Probably a bit of an odd topic but it's something I have been thinking about and working with so I thought maybe theres someone else out there that has the same issues. I love the Wiccan idea of a God and a Goddess. And I love having identities for my God and Goddess, patrons if you will. I had always stuggled with the identity of my patron God because I have worshipped and loved Jesus for so long. And there's been much talk of integrating Pagan and Christian beliefs because it's almost impossible to deny what you have believe most of your life, well for me anyway. So I finally settled on letting my patron God be Jesus. Anyone else come to this conclusion? Another question to go with this, there are tons of little prayers and mantras to the Goddess but I'm having a hard time finding any to the God, much less to Jesus. Any thoughts?
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Missouri
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Re: God
Sat, May 5, 2007 - 2:06 AMJesus is not a god. Don't worship Jesus. Learn from Jesus. You can call God anything you want, Goddess, whatever. That doesn't matter. God said you can't place any other gods before God, but that doesn't mean you can't call God by some other name. That just means you can't worship anything, like money or power, more than God.
Tony -
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Re: God
Sat, May 5, 2007 - 2:37 PMWell specifically the God of Abraham... which I believe means YHVH (so I can say "god damn it" all I want as long as I don't spell out "yaweh" in print... oops!) -- it was an admonition to the jews to ensure that any of the deities commonly worshiped by the Egyptians or others would be secondary to Abraham's God, included in the "ten commandments" (of which there are actually 15) as a means of emphasizing their separation from the Egyptians immediately following the exodus. As with most things that are pervasive in our culture, Wikipedia's entry on the 10 commandments is pretty thorough. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten_Commandments Jesus being or not being god or a god is debatable -- if you interpret the bible literally, "and the word was god and the word became flesh" seems to indicate that Jesus is synonymous with god. Though I personally believe Jesus is a literary character anyway and as symbols go I would say one patron deity is as good as another. It's a matter of choice -- the more important thing in my opinion is that you make up your own mind about what you choose to believe or not believe or use as your symbols. -
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Re: God
Thu, May 10, 2007 - 8:15 AMOh man I so totally agree with Ike on this one. Marry me and birth my babies! :)) -
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Re: God
Thu, May 10, 2007 - 11:50 AM::blush::
I might consider that offer ... if I believed in marriage anymore... or... if I were capable of giving birth. :P Heck I'm not even capable of getting somebody else knocked up anymore... got me snipped after I split with my ex 6 yrs ago. -
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Re: God
Thu, May 10, 2007 - 4:51 PM~whew~ Now I know I'm in lust (you said clipped)
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Re: God
Mon, May 14, 2007 - 4:54 PMThe book "Carmina Gadelica" is a collection of Hymns and Incantations collected from Scotland in the last Century. Most of them are short little prayers to God and Christ and occasionally Mary. They are easily reworded towards Goddess and the like- i know many pagans who have done so with these prayers. Even if you are not Scottish, you may find them to be good prayers and blessings.
The Scottish and Irish people kept a lot of their 'pagan' or pre-christian notions and wove them into their Christian beliefs. Many of these poems and writtings seem like they were orginally pagan and just reworded in to Christian.
I understand your love for Jesus and desire to deify Him- He's teachings are wonderful and worth holding in as high esteem as a Patron God, but as someone (sorry name forgotten) mentioned He's not a God, nor is He even a Saint. If it helps, remember that it's entirely possible that the God Jesus called 'Father' is the same God that pagans call 'Lord'. -
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Re: God
Tue, May 15, 2007 - 2:24 PMhuh... funny, seems to me like the fact that Jesus is *not* a canonized saint would be an argument *for* the idea that Jesus = God rather than against it ...
