the tendency of a law approach to orient people toward institutions as objects rather than toward human life as a free flowing and constantly changing process. Law orients people to the conformity and the regularized patterns of institutionalized life as an object, which then allows little room for freedom of life as flowing change or process. This violates the human self as process. We noted this material on the self as process earlier in chapter 6 in the work of Louis Zurcher.

Law and Play

 Another point worth noting is the effect that a law oriented life has on the spirit of play and spontaneity. According to Brinsmead, one of the modern expressions of a law oriented existence has been noted in the drive to produce and to be usefully occupied at all times. This has been commonly referred to as the Protestant work ethic.

 "Instead of enjoying our own existence, life has become dominated by goals, purposes, and the pressure to achieve... Society, especially Western society, embodies the secular manifestation of this anxiety to achieve, to be useful, to produce" (35), says Brinsmead. In this manner, human existence becomes dominated by a new legalism where everything is geared to purposes and goals.

 People like Moltman, states Brinsmead, propose a theology of joy to liberate us not only from our joyless religion of achievement, but from the Western God. This old God, argues Moltman, is represented by our domineering Western institutions which promote submissiveness and fear rather than creativity and outgoing joy.

 The rule of law in these institutions spoils everything, even the revolution of freedom. The festival of freedom, argues Brinsmead, is inimical to the bondage of law oriented institutions such as those of religion. In a life free from law, he says, there is no blueprint for the future except to playfully dance our way into the open future in the great festival of freedom.

 To try to govern human existence and relating with systems of fixed laws or rules has always been an impossible project. For instance, it is now more widely recognized that humans exhibit nonrational behavior as a basic element of their nature (36). This nonrationality is not suited to rigidly rational systems of law.

 Such nonrationality is often viewed negatively, hence the more common term used to describe such unpredictable and spontaneous behavior has been irrationality. But in reality, nonrationality expresses positive elements of human thinking and feeling such as spontaneity, freedom, love, and diversity. These basic elements of human existence do not survive well in the crushing atmosphere of our tightly organized institutions.

 If law can serve some purpose for human existence and human communities, that would probably be in the role of a guideline for community cooperation. But law should never be allowed to serve in its current form as a fixed and final mechanism to control human behavior from outside of the human person.

 In regard to guidelines for community use, there may be something to learn from traditional communities which do not operate according to strict systems of fixed laws. Many of these communities pass their values and norms along through an oral tradition- in the form of stories. Such storytelling by diverse individuals maintains an openness to change and diverse versions according to the viewpoint of the individual. As story is mediated through varied human personalities you get fresh evolving versions of the stories and the values they are communicating. Many of these communities have survived very well for thousands of years without rigid codes to govern every detail of life.

 The early Christian movement passed on its values in this oral manner until a law orientation once again took over in subsequent centuries.

 Humans are constantly evolving and changing. Fixed and final laws can never serve to anticipate or encourage this diverse and dynamic flow of human life. New people and new situations demand new creative responses and new structuring for those new responses. Law oriented institutions or systems do not contain the flexibility to adapt to such flowing diversity.

 Law has evolved as such a total tool for rigid control of humans that it is now questionable if it can ever be reformed for use in true human existence. While law in conjunction with brute force is becoming a less common reality in human society, law in conjunction with monitoring, evaluation, reward and punishment is still a very common element of efforts to control human behavior. The result is the same- enslavement of the human person.

 Law also seems to bring out the worst in some people. There has always been a nasty tendency in human groups for some to use laws to control others. We have all met those people who are quick to use rules to nit-pick and meddle in the lives of others. These mini-tyrants use organization rules to evaluate, monitor, control ,and punish other free spirited humans who do not feel as obligated to rigidly follow a law controlled existence. Law, much like views of a controlling God, seems to give some people a reason and a means to vent their most inhuman impulses on other human beings.

 Jesus undermined and ended the focus on law millennia ago in declaring that people were not made for law but rather law was made for people (37). Law, he was saying, was simply to be a tool to serve human relating and existence and it should never become a master that humans should subject themselves to or use to control others. As a Jew, Jesus used the term Sabbath as a summary for law in general. The Sabbath was the epitomy and embodiment of all law to the Jewish mind.

 But, ignoring such humane advice, law oriented organizations continue to coerce people to conform to the systems of laws that govern such structures. This dehumanizing subjection and conformity to systems of rules and regulations destroys the unique diversity and freedom of human beings.

 You still often hear people stating that everyone must be subject to the same laws. The implicit assumption in such arguments is that it is somehow right that all human beings be under the same laws. Why? Where then is human diversity and uniqueness? Jesus in the above statement about law being made for people was arguing that law was made to serve human diversity, uniqueness, and development, not to dominate and hinder such freedom.

