Francis Berger's Blog, page 29
April 6, 2024
On the Matter of Magnetic Transcranial Stimulation “Turning Off” Religious Faith
Igor Chudov — a self-proclaimed agnostic who runs what I refer to as an anti-peck blog — has raised alarm bells concerning the Science’s supposed ability to “turn off” religious faith in individuals via a procedure known as Magnetic Transcranial Stimulation.
We can ask a question: can the invisible link between the faithful and God be severed by a third party armed with the tools provided by the latest scientific advances?
Disturbingly, the answer may be yes. Scientists led by Dr. Colin Holbrook at UCLA undertook a multi-year endeavor to discover ways to stop “religious beliefs and right-wing prejudice.” They attempted to apply direct electromagnetic stimulation to the brain to alter human beliefs, specifically turning off belief in God.
Dr. Holbrook has led extensive research on this topic for many years. He described how electromagnetic stimulation of the frontal cortex (frontal part of the brain) “experimentally decreased avowed belief in God."
After using a purposely made device, scientists describe a significant reduction in expressed belief in positive religious ideas:
Religious belief: We next tested the effects of TMS on the endorsement of religious beliefs following a reminder of death. In a marginal trend, overall avowed religious belief (including both positive and negative beliefs) was reduced in the TMS condition relative to the sham condition 2.95 vs 4.26. As predicted, this shift was driven by a significant reduction in expressed belief in positive religious ideas. Participants in the TMS condition reported an average of 32.8% less conviction in positive religious beliefs.
If interested, you can read the whole thing here, but I’ll offer the following summary for those so inclined: the Science can zap religious faith right out of your brain, and you can bet your bottom dollar that will strive to do so en masse very soon.
Thoughts:
First, religious faith has plummeted just dandy on its own in the West without the need for TMS or any other sort of brain-radiating lobotomy. Second, what is the exact nature of the religious faith that TMS supposedly reduced in the trial participants? Third, this whole business of clandestinely reducing religious faith by bombing an unwitting population with anti-religious gamma waves denies the spiritual reality of what religious faith is and how it can be reduced or lost.
Concerning the thoughts above -- first, reducing or abandoning religious faith is a free personal choice. Second, reducing or abandoning religious faith is a free personal choice. And lastly, reducing or abandoning religious faith is a free personal choice.
Putting the concerns of worried agnostics like Chudov aside, no technology capable of actually reducing religious faith contra an individual’s free personal religious choice can or will ever be developed.
That is not how reality operates.
Real religious faith is impervious to all external influences. Only the faithful can reduce or abandon religious faith. Any religious faith that external forces can reduce is not true religious faith.
Anyone who worries about getting their religious faith secretly zapped out of them by radiation or whatever is an irredeemable spiritual idiot.
It really is as simple as that.
We can ask a question: can the invisible link between the faithful and God be severed by a third party armed with the tools provided by the latest scientific advances?
Disturbingly, the answer may be yes. Scientists led by Dr. Colin Holbrook at UCLA undertook a multi-year endeavor to discover ways to stop “religious beliefs and right-wing prejudice.” They attempted to apply direct electromagnetic stimulation to the brain to alter human beliefs, specifically turning off belief in God.
Dr. Holbrook has led extensive research on this topic for many years. He described how electromagnetic stimulation of the frontal cortex (frontal part of the brain) “experimentally decreased avowed belief in God."
After using a purposely made device, scientists describe a significant reduction in expressed belief in positive religious ideas:
Religious belief: We next tested the effects of TMS on the endorsement of religious beliefs following a reminder of death. In a marginal trend, overall avowed religious belief (including both positive and negative beliefs) was reduced in the TMS condition relative to the sham condition 2.95 vs 4.26. As predicted, this shift was driven by a significant reduction in expressed belief in positive religious ideas. Participants in the TMS condition reported an average of 32.8% less conviction in positive religious beliefs.
If interested, you can read the whole thing here, but I’ll offer the following summary for those so inclined: the Science can zap religious faith right out of your brain, and you can bet your bottom dollar that will strive to do so en masse very soon.
Thoughts:
First, religious faith has plummeted just dandy on its own in the West without the need for TMS or any other sort of brain-radiating lobotomy. Second, what is the exact nature of the religious faith that TMS supposedly reduced in the trial participants? Third, this whole business of clandestinely reducing religious faith by bombing an unwitting population with anti-religious gamma waves denies the spiritual reality of what religious faith is and how it can be reduced or lost.
