Thinking About God

Some thinkers discount rarified ideas of God as too vague to have any meaning. These ideas include "God as the Ground of All Being." "Ultimate Source of Reality" or "God as being itself." Religious people who hold such abstract notions are also quite comfortable using God the father, the mother, Jesus or some other personification of the abstract idea. Joseph Campbell was fond of saying he believed in God because he knew a good metaphor when he heard one. In the religious communities, Christian, Jewish or Muslim who have a belief in God find the metaphors of father, mother, Jesus as useful helps in worship and connecting emotionally to the abstract ideas. The metaphor is not God; it reminds us of deeper, broader views and abstract notions of God. The metaphors assist in worship, meditation, prayer and sacraments, which help relate humans to God often defined in quite objective and rarified ways

RWC