 In arguing for all members of a group or society to be under a similar code of law you often encounter the interesting tendency of some people to enact a new law every time some problem occurs. The problem may only involve the response of a tiny minority but such lawmaking tends to excessively bind all members in the group or society, including the many others who may engage in an activity or response and not abuse it or exceed common sense limits.

 As an illustration, I am reminded of the common practise in mental health institutions of staff members affectionately teasing clients with nicknames. This is generally done in good fun and is a normal part of human interaction. However, some staff have exceeded general common sense boundaries and their teasing was felt by others to be abusive. Consequently, in some institutions laws were enacted to prohibit all use of nicknames or teasing. This legal response then ruined the healthy fun and interaction of the majority who understood the common limits of respect and decency.

 Such a law response does not deal with the few people having the problem but tends to inhibit all unnecessarily and spoils their freedom and responsibility. Law responses tend to go far beyond the problem and forbid potentially problematic behavior for all members of a group or society even though only a few may actually engage in abuse. We think of the many religious groups that blanketly forbid the use of alcohol as another example.

 Humanity was never intended to become enslaved to rigidly standardized codes and all law is inherently rigid. Written codes can not be flexible and open to change. There is an inherent resistance to change in written systems of law. The history of humanity and law is a history of free human beings struggling against such rigidly unbending codes of control.

The Bible as Law

 The main instrument developed by Christianity for controlling people has been the Bible. The Bible has been developed as a form of law and has had a preeminent position throughout Christianity's history as a rigidly enforced guide for thought and behavior. But in essence it is simply the written form of the commands of the religious God. This could also be said of the holy books of many religions.

 In creating a new view of God it is necessary to blow away some of the thick clouds of mystery surrounding the Bible and its origin. It is important to do this because the Bible is the major source of information for ideas of God, especially for those in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

 It has been held by many in the Christian tradition that God inspired men to infallibly write every word in the Bible. This is known as the doctrine of inspiration. But if this teaching were true, it would be a serious violation of human freedom. A truly human God would never overpower humans in such a manner. We detect more of an element of animal-like control behind this idea of inspiration. To overpower humans in such a manner would violate the essence of what both God and humans are- which is free and noncoerced.

 Traditional Christian theology has long argued and believed that somehow God inspired special men to write down his exact words and then God acted to preserve these original writings unchanged up into the present. But it is now known that in centuries subsequent to the writing of the original manuscripts much editing and adding has been done until now it is very difficult to judge what was original and who wrote what and when. Also, the early communication of the original stories was in the form of diverse oral traditions. This has resulted in a number of discrepancies in the gospel stories (and other places as well) and this fact does not fit well with the rigidity of the doctrine of inspiration.

 Also, we need to be aware of the historical tendency to regard ancient things as sacred with the passing of time. Someone in the past says something such as "God told me...." and over time that saying or story may become widely reported and eventually be regarded as legend. With the further passage of time it may even begin to be regarded as sacred, scriptural, and even as God's truth or Word.

 It is not healthy to ignore the historical process of creating Scriptures. It is a process of people trying to make special and to claim divine origins for something that is very human in origin. It is another element of the effort to validate human things with appeal to God.

 Emerging research is showing that the written Gospels were based on an oral tradition growing out of actual events in the life of Jesus and also based on his teachings. The life of Jesus was so scandalous, however, that over time his followers borrowed from surrounding mythology and thereby recreated a more respectable version of Jesus. He was even made into a God and king. See Robert Brinsmead's essays on the Scandal of Joshua Ben Adam. An institution (Christianity) was also eventually created to support and promote the new God.

 Emerging research is also showing the rest of the New Testament to be also a very human creation. We quote a Newsweek article at length on this issue:

"A new generation of Scripture scholars is challenging many of the commonplace assumptions about who Paul was and what his teachings meant. Armed with more precise information about the historical Paul and his times, these scholars offer an arresting view of Paul as he saw himself: a Jewish apostle to the gentiles who did not envision the founding of a new religion, a pastor who was more concerned about communal behavior than individual salvation- and a counselor who never expected that his ad hoc advice would become sacred Scripture" (Kenneth Woodward, "How to Read Paul, 2000 Years Later" in Newsweek, Feb. 29, 1988, p.65).

"Because Christian theology has been shaped so largely by Pauline thought, the tendency has been to argue over every nuance, on the premise that Paul was a systematic theorist setting down doctrinal truth for all time... In fact, his letters are highly situational responses to complex congregational problems... In sum, the new scholarly consensus presents Paul as primarily a pastor whose letters were designed to resolve congregational problems that the roving apostle could not attend to in person. Some of those problems are no longer important to Christians" (Ibid).

