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The Conclusion That Actions Speak Louder Than Words

By Arlene F. Harder, MA, MFT

Page One of Two Pages

This article was originally meant to be the last part of An Agnostic's Encounter With God. After describing the experiences that eventually led me to decide there really is a transcendent Spirit with which I can be connected and of which I am a part, I wanted to set down my beliefs, much as Barbara Levine does in "Thirty-six Core Beliefs Influence How She Lives."

However, as I began to write down my spiritual philosophy, I realized a better word than "beliefs" was the term "conclusions" and that these should be located with other material in Experiencing Faith and Spirit in Daily Life.

You see, one can have a belief without any personal experience. All one has to do is accept what someone else says is true and viola! you have a belief. Ready made. Assembled and complete. No experience necessary. But my perspectives have arisen from many years of questioning and experience.

Now before some of you become offended, let me assure you that accepting beliefs on faith alone isn't a bad thing. For almost a third of my life I believed what I had been told and followed a faith that has given comfort and solace to many, many people. I also recognize that when people say "I believe such-and-such," it doesn't automatically indicate they haven't arrived at that belief through experience. Often we accept something at first as a belief and later come to experience it as true.

In any case, tomorrow I may change my conclusions as the result of other experiences, but for today the following are some ideas of what I believe are true, or at least they make sense to me. I share them with you and invite you to share your conclusions with me.

1. Human beings are intrinsically multi-dimensional.

We are composed of a physical body that allows us to function in the world, a mind that can think and reason, an emotional component that allows us to experience pleasure, suffer pain, and understand the feelings of others, a social drive to connect with and share ideas with others, and what might be called a spiritual instinct to go beyond the ego and connect our individual lives with something greater and more long-lasting than the self.

2. There are no adequate words to describe what people refer to as "God."

That which we call "God" is a mystery if we imagine Him-Her-It as a being who created the universe and all of life. If we refer to the essence that transcends human experience as a "no thing" because it (or, in this context, a "non it") is beyond conceptualization, the whole business is still a mystery. Nevertheless, I use the word "God" to convey a small sense of what I experience when I feel in touch with that essence. (See Why Do I Believe I Am Connected With God or Spirit? and Explaining a Spiritual Experience.)

To say "God wants this" or "God's purpose is" or to make any statement that supposes the speaker claims to know what God thinks is, in my view, wishful thinking. Perhaps that person has an idea of what he or she believes God would want or think if God fit his or her image of a divine being. But we'll never know the mind of God. If we did, we'd be that power we call God. And while there may be a sense of God that we believe resides in our hearts, it seems to me that if the essence of God is like a vast ocean, we are but a drop in that ocean. Pretending we know what the whole ocean is like or how it operates is a fair approximation of narcissism.

Another way I think of myself in relation to "God" or the essense of life is to compare myself with a cell in my body. Every cell is important. The white blood cells are no more essential than the skin cells that keep my insides from falling out. The brain cells may think they're important, but they wouldn't function without blood vessel cells that bring oxygen to keep them alive. And so on and so forth. If I am a "cell" of the body or essence of God, there are many ways I am connected with that being and I am as valuable as—but not more than—the next person.

3. How we live is far more important than what we say we believe.

Saying you believe in the tenets of any faith is like saying you believe you can swim. Okay. You either can swim or you can't. Believing you can doesn't count. What do you do with that belief? For example, believing that humans are at the top of the evolutionary ladder—OR—that humans have been created by God to be the caretaker of this earth is neither here nor there. These positions are simply beliefs, although they may be felt very strongly by persons on either side of the issue. The question in either case is, "What do we do with our superior position?" Do we trample on creatures we consider beneath us? Do we treat the world with reverence? Those are, for me, far more important matters than what we believe.

How we act is a direct expression of our core beliefs. What we say we believe is not important. So you can tell a person's beliefs by their actions. "I am a Christian," says the man who cheats on his wife and excuses his actions because his faith tells him he is "saved.". "I will go to paradise," says the suicidal terrorist who believes he is following Allah's wishes and kills the innocent. For me the proof is in the pudding, so to speak. When someone claims to be religious, but does not express spiritual qualities such as peace, joy, acceptance, love, and generosity, I am not impressed with their beliefs, especially when they lack compassion for other human beings (even those with whom they strongly disagree).

4. I don't understand prayer, but I pray.

Recent serious studies seem to suggest that prayer sometimes "works" in the sense that some people get better when they are prayed for. But no one has explained prayer to my satisfaction. And the statement that "God always answers prayer" doesn't make sense if prayer is asking for something.. Either we get what we want or we don't. If we do, we can say God granted our wish. If we don't, we can say God's answer was to not grant our wish. But in any case, I suspect an all-knowing God doesn't need supplicants to tell Him what they want. He-She-It already knows.

The best way I can describe prayer, at least in the way I experience it, is to say that it is being open to Spirit and desiring to know the best that "the spiritual powers that be" can offer me in my limited ability to accept and understand. You see, when I am in "prayer" or "meditating," it is as though I have chosen to enter a large sacred building or residence of a wise and loving being (or as the Buddists would say, a non-being). I begin that experience by sitting still and saying (sometimes aloud but quietly and sometimes just in my thoughts), "I am here. Here I am." And then, mostly, I wait for the sense that I am in touch with something that is larger than myself, something I refer to as God, Spirit, transcendence.

When I am receptive to having my soul expand, to knowing what I need to know to be the person I want to be, to help me live by my highest ideals and to solve the puzzles and conflicts of my heart, something always happens. There is a crack in the veneer I present to the world and an awareness that my ego cuts me off from the very connections with others that I desire. My heart expands and answers I need come, sometimes softly and sometimes with great force, into my awareness. (See Why Do I Believe I Am Connected With God or Spirit?)

Perhaps the most significant part of prayer for me is an underlying sense of gratitude for all I have that I don't deserve and that is given freely for my use, such as air and life itself. When I sit down for breakfast with food and newspaper in front of me, I close my eyes and give thanks for the thousands of people who have made my breakfast possible, from the guy who pumps gas for the man who delivers the paper to my door to the film maker who creates the camera that allows the photographer to take the pictures that tell the stories I will read in the paper. (This line of gratitude is one I plan someday to write more about, because I find it fascinating to notice how widely my gratitude can extend.)

Sometimes I ask for help for someone, although I suspect "the powers that be" already know that my friend or family member could use a little assistance. Although the clinical evidence does indicate there can be a real physical benefit when a person prays for someone else, I rather suspect the primary benefit is to the one doing the praying. Why? Because expressing qualities of the human spirit seems to improve our over-all well-being and, as I've often said, compassion is definitely the top of the list of qualities.

In any case, when I pray for others, my prayer is often similar to one I learned recently at a Kundalini Yoga class. I will say the names of those about whom I'm concerned and then will say something like, "May the long-time sun shine upon them. May all love surround them. And may the pure light within them guide them on their way." Sometimes I'll add, "I'm not sure if that's the way prayer works, but whoever or whatever is taking requests, this is mine."

My approach to prayer will change, of course, as my understanding expands. But for the moment, this brief explanation is the best I can do.

CONCLUDED on Page Two

© Copyright 2002, Arlene F. Harder, MA, MFT