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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 25 of 27. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by 64bowtie on November 23, 2004, at 13:22:50
A simple question...
Where does your faith come from?
You might start your research by slating how old you were and what you were doing at the time when you really recognized that you had faith.
Caution: Faith is an "Inside Job", meaning it has to be something you know inside you, otherwise it belongs to someone else!
Rod
Posted by smokeymadison on November 23, 2004, at 18:30:47
In reply to Where does your faith come from?, posted by 64bowtie on November 23, 2004, at 13:22:50
To start, there is something inside of me that holds constant no matter what i am going through at the time. i had an "experience" when i was 17 that helped me get through the worst depression i have ever had. i hadn't slept or eaten in a week and was curled up against the corner in bed. i sort of floated out of my body and up into the air above the roof of the house. i somehow saw the "bigger" picture. i saw the intersection of the walls supporting me, the walls extending outward in space as far as i could see. i am still not sure what all it meant, but i felt comforted.
i don't beleive that things happen randomly; i believe that there is a purpose to what happens. sure, i was a bit delusional at that moment, but something allowed it to happen the way it did in order to keep me alive the next few years. i think that i have enough "evidence" to support the fact that i am suppose to live. three suicide attempts and one horrific car accident in my past and i can look back and see someone or something intervened to keep my alive. So i believe in some sort of "higher power" than myself. Because, if my life were totally in hands alone, i would not still be living. heavy enough for ya?
My boyfriend wants to head back to church, but i don't see the purpose. My spirituality does not evolve around an organized religion, it has more teleological roots. Basically, the cells and organs in my body are striving towards life. Life is rare and should not be frustrated. Life itself should be respected. that is about all i can think of at the moment.
Posted by rayww on November 23, 2004, at 20:16:30
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from?, posted by smokeymadison on November 23, 2004, at 18:30:47
That was powerful. I'm in awe.
Posted by 64bowtie on November 24, 2004, at 22:10:36
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from?, posted by smokeymadison on November 23, 2004, at 18:30:47
> So i believe in some sort of "higher power" than myself. Because, if my life were totally in (my) hands alone, i would not still be living. heavy enough for ya?
><<< ...as long as you are now at peace.
Rod
Posted by Jai Narayan on November 26, 2004, at 7:23:45
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from? » smokeymadison, posted by 64bowtie on November 24, 2004, at 22:10:36
If I were to answer that honestly the I'd have to say I am still grappling with the concept of "faith".
I was brought up catholic and the word faith was used constantly in the context of being loyal, even though there were burning questions about what we were being loyal to.
Back then I was told to put all my questions away and just believe.
So I am stuck at the doorway of what faith means.
Once I get that squared away (for me) then I can answer the next question.Where does it come from.
Jai
Posted by rayww on November 26, 2004, at 8:05:43
In reply to Where does your faith come from?, posted by 64bowtie on November 23, 2004, at 13:22:50
Faith that is not grounded in truth is imagination
Posted by rayww on November 26, 2004, at 8:11:16
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from?, posted by Jai Narayan on November 26, 2004, at 7:23:45
Faith that is not grounded in truth is vain imagination.
Where does faith come from? It is a gift from God.
God loves to give us gifts, and He has many to give.
The big question here is are you ready to receive?
Posted by Jai Narayan on November 26, 2004, at 17:19:56
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from? » Jai Narayan, posted by rayww on November 26, 2004, at 8:11:16
My dear friend I have no idea what that means: "am I ready to receive"?
Sorry I am so ignorant.
I appreciate your loyalness to your faith.
My life is going along.
I like the buddhist path.
It seems to wake me up.
I hope I have not dissapointed you.
Jai
Posted by Dinah on November 26, 2004, at 18:19:18
In reply to Where does your faith come from?, posted by 64bowtie on November 23, 2004, at 13:22:50
My faith has been reborn many times over my life, depending on my stage of life. My faith now is different than my faith as a child. But neither is better or worse than the other.
Posted by 64bowtie on November 26, 2004, at 22:10:27
In reply to Which time? » 64bowtie, posted by Dinah on November 26, 2004, at 18:19:18
(((Dinah))),
Perhaps your faith is not a "thing" as you depict it. Could your faith be a description of a process, and not a thing?
Rod
Posted by 64bowtie on November 26, 2004, at 22:13:42
In reply to Faith comes from truth, posted by rayww on November 26, 2004, at 8:05:43
Posted by 64bowtie on November 26, 2004, at 22:17:59
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from? » Jai Narayan, posted by rayww on November 26, 2004, at 8:11:16
God or no God, faith is still faith.