 New information, such as the above, is now demystifying the Bible and showing it to be very much a human effort and a very fallible book. People such as Martin Luther saw this long ago and argued for a much more pragmatic approach to the use of the Bible (38). In fact, Luther even bluntly stated that a variety of books should be thrown out of the Bible (notably Hebrews, Romans, James, and Revelation).

 Luther was arguing that mere men had assembled in councils and decided which books should be included in the Bible. Certain powerful factions at the councils pushed to get their favorite books included as divinely inspired and others excluded as not divinely inspired. Basically, Luther was saying that if mere men, during often shameful powerplays, assembled the current Bible, why can't subsequent generations change it?

 Luther also argued that the Bible was useful for the information it contained about Jesus but the rest was mere swaddling clothes of the Christ child (39). It was not to be taken too seriously. He also added that if reading the Bible caused people problems, then they should stop reading it and find other less disturbing material to read. He was not enslaved to the idea that the Bible was all from God and therefore should be a rigidly followed guide for thought and behavior.

 We mention this material by Martin Luther because he is considered the founder of the Protestant movement which is a very Bible oriented movement. That focus on allegiance to a holy book and living according to the laws of a holy book is foreign to Luther's concerns. Such allegiance to holy scriptures also contradicts the teaching of Jesus and Paul the apostle regarding written scripture.

 The argument that the Bible is the inspired word of God has been used by religious people to bolster their claim that they have a special source of information about God. They alone, of course, have the ability to interpret what the inspired book means. And they will mediate this knowledge only to those who subject themselves to the control of the particular religious group making the above claims. Because of the controlling practices which have inevitably followed an unquestioning belief in the Bible, this study is arguing that the doctrine of inspiration can not come from a human God because it embodies a control, mystification, and exclusiveness that is foreign to such a God.

 This study would also argue that as animal features came to be embedded in human worldviews and in human society, so also similar animal-like features were embedded in the Bible. This can be seen in the fact that the Bible presents a vertical orientation in relating throughout its contents. Embodying a vertical God in a sacred book grants more permanence to such vertical reality. By embodying such a controlling God in a holy book, control has thereby been validated and given an undeservedly exalted place in human thinking and society.

 Another interesting point in relation to the Bible as a form of written law is the fact that Jesus never urged anyone to write down anything about his life and teachings (40). This is either an incredible oversight or it was done intentionally. We suggest that Jesus' disinterest in written scripture may be due in part to his realization of the danger that people might coopt his teaching for use as a form of law to control others. Jesus was not at all enthusiastic about written traditions in the same manner that many of his so-called followers are today. We would suggest that contemporary devotion to the Bible has more in common with ancient Pharisaic devotion to Scripture. We remember the brutality toward people that inevitably came from that devotion to written law.

 In regard to a written tradition with its respect for final versions of holy scriptures, Jesus and others warned that the letter (written law) kills, but the spirit gives life (41). Letter, such as the written Bible, effects closure, finality, and rigidity. This is not conducive to the spontaneity and diversity of the free spirit of human life. To the contrary, it distorts and destroys human life.

 We would also add that the word 'letter' used in the New Testament book of Galatians (chapter 4) synonymously covers law, scripture, and religion. The meaning is unquestionably clear. We are no longer to be under law, scripture, or religion. Why is this fact so stubbornly ignored by religions like Christianity? We suggest it is ignored because it completely undermines the authority and even the very existence of powerholding elites in these religions.

 Jesus understood well the danger that written traditions hold for human freedom. In oral traditions there is room for diversity and change. Each messenger can add or delete details or change overall emphasis of any message for new situations. The messengers are free to give their own spontaneous and unique versions of stories. This method of communicating truth or values preserves the freedom for individual expression. It is more suited to the process of the free flow of life, whereas law is more suited to the rigidity of institutions as objects.

 The problem with written traditions is that one version is set down as the only correct version of a story or event. The message or story then becomes closed, final, the 'truth'. All followers of that tradition must then conform rigidly to that one final written form. This is especially true if that form is considered sacred, or from God. Diverting from the true version brings down the wrath of the religious authorities with charges of heresy, ostracism from the chosen group, and even final damnation.

 But we would argue that such rigidity is not from the free and human God. That rigidity does not inspire life but instead destroys life. This is the danger of written traditions. They do not accommodate the flow and evolution of changing life. To the contrary, they constrain the ability of people to change or to express spontaneity or creativity. Written forms tend to become rigid objects instead of remaining free, open, life inspiring processes.

 This explains in part the death dealing nature of written law...

 In regard to written traditions, it is also worth noting that a Biblical scholar once stated that all through the Bible the term 'Word of God' refers repeatedly and almost exclusively to a spoken, personal word and rarely to a written word. As a personal spoken word mediated through diverse people in unique ways, the word of God has life and freedom. It is dynamic and changing, not standardized or final for all people who follow. It becomes a unique word in every person.

