Mom and I know that some of you are just beginning, or are fairly new, to following God. Also, we all have challenges in our daily life with following God and practicing our faith. So, this is a place where we can discuss those challenges, frustrations, concerns, and questions, and help one another grow in our faith.

(If you have any concerns about sharing this in an open thread where anyone outside of the club can also see it, let me know. Either cat mail me or leave a comment.)

I get very very angry when I comprehend what it is that hoo-mans have done to the planet. It´s very hard to be forgiving, and sometimes I fear I want to take it out on all hoo-mans, and when there are natural disasters, I am relieved because the planet groans a little less from the weight of us.

I have to remember that I am hoo-man too, and my guilt is essentially the same as most others.

It´s also difficult to forgive so many of the atrocities carried out in the name of God. Including animal cruelty.

So I guess my challenge is forgiveness.

MaryC, I believe I already emailed you about the challenge I face in my faith. But know this: I´m working on overcoming that challenge, which essentially is just my fear of fully committing to the Lord, so I´m praying on it pretty much constantly.

Beyond that, I have the challenge all people of faith (no matter what the faith) have: How to choose in which way to commit to my faith. I think this is a challenge we all face, no matter what our faith is - how do we live our faith? Do we tell others about it? Do we hang back and reach out only when someone needs our help? There are so many ways to live one´s faith.

JC - forgiveness comes in all forms. And with the problem you´ve brought up, let´s face it - how do you forgive all of humanity? And wouldn´t working for changes in your own area be a step toward at least forgiving yourself for any guilt you feel as a human? I really don´t have any answers here - while I agree with you about our poor "stewardship" of the only home we have, I have no idea where to start putting a stop to it except to do little things in my own life - and these things feel very little and useless sometimes, in light of the larger picture.

JC, A lot of bad things have been done in the name of God, but also a lot of good things. And at the same time a lot of bad things have been done without the name of God - in fact by self-proclaimed atheists e.g. Stalin who murdered more people than Hitler (another one). I think it is human arrogance that is the cause of a lot of "evil" and greed. God is often used as an excuse -sadly, as are other things.

My problems, although I do belive in God, is probably the same as everyone elses:
Why do bad things happen to good people. Why are there disasters that kill thousands, humans and animals etc etc. Is God only good - then what is good? Good as we see it is our perception, so for example good for a killer is different than for most of us. Or is God omnipotent and all - therefore also what we percieve as bad?

Sometimes I feel closer to God, sometimes very far away - it is all confusing and very interesting at the same time.

"Good" is a concept we humans have devised - whenever I see a tragedy, and don´t understand why it happened, I try to remember that God´s definition of Good is not definable in human terms.

JC, I also have a hard time forgiving people sometimes. But, I have to keep in mind that we are to forigive "seventy times seven" (countless) times. Jesus forgave people over and over again, and we are to go by His example, even though it´s hard. Also, forgiveness doesn´t mean letting the other person off the hook for wrongdoing. They still have to deal with the consequences of their behavior.

Marketa, when God gave us free will it also meant that we took on the responsibilty/consequences of our actions. It also means that, even if God doesn´t like it, or will it, He allows certain things to happen. That means sometimes bad things happen to good people. However, God can choose to minimize the effects. I have seen that happen in my own life. ALso, some things happen to test us and help us growth, other things happen that are the work of the devil. I don´t know why there are disaters that kill millions of people, etc. I do believe, however, that some of it has to do with how we take care (or not) of our planet. I also believe that God is there with us helping us through everything. Yes God is good, but not everything that happens in this world is what God would choose. God only wants good for us. God is omnipotent. Regarding good for a killer vs. not, somebody who kills is seperated from God somehow, but I believe is still a child of God. He may have grown up in a bad way, taken the wrong path in life, have a mental illness, and or countless other possibilities.

Wolfie, that is an excellent statement about good!

Thanks, MCD. That idea came from an old politically atheist logic professor I had in college - only instead of destroying my faith, every word he said made my faith stronger. For one entire semester, we studied one very short book on logic - and the main point the author was describing was the human inability to prove or disprove the existence of God, because God was non-sense. Not in the meaning of God being silly or foolish, but because our human senses and language and thought can never perceive in any direct way the "nature" of God since we begin the discussion by "defining" God as outside our comprehension. The point of the book was that there was no point in discussing the existence/non-existence of God and any such discussion was a waste of time. Strangely, I came away from the course more confirmed in my faith than ever.... because I do believe we cannot apprehend God with our human-limited senses and thoughts.