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Re: God
Tue, May 15, 2007 - 3:25 PMForgive me if this sounds angry but I am rather annoyed. I thought part of being pagan was the ability to worship God in any form, from any pantheon of any religion. And in the Christian pantheon, Jesus is an incarnation of God. I still hold on to quite a few of my Christian upbringings because I believe them to be true and valid. Paganism says you can worship God in whatever guise you please, it's all the same Divine. You say Jesus was human, not even a saint. Mary was a proven human being. Both Mary's. But people worship her as their form of the Goddess. So stop telling me I'm wrong for worshipping Jesus as my form of God. please and thank you. It's my right. All I was asking in this thread was if anyone else still worshipped Jesus and if anyone knew any good short prayers to the Christian Jesus or God the Father of Christian mythology. -
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Re: God
Tue, May 15, 2007 - 4:58 PMGood for you Rajani! That's a very positive affirmation of your right to choose. :) I don't think there's anything wrong with "sounding angry" -- you managed to express your feelings (which you have every right to) without being derogatory to anyone... which is sometimes difficult even for us adults. I let myself slip recently actually in response to someone on a mailing list saying "would somebody teach this guy some basic 3rd grade math". And I degenerated to where he was... See the dif? Nothing wrong with what you said here.
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Re: God
Tue, May 15, 2007 - 8:31 PMAs far as I know the only diety that IS a saint is St. Bride.
Pharohs were worshiped as incarnations of Ra.
The historically known and verified high-priest Imhotep was diefied for his healing abilities.
Kuan Yin's tale starts her out as an emperor's daughter who is later diefied.
I think it was Yuma, who was diefied because the gods were amazed that he could be so destructive.
There is speculation that Odin is a diefication of a known and highly traveled chieftain named Odin who set up several sons as chiefs in many areas that he passed through and likely conquered.
Atum, by some accounts, the diefied first man, and Adam are thought to be the same person
The Egyptian Set is likely a diefication of the Biblical human Seth.
The entire Tuatha de Danannan pantheon, as well as the gods they deposed and the gods that deposed them, appear to be a historical tribe of humans who conquered Ireland.
Jesus, as The Christ, has been worshipped as an incarnation of God for almost 2000 years, now.
Whether any of us choose to honor him or not, I think he qualifies as a diefied being.
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Re: God
Wed, May 16, 2007 - 9:55 AMyou are correct and I apologize for offending you. It was very unfair of me to judge you on your beliefs. I can only speak for myself and my opinions and i would like to share with you why I made the comment that I did. In my own belief system, raised Xtain, nor pagan, I do not believe that Jesus was an incarnation of God. I believe he was a good person, a human born of two mortal parents and that his teachings and ideas where very close to god. Through my study of Theology I have come to the -personal- conclusion that after his death others imposed the idea of him being a God incarnation. I greatly respect and honour the man that was Jesus, but i see it as a disservice to his humanity to deify him. Christianity is all about being like Jesus to be closer to God and I don't see how that could be even remotely possible if he is a Demi-God and the rest of us mere mortals. For me there's no way in all that is holy i can come close to Jesus if he's a God. But if he is a human, with faults and foibles like all of us than I can see a glimmer of a chance at being like him, like his teachings and therefore closer to God.
However- that being said I have absolutely no right to impose my personal thoughts on you and for that I sincerely, sincerely apologize.
You are correct that both Marys have also been made into Goddesses by some and i also believe that does them as much a disservice. Again I, personally, honour and respect them, but to make them deity's take away their strength as powerful women in a time when women were heavily oppressed.
You are not wrong in your beliefs and it was unkind and rude to pass such judgment.
I do hope that you take a look at "Carmina Gadelica" you will find some wonderful prayers and blessings. i was looking through my copy and i found this little blessing:
"May Mary's son Himself
be a generous lamp to you,
to guide you over
the great and awful ocean of eternity."
there are better ones, but they are much longer and I have to go get breakfast for me son,
Anne -
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Re: God
Mon, May 21, 2007 - 12:15 AMIt started with Paul, who wrote most of the books in the New Testament. Paul spent his time in opposition to Jesus, even killing Jesus' apostles. Then suddenly Paul "finds Jesus" as they say. The reality is a leopard can not change his spots, nor can Paul become a good person just like that. Paul was still a killer at heart, and the Churches worshiped him, so the Churches based themselves on the teachings of a killer. Is it any wonder that we've had so many "christian wars"?. The teachings of a killer is killing or how to justify killing.
Paul says the opposite of what Jesus says on many points. Pretty much everything, in fact. Jesus says don't judge, and Paul tells people to be prejudice, to stay away from people who are not "good christians".