 In saying the above, we are not denying the value of the Bible as literature or as a useful source of information on the life and teaching of Jesus. But care must be taken in the use of the Bible as much has been added to it in an effort to remake Jesus into a vertically oriented and institutional God. While it may appear to some that in saying these things about the Bible we are attacking something very sacred, it is important to question this book that has been so widely used as an instrument to control people's thoughts and behavior.

 Care must also be taken in viewing the Bible too seriously as some special authority from God. Excessive respect for the Bible as an authority over life and behavior leads to subjection to outside control and constrains freedom of thought and behavior to categories based on Biblical parameters. These Biblical limits are often interpreted and set primarily by elite religious experts. Such practices embody controlling authority which is not conducive to true freedom and human development.

 We also note here the caution of Joseph Campbell against taking our own religious writings too seriously. All societies have religious myths which they believe their gods have revealed to them. Campbell says, "the peoples of all great civilizations everywhere have been prone to interpret their own symbolic figures literally, and to regard themselves as favored in a special way, in direct contact with the Absolute" (Myths To Live By, p.10). In taking our mythology too seriously we distort the intent and meaning of myths. As Karen Armstrong says, "Once the Bible begins to be interpreted literally instead of symbolically, the idea of its God becomes impossible" (A History of God, p. 283). With the emergence of the scientific age and the use of rationalism to understand all reality, including God, people began to insist on a literal understanding of Scripture and ignored the symbolic or metaphorical nature of the Bible. Armstrong says once the scientific viewpoint became normative for many people, then it was difficult to read the Bible in any other way. "Western Christians were now committed to a literal understanding of their faith and had taken an irrevocable step back from myth: a story was either factually true or it was a delusion" (Ibid, p.307).

 Myths are important in knowing and experiencing God. God is indescribable and any attempt to use words literally will only distort the reality of such a God. Myths help evoke imagination, intuition, and feeling in the perception of God. They use figurative language that assists in the imagination of God and to take mythical language literally is only to distort an indescribable God. We remember the caution of Michael Morwood that recognizing myths are not pointing to historical reality does not mean they are false or a delusion. They point effectively to spiritual truth.

 Brinsmead also cautions against using the Bible as some sort of sacred or absolute authority. He echoes Jaynes viewpoint about humans fearing freedom and seeking refuge under some authority such as Biblical authority. Biblical authority, he says, is just an attempt "to construct an inhuman universe where everything is planned and secure and nothing is open, free, or spontaneous... Biblical authority is just another attempt to live by vertical religious authority, to escape our human responsibility and to create a security which can never exist" (42).

 Ultimately, humans can not live by or according to the Bible. The Bible is fundamentally law and can not promote true human relating or development. The Bible is the creation of religious humans who were driven to maintain the hierarchical domination so characteristic of their times. It is a book of law and has been part of millennia of effort to control human behavior by law. Also, it is simply not possible for a book containing an ancient worldview to provide sufficient information for the complex issues of modern life.

 Again, we are not denying there is positive human teaching in the Bible such as that found in the teaching of Jesus and others. But too often there are elements of vertical orientation and control which have been added and which then distort the human elements contained in the Bible.

 Davies quotes a scientist who points out the dangerous arrogance that arises from the belief that God has given revealed truth. He notes that religion is founded on this idea of revelation. The trouble with such revealed truth is that it is considered unalterable and therefore can not be modified to fit changing ideas. As Davies says, "Religion is founded on dogma and received wisdom, which purports to represent immutable truth. Though peripheral doctrinal issues may become adapted and distorted with time, the idea of a religion's fundamental dogma being abandoned in favor of a more accurate 'model' of reality is unthinkable... Some critics have claimed that dogmatic rigidity means that every new discovery and every novel idea is likely to pose a threat to religion, whereas new facts and ideas are the very life-blood of science. So it is that scientific discoveries have, over the years, set science and religion into conflict" (43).

 This rigid and blind loyalty to dogma has led people to absurd positions over the years. We only need remember the Copernican revolution as an example. Inspite of the growing evidence that the earth revolved around the sun, the church forbade such evidence as contradicting revealed biblical truth. The true believer, it is argued, must be loyal to his truth no matter what evidence comes to light that undermines it.

 Davies quotes a scientist who maintains that revealed truth is a positive evil because of the arrogance it produces. He says, "Generally the state of mind of a believer in revelation is the awful arrogance of saying, 'I know, and those who do not agree with my belief are wrong'. In no other field is such arrogance so widespread... It is to me quite disgusting that anybody should feel so superior, so selected and chosen against all the many who differ in their beliefs" (44).