Concerning the thoughts above -- first, reducing or abandoning religious faith is a free personal choice. Second, reducing or abandoning religious faith is a free personal choice. And lastly, reducing or abandoning religious faith is a free personal choice.
Putting the concerns of worried agnostics like Chudov aside, no technology capable of actually reducing religious faith contra an individual’s free personal religious choice can or will ever be developed.
That is not how reality operates.
Real religious faith is impervious to all external influences. Only the faithful can reduce or abandon religious faith. Any religious faith that external forces can reduce is not true religious faith.
Anyone who worries about getting their religious faith secretly zapped out of them by radiation or whatever is an irredeemable spiritual idiot.
It really is as simple as that.
April 5, 2024
Spring Has Arrived. Me? Not So Much.
Barring unexpected cold snaps between now and the Ice Saint Days, spring has arrived. The plum blossoms have come and gone, and the cherry and pear blossoms are waning. The storks have returned. The mornings trill with birdsong. The sun hangs longer in the sky — even without the insipid time change last week. Yes, it’s safe to say that spring has arrived.
Me? Not so much.
Though I have mowed the lawn twice, I have not felt as inspired to get out there and get cracking the way I usually do when the weather turns and stays nice. I will spend the next two days planting most of the garden and starting the greenhouse, but I’m not overly enthusiastic about it.
Spring is in the air, but I remain locked in the dreary rhythm of winter. I’m sure all that will change tomorrow after I feel the warm sun on my skin and inevitably break a sweat digging and hoeing. If not, I am bound to catch up to the season after I hear my first cuckoo call, which is bound to come any day now.
Something will have to do the trick -- I have planned many substantial projects that require spring and summer tempos, not a dour winter cadence.
Me? Not so much.
Though I have mowed the lawn twice, I have not felt as inspired to get out there and get cracking the way I usually do when the weather turns and stays nice. I will spend the next two days planting most of the garden and starting the greenhouse, but I’m not overly enthusiastic about it.
Spring is in the air, but I remain locked in the dreary rhythm of winter. I’m sure all that will change tomorrow after I feel the warm sun on my skin and inevitably break a sweat digging and hoeing. If not, I am bound to catch up to the season after I hear my first cuckoo call, which is bound to come any day now.
Something will have to do the trick -- I have planned many substantial projects that require spring and summer tempos, not a dour winter cadence.
March 31, 2024
The Magnificence of the Resurrection Needs No Emphasis, But...
Still my favorite image of Jesus leaving the tomb. I was struck down by a moderate stomach virus or something of the sort late in the evening on Good Friday. It’s Easter Sunday, and I’m still not entirely over it. For the first time since the birdemic chuch closures, I missed Easter Mass.I also won’t partake in any of the delicious food my wife prepared for us today. It matters little. If anything, this bout of discomfort over the holidays has only served to underscore the magnificence of the Resurrection and Jesus’ offer of eternal life.
Happy Easter to everyone.
March 29, 2024
But Now Is My Kingdom Not From Hence
Christ Crucified - Diego Velázquez - 1632 Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence. (John 18:36)* * *
Great temptation consists in the identification of Christianity with any sort of the kingdom of Caesar, i.e., in the enslavement of the infinite to the finite...
Christianity is not revolutionary in the outward sense of the word. It has not entered into the world as a revolutionary social force, calling for a violent altering of the order of life.
It is impossible even to call Christianity a force of social reform. The nature of Christianity is altogether inexpressible in the social categories of this world.
Christianity has come into the world as the good news about salvation and about the Kingdom of God, which is not of this world ... In the world, Truth is crucified. (N. Berdyaev)
March 28, 2024
The Last Supper - Tintoretto
Da Vinci's is the best known, but I like this depiction better. 
The Last Supper - 1592 - Jacopo Robusti (Tintoretto) - 1518-1594
The Last Supper - 1592 - Jacopo Robusti (Tintoretto) - 1518-1594
March 26, 2024
Not a Convincing Kind of Blog
The longer this blog goes on, the less motivated I am to convince anyone of anything.
I’m all for sharing my ideas and assumptions or expounding on the ideas and assumptions of others, and I welcome comments that agree or disagree with all of that; however, I have become utterly uninterested in trying to convince anyone of the rightness or wrongness of my stated positions, opinions, beliefs, notions, or assumptions, not out of indifference or conceit but from my recent realization that the time for convincing anyone of anything has passed.
