ORDER FORM | HOME PAGE | SEPTEMBER 11, 2001
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How God Stops the Bad Guys Without Ruining Her Hair By Shepherd Hoodwin |
After the tragedy of September 11th, as after most tragedies, some people angrily wondered why God didn't intervene to prevent it, or questioned, as I did when my mother died when I was eight years old, whether God exists, because a loving God would not allow such a thing to happen.
I viewed God then as a sort of cosmic Superman, swooping down at the last minute to save good people from bad ones. How exactly He would do that was somewhat fuzzy in my mind. Maybe just as the bad guy was about to strike, God would smite him dead, but that would be murder, too, wouldn't it? Superman never killed anyone. Well, then maybe He would just somehow freeze him, or possibly break his leg, giving an opportunity for the good guy to escape.
This view of God requires a clear-cut knowledge of just who the good and bad guys are, but that can be fuzzy, too. Most of us are sure that terrorists are bad guys, but no doubt terrorists think that WE are bad guys and that God would back them up on that 100%. They have their evidence, just as we have ours. It can sound like a bunch of kids yelling, "Well, he started it!"
I suspect that God thinks that most of us are good guys, since He created us, even when we are misbehaving. Maybe he even thinks that most of us are really good-looking, even if we could stand to lose a few pounds; after all, parents can be biased that way.
NECESSARY EVILS
A good definition of evil is willfully causing harm not strictly necessary in self-defense, so terrorist acts are certainly evil, but our government, like all governments, like all people, have also harmed at times. There's the concept of the lessor of two evils, and it's valid, but it's also a judgment call to some extent, and if someone killed your loved one, it isn't much comfort if, in the larger picture, it was the lessor of evils.
Most agree that it was absolutely necessary for us to fight the Nazis in WWII. We killed innocent people, too, but it prevented a much greater evil. Still, if we'd been kinder to the German people after WWI, if there had been something like a Marshall plan then, maybe they would not have spiraled down into the despair and feelings of powerlessness that gave rise to Hitler.
Perhaps if we hadn't militarily forced Japan to trade with us in the 19th Century, they wouldn't have bombed Pearl Harbor in the 20th. It doesn't excuse their actions, but it might help explain them. What goes around comes around, unless someone stops the vicious circle from turning.
Maybe if our postwar policy in the Middle East and elsewhere had had more integrity, there would not be terrorists who see us as their enemy. We rightly demand that terrorists take responsibility for their actions; we must do the same.
Every time we harm, even if it's a necessary evil, we plant seeds for more harm later; every time we act with generosity of spirit, we plant seeds of love. When we do acts of necessary evil, we need to clean up the mess afterward.
We see ourselves as white knights fighting dragons, but so do terrorists. It's not white and black. Most of us are basically good people who sometimes harm because somehow in our own mind we justify it. Those who harm a lot have severely screwed-up beliefs that justify doing a lot of harm. The attacks of September 11 were horrific and unconscionable, but "love the sinner, hate the sin." Acts can be evil, as are the people who do them while they're doing them, but that's not their whole story.
Maybe the true definition of "bad guy" is someone who is unsalvageably cruel, someone who takes pleasure out of the suffering of others and is incapable of "getting" what he's doing, but that would exclude someone who thinks he's doing something good or justified. And only God is capable of knowing for certain that a soul is unsalvageable; we human beings don't have enough information to judge that. Sometimes, people's souls are a lot better that it would appear from their actions; a beautiful essence can be imprisoned by a personality damaged by overwhelming experiences that it is not yet able to understand and transcend.
SUPERGOD
The Superman model of God, or one like it, is behind the idea that God shouldn't or wouldn't allow bad things to happen, that God should bring peace on earth whether anybody likes it or not. However, in my limited knowledge of history, I can't recall any stories of God acting like Superman. Of course, if there were, we might not hear about them, because potential Hitlers or bin Ladens would have been stopped before they could have done something to get into the news.
Or, we might have a world in which whenever someone started to harm someone else, he would break his leg and hobble toward his intended victim, his weapon flying out of his hand. A Keystone Cop world. A Pinocchio world in which we could tell if someone was about to do something terrible, because his leg would suddenly break for no apparent reason. Of course, that might lead to prejudice against everyone who broke their leg for whatever reason, because you'd never know for sure if it really was a skiing accident. I don't think that God would want that.
Some think that God should apply a policy of smiting the bad guys selectively--get rid of the *really* bad guys and leave alone those who kill in cold blood but on a smaller scale. Where should He draw the line? Those whose hearts are dead and create misery from their rage are fundamentally the same regardless of scale. If God were pursuing a policy of only going after the really big guys, you'd better hope that you or your loved ones don't run into any amateurs.
