Deepak Chopra and Proof of God: Personal experience is the most convincing proof

[Guest guest]

>

> i) All Holy Scriptures declare life is eternal;

> ii) The resurrection of Jesus Christ demonstrated that human

> evolution into that eternal spirit, a fundamental promise of all

> Holy Scriptures, is a fact;

> iii) The Advent and Message of Shri Mataji as the Comforter/Holy

> Spirit/Ruh meets the exacting requirements of eschatology;

> iv) Shri Mataji is verily the incarnation of the Adi Shakti/Holy

> Spirit/Ruh of God Almighty;

> v) adishakti.org is the only unassailable evidence available for

> those who want to confirm all the above before pursuing life

> eternal.

>

> Almost daily adishakti.org reminds me that the Divine Feminine

> within is omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing), and

> omnipresent (always present everywhere). These attributes solely

> belong to God Almighty and His Power (Shakti), and adishakti.org

> confirms those attributes. Unlike the vast majority, my faith in the

> Divine is based on the experience, evidence and enlightenment of

> eschatological evolution. Can you name even a single priest, pastor,

> reverend, bishop, pope, rabbi, cleric, imam, mullah, shaikh, ulema,

> ayatollah, guru, swami, pandit, brahmin, acarya, bhagwan, amma,

> granthi, giani, lama, monk, or dalai lama capable of giving you that

> experience, evidence and enlightenment of eschatological evolution?

>

 

 

Deepak Chopra

Proof of God Never Stands Still

Posted: October 9, 2009

 

What makes the best 'case for God' to a skeptic or non-believer, an

open-minded seeker, and to a person of faith and Why?

 

The Trappist monk and writer Thomas Merton remarked that God is

always a step ahead of the seeker, having just departed wherever the

seeker arrives. That's true for anyone who seeks proof of God. The

debate is constantly changing its ground. But it wouldn't be true of

personal experience, which is the most convincing proof to any

individual, an immediate sense that God's presence is here and now

(although much less convincing to friends and family who stand by as

spectators).

 

The Bible contains almost no intellectual arguments for God's

existence, being entirely filled with direct experience. Jehovah

talks to the prophets: Jesus performs supernatural miracles. In

modern times the reverse is true. We hunger for objective evidence of

all things, even things that cannot help but be subjective, such as

beauty or for that matter, thinking itself.

 

The essential question isn't which type of proof is convincing but

whether any proof is possible. Science has steadily eroded religion

by saying, in essence, that there is no proof that satisfies

experimental inquiry. In the eighteenth century most people would

have accepted the argument from design, a rational proposition which

pointed to the intricacy of Nature and declared that there must be a

Creator behind it. Although such an argument can be updated, not

through the creationism of Intelligent Design but by a rigorous

argument against randomness, that has proven to be too great a leap

for people inculcated to believe that randomness is, in fact, the

basis of the universe since the Big Bang.

 

I'd offer that convincing arguments for God depend upon several

factors:

 

- Getting rid of the notion that God is a person.

- Throwing out all dogma and religious conditioning.

- Looking into the nature of consciousness, which links the observer

to reality.

- Taking seriously the concept of an intelligent universe, which

implies self-awareness as primary in Nature, not a chance development

in human beings.

 

There are now countless books by a diverse range of thinkers to

support all these avenues of exploration. But ultimately, without an

understanding of consciousness one can't possibly explain God or the

numinous, or expand from personal awareness to divine awareness.

Perception changes with the perceiver, including perception of God.

Such an ever-elusive deity cannot be the real thing, only a mirror of

our own restless awareness. Therefore, to be fully real, God must be

perceived at a level of consciousness that isn't personal or

shifting. In the East such changeless consciousness is available in a

state known as enlightenment, the Christian equivalent of grace. In a

secular society such a state of consciousness has yet to be defined

and widely accepted (although millions of people meditate or pray,

hoping to meet the divine face to face).

 

Theology has lagged far behind in helping us explore God personally

or define the state of God consciousness, unfortunately, being

occupied with side issues like defending one faith against another or

trying to lure believers back into the church or synagogue.

Scientists have done a far better job, ironically, by dismantling

outworn notions about reality, but it's rare to find a scientist who

is professionally interested in either God or consciousness. God is

considered so unscientific to begin with that few researchers

consider this a valid field, except for the purposes of a debunker a

la Richard Dawkins, who does nothing more than repeat the tired

clichés of skeptical materialism. Telling us all the reasons that

finding God is impossible, attempts to prove a negative and is

useless in explaining the great thinkers, sages, and saints who

assure us that God is real.

 

So where do we stand now? On our own two feet -- seekers must find

proof that satisfies them, one person at a time. It's not an easy

journey, but it never was, except to those who preferred blind faith

over personal exploration. The reason that the Kingdom of Heaven is

within is that God is a state of consciousness; there is nowhere to

look but within. The deity may be infinite, all-pervasive, and ever-

present, but proof of God is on the move, shifting as fast as our own

perceptions.

 

Published in the Washington Post OnFaith

www.huffingtonpost.com/deepak-chopra/proof-of-god-never-stands_b_315594.html