Once again, this does not entail that I refuse to consider disagreements, new information, or other points of view, only that I do not want anyone to convince me.
I do consider most of what people share here. It often helps me to expand my understanding or re-examine whatever idea I have shared.
At the same time, I feel no desire to wade into drawn-out comment exchanges that hope to convince me. Conversely, I feel no impetus to hammer my thoughts into anyone else’s head.
The etymology of convince may help shed some light on my aversion to convincing anyone of anything in this time and place.
The word stems from the Latin con, meaning with, and vincere, to conquer. Thus, convincing is all about decisively overcoming and defeating someone else in an argument, to firmly persuade by argument, usually with the support of some kind of evidence.
At its root, convince is a bellicose, fighting word, but convincing is not the kind of fight I want to have with anyone here and now.
Dr. Charlton has written extensively on the primacy of assumptions, particularly metaphysical assumptions, and how those — not experience, not education, not facts, not evidence — fundamentally shape our relationship with the world.
Assumptions are essentially unprovable beliefs, and it is these unprovable beliefs that provide the foundation for everything else a person accepts as real or unreal. And, yes, this extends well into the provable stuff, too.
I don’t find the old argument-battle framework appealing anymore because my self-declared argument-opponents cannot grasp that we are on entirely different battlefields with no hope of meaningful engagement.
The best anyone can hope to do now is to share ideas and assumptions unobtrusively and peaceably.
Whoever wants to consider the ideas and assumptions will consider them, not by being overcome or conquered by decisive arguments but by thinking more deeply about his own ideas and assumptions...
...which is exactly what everyone should be doing in this time and place instead of yearning to conquer or be conquered with arguments.
I’m all for sharing my ideas and assumptions or expounding on the ideas and assumptions of others, and I welcome comments that agree or disagree with all of that; however, I have become utterly uninterested in trying to convince anyone of the rightness or wrongness of my stated positions, opinions, beliefs, notions, or assumptions, not out of indifference or conceit but from my recent realization that the time for convincing anyone of anything has passed.
Once again, this does not entail that I refuse to consider disagreements, new information, or other points of view, only that I do not want anyone to convince me.
I do consider most of what people share here. It often helps me to expand my understanding or re-examine whatever idea I have shared.
At the same time, I feel no desire to wade into drawn-out comment exchanges that hope to convince me. Conversely, I feel no impetus to hammer my thoughts into anyone else’s head.
The etymology of convince may help shed some light on my aversion to convincing anyone of anything in this time and place.
The word stems from the Latin con, meaning with, and vincere, to conquer. Thus, convincing is all about decisively overcoming and defeating someone else in an argument, to firmly persuade by argument, usually with the support of some kind of evidence.
At its root, convince is a bellicose, fighting word, but convincing is not the kind of fight I want to have with anyone here and now.
Dr. Charlton has written extensively on the primacy of assumptions, particularly metaphysical assumptions, and how those — not experience, not education, not facts, not evidence — fundamentally shape our relationship with the world.
Assumptions are essentially unprovable beliefs, and it is these unprovable beliefs that provide the foundation for everything else a person accepts as real or unreal. And, yes, this extends well into the provable stuff, too.
I don’t find the old argument-battle framework appealing anymore because my self-declared argument-opponents cannot grasp that we are on entirely different battlefields with no hope of meaningful engagement.
The best anyone can hope to do now is to share ideas and assumptions unobtrusively and peaceably.
Whoever wants to consider the ideas and assumptions will consider them, not by being overcome or conquered by decisive arguments but by thinking more deeply about his own ideas and assumptions...
...which is exactly what everyone should be doing in this time and place instead of yearning to conquer or be conquered with arguments.
Silly Stuff My Twelve-Year-Old Son Gets a Kick Out Of
All I can say is I'm glad there was no Internet when I was a kid.
March 24, 2024
If Evil is the Product of Free Will, Then Free Will Has No Place in Heaven
Adding on to yesterday’s post contra the idea that evil is the product of human free will — a free will that God created into humans so that they could be “free” to choose good rather than simply being created good and having no choice in the matter — it occurred to me that if evil truly is the product of free will, then free will has no place in Heaven.
Since Heaven is without evil, entropy, or death, no force or motivation that could choose or produce evil, entropy, or death could enter Heaven. In other words, those desiring to Heaven would have to check their God-given, God-created free will at the gates because it will no longer be necessary. Without that free will, resurrected man would have no choice but to be good, which takes us back to square one.