Yes, Jesus was a man, a regular human just like you and me. The Bible makes it very clear that Jesus' father is Joseph. A lot of the prophecies require Jesus to be Joseph's son. Jesus' birth was predicted in several places in the Old Testament. Even on the first page of the Bible, there's a reference to the birth of Jesus, even giving the date.
Gen 1:14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
Gen 1:15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
Gen 1:16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
Gen 1:17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
Gen 1:18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
The word "for" to a child sounds like "4", so we have 4 signs, 4 seasons, 4 days and 0 years. Now in Hebrew that stuff might have been left out, so they'd only have "the fourth day" telling them there'd be 4 days. A day is 1000 years, so that makes it 4,000 years in the 4th season when Christ "The greater light" was to be born. The reference to "the stars" was to refer us to a dream by Joseph to give us more details about the birth of Jesus.
The first page of Matthew gives the lineage of Joseph all the way back to Abraham. Why? If Joseph is nobody, who cares about his lineage? It is there, so we understand when it says things like "there shall come a star out of Jacob", it is referring to the birth of Jesus. We know from the lineage, that Jesus' father is "out of Jacob" or of Jacob's lineage, 'cause Matthew tells us that. If Jesus wasn't the son of Joseph, than we wouldn't know if Jesus was "out of Jacob", 'cause Mary's lineage was not traced.
If you believe the crap the churches teach, you won't understand what God is trying to tell us. It's like they say, a lie just keeps getting bigger and bigger. Everything connected to Jesus' father is thrown out, then everything connected to things that are connected to Jesus' father are thrown out, etc. Before you know it, the Bible is completely meaningless.
Tony -
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Re: God
Mon, May 21, 2007 - 8:52 AMboy I wish I knew the languages better... I'd be willing to bet that the number 4 and the word "for" (or translations of them) aren't homonyms in either hebrew or aramaic. -
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Re: God
Mon, May 21, 2007 - 11:56 PMI don't think they used a word "for" in Hebrew. That doesn't matter. God controls the languages, and God controls the interpreting of the Bible.
Many things in the Bible were not intended to be understood in those days. For example, Jesus talks about "Father Abraham" as a lier and as having existed after Jesus. We know the Abraham in the Bible was not a lier, he always told the truth. He was a bit of a scumbag, but he was an honest scumbag, therefore we know that Jesus was not talking about him. Therefore, the people of that time could not have possibly understood Jesus' references to "Father Abraham", as they didn't know who Father Abraham was or when or where he would live.
If we were to take some book about a true story or something If we took that book and had people rewrite it word for word, over and over and over again, like the scribes did in the old days. We would eventually end up with the Word of God. The original content would eventually be lost or badly distorted, and the book would appear messed up and untruthful, as the Bible does in many places, but the words would contain messages from God.
God communicates to us not just in the Bible, but in many other ways as well. In fairy tales, in movies, in books, in wiccan spells, in pagan rituals, in church rituals as well. Even those church fantasies (for lack of a better term) contain messages from God. To understand these messages, you have to let go of your preconceived notions about word meanings and about what you think or want it to mean, and allow it to mean what it really means. The true meanings are much more logical and agree with what we know of science.
Tony -
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Re: God
Tue, May 22, 2007 - 9:36 AMseems like a ghastly stretch to me ... I believe that god or "consciousness" is in everything and therefore there is no reason why we would have needed a flesh and blood jesus -- a literary jesus would have been just fine for the purposes of god or anyone else, just as a literary Buddha was just fine, etc... if god is in all things (including those things we dislike such as war, slavery, etc.) then there is no need of physical manifestations of god -- because everything we experience is a physical manifestation of god, including stories, and in fact *stories* is how Jesus teaches his followers in the bible -- hence no need to try and force an interpretation of the bible that "proves" Jesus to have been a physical person -- *and* -- I think believing that religious figures are literary in nature will help us get a lot closer to world peace ... but hey, who am I to judge? :)
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Re: God
Mon, May 21, 2007 - 11:13 AMThe Bible is far from meaningless! It's a great concoction of stories, embellished truths and sensible wisdoms. It's those people who choose to use this book as a method to place fear in others, thus forcing them to succumb to their "perception" of these stories, that should be getting a good flogging. Every human being has a right to believe in a greater power, and GOD, Jesus and his disciples, or any other character in the Bible are just as worthy of one's devotion as those entities that we, as pagans, elect to pay homage to. As I would not appreciate anyon telling me I am wrong in my religious or spiritual choices, nor do I propose to do this to someone else.