In cases of illness, SuperGod is expected to somehow take a body on the verge of death and give it perfect health. It would probably be easier to keep it healthy in the first place, but maybe there's a lesson to be had, or perhaps God needs to show off once in a while so that people will praise His wonders. Not for his own ego, of course, because he's already King of the Universe--there's no room for advancement--but for our benefit, so we'll believe. There ARE cases of miraculous healings, not only in the Bible, so this facet of SuperGod seems more plausible, but then why is it so intermittent? If God could give us all perfect health, why doesn't He do it?
Some people come up with elaborate explanations for such mysteries, but I don't buy them. Yes, suffering can spur us to grow and bring us closer to God, but so can joy. If God is love, and most of us agree that He is, I think that He would remove suffering whenever He could. I would--wouldn't you?
Like so many beliefs we take for granted, the SuperGod model of God breaks down when we really look at it. Models of reality, like models of cars, can be replaced by new, spiffier models that give us better mileage and options. All of us probably have some clunkers sitting in our garage that we could donate to charity for a write-off. We certainly feel less taxed when we get rid of them.
Here's my current model of reality: God is the consciousness of the whole. The whole includes everything, so you and I are part of God; there is nothing that isn't God.
GOD AS THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE WHOLE
Our bodies have billions of individual cells that are alive and have consciousness on their level. They gather into organs, which also have consciousness, allowing them to function as organs. The body as a whole has consciousness, allowing it to move, for example, without leaving pieces of itself behind. Incarnate in the body is our soul, our self-awareness that allows us to say "I am."
Our soul, in turn, is like one cell in the vast body of God, and God is the self-awareness of that body. God is the universe saying "I am." "I am" is the name of God, whether in the microcosm or the macrocosm. Every sentient being says "I am."
God is both He and She, and neither, but I'll say She from this point on to keep it simple and to be ornery and in the interests of the Equal Time doctrine. When we talk to God, our communication is routed to the soul on duty best suited to receive it, often one of our spirit guides. This may be disappointing--it might sound like your prayers are being handled by middle management instead of going straight to the CEO. However, keep in mind that we're all one--there's only one whole. If you touch an arm, you're touching the body. In the body, communication rises as far up the nervous system as it needs to in order to get the job done. Not every nerve impulse needs to reach conscious awareness, but it's all part of the body's experience. It's the same with God.
SPIRIT GUIDES
Spirit guides are friends who live on other side, a.k.a. the astral plane, where we often go when we're sleeping as well as between lifetimes and when we're finished incarnating. When we're not physical, we are often a spirit guide for others. There are also angels, full-time staff on the other side who are adorable and innocent because they usually don't incarnate. These guides and angels aren't necessarily more advanced than we are, but they're like coaches who, by reason of being on the sidelines, have more perspective on the game we're playing and can shout suggestions, such as "Watch out for that ball about to hit you in the head!"
The trouble is that most of the time, they have to holler, hoot, wave their arms, stamp their feet, and jump up and down for us self-absorbed, preoccupied, and somewhat deaf players to notice. At times, we hear but ignore their advice.
PEOPLE ARE SPIRIT, TOO
Sometimes our communications with God are routed to the souls of other incarnate human beings. It doesn't matter--we're all spirit, whether or not we also happen to have a body. With a body, there's the added bonus that each human being is potentially God's hands and feet, eyes and ears, on earth. So sometimes our prayers are answered by other human beings.
I think of us as God in training. Earth is God School. We make choices and then experience the ramifications of them, thereby learning to make better choices and create more wisely. We can make reasoned choices that bring joy, thereby learning what works, or make impulsive choices out of unexamined, confused emotions that bring pain, thereby learning what doesn't work. The lessons in both growing through joy and growing through pain are valid, but after thrashing around in the dark, banging into walls and stubbing our toes, long enough, we begin to realize that it might be smarter to turn on the light.
If SuperGod intervened every time we were about to do great harm, how would we ever learn? The good news is that our souls cannot be permanently harmed. Death itself is not the huge thing that our biology's survival instinct makes it out to be--it is simply being called back to the bleachers and maybe getting to have a nice long, hot shower. Unfortunately, we can experience great pain while still in the body. This is partly due to our body's mechanism that lets us know if something is wrong so that we don't accidentally cut off our hand or something. Although I personally much prefer pleasure to pain, it's basically a good thing; not fun, but necessary equipment. We can also experience mental and emotional damage, but it's usually temporary, and in healing it later, we gain depth and wisdom. It's not the only way to gain depth and wisdom, but it's one. So the fact that our free will comes with the price that others can inflict harm on us is not so terrible really, even if it's way out of hand right now and ultimately unnecessary.