If God is good, why does he permit evil in mortal life but not resurrected life? Why bother with the whole free will journey in mortal life if that gift of God’s love and goodness must be checked at the door before entering Heaven? Why didn’t just God place us in Heaven to begin with? Because he wanted us to choose goodness and eternal life over evil and death. Okay, but in the end, we will have to surrender free will because that, apparently, is where the source of all evil lies. Something else must take the place of free will. God will have to grant us another kind of freedom in Heaven.
Now, I suppose we could argue that free will in mortal life builds up to some greater, eternal freedom we will gain access to in Heaven, but if this is indeed the case, it seems like a roundabout way of going about things. Unless of course, freedom in mortal life extends far beyond a lifetime’s worth of free will choices.
Freedom is not and cannot be necessity. Necessity is imposed externally. If freedom is externally imposed, it is not truly freedom. If God imposed free will upon us, that free will is not freedom but necessity. Under free will, we have no choice but to choose! Moreover, we are held completely accountable for the “products” of these necessary choices. That doesn’t sound very free. It sounds positively burdensome.
Free will cannot be true spiritual freedom. If it were, it would have a place in Heaven, but it cannot because it is cited as the source of all evil.
No...freedom, true spiritual freedom, must be something other than free will. It cannot reside in the realm of necessity. It cannot be something God gifts us when we begin mortal life. For freedom to be free, it must be outside of God, not something God creates. It must be something inherent in our being; something we bring into Creation; something God has little or no control over.
It must also be capable of good and evil choices, but its ultimate purpose must exist far beyond the good-evil choice paradigm. Unlike free will, true spiritual freedom is not something we will have to surrender in Heaven. On the contrary, true spiritual freedom is one of the overarching reasons for Heaven.
Having said all of that, I sense that it is extremely difficult to achieve true spiritual freedom in mortal life, at least on a consistent and permanent basis, and I sometimes wonder if we are even meant to attain such freedom in mortal life, again on a consistent, permanent basis.
I sometimes think of freedom in the same way I think about sin. The flesh may be weak — we may not be able to rise above the free will choice level of freedom — but the spirit must be willing to aspire to a kind of freedom that transcends free will choosing.
What I mean is that we must at least become aware of what true spiritual freedom is and work toward that in some manner, however intermittent and temporary our success may be.
I think this is a better way of expressing freedom than using our "free will" to choose among predetermined, externally imposed choices.
Also, as with sin, I think we should acknowledge whenever we fall short of using our innate freedom and fall back on "mere free will" instead of lauding our successful use of free will as some sort of major spiritual accomplishment that is guaranteed to reap eternal rewards.
I sense that true spiritual freedom -- willing and creative alignment with God's purposes where we also add something to Creation, something God could not have added on his own -- is our state in Heaven. I say this because I can't imagine free will having any place in Heaven.
Note: This post was sparked by a comment exchange with Laeth on yesterday's post.
Since Heaven is without evil, entropy, or death, no force or motivation that could choose or produce evil, entropy, or death could enter Heaven. In other words, those desiring to Heaven would have to check their God-given, God-created free will at the gates because it will no longer be necessary. Without that free will, resurrected man would have no choice but to be good, which takes us back to square one.
If God is good, why does he permit evil in mortal life but not resurrected life? Why bother with the whole free will journey in mortal life if that gift of God’s love and goodness must be checked at the door before entering Heaven? Why didn’t just God place us in Heaven to begin with? Because he wanted us to choose goodness and eternal life over evil and death. Okay, but in the end, we will have to surrender free will because that, apparently, is where the source of all evil lies. Something else must take the place of free will. God will have to grant us another kind of freedom in Heaven.
Now, I suppose we could argue that free will in mortal life builds up to some greater, eternal freedom we will gain access to in Heaven, but if this is indeed the case, it seems like a roundabout way of going about things. Unless of course, freedom in mortal life extends far beyond a lifetime’s worth of free will choices.
Freedom is not and cannot be necessity. Necessity is imposed externally. If freedom is externally imposed, it is not truly freedom. If God imposed free will upon us, that free will is not freedom but necessity. Under free will, we have no choice but to choose! Moreover, we are held completely accountable for the “products” of these necessary choices. That doesn’t sound very free. It sounds positively burdensome.
Free will cannot be true spiritual freedom. If it were, it would have a place in Heaven, but it cannot because it is cited as the source of all evil.
