I don't believe in God

Because I write about God all the time, I guess I should make clear that I don’t believe in God.

More accurately, I don’t believe (and have never believed) in the God that most Westerners believe. You know, this guy:1

I’m Quaker and was trained as a Franciscan spiritual director. But I’m not a Christian. I don’t think I’m going to heaven and I don’t think you’re going to heaven. But as my friend, the mystic artist Jon Marro once told me, “I’m not Christian, but I want to be Christic.”

When I heard that, I wanted to be Christic too.

I do believe in Something.2 A few years ago, I explained that “Something” for Modern Elder Academy’s blog, a part of which excerpted here:

In spiritual direction, people come to me to become present with whatever is happening in their spiritual lives, at that moment. The goal is not to change, fix, or improve anything. It’s a mindfulness practice where you give full attention to your own inner life, with someone else witnessing and welcoming.

In one session, a directee came in with a Bible verse she was struggling with. In her Christian tradition, every child is given a single Bible verse that is specially theirs for the rest of their lives. The one she was given was:

Five decades later, there was something that didn’t sit right with her about this verse she had been given. Too demanding? Too patriarchal? I suggested that many people have problems with the word “Lord” or “God,” so why don’t we simply choose another word? AC/DC’s road manager Barry Taylor once said that God is the name of the blanket we throw over mystery to give it shape. If that was true, how about trying another name for the blanket? Something like Universe, Source, or Spirit?

She chose the word “Love.” In reframing the verse as about Love, it read:

We both loved that. The exercise gave the verse enchantment and new meaning for my directee. Since then, I’ve discovered this idea has roots in Christian mysticism as well. In the Middle Ages, French mystic Marguerite Porete wrote: “I am God, says Love, for Love is God and God is Love, and this soul is God by the condition of Love.” In my own practice, I’ve started replacing the word “God” with the word “Love.” Here’s another revised Bible verse:‍

This is relevant because last week I went on a border pilgrimage in San Diego and Tijuana. I went with the Christian group Journey Home on a 2-day immersive journey into the immigration crisis, one day on each side of the border. Before our journey, our San Diego host, Jon Huckins, had asked us to contemplate:

What borders are we being invited to transcend (physical, relational, political, theological, ideological) that separate us from each other?

In Tijuana, our Mexican host Alejandra Ortiz Chacon told us that the reason we (US Americans) built this border wall to keep out migrants and asylum seekers was:

“Your Lord is money. We can see it from the outside.”

Indulge me for just for a moment. In the above verse, if we replaced the word “God” with the word “money,” would so much of our behavior make sense?

Alejandra was telling us that we, US Americans, commit and delight in money instead of committing or delighting in God. Or in Love.3 At least that’s what she sees from the outside.

It’s easy to get angry at ICE and Border Patrol for all of this. Be furious with the Administration. But if there’s any spiritual wisdom I can offer, it’s: everything we see on the outside is a mirror to what happens on the inside. What borders do I construct that separates me from the needs of others? Where have I, like Peter on that fateful night in the garden, denied Christ?

“If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, author of The Gulag Archipelago

My friend Alexa isn’t Christian either. Her definition of spirituality is a growing intimacy with all of reality. So what borders am I being invited to transcend that separate me from intimacy with reality? Well, the easiest to see (and hardest to let go of) is the border of me, my and mine. The biggest barrier that separates me from others is the idea of personal property. My money. My house. My country. The ego self wants to separate, comfortable, and superior and what is the right of property but the right to exclude others?4 We hold on very tightly, sometimes violently,5 to the right to exclude others.

This country relies on the principle of me, my, and mine. We hold onto it very tightly, sometimes violently.

Capitalism relies on us believing in the principle of me, my, and mine.

But as Alejandra told us:

“In the kingdom of God, there will be no walls.”

Again, I don’t believe in God. I’m not a Christian.

But in the kingdom of Love, there will be no walls. There will be no property.

I’m not Christian, but I’m trying to be Christic. What of my borders am I being invited to transcend? The boundaries of my money, my property, my beliefs and surrender them to Love. I’m reminded of the rich young man in the Bible, so earnest and so hopeful, who is invited to surrender all his possessions (i.e. everything that he thought was his, everything that he thought made him separate, comfortable, and superior) in order to enter the kingdom of Love. Sorrowfully, he finds himself unable to walk away from his privilege. The story continues:

I don’t know how much of my wealth and privilege I’ll be able to walk away from in this lifetime. But I’m trying, really. It’s so hard. But all things are possible with Love.

Trust in Love with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In the kingdom of Love, there will be no walls. There won’t be property. The Christic part of me wants to surrender the tight grip of me, my and mine.

You too? It takes time; so we’ll need to give each other grace.6

I know it sounds impossible and idealistic, but do you think it’s possible is to keep consuming more resources on planet to keep doubling and doubling our personal property? " Stein's Law says if something cannot go on forever, it will stop. In other words, unsustainable trends— exponential debt, exponential consumption, broken systems—cannot continue indefinitely and will inevitably end or reverse, often abruptly. We’ll change our conceptions of what’s mine and what’s yours (a change of heart) before we break the laws of planetary physics.

I’m not a Christian, so I don’t believe I’m going to heaven. I don’t believe you’re going to heaven either. But as every mystic knows, let go. The long journey to enlightenment is simply a slow surrender of everything we thought was “us.” The Buddhist teacher Stephen Levine wrote in the classic Who Dies?:

“If you made a list of everything you own, everything you think of as you, everything that you prefer, that list would be the distance between you and the living truth.”

No me, no you. No property, no borders. I don’t believe in God, but I believe that this living truth mystical shit, made real, is heaven. I’m not going to heaven, and you’re not going to heaven. But when we all surrender ourselves, and let go, we’re going, ALL OF US, to heaven.

And we’ll realize it was always sitting right here, all along. All it took was metanoia, a change of heart. That’s what Jesus meant what he said the kingdom of heaven is upon us/within you. The ancients (Buddha) and the moderns (Shunryu Suzuki, Eckhart Tolle, Byron Katie) saying the same thing: It’s here, right now, if we just let go of that tight grip. Even our old friend Belinda Carlisle. They say in heaven, Love comes first:

I don’t believe in God. I’m not Christian.

But I want to be Christic. I want to commit to and delight in Love more than committing to and delighting in money. I want to trust in Love with all my heart, and do not lean on my own understanding. Intimacy with reality. No boundaries. Let go.

It takes time.

We’ll need to give each other grace.

Let’s go.

A lovely cohort of FF1 just started. If you haven’t done it, consider it! If you are alumni, send people. I always say this, but maybe my last cohort?7 More info here. FF1: it’s real and it’s spectacular.