Alpha Course - Day Six

A new week and previous to this session, I felt quite comfortable with it all - there was something innately reassuring about the routine of turning up, having become familiar with many of the faces and personalities. It was knocked a little by the end by what felt like me having to take cover in a bit of an embattled position, where I felt my doubts and cynicism had been interpreted as some kind of pre-meditated malevolence or wilful mischief-making. Again it ended just as it got interesting and heated - as the grizzled band of rag-tag surviving agnostics grappled with the massed machinery of Christianity, surrounded by Christian footsoldiers. More of that later anyway.

After last week, I'd read a little of the bible in an open exercise in keeping my side of the bargain, but had found exactly what I had expected to find - beautiful smoke and comforting mirrors. Reading Mark, there was much to admire, and not much to disagree with in terms of message, which seems to boil down to "Jesus was incredible, read here about his remarkable exploits". I can't fault any of them, even the parts which defy belief, as they are all employed to convey the "message", and 70% (at a rough estimate) of the message is something I can relate to and broadly agree with anyway.

Unfortunately 30% of it remains considered somewhere between "dubious" to “downright repugnant”. So God didn't speak to me at all, at least not in a way that broke through and made me in no doubt it was him. It was a question that was raised repeatedly - whether God had spoken to anyone in the group, according to the five identified "methods" of doing so - via the Bible, via the "Holy Spirit", via "Common Sense", via "Other people" or via "Circumstantial Signs". In my case, numbers 1-3 were certainly a no, number 4 was rather disingenuous in a group of people talking about God I think. That could be claimed to be "God speaking" easily enough, but I didn't think putting myself in that position really counted somehow. I think there were plenty of people talking on behalf of God, interpreting the issues and problems and apparent holes in logic on behalf of one strand of Christianity which believed one set of ticked boxes. I can't escape the bigger picture that the vast majority of people on earth have nothing to do with him, but that their social systems don’t break down, they’re not immoral, these people don’t wantonly “sin” in the big ways (murder, infidelity, cruelty) any more than Christians do to be honest. So the huge number of people “outside of God”, with no relationship with him through Jesus, who worship other Gods, are no better or worse by Christian measurements than Christians barring their stubborn refusal to come on board the big ship to salvation.

At this point, I should apologise. This blog isn’t quite going the way I thought. My best efforts to appear even-handed and simply report what was happening are becoming a little bit clouded by pessimism and a pervading sense of frustration at the way Christianity throws up more and more plugs for the holes that are blown in it until the whole thing is deliberately not explained by various circular and un-measurable criteria – faith, the mystery of God, prayer. None of this stands up to the slightest scrutiny. I feel as if I am not just “away” from the God described in the bible, but that I would actually quite like things to stay that way. As the more I read and hear, the more I cannot see him as loving or compassionate, or worthy of worship, and the more I see him as a controlling, bullying ego, weeping crocodile tears as vast numbers of his children are presumably shovelled into a big furnace. That’s not a father to me – a father would burn themselves trying to pull his children out of the furnace rather than just write the whole thing off as “their decision”. Of course, a Christian would explain that Jesus was the earthly representation of God doing just that (excuse the thinking aloud at this point). That’s an interesting concept, and an admirable one, but then that in turn beggars the question of why and how God messed up enough to let things get that bad. If he has mastery over the grand plan (more of which later), then he foresaw all this long before it happened. So it’s not a sacrifice in conventional means – it’s almost just part of the deal surely? If someone is born and knows that on November 6th 2009 they have to write a blog entry, regardless of anything else that was going to happen, regardless of personal cost, it’s less a sacrifice than just a fact. In fact, surely it’s just God’s destiny?

Anyway, the theme last night was "How Does God Guide Us?" - another of those rather conditional questions which makes at least four assumptions in five words; that there is a God, that he can guide us, that he should guide us and that he does guide us.

The speech before the group discussion covered an Alpha-ised précis of the techniques God uses to guide us toward him in life.

Pete delivered his usual brand of infectious enthusiasm to a decimated group (laid low by the flu that’s going around no doubt, though I hesitated to ask where God’s plan was in keeping people away from a group designed to discuss him and his works). Anyway, Pete kicked off in jovial style listing some frivolous lawsuits from the US, along the lines of the lady who sued McDonalds for her coffee being hot (no, really).