No...freedom, true spiritual freedom, must be something other than free will. It cannot reside in the realm of necessity. It cannot be something God gifts us when we begin mortal life. For freedom to be free, it must be outside of God, not something God creates. It must be something inherent in our being; something we bring into Creation; something God has little or no control over.
It must also be capable of good and evil choices, but its ultimate purpose must exist far beyond the good-evil choice paradigm. Unlike free will, true spiritual freedom is not something we will have to surrender in Heaven. On the contrary, true spiritual freedom is one of the overarching reasons for Heaven.
Having said all of that, I sense that it is extremely difficult to achieve true spiritual freedom in mortal life, at least on a consistent and permanent basis, and I sometimes wonder if we are even meant to attain such freedom in mortal life, again on a consistent, permanent basis.
I sometimes think of freedom in the same way I think about sin. The flesh may be weak — we may not be able to rise above the free will choice level of freedom — but the spirit must be willing to aspire to a kind of freedom that transcends free will choosing.
What I mean is that we must at least become aware of what true spiritual freedom is and work toward that in some manner, however intermittent and temporary our success may be.
I think this is a better way of expressing freedom than using our "free will" to choose among predetermined, externally imposed choices.
Also, as with sin, I think we should acknowledge whenever we fall short of using our innate freedom and fall back on "mere free will" instead of lauding our successful use of free will as some sort of major spiritual accomplishment that is guaranteed to reap eternal rewards.
I sense that true spiritual freedom -- willing and creative alignment with God's purposes where we also add something to Creation, something God could not have added on his own -- is our state in Heaven. I say this because I can't imagine free will having any place in Heaven.
Note: This post was sparked by a comment exchange with Laeth on yesterday's post.
March 23, 2024
Should Be a Bumper Sticker!
after the question mark comes the answer john.
More thought-provoking aphorisms by Laeth available here.
More thought-provoking aphorisms by Laeth available here.
Free Will Is Freer Slavery, Not Freedom
Mostly irrelevant preface: When I was a kid, I used to chuckle at the notion that the United States was a politically free country because it granted its citizens the right to choose between two political parties, as opposed to the Soviet Union which offered only one real choice.
Many Christians continue to fall into the trap of defining evil as a “product” of the free will God granted or created into humanity — out of nothing, of course.
This immediately begs the following question — if God knew man might use free will for evil, then why did He equip man with “free will?” Simple — because He did not wish to make man a slave of good, an automaton incapable of choosing anything but good. He wanted man to choose good over evil freely and willingly because -- morality.
You see if God had not created free will — a doctrine that essentially boils down to being able to choose between good and evil — then there would be no morality. Nor spirituality. Nor anything beyond the physical/material.
The problem with the doctrine of free will is simple – it is not about freedom at all. Free will is just an algorithm. If God grants man free will, then whatever freedom resides within it emanates from God, not man.
Secondly, God determines the scope and range of choice to which free will may be applied. On the one side is the good choice to abide by God’s law and commands. On the other side, rejecting this law and embracing evil. Thus, the free will choice essentially boils down to obeying God’s law and commands . . . or else.
Free will enslaves man to the necessity of choice. I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound very moral or spiritual.
Accountability is another problem with free will. The free will doctrine makes man accountable for his choices between good and evil within the context of God’s laws and commands. It places the onus of such choices on man while simultaneously exempting God from all accountability.
The doctrine of free will provides man the “freedom” to be the offender while simultaneously relieving God of all responsibility for evil choices. Thus, man must own his choice for evil, but God is under no obligation to own His choice for giving man the power to choose. Man’s free will choice to be a transgressor of divine law also justifies God’s role as a punisher of divine law transgressions.
The free will doctrine is God adopting a “my way or the highway” framework of freedom. Use the free will I provided to do what I command, and all will be well. Use the free will I provided to reject My commands, and all will be lost.
Seen this way, the free will choice to obey God’s law and command becomes a matter of necessity. Man needs to choose the good option God has provided or face the consequences. The need to choose the Good – this necessity inherent within the free will choice – does not emanate from within man but is externally imposed by God.
As such, it does little more than ask a man to adhere to or fulfill a given law or command, leaving no space for creativity or a creative act.
The free will doctrine reduces man to a mere instrument in the fulfillment of God’s law. It lacks all spiritual dynamism and ultimately relegates freedom to the level of submission.