Rod
Posted by alexandra_k on November 26, 2004, at 23:21:50
In reply to » rayww » Faith is faith..., posted by 64bowtie on November 26, 2004, at 22:17:59
Maybe religious faith (as in faith in god or the supernatural) is different from faith in other things, but maybe not.
Maybe faith changes like love changes. It is easy when you are little, but as you grow up you start to see complications and eventually you are not even so sure you know what it means anymore.
Posted by Jai Narayan on November 27, 2004, at 8:41:22
In reply to Faith, posted by alexandra_k on November 26, 2004, at 23:21:50
As with all the big questions:
"What is: Beauty, Truth, God, Faith, Love, Justice, Reality.."
As I age life is far more gray...
not so much black and white.
I can see cracks and fissures where there once was an attitude of absolute certainty.So if I can't define the term for myself?
Jai
Posted by rayww on November 28, 2004, at 13:32:42
In reply to Faith, posted by alexandra_k on November 26, 2004, at 23:21:50
If love means never having to say you're sorry perhaps faith would mean never having to say you doubt. If something goes wrong with it, we shouldn't abandon the notion.
Alexandra, just because you don't know what faith is any more doesn't mean you really don't. I think deep down it is still there.
Roots of pure faith produce fruit. The olive tree is one example of how faith works. The mustard seed is another. It takes something like 7 years for the olive tree to produce fruit. (after the trial of your faith)
http://scriptures.lds.org/query?words=%22see+not%2C+for%22&search.x=42&search.y=10
In order for the tree to produce at all, it needs to be pruned and cut back (disciplined). The wild branches must always be removed. I wish I could find a web page that explained this.Our pure seeds of faith were planted in our souls long before we were born, They're inborn. We just need to nurture and nourish them. How we test our faith, is if our works produce good fruit we know it came from a good seed. A person should want to know if theirs is pure faith or the phoney baloney. http://scriptures.lds.org/matt/7/16#16
A good tree cannot produce bad fruit.
http://scriptures.lds.org/query?words=%22cannot+produce%22&search.x=31&search.y=10
http://scriptures.lds.org/query?words=%22a+good+tree+cannot%22&search.x=31&search.y=10Faith works.
http://scriptures.lds.org/query?words=%22faith+without+works%22&scripturesearch_button=Search
Posted by Dinah on November 28, 2004, at 20:24:55
In reply to Re: Which time? How 'bout... » Dinah, posted by 64bowtie on November 26, 2004, at 22:10:27
Faith is part of my relationship with God. And my relationship with God is like other relationships in many ways. It grows and changes - more based on my needs at any given point in my life than on God's of course.
When my son was little, I used one of those collage frames to show his relationship with all the important people in his life - his mother and father, his grandparents, his uncle, his great grandmother. I used a picture of him interacting with each of these people. And in the center of the picture is a picture of his christening - showing him interacting in relationship with God.
Now that my father is in the hopefully long and not painful process of dying, I'm really wishing for him that he can find peace in the important relationships in his life. Reconciling with my mother and brother, cementing his relationship with me, and gaining strength from a renewed relationship with God.
My therapist warns me that those who don't live particularly well don't die particularly well either, but there's hope isn't there? And faith?
Posted by Jai Narayan on November 28, 2004, at 20:50:25
In reply to More a relationship than a process » 64bowtie, posted by Dinah on November 28, 2004, at 20:24:55
death is such a personal thing.
No one else can do it for you.
There seems to be a struggle always at the end.
We just are born to live...
our bodies only know that. So we struggle.
It's so human.
Dinah, it's so nice to see your post.
I have been thinking about you lately.
You used to post so much.
things change.
all the time.
Jai
Posted by alexandra_k on November 28, 2004, at 23:30:24
In reply to Re: Faith, posted by Jai Narayan on November 27, 2004, at 8:41:22
Thats lovely Jai.
I guess I was thinking that traditionally philosophers searched for the meaning of notions such as 'truth' 'knowledge' 'faith' etc etc by trying to analyse the concepts into their necessary and sufficient conditions.
But then we got sick of that after a while....
We just couldn't find them for the majority of our concepts, and some of them seem to lack them as a matter of principle (sometimes there is even a genuine indeterminacy there - is a chair with a leg knocked off still a chair (a broken one) - or is a three legged chair a stool?)Everyone will probably be pleased to know that the general verdict seems to be 'who cares?'.