TIME FOR NEW SOFTWARE
If we are made in the image and likeness of God, we are designed to be creators, and this has been our nature from the beginning. However, as the history of this crazy planet shows, having the design and using it well are two different things. Our brains have been supercomputers all along, but we still use only a fraction of our capacity because our software is primitive and limited. We need to continually upgrade it in order to improve our functioning.
If, for example, we're running the current God Operating System concurrently with the incompatible I'llGetThoseGoddamnFuckers! program, we're heading for a nasty crash. To begin to effectively run the GOS, we need compatible programs such as UnderstandingandResponsibility. Mind you, I'llGetThoseGoddamnFuckers! might have been useful at one point, for example, to keep other cavemen from stealing and eating our children. It may have even been state-of-the-art at one time. However, now, in this age of nuclear weapons and germ warfare, and with the existence of much more sophisticated programs than can allow us to actually solve problems rather than just contain or react to them, this old program needs to be erased from our hard drives.
When AnEyeforAnEye was first introduced, it was a big step forward, because before that, people would massacre whole villages in retaliation for taking an eye. Reducing it to just an eye was great progress in creating a more just world. Those who called for bombing Afghanistan back into the Stone Age, wishing to do far more damage than had been done to us, were reverting to that same era's I'llGetThoseGoddamnFuckers! software.
Later, Jesus came along with even better software, TurntheOtherCheek, which has never really caught on. Maybe AnEyeforAnEye is a Microsoft product and TurntheOtherCheek is owned by a small, scrappy competitor that refused to be bought out.
Anyway, 2000 years later, perhaps it's time for an even more advanced program, CommunicationandHealing. If we were to adopt it, the endless cycle of revenge and retaliation called history could at last come to an end. Yes, immediate steps have to be taken to stop terrorism, but in addition to that, isn't it smart strategy to begin eliminating its root causes so that we don't have to go on fighting it forever?
SO WHERE WAS GOD?
There are many instances of divine intervention cited in both sacred literature and our current lives. In every case, there was, on some level, an invitation for that intervention and an open heart to receive it in whatever way it could be given.
Deirdre Reel outlines some of the ways in which God did intervene in this tragedy:
"I know where God was the morning of September 11, 2001! He was very busy. First of all, he was trying to discourage anyone from taking those flights. Those four flights together held over 1000 passengers and there were only 266 aboard. He was on four commercial flights giving terrified passengers the ability to stay calm. Not one of the family members who was called by a loved one on one of the hijacked planes said that passengers were screaming in the background. On one of the flights He was giving strength to passengers to try to overtake the hijackers. He was busy trying to create obstacles for employees at the World Trade Center. After all, only around 20,000 were at the towers when the first jet hit. Since the buildings hold over 50,000 workers, this was a miracle in itself. How many of the people who were employed at the WTC told the media that they were late for work or they had traffic delays? He was holding up two 110-story buildings so that 2/3 of the workers could get out. I was so amazed that the top of the towers didn't topple when the jets impacted. Although this is without a doubt the worst thing I have seen in my life, I can see God's miracles in every bit of it."
Michael, whom I channel, said that on the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania, a unique opportunity arose for passengers, supported by spirit guides, to intervene. They prevented a possibly worse outcome because the hijackers were flying off the handle rather than staying coolly in control. Had there been such openings on the other planes, no doubt those concerned would have taken advantage of them as well. Had there been an opportunity to thwart the plot altogether, no doubt it would have been. Of course, we don't hear about all the horrific things that don't happen.
I always figure that whatever the outcome, it's the best that God can do with the raw material She has to work with, including my current state of consciousness and that of everyone else. The whole point of creating the universe is to expand the experience of love and joy, and all our growth moves us toward being capable of more of it. God can't help it if most of us Earth School students are slow learners.
I'm not religious--I get bored in services and don't care for dogma of any kind, although I don't knock it if it works for someone, if it assists him in coming into a higher place. However, I do talk with God. I don't think of God as separate from myself. If my soul is my Higher Self, then God is my Highest Self. If my human self works in the field, then my Highest Self is the CEO, but my human self is a stockholder in the company, which is the only company there is. It even owns Microsoft. Incidentally, it's not true that Bill Gates has more money than God; Bill Gates IS God. So is everyone else.
