Going To Church, and Liking It

THIS SUNDAY PAST I attended services at the little brick Presbyterian church in the country, for the same reason as always:I got a free ride, and we went out to lunch at a nice restaurant afterwards. To me those reasons are as good as any. One a month they intend to have a guest minister, because the regular guy, a dear frined of mine,wants to take a week off each month, partly due to his age, eighty three. That sort of solves my problem for me. Once amonth, henceforth,on Sundays when the fill in minister is holding forth at the little Presbyterian church, I'll sneak off to the big city for a Sunday morning with my beloved Unitarians. That ought to be enough to keep me satisfied; I am,at heart, a Uniterian pantheist, not a Christian. No offense intended to the substitute pastor, and I told himso, but this solution llows me to keep my participation in both the Presbyterian and the Unitarian churches going full steam ahead. The irony of how strange it is for a lifelong unbeliever like myself to be choosing between two churches because he likes both is not lost on me, I assure you. I firmly believe that I could trapse happily into any house of worship of any religious faith anywhere in the world, and gain from it. Gain from it spiritually, intellectually, socially, among other ways. Unlike Geroge Washington and Thomas Jefferson, who both refrained from the communion ritual because they thought it was symbolic cannibalism, I go with the "when in Rome" approach, even though I agree with Washington and Jefferson. This Sunday we had, I believe, nine people in the church, inclduing the pastor and organ player; I always hope to reach double digits in attendnce. Part Presbyterian, part Unitarian, part agnostic, part atheist, I'm amixed breed, aspiritual mutt. "My religiosity consists of humble admiration of the infinitely superior spirit which reveals itself in nature", to paraphrase Einstein. You can be a votary of any religion on Earth, any of the more than four thousand organized religions, and be a Unitarian. Whereas the hindu faith embraces and encompasses all other religions, the Unitarian Universalist Church (UUC) likewise encircls them all, including Hinduism, merely by embracing them. See how easy it is? Einstein suggested that it would be a good idea if every man on Earth of military service age refused to serve in the military, so that all national military organizations cease to exist. Perhaps, in a similar mass movement, we could all, despite our disparate religious affiliations, declare oooourselves to be children of the universe, living beings of the creation of the grreat eternal creator, what Einstin variously called "the old eternal genius who built the universe", and "the ancient one". Einstein proclaimed himself to be a follower of Baruch Spinoza, a pantheist. These religious philosophies which elevate human beings to the status of Gods appeal to me, eogtisticlly. I enjoyed, for instance, listening to "Ramtha", some years ago, the lady from Seattle,J.Z. Knight,"hosting" the spirit from ancient India, giving lectures, seminars, books, movies,the works. I assume she made good money doing that, and for all I know, still does it. I'm sure I would be, were I she. I listened to quite a bit of her recorded lectures, and found them interesting. She certainly has a way of making you feel good about yourself, and maybe that was the secret of her success. Now, I hear, gurus are a dime a dozen,just like they were in Jesus's time. So, who knows?