AboutJohn of AllFaith Expertise I can offer answers on a wide variety of topics about the world's religions including, Christianity, Hinduism, Judaism, Noahide, Sikhism, Paganism, Taoism, etc. If the question is of a religious nature drop me a line! For auto maintenance look elsewhere :-)
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To read more about this issue go to the following link. Its a conversation between a teacher from a respectable institution of learning and me where she writes: ...I have had over 20 students copy your work in the past 3 months...
Understand that if you plagiarize you are cheating your instructors, your answerer, your fellow students, everyone who respects you... and ultimately yourself. Don't do it!
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Experience Since 1969 I've been involved with many diverse spiritual and religious disciplines. I've lived in ashrams and monasteries, acquired ordinations and degrees and so on.
Education/Credentials I hold a Calvary Chapel (Christian) Ordination, an independent Missionary Baptist (Christian) ordination, an MA in Religious Studies from John F Kennedy University, an ordination in Ministry and Spiritual Counseling from the Interfaith Seminaries, an ordination from the Universal Life Church, and am Pastor Emeritus of Grace Inclusive Church.
My main work today is at AllFaith.com
To varying degrees I have worked and studied with many different groups including: the Noahide Nazarene sect, I attained the position of Vaisnava brahmana within the International Society for KRSNA Consciousness and in the Sri Gopinath Gaudiya Math (both members of the greater Brahma Madhva Gaudiya Vaisnava Sampradaya), I'm a former student of Swami Muktinanda's Sidha Yoga Foundation, an initiate of the Yoga Society (of Sri Ramamurti Mishra), was initiated as a Welsh Pagan priest, have been a Sunni Muslim, a Taoist, a member of various Buddhist sects (including the Dharmad Hatu of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche) and various diverse Hindu sects, numerous Christian denominations and movements, was a Missionary to Central America, carried a 12x6 foot wooden cross on my back from Atlanta Georgia to San Antonia Texas, and have been involved with numerous other groups and movements too numerous to mention.
Question John of AllFaith, I respect your knowledge, thus I am asking you this question expecting an answer other than the standard "free will" answer which I consider rubbish. Here is my question, "Why would an all-powerful, all-loving, all-knowing, everywhere present God create a world where so much pain and suffering exists for so many millions of people, many of them very young children?"
Answer Hi Nathan,
Thanks for the kind words.
You asked this in Misc. Religion questions which gives me a bit more freedom to respond than I would have in the Christian or other religion specific sections.
I will be happy to share my personal views on this important issue with you:
The answer is: Free Will.
Hehe sorry, couldn't resist.
The question is, what does free will mean and why is it not rubbish. When used as a cop-out answer I agree it often is rubbish, but remember, "the lotus grows in the mud."
I believe that "time" is an illusion, or better, a temporary construct devoid of permanent reality. The individual being, called soul, jiva, atman, etc. exists within this illusory existence for good reasons.
This temporary nature exists, in my opinion, for good reasons. Understanding this essential reason is the answer to this question.
Jiva Atman, the Soul, transcends material existence. This can be thought of in this way. The Soul "sends out tentacles," referenced in the Bible as the Silver Cord:
Ecc 12:6 Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern.
The embodied being you think of as your self when you say "I" is a temporary construct linked to the "real transcendent you" through this "silver cord." The "golden bowl" can be thought of as the base of the kundalini or energy stream that actualizes your physical existence. By understanding the components of this presentation we see how the Higher Self connects with or manifests the lower self.
The "Higher Self" or "true you" sends out these materially manifest "lower selfs" to gain experience.
In order for these experiences to be meaningful actions and reactions take place. This is the nature of material existence. Material existence is called Sa-Guna in the East. Sa-Guna means "with qualities" or in duality. In simplistic terms when the embodied Self ("Nathan" or "John") does "good things" (good being a guna or quality) the reaction is "good" and when "Nathan" does "bad" things the results are "bad." Whether good or bad, positive or negative, all such actions produce reactions and these reactions bind the Soul to ever increasing material nature and illusion.
All actions done in material existence produce reactions. This is called the Laws of karma (or in Master Y'shua's words, "you reap what you sow").
By acquiring karma the embodied soul sinks deeper and deeper into illusion and soon forgets spiritual existence.
Spiritual existence or Nir-Guna (without qualities or dualism) is the eternal condition of the Soul. The purpose of all religion and spiritual practice is to wake up to this spiritual reality or consciousness. As we awaken to this spiritual reality our actions gradually become harmonized and spiritualized. Rather than performing "good" or "bad" actions (which result in karma) spiritual consciousness results in "neutral" karma or harmony with the individual Higher Self. The Higher Self is naturally harmonious with Ek Devata, the One All Transcendent Divinity. Ek Devata is our Eternal Well Wisher and so the more harmonious we are with God the more we bless material existence.
With this understanding we can see that the "young" are not really young and the "old" are not really old. And yet the young, the old, the weak and the needy are our especial responsibility if we would be in harmony with the Just and Merciful God.
This is why free will is so important.
It is by free will that the embodied soul learns and grows.
The many evils that exist in these material worlds exist by the free will choices of the embodied souls. The vast goodness that exists in these material worlds exist because the individual souls have allowed goodness of God to flow through them.
Without free will life would be meaningless.
Without Ek Devata, however concieved, there would be no free will.
A key problem we have is that we consider ourselves to be these limited material beings. We are "White" or "Black" or "American" or "Russian" or "Male" or "Female" and so on and yet, we are more than these temporary designations. This illusion/imprisonment, by the way, is key to the agenda of the New World Order that is enslaving the planet. "Religion" is sometimes as much part of the problem as part of the solution. As people accept ideologies like Secular Humanism, Humanistic Psychology, Chaos Theory, Quantum Physics and so on they lose sight of the importance of the individual and the sacredness of human life.
I hope this reply is helpful in your ongoing quest for Truth,
