- Boris Johnson will be replaced with a Prime Minister who is more competent, more right wing and more difficult to beat.
- A good year for Michael Gove (who is almost invisible at the moment).
- Church of Scotland General Assembly votes to allow same-sex couples to be married in church. More significantly, almost no-one leaves in a huff.
- No progress for those seeking marriage equality in the Church of England.
- US Republican Party do well at the November midterms.
- Midnight Mass will happen at St Mary’s Cathedral, Glasgow – some people will still be wearing masks but it won’t be mandatory.
- Lots of people discover that cryptocurrency is not the sure thing that they thought. (Losses will disproportionately affect young people).
- Nicola Sturgeon will be forced to announce a proposed date for an Independence Referendum against her better judgement.
- Lambeth Conference will take place but some people forced to participate virtually due to continued pandemic in developing world. (No new sanctions against pro-gay provinces).
- Working from home/hybrid working becomes normalised for big companies. Consequent increase in ransomware demands.
12 responses to “Do you believe that God intervenes in the world?”
-
I think this is probably the best way to think about prayer. When you say the world is affected by praying people, are you saying there is a link between prayer and improved behaviour or increased charity etc ?
-
Well, I guess if I think that I’m changed by prayer, I probably hope that it affects me for the better.
I might even be prepared to say that unless prayer changes the person praying, it probably isn’t being done right at all.
-
-
Thanks for this thoughtful piece.
I agree with you wholeheartedly that prayer is about me being silent before God for a moment. Such a silence is so necessary in the midst of our busy lives and busy minds.
But I do believe in healing – physical, emotional, and spiritual. I have no experience of physical healing but I have plenty of experience of the emotional kind. As someone who was left very angry and full of shame following an episode of abuse as a young child, I have certainly known God’s love wash away those feelings as I have been prayed for by friends.
-
Before I ever ventured into the concept of prayers being answered, my journey took me to a place where I asked myself “who or what is this G-d I am communicating with?”
My idea of g-d has nothing to do with an old man with a long beard sitting in the clouds looking down on us, but rather a positive spiritual consciousness that we are all connected to.
When I pray I tap into this consciousness and often prayer, when used as a form of meditation, brings to me the answers I need, even sometimes realising that they are not rhe answers I want.
Does g-d intervene? In my interpretation definitely yes. But not necessarily in the way we traditionally expect. Intervention from G-d in my life has always involved realisations as to how I should deal with the very personal things I pray about and for. I have often cleared my mind for prayer in Church and found unthought of solutions to my problems come rushing into the void.
As for tangible interventions such as g-d curing cancer, I think we find ourselves dealing with similar spiritual issues such as destiny, freedom of choice and the like which become interwoven with our concept of prayer and its use and usefulness.
I do believe prayer brings healing too, but I could write a blogpost of my own about that.
The question is a huge one, and if we can accept that the answer we get is not always the one we’re seeking then the value of prayer becomes priceless, regardless of our religious/spiritual path.
I dont comment often, but I couldnt resist replying, sorry for the long reply.
-
What do we mean by ‘intervene’??
Not perhaps a foolish question. Let me put it another way, or rather let me borrow from Terry Pratchett/Neil Gaiman the words they put in the mouth of their sorely tempted (to save the world) Christ figure, a small boy: ‘Seems to me, the only sensible thing is for people to know that it they kill a whale they’ve got a dead whale.’ I am fond of saying that God lets us run around barefoot in the snow until we see the good sense in wearing wellies in it. The only way the world works is if it has consequences.
That said, I think there are ways he does intervene.
As regards prejudice – I’m with Shaw and Pratchett on that too – thoughts are too powerful to be let to run into paths which corrupt and anything that stops us seeing the equal worth of the life and love of another is downright evil. While people are made miserable, or made to suffer consequences, because their skin is one or another colour, or they love their own gender, or anything else which stops us valuing the person before us, then we can never let such attitudes breed in ourselves, or go unchallenged when they pass before us, whatever the cost. This is a quite different thing from disagreeing on matters which are almost certainly so complex that we struggle to understand them almost as much as my dogs struggle to understand when happens when I to work, and how that links into the bowls of food which turn for breakfast each day.
-
Far be it from me to say what is and isn’t god or to doubt your experience but it could be said that your example of intervention is a common result from any meditation, religious or otherwise.
-
Yes, that’s right.
But that doesn’t prove a great deal either. It could simply show that God is with those who least suspect that God is with them. (Which would fit rather with some of the ways in which Christians do understand God).
-
-
Just came across this…
Lord, I do not presume to tell you what to do,
or how and when to do it.
I simply bring before you
people who need your love,
and needs which your grace alone can meet.
Let love reign, O my God.
Let grace avail. -
All the same, I do not wholly discount the possibility that God might have so structured things that he does actually need our help in praying for actual events (healing eg.)
IF there IS ‘non-medical healing’ (and plenty of people believe in it) it would be just like God to so structure it that it is hard for him to do alone. He has, after all, structured justice that way, and absolutely enjoined us to join him in pursuing it. (FWIW, I believe that in the parable it is God who is the Importunate Widow).
-
I’m inclined to agree.
Panentheistic immanence implies God is already *in* (and, indeed, permeating through) the world so the idea of intervention becomes moot.
-
I believe that above all God really really wants us to grow up, take responsibility and help in his work – I believe most things are set up to draw us into this.
-
I like that Tim – I think that yes ‘intervention’ fails to grapple with immanence.
Previous Posts
-
What should ecumenical and interfaith dialogue actually be about?
I’ve taken, in the manner of Jeremy Corbyn, to asking for suggestions for things that I might write about on the blog. This article stems from a suggestion by Hugh Foy via twitter. It seems to me that in Scotland, things are very different within the ecumenical movement to where we are thinking about interfaith.…
-
Some Bisexuals are Christian (and there’s lots of them)
Today is designated as Bisexual Visibility Day and it seems to me that it is about time that I said something about the B in LGBT that is so often silenced or invisible. Some Christians are bisexual. In fact rather a lot of Christians are bisexual. Rather a lot of people now describe themselves as…
-
Don’t worry – it just religion. It won’t bother you.
Preached on 20 September 2015 In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Don’t worry, its just a religious thing. It won’t bother you.” I’d just arrived in the village. And she said, ““Don’t worry, its just a religious thing. It won’t bother…
-
Dear Straight People – Greenbelt Talk 2015
Here’s the talk I recently gave at Greenbelt. In the course of what I was saying, I threw these badges out into the crowd. The spectre of homophobia stalks the church. It is, in the language that Jesus would have understood, one of the principalities, one of the very powers of darkness. It is a…
Leave a Reply