It doesn't matter that we cannot explicitly provide adequate definitions of such notions.
They are good enough for our everyday purposes... Maybe our understanding is implicit rather than explicit...
Posted by alexandra_k on November 28, 2004, at 23:36:14
In reply to Re: Faith » Jai Narayan, posted by alexandra_k on November 28, 2004, at 23:30:24
Sorry, I meant to say that realising that issues are not black and white... that there aren't strict definitions may well be a sign of growing up and maturity.
The world isn't that simple.
It simply does not work that way.I am just seeing what you said about yourself as something that is mirrored in the history of analytic philosophy... Cluster concepts, an understanding of shades of grey... indeterminacy...
I am about dead on my feet right now....
Sorry if this doesn't make any sense....
I have been at conference all day...
There are only so many new artificial languages that one can get ones head around in one day before one starts to feel like a block of lead is inside ones head and if anybody tries to introduce a new logic to provide correspondance rules between prima facie different logic languages designed for an analysis of time tomorrow THEN I AM GOING TO SCREAM
Posted by Dinah on November 29, 2004, at 1:37:08
In reply to Re: More a relationship than a process, posted by Jai Narayan on November 28, 2004, at 20:50:25
My relationship with Babble is another one that grows and evolves. Who knows where it will end.
Actually, to my surprise, my father seems to be grasping the dying thing pretty well. He's reaching out to us more. Hopefully he'll do the same with God. (Not that he ever lost a relationship with God completely of course.)
Posted by Jai Narayan on November 29, 2004, at 20:25:38
In reply to Re: More a relationship than a process » Jai Narayan, posted by Dinah on November 29, 2004, at 1:37:08
Posted by Jai Narayan on November 29, 2004, at 20:32:04
In reply to Jai, posted by alexandra_k on November 28, 2004, at 23:36:14
you need to get yourself to a nice comfy bed and stack the zzzzz's, press the cotton, count sheep...
okay I am racking my brain (I've always tried to imagine what that looked like) for all the sayings for going to sleep.
I need to rest my weary head on my cement pillows.
Turn on the fan.
Take my Ambien.
And let the world melt away.
Way too much tension for one little old gray haired girl today.
time to take five....
goodnight dear woman.
Jai
Posted by verne on December 1, 2004, at 2:08:36
In reply to Where does your faith come from?, posted by 64bowtie on November 23, 2004, at 13:22:50
You write, "Caution: Faith is an "Inside Job", meaning it has to be something you know inside you, otherwise it belongs to someone else!"
I agree with "faith is an inside job" but it's the "has to be something you know inside you" I have a problem with.
In dying to self, and complete surrender, is there an ego left over that philosophizes and measures and "knows" what's inside itself? You can't both die to self and continue to evaluate, judge, and measure in worldly terms.
Going back to an earlier thread and idea you espoused: that faith is a tool. Nothing is a "tool" without an ego firmly engaged in the WORLD. There is nothing spiritual about a tool and faith is far from it.
This isn't semantics and can only be understood if you're "awake".
verne
Posted by verne on December 1, 2004, at 18:45:16
In reply to Re: Where does your faith come from? » 64bowtie, posted by verne on December 1, 2004, at 2:08:36
I need to stay away from the Faith board. This board is the trying of my faith - that is, if "I" had any to begin with.
One of my least favorite things to do is talk theology - "Knowing" God. Even the New Testament writer Paul seemed to correct himself at one point when he writes in Galatians 4:9
"But now that you know God--or rather are known by God..."Since, as soon as we make God an object in our head and think we "know", we no longer know. We may appear to know in worldly terms and even excel at church. Those who think they see, don't. Much thinking about God doesn't get us any closer to the Truth.
So I'm backing away from the Faith board. I've dropped my concordance and uninstalled quickverse. I'm laying down both the unabridged and pocket versions, backing away slowly without making any sudden bible thumps.
Peace, Love, and Hope remain. I can't "get" them or "have" them but I hope they get me.
verne
Posted by Jai Narayan on December 1, 2004, at 21:01:17
In reply to Peace, Love, Hope, posted by verne on December 1, 2004, at 18:45:16
oh my god, verne...you crack me up.
You might be the cause of me having faith.
I mean it!
when I read your posts I can feel myself lighten up....you know enlightenment?
Jai
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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
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