Spirituality Survey

Take the ExploreFaith Quiz and Find Your Place on the Spiritual Spectrum:

This little survey (I don't think "quiz" is quite the right word...) gave me an extremely worthwhile picture of where I'm at on my Spiritual Path. Ten questions and quite a bit of insight gained!

I'm reproducing the introductory explanation and the ten questions below.

The intro. because, even if you read it again when you go to the site, it can't hurt to be clear about the parameters of the experience...

The questions because I think it's a good idea to briefly ponder the issues before you actually take the survey:

"Think of the questions below as the first marks on a canvas. Like many quizzes pertaining to faith, this one traces the edges of your spiritual life and how you relate to the sacred. Yet this quiz also reminds us that we are all works in progress, that portraits begun in black and white come alive when we add color. We need space to change and grow, and ways to help us fill out our lives and move ever closer to the Holy.

"Thus, your responses are not simply conclusions, they are beginning points for new discoveries, brilliant adventures and fruitful growth. In answering these 10 questions, you can both discern more clearly who you are, and discover new avenues for God's creative spirit to work within you. "

* I try to feel close to God through _________.

* When I have an extraordinary experience of God's presence, I _________.

* When I am questioned about my faith, I _________.

* If someone threatened to harm me unless I renounced my faith, I would _________.

* If I felt that God was calling me to perform an extraordinary feat, I would _________.

* When I feel disconnected to the Holy One and wonder about God’s presence, I _________.

* When others around me are trying to find God, I _________.

* If I were going through a period of doubt in my life, I would _________.

* If a story were written about my spiritual life, I’d want it to say that I _________.

* When I think of being a person of faith in my everyday life, I want to _________.

Go here >>> explorefaith.org and do the survey!

Dangerous Blogging

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Blogging can be dangerous ( Check out two and three posts before this one...) .

Just this morning, on the way to a religious party with my best friend, the topic of blogging and controversy came up--the tact necessary, especially when one steps into the arena of Spiritual Commentary On Current Events...

The other day, as I responded to a discussion post on a spiritually-oriented site (mentioning my Faith), I was met with extreme prejudice--"How in the world can you believe that?!" I responded with as much tact and gentleness as I could muster and will lay low for a bit in that particular discussion thread...

I want to mention our B.I.D.E. Global Blog Feed again (down the sidebar on the left).
I found the meat for this post there: Free Kareem: Egyptian Bloggers Speak Out.

A blogger being jailed (if the appeal doesn't work) for speaking his mind. . .

Here's a snippet of a very interesting blog post:

"Once again a religious institution is confusing itself with God: instead of seeing that they are part of the problem, they interpret any criticism of the institution as criticism of Allah, whereas Karim only did what Allah has told every Muslim to do: [Qur'an 4:135]: “O you who believe! be maintainers of justice, bearers of witness of Allah’s sake, though it may be against your own selves or (your) parents or near relatives; if he be rich or poor, Allah is nearer to them both in compassion; therefore do not follow (your) low desires, lest you deviate; and if you swerve or turn aside, then surely Allah is aware of what you do.”

Where Do I Turn?

So much is wrong in the world...

So much effort must be spent just to stay slightly positive...

Most folks just give up.

Oh, they may still go to a church or mosque or temple but beyond a passing prayer for peace, not much gets done...

Our post, The Death of Violence !, has 64 simple and powerful things each of us could do, every day, to further peace...

But...

Beyond the good deeds we all need to do lies the need for a solid connection to a Spiritual Path.

Back in the post, My God, Your God, Our God, I listed quite a few Names of God from different cultures and Faiths. Right here, I want to list these names of the major Founders of Religion: Zarathustra, Krishna, Buddha, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, The Báb, and Bahá’u’lláh.

More and more people are coming to realize that these Prophets of God were all speaking the same "Language". When you look carefully at the core teachings of each of Their Faiths, you find the very same Truths. The only real variance in what They each brought to us is in the social laws, which must change periodically as humanity grows up...

So, how does a person decide which Faith to cleave to? If they're all teaching basically the same thing why do people fight over their religious beliefs?

According to a WebPage titled, Major Branches of Religions Ranked by Number of Adherents, there are twelve "classical" major world religions and 65 "branches" in those twelve "classical" styles of Faith.

If you look at that page, you'll find Many More "sub-branches"...

Ever get the suspicion that all those flavors of religion are created by people and may or may not have much to do with God's Wishes?

The more I talk to earnest believers in various Faiths, the more I find agreement that the Prophets each brought the Faith of God and people immediately began to erode It's pristine beauty and purity, created their own materialized variants, and made it quite easy for massive human slaughter due to "religious" strife !

This is one post I really hope to get many comments on...

Doomsday !

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists sets the hands of the Doomsday Clock and that setting has changed many times since 1947.

Does it scare you to know that a group of supposedly educated individuals thinks we're closer to annihilating ourselves?

Does your Faith have anything to say about the End of the World?

Why have all the Major Faiths in recorded history included in their Scriptures a reference to the end of things as we know them? They've even predicted (symbolically) a time when the "End" will arrive. Even, in some cases, given hints that certain individuals have interpreted as definite dates for human, earthly annihilation...

If you don't have first hand info on what various Faiths have claimed, the Doomsday Guide is an interesting place to begin an investigation.

What does Your God say about the End of the World?