 The fact that there are a wide variety of differing religious truths means that some revealed truths must be wrong. Our scientist continues, "One would have expected this obvious fact to lead to some humility, to some thought that however deep one's faith, one may conceivably be mistaken. Nothing is further from the believer, any believer, than this elementary humility" (45).

 Finally, we need to conclude this section with some comments by Brinsmead on knowing God, comments we have quoted previously in part. If God is not to be known primarily in the Bible, then where do we encounter God? Brinsmead says, "The other way to interpret the matter is to say that Jesus shows us that God is encountered on the ordinary human level. God, who is spirit, is not found in a Book (as Fundamentalists think) much less in religious rituals, monasticism, mysticism, dreams, voices and visions of the bicameral mind, he is not found by scaling up into heaven and digging down into the deep. He is found on the ordinary level of human existence".

 "So Jesus taught! The domain of God is discernible neither in the solitude of the dessert or in the secret chamber. His presence (kingdom) is in you and among you, as you go about ordinary human affairs. He may be seen in the employer being generous to the latecomers, the despised Samaritan showing compassion to a man in need, a forgiving neighbor, a person loving and doing good to an enemy, the father welcoming home the son who is a waster, and man who invites outcasts to his table. In short, we may see the face of God in those who enrich us, support us or who depend on us for support. Like Jacob of old, we should awake with the startling realization, 'The Lord is in this place, and I knew it not', or with Isaiah who exclaimed, 'The whole earth is full of his glory'".

 "As Morwood beautifully presents it, Jesus encountered ordinary poor and lonely people who 'thought God was not close to them. Jesus called them to change this way of thinking. Convert! God IS here- in your loving, in your caring, in your generosity, in your visiting. And more! God is ALWAYS here, even when you are conscious of your failure, your sin, your low status in life, and when everything seems to be going wrong'".

 "If Jesus was an ordinary human person, then ordinary human existence is the arena where God is manifested. God is not encountered by an escape from the human condition, but by real participation in it. For those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, the kingdom of God is present just as Jesus said and acted out" (46).

Further Comments On Law

 It is time to seriously question whether contemporary forms of law can still serve human community and human efforts at cooperation. Law orients people to that which is past (previous responses) in a fixed, rigid, final, and permanent manner. It lacks the flexibility to serve true human community which is oriented to free, creative, and diverse response in an open and flowing existence.

 Humans are constantly evolving, developing, and changing. Any system of law, to properly serve this open and free human life, would have to be that of flexible, open-ended guidelines to assist humans in their cooperative efforts. It is doubtful if any form of law could be developed to assist humanity in such a flexible and rapidly changing manner.

 Law, regulations, policies, and rules all embody restriction, limits, conformity to one standard, and punishment for failure to comply. Law and human freedom are therefore completely incompatible realities.

 Some would argue that law is still necessary for this transitional era where we are still subject to animal drives and behavior (47). This may be true, but even so, it is still necessary to remember that law control is basically an ancient method of animal-like control of human behavior. It is highly questionable if something oriented to animal-like existence can serve to encourage emerging humanity or human relating. The more human we all become, the less we will need law and the more we will live humanly.

 Even if it is accepted that the use of law is still necessary while the human race is in the present transitional time on the way to a more human future, a much more flexible attitude is needed toward law and its use. We include all rules, regulations, and policies in our definition of law. Law may still be a useful tool to serve human cooperation and community but it must never be used to control anyone who is already striving to be more human.

 Systems of law would only be safe to use in the context of radically new and relaxed attitudes toward the place of rules and laws in human relationships. For instance, one possible safe use of law could be that of embodying past experience and past response as a sort of tradition for succeeding generations to learn from, much like the oral practices of traditional societies that we noted earlier.

 But while law may embody past wisdom and experience in the form of general guidelines, it should never become a fixed or final standard to control all members of a group or society. It should never become a conforming standard which is used to monitor and evaluate diverse human beings. Such a use of law is a dehumanizing approach to human relating. It inevitably tends toward opportunity for some to control and thereby abuse others.

 Law simply can not encompass and allow for the infinite diversity and nonrationality of human emotion, expression, response, and behavior. It is very much an animal-like authority with distinctly animal origins and is oriented to animal-like functions of controlling behavior.

 The increasing use of law in modern human societies to arbitrate human relationships, especially Western societies, reflects the increasingly impersonal nature of relating in these societies. It reflects an increasingly colder and more competitive element in modern relationships. Instead of people taking the time to get together to work out cooperative solutions, there is more reliance on writing laws as solutions to relationship problems. This approach is more efficient but also more inhuman.