True spiritual freedom does not reside within the framework of the free will doctrine. True spiritual freedom is not about choosing between good and evil but knowing what constitutes authentic creative alignment and harmony with God and Creation.
True spiritual freedom can only exist if freedom is uncreated — if the freedom and agency of Beings in Creation are not of God. God is good because He has mastered freedom. God no longer needs to choose between good and evil. God knows what He must do and does it. Men and other Beings are capable of evil because they have not or refuse to master their freedom.
True spiritual freedom liberates from the necessity of having to choose. Spiritual freedom is not about agonizing over externally imposed good and evil choices; it is about internally/spiritually knowing what good is and doing/thinking that. The need to choose never enters the picture.
Freedom is not and cannot be reduced to the free will doctrine of merely choosing between external, given choices. If it is, it becomes an enslaving force — a burden that diminishes man to a level of “submitting to Good,” albeit with some limited say.
Man is free when he doesn’t have to choose -- when he aligns with God and Creation. How does he know that what he is thinking and doing is good? When he applies his freedom to loving God, and it brings forth creativity.
Note: This post is basically just a rehashing of ideas I have written about many times on this blog.
Many Christians continue to fall into the trap of defining evil as a “product” of the free will God granted or created into humanity — out of nothing, of course.
This immediately begs the following question — if God knew man might use free will for evil, then why did He equip man with “free will?” Simple — because He did not wish to make man a slave of good, an automaton incapable of choosing anything but good. He wanted man to choose good over evil freely and willingly because -- morality.
You see if God had not created free will — a doctrine that essentially boils down to being able to choose between good and evil — then there would be no morality. Nor spirituality. Nor anything beyond the physical/material.
The problem with the doctrine of free will is simple – it is not about freedom at all. Free will is just an algorithm. If God grants man free will, then whatever freedom resides within it emanates from God, not man.
Secondly, God determines the scope and range of choice to which free will may be applied. On the one side is the good choice to abide by God’s law and commands. On the other side, rejecting this law and embracing evil. Thus, the free will choice essentially boils down to obeying God’s law and commands . . . or else.
Free will enslaves man to the necessity of choice. I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound very moral or spiritual.
Accountability is another problem with free will. The free will doctrine makes man accountable for his choices between good and evil within the context of God’s laws and commands. It places the onus of such choices on man while simultaneously exempting God from all accountability.
The doctrine of free will provides man the “freedom” to be the offender while simultaneously relieving God of all responsibility for evil choices. Thus, man must own his choice for evil, but God is under no obligation to own His choice for giving man the power to choose. Man’s free will choice to be a transgressor of divine law also justifies God’s role as a punisher of divine law transgressions.
The free will doctrine is God adopting a “my way or the highway” framework of freedom. Use the free will I provided to do what I command, and all will be well. Use the free will I provided to reject My commands, and all will be lost.
Seen this way, the free will choice to obey God’s law and command becomes a matter of necessity. Man needs to choose the good option God has provided or face the consequences. The need to choose the Good – this necessity inherent within the free will choice – does not emanate from within man but is externally imposed by God.
As such, it does little more than ask a man to adhere to or fulfill a given law or command, leaving no space for creativity or a creative act.
The free will doctrine reduces man to a mere instrument in the fulfillment of God’s law. It lacks all spiritual dynamism and ultimately relegates freedom to the level of submission.
True spiritual freedom does not reside within the framework of the free will doctrine. True spiritual freedom is not about choosing between good and evil but knowing what constitutes authentic creative alignment and harmony with God and Creation.
True spiritual freedom can only exist if freedom is uncreated — if the freedom and agency of Beings in Creation are not of God. God is good because He has mastered freedom. God no longer needs to choose between good and evil. God knows what He must do and does it. Men and other Beings are capable of evil because they have not or refuse to master their freedom.
True spiritual freedom liberates from the necessity of having to choose. Spiritual freedom is not about agonizing over externally imposed good and evil choices; it is about internally/spiritually knowing what good is and doing/thinking that. The need to choose never enters the picture.
Freedom is not and cannot be reduced to the free will doctrine of merely choosing between external, given choices. If it is, it becomes an enslaving force — a burden that diminishes man to a level of “submitting to Good,” albeit with some limited say.
Man is free when he doesn’t have to choose -- when he aligns with God and Creation. How does he know that what he is thinking and doing is good? When he applies his freedom to loving God, and it brings forth creativity.
Note: This post is basically just a rehashing of ideas I have written about many times on this blog.