TALKING WITH GOD
From my vantage point in the field, I talk with God. I let Her know, for instance, what improvements could be made in the product line. For example, God might want to let the Design Department know that knees could use more shock absorbing capabilities with today's concrete surfaces, and that they might consider making arms modular or retractable (perhaps like penises) to make cuddling easier so that one arm isn't always falling asleep. Just a suggestion. (I hope I get further than I did with Microsoft regarding Word.)
I talk with God as a co-creator about the little part of the whole for which I'm responsible, like a construction foreman with the master architect. She isn't a micromanager. As long as certain parameters are met, she lets me practice creating as I see fit. We tell each other what we need to get the job done. Mostly She guides me, but as Her eyes and ears in my world, sometimes I guide Her, too. We, the whole, are evolving together.
HEALING THE BAD GUYS
God doesn't instruct people to go out and destroy the bad guys, because it can't be done. In a universe that is only God, one whole, ultimately nothing can be destroyed, only changed or moved. As Einstein said, e=mc2.
Souls are eternal; they're real hard to get rid of, but they can be healed, and in the long course of evolution, most of them are. Healing means uncrossing the wires, straightening out the confusion, sorting out what can be used and integrating it, and composting the rest. It means seeing the truth, making amends, forgiving yourself and others, and moving on.
Earth is getting to be a small planet. We're running out of landfills in which to try to bury the bad guys; we're going to have to start recycling them. We're running out of hiding places for our shadows; we're going to have to start bringing them into the light.
Prejudice is projection--we project the parts of ourselves we judge and deny onto our bad guys, and seek to purify ourselves by getting rid of them. Of course, it doesn't work, because they are only mirrors. What we rail against in a particular group or person is a trait within ourselves that we wish to destroy, or its opposite. If we follow that to its logical end, it leads to our own destruction. However, there is no need for this, because all traits have a positive side. If we can harvest the good stuff, bringing the trait into balance, we don't need to try to get rid of it. The process starts by taking responsibility for what is within us, especially the parts we have heretofore hidden in dark shadows.
For example, if you get steamed up by those darned Eskimos because they're "too lazy" to cook their meat and are therefore a threat to our American way of life, it might be that you judge and disown the part of yourself that is tired and would rather not cook so much. Maybe you were raised to feel ashamed of your "laziness" and overcompensate by working too much. The Eskimos make good demons, because you've never actually met any, although you've heard tell of them. So you demonize them for doing what you wish you could do (not cook dinner every night) but won't let yourself. Maybe you need to give yourself a break. Maybe you should go meet an Eskimo or at least take yourself and your family out to a nice Eskimo restaurant for dinner. ("Hi, I'm Nanook and I'll be your waiter tonight. Our blubber of the day is….")
The Hitlers and terrorists of the world, big and small, have been doing pretty much the same thing that the rest of us have been doing--trying to get rid of the bad guys--except that they subscribe absolutely to the idea that the ends justify the means, so they are willing to do horrific things, without feeling for others. It's obviously necessary to protect ourselves and stop people like that from acting out, and it's not likely that someone that far gone is going to seek healing in this lifetime (and you don't get it if you don't seek it).
However, while stopping them, we have to be careful not to fall for the same illusions for which they've fallen, such as the one about destroying the bad guys. More importantly, we need to examine how all of us together have created a world that feeds such darkness, or, more accurately, fails to light it. Events in the world reflect those in millions of individual lives; small daily acts of terrorism, in families, offices, and within ourselves, lead to big ones.
We can begin changing the world by lighting up our own lives. (Hey! That might be a good song--"I Light Up My Life") Then, together, we can find ways to help heal humanity collectively and stop making more terrorists, which, after all, are not really part of our product line. A good start would be to do far more to end poverty, hunger, and ignorance all around the world.
God is the Creator. Yes, destruction is also part of the cycle of life, such as the leaves in autumn. Occasionally, there are earthquakes and other "acts of God" (although I'm not convinced that they're necessarily the Design Department's fault--we human beings have vast capabilities all on our own for screwing up the planet.) Sure, let's defend ourselves against aggressors as we must, in intelligent ways that will actually work and not blow up in our faces. However, I think that God is much more interested in creation than destruction. I know that "I am."
Shepherd Hoodwin
*You can download the latest software, including new versions of UnconditionalLove and PeaceMaker, at God.com.
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Copyright 2001 Shepherd Hoodwin
(Feel free to pass along any of my pieces as long as you do so in full.--SGH)
