Disconnected

[happytrails]

Where has God gone?
And why did he go?
I've prayed and I've asked
But I still don't know.

When I was a youth
God was right here
I faced life AND death
Without any fear.

Then He left
And I don't know why
Now I'm afraid of life
And I'm afraid to die.

I've looked in my head,
My heart and my soul,
But all I have found,
Is a dark empty hole.

I send up my prayers
On the wings of a bird
But he must lose his way
As my prayers are unheard.

Is it because
I don't get on my knees;
I don't bow my head
When I send up my pleas?

I pray and I beg
And I cry and I shout;
Give me back my faith.
Take away my doubt.

Those prayers go unanswered
And I am bereft.
I'm looking for God,
But God has left.

[jim turner]

Doggonit! The older you get the better you become. As for the departure of God, long ago, learning of so much cruelty, I began to doubt He was ever here. I thought maybe He was concerned only with the planet; then I realized He has allowed it to become a landfill. Even the oceans are full of our trash. How can that be? jim

[SmileGRL]

i think we all struggle with this question at some point in our lives.

here's what i've learned so far

it's not that god has left us. it's that most people expect that if they worship and fear him, he will protect them. it's that most people expect god to stop the hurt and then doesn't. most of us are raised to believe in a god that will judge us if we sin, but then grows up to witness a god that does nothing while people rape and murder and plunder and destroy.

if we cling to these believes, the only explanation we can find for the chaotic state of the world, is... "this can not be part of god's plan, therefore god must have left the building."

here's the thing...it's not god's job to stop the hurt. it's our job to experience all that is life (including hurt). it is our choice how we deal with it. and it's up to us to find our own balance and strength in spirituality or organized religion, or whatever we choose.

"judgment" comes in the form of karma. (if you sow bad karma, you will reap bad karma). not because god is judging us, but because the balance needs to be restored.

bad things happen to us, not because god has turned his back on us, but because it is part of life. it's what moves us, makes us grow. it forces us to re-examine everything that we know. if we are stuck in our childhood beliefs and refuses to consider other possibilities when our original beliefs doesn't work for us anymore, that's when we feel abandoned and lost in our faith. faith is not supposed to be a stagnant thing. it grows, when we allow ourselves to expand.

if your faith isn't enough for you to make sense of the world anymore, give yourself permission to search wider. read books, listen to others views, try something new. you will likely come across a lot of things that looks like nonsense or offends you, but don't stop until you find something that does make sense and allows you to find peace with whatever it is you're struggling with.

[stilltrucking]

I can relate to this one HT
I have lost my faith too
now I miss it
The world made so much more sense to me when I was still an atheist.
I wish I could be an atheist again



I like this song a lot
Randy Newman wrote it for God.
Pretty much how I feel about that mighty smitey patriarchal god of my mother
How do you know G d is a He? Because your Bible tells you so?

Cain slew Abel Seth knew not why
For if the children of Israel were to multiply
Why must any of the children die?
So he asked the Lord
And the Lord said:

"Man means nothing he means less to me
than the lowiliest cactus flower
or the humblest yucca tree
he chases round this desert
cause he thinks that's where i'll be
that's why i love mankind

I recoil in horror from the foulness of thee
from the squalor and the filth and the misery
How we laugh up here in heaven at the prayers you offer me
That's why i love mankind"

The Christians and the Jews were having a jamboree
The Buddhists and the Hindus joined on satellite TV
They picked their four greatest priests
And they began to speak
They said "Lord the plague is on the world
Lord no man is free
The temples that we built to you
Have tumbled into the sea
Lord, if you won't take care of us
Won't you please please let us be?"

And the Lord said
And the Lord said

"I burn down your cities--how blind you must be
I take from you your children and you say how blessed are we
You must all be crazy to put your faith in me
That's why i love mankind
You really need me
That's why i love mankind"

Please pardon the ramble

[SmileGRL]

i guess it all boils down to choice. when life gets hard, you can choose to loose yourself in self pity or sarcasm against a god you don't understand or you can pick yourself up and look for something that makes more sense.

this is not me picking a fight with anyone. (we are all entitled to our own beliefs.) just me saying there are more ways of dealing with lost faith than just accepting it.

i'm not saying we shouldn't struggle. i'm saying we shouldn't give up.

[stilltrucking]

I suppose I sound sarcastic, maybe I am, I don't think so but I am crazy jack son of crazy mike the most sarcastic son bitch that ever walked a lonesome valley
but I I think I am sincere
I do believe
in that amazing grace that saved a wretch like me.
but my faith is heretical
I know what is at stake.


Buddhism makes more sense to me than any religion I have been exposed to
We are a lamp unto ourselves
but maybe if we let our little light shine we can be a refuge for each other to help us pass through this lonesome valley that we must all walk by ourselves.