 Human communities need to search for new systems of ethics or morality which are not law oriented. A truly human ethic must be oriented to what it means to be truly human. Such an ethic will demand a flexible and open attitude toward all human spontaneity, diversity, and creativity. A more human system of ethics will not hinder any true expression of humanity but would encourage and even promote all such diverse and evolving expression of human life.

 We need to remember that even in the present we are never bound under law. Jesus clarified this long ago when he stated that law was made to serve humans and humans were not made to serve law (48). He was arguing that all humans are above the law. Law should simply be a flexible tool to serve human existence and community. Hans Kung makes this point clearly in his work 'On Being a Christian' (49). While law may be used to curb residual animal drives, it can never be a mechanism for developing or encouraging positive human existence and relating. Law can not command love, trust, or free cooperation nor can law promote positive human development in any form.

 Law and religion, often combined in the same system, have been central authorities in societies since domestication and the emergence of god consciousness. Religion has claimed to represent God and his law, but in reality neither God nor Jesus have anything to do with religion or law. God is not institutional and God does not try to control humans through institutional hierarchies nor through religious law or law of any form.

 Religion and law are purely human creations. Throughout history they have been used in the relentless effort of animal-like humans to dominate and control other human beings. But like all vertically oriented institutions and authorities, they have served mainly to activate and encourage the expression of residual animal drives of emerging humans and quite frankly that is a regressive step for humanity.

 In religion we find the idea of God has been coopted and transformed into an animal-like figure who has little resemblance to a human God. Religious authorities have in effect created a God in their own image and suited to their insatiable drive to dominate others. They have also exploited people's respect for God and law and manipulated that respect to demand unquestioning submission to their vertically oriented authority.

 We need to realize with a stunning sense of liberation that God freely belongs to every person in the world and is experienced in ordinary daily life. God is freely accessible to all. There is no need to join a religion or accept Jesus into your heart in order to know God. There is no need to become religious or moral, to read the Bible and pray regularly in order to have a relationship to God. There is no need to submit to and obey the so-called laws of God. Just be yourself- human.

 Let me say it as bluntly as possible- God has nothing to do with any religion. The God of religion is simply a manmade God that has little to do with the reality that is God...

Sacralization

 Another factor in the development of control in religion is what is known as sacralization. This is an essential element of the process of creating supporting mechanisms for the authority of a dominating God. The process of sacralization is the making of certain people, places, days, rituals, and writings sacred. These things are then viewed as special; they are viewed as being from God or belonging to God in some special way. They are viewed as being superior to other items of a similar kind.

 These special things then require special handling by special people- the religious authorities. Religious specialists have long used complex rituals and ideologies to build mystery around the sacred. In doing this, they have created a special power and privilege for themselves as the only legitimate interpreters or mediators of the sacred.

 The claim that God can only be mediated through sacred people, sacred places, sacred rituals, or sacred writings, grants the religious authorities great power over others who have no access to nor understanding of the sacred mysteries. In this manner, religious authorities exploit people's respect for God in order to dominate and control them. They make the sacred a very elite concept and tool.

 We will state categorically here that the whole idea of the sacred is just religious gobbledygook. It has nothing to do with God and, in fact, it is the opposite on all points to the human God. There is no sacred in the universe of a human God. All life, all persons are equally important and special. All people have the same direct access and horizontal relationship to God. As Ellul said, "Humanity alone is sacred" (59). God is never mediated through special people, places, rituals, or writings.

 The idea of the sacred is often simply an attempt to make animal-like existence sophisticated, civilized, and legitimate. It is an effort by religious specialists to create mysterious and secretive mechanisms to support their hierarchical domination of others. The use of the sacred is too often just another attempt to legitimize the animal drives of religious authorities to control others. The idea of the sacred has no place in human existence because it supports the domination and control which destroys true human relating.

 The entire process of sacralization is simply an attempt to control God and make God the exclusive property of religion. In doing so, religion distorts God entirely.

 Further undermining the idea of the sacred is the reality of God's presence everywhere. Michael Morwood has said, 'Immediately, we have to image God differently. We have to let go of the localizing tendency and allow the name 'God' to depict, on the one hand, a limitless, infinitely vast reality, totally beyond our imagining. We can not localize this reality into a 'he' who is in heaven. On the other hand, God must be present everywhere as the life-force, or energy, or power- whatever it is that sustains and energizes life... nothing can have existence without the presence of God sustaining it. We can assert that everything in existence is permeated with the presence of God... We are talking about a presence within the depths of all that is... This is incarnation at the most basic level. God really is in and with and through all" (Tommorrows Catholic: Understanding God and Jesus in a New Millennium, p.36-37).