It's really pointless for us to hold our past religious experiences against those people that "forced" us to adhere to them as children. They think it was the right thing, as it was affirmation of their personal belief system that they were attempting to instill in their children. Now, all grown up and on our own, it's not difficult to make a choice for yourself. Choose...decide...VOILA!...done. Meaningless to me is forcing yourself into years of inner conflict and turmoil and rue over a childhood of the past rather than focusding all of that energy onto the present and the future. One can make all sorts of excuses why you fell so angry about it, but, face it, that's only creating negative energy in a world that offers so much more to you through positive energy.
Get your chakra on straight and let go of the past, and focus on your personal spirituality now. When someone forces their religious viewpoint on you, it's up to you whether or not to just sit there and take it, defend your own beliefs, or simply opt not to waste a lot of precious energy on an argument that will never end.
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Re: God
Sat, May 26, 2007 - 10:06 AMTony,
Every decision I have come to regarding God, Goddess, what to call them and how to worship I have come to after much soul searching and pondering. I reexamine every belief I had held since childhood several years ago. I came to the conclusion that Jesus was God on my own terms, my own time. I did not "just believe all the crap the church teaches". I stopped that years ago. You are entited to your opinions. I am not saying that you have to worship Jesus as God or that you are wrong. But I am also entitled to my opinions. Pagan means being able to worship God in any form. As I said in a previous post, both Mary's have been deified and they are proven humans as well. Don't tell me who I can and cannot worship. It is not your place to correct me. God reveals Himself to me as He sees fit and if that be in the form of Jesus Christ, so be it.
I am an avid Bible scholar as well and should you so desire, I can provide just as many Bible verses that attest to Jesus' divinity. Please dont make this into a battle over who's right and who's wrong. All I asked when I started this thread was if there were any prayers anyone knew of to Jesus and if anyone else still worshipped Him. I did not ask if I were correct in my belief of Jesus as God.
Go find someone else to preach to that isnt so sure of their own beliefs. You will not sway me. -
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Moderator's input
Sun, May 27, 2007 - 6:17 PMWe are each allowed our own opinions and beliefs.
This is a tribe where both sides of the fence will come in contact with each other.
From the beginning I forsaw (sometimes heated) debates as a result of such divergent beliefs.
But.....(to keep the peace)
Rajani started this thread to pursue a topic of her choosing - input from those with similar beliefs.
As far as I'm concerned, this is her thread, for that purpose.
If any member wishes to start a thread discussing belief systems, they are more than welcome. In fact, I would likely find such discussion enjoyable. But as clearly expressed in Rajani's previous post, those discussions are not welcome in this (her) thread and will henceforth be deleted.
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Re: God
Thu, May 17, 2007 - 6:20 AMRajani...you are corrrect. Paganism is making a choice "outside the box". Again and again and again I repeat this one thing...live with morality and it shouldn't matter who or WHAT you worship in the process.
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Re: God
Tue, July 17, 2007 - 3:31 PMI had a similar reaction when I read those posts about not calling Jesus God. I don't think he will mind. Jesus deserves worship more than that evil puppetmaster Yaweh. A little too judgemental for my taste, but I totally understand the need to put a name to god. I still haven't.
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Re: God
Mon, May 28, 2007 - 8:40 AMnicely said ken.
Rajani-- with regards to your quest to find prayers, blessings etc to God and Jesus, have you wandered through the sacred text archives? www.sacred-texts.com/chr/index.htm i haven't done a lot of wandering in the Christian section, but have spend many, too many hours, in the pagan. Perhaps you may find what you are looking for there.
Don't forget the power of your own pen, either. If you can't find want you're looking for why not write something yourself? it would be a very powerful way for you to come into relationship with God and Jesus. Just another thought.
if you do write for yourself- it would be lovely to read what you write- if your willing to share something so personal.
good luck on your quest.