Or maybe my faith is more mature now
then when I believed that a personal G d that was at my beck and call.

what ever gets us through our long nights
give me that old time religion
"lets all worship Zarathrusta just like we use ta"
I still believe in happy endings

never did i invoke
prayer absolute
so selflessly
for the soul of another
as when i threw his work
Thus Spake Zarathustra
across the room

------
for Nietzsche we will wait
for time itself to crumble
pay for its drone
over and again
nappy headed songs
of missing the larger point
and making a god of being
a thorn in the side of the highest high


e-piph[lol] on The I Can't Wait Word Jam! September 2005
http://www.studioeight.tv/phpbb/viewtop ... ake#p30055

[SmileGRL]

i apologize if you think the sarcasm comment was directed at you, jack. it was not directed at any specific person. i think a lot of people that get "lost" in their faith get sarcastic and/or fall into self pity at some point. it's natural but it would be sad to get stuck there.

i'm also not advocating any specific religion here. unless having an open mind is considered a religion. heh.

i don't mean to preach to anyone. sometimes i get the urge to share my thoughts this way and it doesn't always come out polite. i do appreciate when people make themselves vulnerable by sharing their poetry or thoughts about weighty subjects like religion. and i have the utmost respect for every persons individual spiritual journey. there is no right or wrong here. just people sharing. please forgive me if i came over as arrogant, pushy or judgmental. that was not my intention.

thank you for sharing this poem ht. it's well written and thought provoking and i can see your struggle all the way through.

[stilltrucking]

I found it easier to be an atheist than a Christian
But I can't go back there is no turning my back on G d once I first believed

there is no right or wrong here. just people sharing. please forgive me if i came over as arrogant, pushy or judgmental. that was not my intention.

You can't appologize to me
you have nothing to appologize for
maybe you mistook my fear for sarcasm
every thing is personal to me
I am lucky to be here
I am not right MJ
I think it is some sort of autism
I am sorry if I made you feel bad
I try to be aware of how insensitve I sound
but there a child's mind behind it
"not cruel, just honest" Plath from geezer memory
sorry if I tagged your poem Ht
I am pretty stupid about poetry
it is a trip for me
but without the downside of LSD.
i apologize for my sarcasm if that is what it is
god knows I got a streak of it
still working on that.
still just a lump of coal
but I might be a diamond one day.

____________---------------------------------_______________

RE: Plath quote

"The Death Throes of Romanticism: The Poetry of Sylvia Plath"
by Joyce Carol Oates

Originally published in Southern Review, July 1973. Reprinted in New Heaven, New Earth.
Copyright © by Joyce Carol Oates


I am not cruel, only truthful—
The eye of a little god. . . .
Plath, Mirror


Tragedy is not a woman, however gifted, dragging her shadow around in a circle, or analyzing with dazzling scrupulosity the stale, boring inertia of the circle; tragedy is cultural, mysteriously enlarging the individual so that what he has experienced is both what we have experienced and what we need not experience—because of his, or her, private agony.
http://jco.usfca.edu/throes.html

[stilltrucking]

I am solitary as grass. What is it I miss?
Shall I ever find it, whatever it is?

ibid

I suppose the line about the how do you know because your Bible told you so is sarcasm. But it is also a sincere question
about what
I have assumed G d to be. I don't even want to use the word God anymore. All we got is these got dam words, but some us have poetry
thank you for sharing yours.
I know I am sarcastic but I would hate to be sarcastic on the poetry board. People sharing their poetry, don't need my obsidian words.

I would not want to be a thorn in the side of the most high

[SmileGRL]

you didn't say anything that i found sarcastic, jack. it was just a generalization.

the "how do you know god is a he, because your bible tells you so?" is a valid question that a lot of people have asked before. i guess a lot of people, even when they realize there's no human traits (like gender or race) where god is concerned, sticks with "he" because it's uncomfortable to navigate around a god of no gender (...do you keep saying he, do you say he/she, do you talk around the gender??? so we take the easiest way out and stick with he). i, for one, do that and also i try to respect people that still thinks of god as he. it makes the subject of god more approachable.

you didn't make me feel bad either, jack. i just realized that i'm so open about what i believe and so direct with other people sometimes that i forget to show respect and tact. i'm like a kid that found something and wants to wrap a bow around it and give it to everyone regardless of if they want it or not.

i appreciate every communication we have, no matter how flawed you may think you are. i think deep down we are all growing from the bits of fertilizer and the drops of water each person drops on our roots whether intentional or unintentional. and this is why we are attracted to friendships with people on forums like this. i think it's either compassion and grace or catalysts given to us to help us navigate our journeys.

Tragedy is not a woman, however gifted, dragging her shadow around in a circle, or analyzing with dazzling scrupulosity the stale, boring inertia of the circle; tragedy is cultural, mysteriously enlarging the individual so that what he has experienced is both what we have experienced and what we need not experience—because of his, or her, private agony.

this is an awesome quote.

[joel]

I send up my prayers
On the wings of a bird
But he must lose his way
As my prayers are unheard.

I pray and I beg
And I cry and I shout;
Give me back my faith.
Take away my doubt.

I’ve long wanted faith, belief I could trust,
trust I could pin on The Holy that’s just,
faith like a wisdom I’d know in my head,
belief in a life that never says Dead.
I’ve long sought a thought, a proof there is truth,
proof that the love to Naomi from Ruth
might be a symbol of One’s love to me
where it’s the truth that there’s true unity.
I’ve longed for less fear, for less fearful dread,
fewer high numbers of nightmares in bed,
fewer the fires of hellflames that burn,
fewer the prayers where I ask less to yearn
for faith I have wanted, faith that I lack.
Maybe it’s faith just to pray it comes back.

[happytrails]

Joel, you sent a shiver up my spine with this.