Yesterday I wrote about intuition as the marriage of human intelligence with divine wisdom. Here, let us go back to basics: Do we have faith in the existence of God? Do we have faith in the existence of transcendental wisdom and truth? My own guess is that deep down we are all a bit ambivalent about these questions. I say this because to acknowledge the existence of God means that we are not gods unto ourselves and that we must bow to something other than our own agendas or the pervading winds of culture. The opening chapters of Genesis perfectly capture this tension. Adam and Eve choose to listen to the mythological voice of the serpent, which asks, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?’” Translation: our capacity to ignore the voice of conscience and rationalize our behavior knows no limits. Far too often we want what we want over and above wanting the truth. Putin’s unjustified war against Ukraine is a prime example of this phenomenon. Bowing to a transcendental intelligence, to God’s will, does not make us weak or subservient. Rather, it empowers us to be fully human, fully alive, and fully creative. It empowers us to live and express the divine life here and now.
Thank God,
I am not God.