 The presence of God means that all that is God and all of God is here now, immediately everywhere, not somewhere else or more discouragingly, in some special isolated place elsewhere, where access is restricted. God is not up and away. The conclusion is then clear- everyone has the same special access and equal access to all there is of God. There is no need to go to some special place to find God, for you are right now in the most special place in the universe. There is nothing to be done to gain access to all of God. There is nothing to learn or practice to gain God. There is no need to find God through some special person such as a guru, spiritual advisor, pastor or priest, psychic or anyone else selling their special insights and techniques. All you need do is just realize and enjoy all of God in your own unique way. No one else has more or better access to God. And more than anything else, God being here now, means unconditional love for everyone equally.

 The presence of God everywhere also undermines forever the idea of election, that there are special people who are closer to God than others, people who have God and people who do not have God. Campbell notes the widespread adoption by all peoples of this idea of special election. He notes it is based on the idea "that the god has rendered a revelation, which is registered in a book that men are to read and to revere, never to presume to criticize, but to accept and to obey. Those who do not know, or who would reject this holy book are in exile from their maker. Many nations great and small are in actuality godless. Indeed the dominant idea in all the major religions stemming from this idea- Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam- is that there is but one people on earth that has received the Word, one holy people of one tradition, and that its members, then, are the members on one historic body... a supernaturally sanctified, altogether exceptional social body with its own often harshly unnatural laws" (Myths To Live By, p.77). Thankfully, this idea of a special people closer to God than others is ended with the reality of God's presence everywhere.

 There is no religious requirement necessary to gain access to God. The presence of God everywhere ends forever the need for religion as a mediator of God and God's presence. In God's presence there is no more separation, no more God up and away somewhere. We can all relax and just enjoy a God who exists everywhere, equally present to all and equally accessible to all.

 Morwood says further, "God is that infinite being who is the source and sustainer of all life. God is indeed in all, with all, and through all that has existence. God is not more present to one being than another. God is not 'in' any one person more than God is 'in' another person. No: God permeates all creation... we must rid ourselves of notions that we have to buy or win God's love or presence. God's presence is an essential condition for existence. You can not have 'more' or 'less' of it" (Ibid, p.98).

 "Everyone of us is permeated with God's presence. The pope does not have it any more than the truck driver or the nurse. The vital difference comes not from the reality but from the recognition and the naming of the reality, that is, naming and recognizing oneself as someone who gives flesh to, gives human form to, gives a particular, unique, personal human expression to the reality we name as God. God comes to expression, comes to particular life form in ME. In me, God can speak, can move, can dance, can compose music or write poetry, can make love and create life, can laugh and can cry at the imperfection of it all" (p.99).

 "The reality we name as 'God', mightier and more vast than 400 billion galaxies, permeates my existence as a human person. Certainly God is infinite and unknowable; but we look into our own hearts and lives, and there is this same God bursting to life in us. Why do we keep looking elsewhere to find God? Why do we stay locked into a spirituality that looks for God in the heavens in preference to a spirituality that focuses on the God within and among us, urging and prompting us to claim our sacred identity- and to live it?... Our responsibility is to allow that presence to emerge and be seen in the way we live. Our basic sin, if we are to talk about an 'original sin', is our blindness to this reality of who we are and the ways we block the emergence of the sacred within us. The story is not of a 'fall' from a perfect state... rather it is the story of the slow emergence within human beings of the realization that the sacred is deep within each of us" (p.99).

 Sacralization within religion has too long been the selfish and excluding effort to restrict God to special people, times and places. Our conclusion is that sacralization is a human invention which simply serves to give special privilege to religious elites. It is closely related to such ideas as election which is also the creation of an elite or special group of people. But to make any class of people more special than others is inhuman and unnatural. It violates the egalitarian essence of emerging humanity which seeks to relate equally to all others. It also violates the nature of a human and egalitarian God.

 All knowledge of God is clearly and equally available to every human being. Whether we seek that knowledge in Jesus or in the wider arena of life, it is free and open to all without condition. There is nothing secret or special about it because it is very human.

 Again, to quote Morwood, "God is love and when you live in love you live in God and God lives in you (1 Jn 4:16). We must believe of ourselves that the sacred which we name as God is intimately part of each of us, and love is the expression we give to it. So let us have a down-to-earth spirituality that proclaims that the kitchen, the workplace, the garden, the community center, and the bedroom- as well as the parish church and the tabernacle- are permeated with the presence of God. And let us proclaim the good news that ordinary people, struggling and battling to be faithful to their commitments and responsibilities, are no less God-filled than the greatest of saints, for we dare to believe that God is love and when you live in love you live in God and God lives in you... Let us believe, as did the early Christians following Pentecost, that the same Spirit of God that moved in Jesus moves in us. And again, let us be sure about this: we are not talking about a difference in kind or quality or even quantity. The Spirit of God permeates us just as it permeated Jesus 2000 years ago" (Tommorrow's Catholic, p.103-104).

