WillSpirit!

This post is one in a string of essays about spirituality. It may make sense to start with the first entry in the series.

After an online friend told me an early draft of what I planned to post today sounded like Greek, it became clear that my goal of opening spirituality to skeptics is a bit grandiose. My skills may not be up to the task. The job might even be undoable. But I made a promise, and I will follow through. I will try to keep things as clear as possible, but as I wrote recently, that’s a challenge for me. Even so, someone needs to do this work, and although my audience is small it seems important that I step in. I will do my best, and hope it helps at least one person.

My goal is to make faith available to those who value clear thinking and open eyes. Spirituality is of questionable value if it requires us to blind ourselves to tragedy and common sense.

Faith Defined: Before we go further, what do I mean by ‘faith?’ If my goal is to make it more available to thinkers, I need to be clear about what is on offer. No one will slog their way through my writing without knowing what benefit they can expect. To me, ‘faith’ means the sense that the universe is a loving place that values me. So I am not simply talking about a vague sense of mystery. Richard Dawkins in ‘The God Delusion’ claims to respect the spirituality of ‘the physicists.’ Much of what he writes takes back even this concession to spiritualism, but I am talking about something more than the elevated awe expressed by Einstein as a proxy for ‘God.’ I recently read an essay by Walter Isaacson about Einstein’s spiritual views. Afterward, I remained unsure of the extent of Einstein’s belief in mystical underpinnings to the universe; my sense was he did not go very far in that direction. I plan to go further. Far enough to help others open their hearts to the kind of faith that makes one feel better about being alive. The sort of belief that convinces one s/he is an important part of something grand and pervasive. In the end, I hope to make others more comfortable with ‘letting go,’ and trusting that deeper influences will keep them on track.

I am not trying to invent a theology. I will not say what ‘God’ is, only that ‘God’ might exist. My goal is to show that science leaves the door open for mysticism. In particular, I aspire to reassure people in 12-step programs who are trying to build a sense of a ‘higher power.’ My hope is to show readers some stepping stones that will get them beyond fear and resistance, until they can open their hearts to mystery. With ‘divine’ assistance, my words will help others surrender to the deep, inspiring currents beneath the storms of day-to-day reality. I’ll admit these flows may simply be the veiled movements of the unconscious mind; but it is also possible that the unconscious extends its roots far into the heart of creation. It is up to you to decide. My goal is to argue against skepticism, and let others find their own versions of spirituality.

***The following paragraph can be skipped without losing the thread of my discussion. It only establishes my qualifications to write about science:
If I make assertions about quantum mechanics and evolution, both of which have to be encompassed by any modern spiritual sensibility, then there needs to be evidence that I understand this material. With a BA in zoology, an MA in biophysics, an MD, and a lifetime of studying life science and evolution, I feel very confident of my knowledge of biology, genetics, and evolution. As for physics, at UC Berkeley I took four years of college level mathematics, and three years of rigorous physics, physical chemistry, and electrical engineering courses. I also completed numerous courses in biophysics during my masters program in that field. I’ve gone on to read a large number of books relating physics to spirituality, and every few years I work my way through a calculus textbook so I don’t forget my math fundamentals. This modest exposure to physics does not compare to a PhD in something like astrophysics, the kind of credential some spiritual scientist-writers (e.g, Bernard Ross) have earned. But my background gives me a solid grasp of the basics, and that is all that’s necessary for my purposes. I don’t plan to rely on arcane and cutting edge theories. The movie ‘What the Bleep Do We Know?‘ enjoyed tremendous success (despite valid criticism of the way it distorts physical findings to support a new age mysticism,) and opened people’s eyes to quantal mysteries, but never ventured beyond what I suspect one learns these days in high school physics. I don’t plan to make claims anywhere near as sweeping as that movie, and I believe my grasp of the material is more than sufficient for my purposes.

My plan is to work through a series of statements that are not too controversial when taken in isolation. Some will be based on physics and/or biology, and others on widespread human experience. Some will be more speculative than the rest, but none will fly in the face of either science or logic. Taken together, even if one rejects a subset, they permit one to have the kind of faith I describe. They allow one to believe there could be mystery, order, omniscience, omnipresence, intervention, and other qualities usually associated with ‘God.’ I want to emphasize that my intent is not to prove that this ‘God’ entity exists, only that it still might. That science has not shut the door on it. That reasonable people can be comforted by a sense that the universe cares.

As a final caveat, we need to be clear that love does not imply rescue. There could well be all-encompassing adoration and concern for each and every one of us, with little or no protection from danger and folly. I find it difficult to support belief in a ‘God’ that answers detailed prayers, for instance. We may reach some deeper principle when we speak within our hearts, but I see little evidence in today’s world for a personal ‘God’ that steps in and provides more than moral support. There is simply too much suffering and hardship for such a ‘God’ to be likely. Propitious events do occur from time to time, as I will discuss. But they happen rarely and appear to me more like an aligning of circumstances than a deliberate intervention on the part of a personalized deity.

Science and reality do constrain the kind of ‘God’ that might exist. But they do not rule out the possibility of a conscious presence pervading space, time, matter, and biology. That is the thesis I intend to support in posts to follow.

I write about this material because in 2000 my mind opened to the presence of something that felt like ‘God.’ It may have just been a brain spasm, but it felt like revelation. That experience underlies all that I write about spirituality. It has taken a decade to sort out what I learned, but right from the start I felt ‘called’ to speak out about it. In subsequent posts, I will discuss my ‘visions’ a bit, to show the ground from which I started. Doing so will serve the same purpose that listing my education did above; it will show that my writing is informed by direct experience. Along the way I will also outline my personal opinions about ‘God.’ My goal will not be to convince anyone I am correct in my outlook. I only want to give an example of the kind of spiritualism I think science permits, and my life demands.

***Click here for the next entry in this series.