He then continued (in a not obviously related way) to talk about hearing God’s voice, that God wanted to guide and teach us. He used a comparison of a shepherd and his sheep which immediately struck me as strange given its contemporary usage as a by-word for unthinking sycophancy. In any case, Pete laid out a whole range of mechanisms we could use to hear God’s voice, as mentioned above, and the thing that struck me was how much they could be ascribed to a sense of “control” rather than just this much advertised “free gift” of God’s love. Lots of words relating to God “instructing” and “teaching” and how humans don’t know the best way, how we all need his help. Again, if we “need” his help, then we’ve not really been designed to cope with this much heralded gift of free will have we?

The groups duly formed and we were left with the usual enormous reticence of anyone to say anything at all to start. As a result, one of the team leaders kept looking at me encouragingly during the pained silence, enough to make me smile and then laugh at the slightly farcical nature of it all. I hope I am not becoming a caricature of someone who constantly talks for the sake of controversy during these things. So I took the bait, and asked how God’s guidance was really compatible with free will. It was pretty much stated that God has a “grand plan” for us, and that much of what is to happen is pre-destined. As such, the will that is so advertised is not really free at all – in the sense that it’s not free from interference.

This leads to another question – the question of what the point of prayer is, as discussed last week. The logic is that if God knows all, and what’s best for us, then what is the point of us asking for anything from him? If it’s been decided it will happen then it will happen, regardless of our grovelling requests or not.

A murmured “good question” and a much repeated question of whether anyone had heard God “speak to them” during the week. Even the Christians were reticent here, barring a couple of stories which were told by the young girls present, one of which seemed to revolve around a tramp and some Doritos.

The conversation moved on, and I can’t quite remember how, but more from exasperation than anything else, I proclaimed that I couldn’t agree with the God in the bible as he created hell.

It was said that God didn’t make hell. I think that’s pretty much unsubstantiated by anything that’s actually written down, but was presented as sage wisdom in a kind of triumphant flourish by one of the young girls. Well, notwithstanding the bible, which states that the devil was thrown into hell, and he clearly wasn’t thrown into something that didn’t exist, and that God created everything. Anyway, I played along and asked who had created hell, “the Devil” came the cry. Strange. The devil was also created by God who knew he was going to do it anyway. Is the devil stronger than God then? Is that the implication. He can create something that God can’t influence or get into. Amazing.

I subsequently read something which said that hell was actually created purely to house the devil, but that man tended to wander into it “by accident” and that God was constantly trying to pull us out of it. Notwithstanding that intervention (again) vs “free will”, the implication here is that God made a mistake by creating hell and that when he realised his massive error, he was forced to chuck Jesus down on earth to try and get people out of there. He’d have saved himself a whole lot of bother by simply being completely omnipotent and having mastery over all creation.… hold on a minute…!

“God wants what’s best for us.”

“God loves us.”

“God has a plan for us all.”

“God has given us the gift of free will.”

“God wants us to love him.”

These are some of the comments from last night. In each and every case, I am unable to come up with a convincing answer that’s pro-Christian. Inside myself. I am sure there are many dialectical responses to all of these points and factors, neat little rejoinders and caveats. But inside myself, I can’t look at them and be convinced.

As a final caveat, I thought about the Old Testament, and how parts of it were described before by “Des” as actually just a handy guidebook for “best practice” in staying alive and healthy and helping everyone along. The rest of it could pretty much be seen as a mechanism to keep people in check.

As tribes grew and as things changed and became more volatile, stamping down ever harder on people who didn’t tow the line wasn’t working. It’s feasible they needed a “new deal” that was an extended reboot of the old deal. Keep the control, but introduce an illusion of self-determination. If you can control people while simultaneously telling them they’re free, you’ve got a “great product” in marketing speak.

This is hugely cynical I would say. And I apologise for that, but it’s actually more feasible than someone walking on water or rising from the dead.

Anyway, the group ended with some kind of free discussion having broken out, and to my personal satisfaction the new lady who I had tagged as a surefire convert actually came out with a lot of the same misgivings about the so-called “Love” of God that I did. After being the focal point of much of the Christian questions for the night, it seemed like a minor victory of sorts, at least making me feel like my position wasn’t quite so “out on a limb”. Before things wound up, the thorny subject of “talking in tongues” was broached. Slightly startled looks on the faces of some of the team members, as this was a topic for the away day (scheduled next Saturday), but knowing that this is going to be included, some of the incredulity on the faces of the agnostics was quite joyous to behold. They were as passionately convinced it was “weird” as the Christians were in their own beliefs. I stated that I found it totally unbelievable, again being guarded that some people would no doubt claim to have experienced it (I am constantly guarding against calling anyone a liar – painstakingly so). And on that note we went on our merry way.

This week scores a standard 6/10 on the Alpha-o-meter. No voices. No inspiration. Tune in next week to see if I’ve been struck by the Holy Spirit.