 Campbell qoutes someone who makes the same point as Morwood when he says "God is an intelligible sphere whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere" (Myths To Live By, p.65). Campbell then says, in commenting on this statement, "Each of us- whoever and wherever he may be- is then the center, and within him, whether he knows it or not, is (God)" (Ibid, p.65). His point is that because there is no center or circumference to God, you are at the center of God and therefore at the center of what is important in the universe. This may be the single most important discovery and realization in any human life. You have already arrived at what all of humanity has been searching for throughout the millennia- God.

 There is no need to continue searching or looking for anything further. There is no need to go somewhere else to find God. You are there now, in the center of God. It will get no better after death, only more clear. When you die you do not go anywhere for you are already safe in God. And being in this center is free. That is to say, there are no difficult techniques of mysticism or meditation or special forms of knowledge to learn or gain. There is no group or institution to join- i.e. religion- in order to find this presence of God. No one else has anymore of God than you do now. And let me say it, though it will upset many religious people; there is no need for improvement in personal behavior to qualify for being in God's presence. There are absolutely no requirements at all to meet. All we need to do is realize it and enjoy it now.

From the series "Taking The Vertical Out Of God" by W. Krossa, copyrighted material.

Works Cited

1. Zwemer, Jack. 1992. "The Origin of the Human Self" in Forum, No. 5, p.2.

2. Brinsmead, Robert. 1991. "Reflections on the Question of Authority" in Quest, Essay 10, p.8.

3. Ellul, Jacques. 1986. The Subversion of Christianity, p.3.

4. Jefferson, Thomas quoted in "The Status of Jesus Re-examined" by Robert Brinsmead, Verdict, Essay 1A, 1998.

5. Matthew 20: 28.

6. Matthew 20:16.

7. Brinsmead, Robert. 1990. "Where Human Liberation Movements Fall Short" in Quest, Essay 5, p.4.

8. John 15: 15.

9. Matthew 20: 25- 27.

10. Zwemer, Jack. 1992. "The Origin of the Human Self" in Forum, No. 5, p.2.

11. Jaynes, Julian. 1976. The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, p.297, 228.

12. Sandole, Dennis. The Biological Basis of Needs in World Society: The Ultimate Micro-Macro Nexus, p.71.

13. Davies, Paul. 1990. God And The New Physics, p.4.

14. Ibid, p.4.

15. Ibid, p.4.

16. Brinsmead, Robert. 1998. "The Status Of Jesus Re-Examined" in Verdict, Essay 1A, p.8.

17. Jaynes, Julian. The Origin of Consciousness, p.198.

18. Brinsmead, Robert. 1986. "The Spirit of Jesus Versus Christianity" in Verdict, Special Issue 3, p.10.

19. Ibid, p.6.

20. Ibid. 1987. "Resurrection and the Subversion of Christianity" in Verdict, Essay 29, p.6.

21. Ibid, p.6.

22. Ibid, p.

23. Ibid. p.

24. Spirit gives life.

25. Abrahamsson, Bengt. 1993. Why Organizations?: How and Why People Organize, p.13.

26. Ibid, p.14.

27. Boorstin, Daniel. "The Asking Animal" in Time, Special Issue, Winter 1997-1998, p.20.

28. Brinsmead, Robert. 1984. "A Festival of Freedom" in Verdict, Essay 14, p.7.

29. Ibid, p.7.

30. Kipnis, David. 1976. The Powerholders, p.19.

31. Ibid, p.91.

32. Ibid, p.94.

33. Ibid, p.94.

34. Brinsmead, Robert. 1980. Judged by the Gospel, p.233.

35. Ibid. 1984. "A Theology of the Resurrection" in Verdict, Special Issue 2, p.15.

36. Abrahamsson, Bengt. 1993. Why Organizations?, p.17.

37. Mark 2: 27.

38. Brinsmead, Robert. "The Principles of the Reformation: The Bible Alone", a taped lecture.

39. Ibid.

40. Brinsmead, Robert. Taped lecture.

41. Letter kills but spirit gives life.

42. Brinsmead, Robert. 1991. "Reflections on the Question of Authority" in Quest, No. 10, p.6.

43. Davies, Paul. 1990. God And The New Physics, p.7.

44. Ibid, p. 220.

45. Ibid, p.7.

46. Brinsmead, Robert. 1998. "The Status of Jesus Re-Examined" in Verdict, Essay 1A, p.11.

47. Ibid, p.7.

48. Zwemer, Jack. 1995. "The Abuse of Law" in Destiny, No. 2.

49. Mark 2: 27.

50. Kung, Hans. On Being A Christian.