Which is why we have faith instead of knowledge of this.... being.... we call God. There are no words whatsoever in any human language that can even come within a nano-nano-micron of describing the smallest piece of what God is. We just can´t do it. It would be like asking an ant to write Beethoven´s Ninth Symphony... backwards.... and still have it come out as magnificent music.

All that does is reassure me as to what I believe. The closest I ever came was in a dream - I´d been discussing the Trinity with another Christian friend of mine, and later that evening I dreamt of this immeasurably high blue mountain which I was viewing from an immeasurable distance, a mountain made of stars and spacetime, which was one mountain, and three mountains, and an infinity of mountain. I´m not describing it well, but I can see it clearly in my mind. Now, I don´t think God looks like a mountain - a mountain is a human-perceived thing. At best, it was an analogy, it was the furthest my human mind could go in perceiving this.

And it´s enough for me. I have the feeling that if I were suddenly to see God, I would explode into a cloud of random electrons or something. We are not meant to directly perceive God (by whatever name you choose, be it God or Allah or Jehovah or Gaia). Not while we live, anyway.

I´m going out on a bit of a limb here, but there is some scientific research trying to discover what the pineal gland actually *does*.

Some postulate that it is the organ which senses "God."

But we cannot explain how the pineal gland works, or what it does, any more than we can explain "God."

The thing about the pineal gland is that it is light sensitive (possibly involved in regulation sleep, and involved in dreaming) but it is in the middle of our head. Where it gets no direct light. You can activate it by (gently) rubbing your eyes with them closed until you start to see patterns. It is my (weak) understanding that the pineal is producing those patterns on the retina of the eye.

Someone in here with some science could do better. Like - do other animals (chimps, cats) have pineal glands.

But I guess what I´m saying is, if it *is* an organ to sense "God" as we know it, then why are hoo-mans *hard-wired* for sensing God?

What you are saying Wolfie is similar to my thing about "the sex of God" - why would God need a sex? To make a choice? To limit him/herself to one? What *we* perceive as hoo-mans is literally infinitely different than an omnipotent God would experience. Hoo-man perception can be limiting to an infinite being.

Whales and dolphins have famously huge brains, and different ways of perceiving things. They would perceive their world in terms of waves, currents, depths, pressures, the length of a breath. Totally different to us.

And if a God just combined those two "ways of seeing" and then adds in that of a bee, or a bat, or a hummingbird, or wolf, or cat!? Well that´s just a few of the ways God could "see."

Well, I went off. I hope I said what I set out to!
JC

The pineal Gland is found in vertabrates and cells that look like the gland in non-vertabrates. It is involved in the production of Melatonin. The production of melatonin by the pineal gland is stimulated by darkness and inhibited by light. Photosensitive cells in the retina detect light and directly signal the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), entraining it to the 24 hour clock. Fibers project from the SCN to the paraventricular nuclei (PVN), which relay the circadian signals to the spinal cord and out via the sympathetic system to superior cervical ganglia (SCG), and from there into the pineal gland.

All the functions of melatonin in humans is not clear. It may help to protect against cancer (a number of cancers, such as breast, prostate and colon, are more common among night workers or those whose circadian rhythms are disrupted) and it seems to be essential for pregnancy to have a successful outcome (the mothers melatonin can pass across the placenta and may help to correct complications that result from problems such as pre-eclampsia or fetal brain damage)

Axelrod J (1970). "The pineal gland". Endeavour 29, 108, 144–8. PMID 4195878.

Racagni G, Riva MA, Popoli M. The interaction between the internal clock and antidepressant efficacy. Int Clin Psychopharmacol. 2007 Oct;22 Suppl 29-S14.

Maronde E, Stehle JH. The mammalian pineal gland: known facts, unknown facets.
Trends Endocrinol Metab. 2007 May-Jun;18, 42-9. Epub 2007 Mar 19.

From your friendly in house research scientist...