Anne -
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Re: God
Tue, May 29, 2007 - 6:52 AMOh wow. That's quite a find. Thanks Annell! I'll have to look through there. That's quite a collection of texts. -
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Re: God
Tue, May 29, 2007 - 2:15 PMglad you like it! it is an awesome website. If you find what you're looking for, would you post a link?
I, for one, am curious about what moves people to Spirit (or whatever name you choose) and though we got off to the wrong foot, I am genuinely interested in understanding YOUR understanding of God and Spirit because it differs from mine.
I hope that you can feel comfortable to share and I will be sure to double check that my foot in not in my mouth before i hit submit ever again.
Anne
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Re: God
Thu, June 14, 2007 - 10:21 PMIt might be interesting for you to know Rajani that when Christianity first started to form there were many different groups and interpretations. It took several hundred years and lots of rather violent disagreements before the bible was eventually worked out.
I watched a documentry about all the different books that didn't make it into the bible, including writings from Peter and Mary Magdaliene, but I digress. Annoyingly I can't remember their names but there was a group of Christians that were wiped out fairly early on. Historian's only know about them because they were decried as heretics in several surviving pieces of literiture from the time. Their belief was founded on the fact that the Jewish God of the Old Testement was vengeful and full of wrath, but the new God was about mercy and compassion. Therefore they thought it logical that these two gods were actually two seperate entities entirely, the new one trying to save souls from the anger of the old.
In this context it isn't hard to see Jesus as the incarnation of this new forgiving God and I don't see any problems with you worshipping Jesus as your patron deity. Though in my experiance pagan gods and the monotheistic gods don't mix, they don't have to be mutually exclusive, you just have to have good diplomatic skills on hand, just in case. :)
Out of interest who is your female deity? -
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Re: God
Fri, June 15, 2007 - 12:05 PMHey wasn't there a notion that the Baphomet of the Knights Templar if you ran it through a cipher the Jews had created (can't remember the name of it offhand) translated as the greek goddes Diana? Not that it has anything to do with anything I was just suddenly reminded of that by your question of the female deity.
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Re: God
Wed, September 5, 2007 - 3:47 PMMy own belief is that god's don't exist outside of men/women
But anyway, gnosis and godforming would be keywords for that.
You can't really integrate pagan and christian beliefs.
The christian/abrahamic religions are all based around magnified shame and suffering.
Being ashamed of your humanity, sexuality, pagan spiritual visions, and pray in mortal terror to the cross where you can keep in mind what happens to people who don't follow along with the herd. -
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Integrating Christian and Pagan Beliefs
Sat, January 12, 2008 - 5:48 PMOf course you can integrate Christian and Pagan belief systems. The Christians have been doing it pretty much from the start of their religion.
One of the first things missionaries try to achieve is to explain that the pagan beliefs of a culture are correct but misguided. Then they work to integrate the two in a way that the locals will accept, slowly converting them to the new God through explanation and example.
You only need to look at similarities between Christian and Roman paganism to realise that the date of the birth of Christ and the birth of Mithras the Roman sun god are both on the 25th of December. From the very beginning of Christianity becoming a major religion there was give and take on both sides until Christianity subsumed the original faith.
If Christians were ashamed of spiritual visions there would be no prophecies and the Book of Revelations would never have made it into the bible. Indeed even now 'faith healers' and 'miracle workers' are celebrated within Christianity and believed to be blessed by God to do things that other people cannot.
I do get the feeling that you've been hanging out with the wrong type of Christians. In every religion there are those who are intolerant to another's faith or anyone who is perceived different. I have met many pagans who are just as intolerant and get very indignant if you do a ritual they are familiar with in a different way to what they are accustomed to; even if it's just a different colour of candle or a slight change in the wording. They can become down right abusive and even threatening if you happen to follow a God or religion that they perceive as anathema.
This is a problem across the board, not just in a certain type of faith, whether mono or poly theistic. It really is down to the person, not the faith that they follow, as to how they interpret what is right and what is wrong and how they deal with it.
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