It is true that traditionally God and Christ have been predominantly associated with the male gender and masculine principle (a "He"), at least in the West. What we need to decide today is if that traditional interpretation, these symbols of the Divine, are still valid, and accurate, and if they point to truth in the present, or if we need a better interpretation of these symbols as a society, a culture, in our interspirituality, in the world today.
Tag: incarnation
Reconstructing Mormonism’s “Holy Ghost”
The "Holy Ghost" is perhaps one of the most mysterious figures in Mormon theology (and perhaps more generally in Christianity). Many Mormons likely know this being of the Godhead as a "personage of spirit," which "has not a body of flesh and bones," "were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell within us" (D&C 130:22). This already begins to sound quite supernatural, a ghostly person that may come and dwell within me? How are we to make sense of this?
What is the Second Coming?
One of the most profound realizations I've had in recent years is that the Second Coming is something that we can effect through our "repentance" (metanoia = a change of mind, or conscious perception of the world).
What is the Spirit or Soul?
Many religious people believe that the spirit or soul is the ego-self, our personality, the person we think we are in our heads, our psychological "self," with all our memories and experiences and relationships, etc. But none of this existed at our birth.
The Mystical Meaning of Christmas
At this time of year the Christian world celebrates the birth of Jesus during a holy day we call Christmas. This birth happened some two thousand years ago, which brought into the world a man who many billions of people today have come to adore and worship as both human and divine.
We Awaken in Christ’s Body, by Symeon
We awaken in Christ’s body
as Christ awakens our bodies,
and my poor hand is Christ, He enters
my foot, and is infinitely me.
Non-Self Reveals the True Self
When the false self dies—the ego, the old creature, the constructed personality, the illusory self, the separate independent idea of one's self, the man of sin, the son of perdition, the natural man, the carnal mind—when this is seen for what it really is, when it is revealed in truth, when it is put off, taken out of the way, when it is crucified and passes away, then the true Self is revealed in glory.