BellaOnline Forums Religion and Spirituality Wicca Horned God vs the Devil?

Well i dont know many Islams but I am sure most are not the extermist and most do not wish death to anyone or country or religion for that matter. As for the others who do not believe in Christian God well that is there right and it is a Wiccan forum so... I dont think you understand where most of them are coming from. Most of the non christians you find here where christians at one time or the other and most can quote chapter and verus better then most pasters I know. You may have the best christian church and the most open minded christian family and friends but this is not the case in some peoples lives. be fore you can convert or talk strongly about your believes to convense your is the only way, you have to find out what they believe and why then understand and find out why they do not believe your way. you have to put all the prejustice that you have been taught to believe about other faith systems and clear up some myths about christianity along the way.... but the choice is still theirs to make. when God sees fit to convert them HE will.

but yes I do have to agree the aint chirstian additude is strong but they almost always welcome a christian and respect there input!

Welcome to the boards!!!

As a Wiccan/Christian I have to say that all major religions/belief systems have their zealots who are willing to kill for their version of truth. No religion in history has as bloody of a past as Christianity and the Inquisition. Not to excuse todays radicals in any way, just realize the Jihadists aren't the only ones (fundi christian abortion clinics bombings anyone?). Please don't make generalizations about different faiths without learning about them. Islam in general is one of the most tolerant, peace loving faiths you can find.
That said, how does this have anything to do with the original topic thread?

Interesting not only does christians have a male God but a male Devil! I have always found it funny that Devil spelled backwards is Lived and live spelled backwards is Evil....

I thing God is both male and female but also not either of them where the devil is also both male and female and neither at the same time...

Freebubbles, I think you might find Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch an interesting read. There is a lot of looking at word usage and semantics of religions in a different perspective. It's a confronting book though; my (Christian) friend was unable to get more than half-way.

I have been looking at those books and have been for years but i havent read a one yet... at first it was like "Oh thats New Age [censored]" then I was like "I dont give a [censored]" then it was "mmm what would my family think?" now its like mmm Interesting!!!" lol funny how we change over time!!!

I had never heard of these books, but I just looked them up on Amazon. Fortunately, they are listed as "Search Inside" so I was able to see some excerpts and such.

If this guy really did what he said he did, I am awed and amazed. I was reading the excerpts, and there is a ton of stuff that has very Pagan ideas. Which is pretty cool.

Any thoughts on him talking with God/ess? Do you think he really did, or did he just post a bunch of his thoughts in a book? Or does it matter?

Froggie, this is me coming at it from my Agnostic Pagan viewpoint, so forgive my strange ideas for a moment (and I'll try to be brief since this is the Wicca forum):

Personally, I think he was talking to himself. Not god or the goddess, but his own various consciousnesses. My theory is that we all have a "higher" self, or elemental self that is unconnected to our physical selves and it is this part that is tuned in to the universe and able to understand the bigger picture. I think he was simply opening himself to that extra layer of knowledge and processing it in a way that he could understand in his limited physical (and socially/religiously preconditioned) form.

Essentially, this is the book that brought me to the awareness that it doesn't actually matter whether you believe there is a deity (or more than one) or not. There is one point in the book where Walsch asks that exact question - could he be imagining it all? The answer is something like: so what if he is? What does it change? I felt an immense sense of freedom when I read that.

I stopped reading his books after book 3, because I don't like to get too influenced by one person's ideas. Walsch went on to create his own church and wrote books about meditating and worshipping this godform whom he'd encountered. I feel, if the personality of the being he's speaking to is true, that god/dess would not require anyone to worship him/her. But some people do need that type of relationship.

I tend to believe something similar. I guess, for me, the thing that pushes it over the edge is the direct questions and answering. Could he have tapped into "The Force" that unites us all and received "real" answers?

Again, I guess it is a non-issue. If we all do have a higher self, which is a manifestation of the divine, then we can all talk to the Divine and receive answers from It.

I don't know. I guess the whole idea is just neat to me. Though it did bring to mind the question: If he was talking to God, why does God always talk to men? Maybe women just don't need the recognition??

Or maybe women talk to their higher selves all the time, so they don't get that sudden "Hey, someone's answering me!" feeling.