Divine Relations

Our relationship with the Divine is complex. All that we are is of the Divine, as the Divine is the entire Universe. However, our own ego and masks block us from the Divine, leaving it a thread that runs through us but not our entire personality.

We put faces on the Divine to separate ourselves from it, to relieve ourselves of the responsibility of recognizing that we are faces of the Universe. And we relate with those other faces as though they are separate beings, not a part of ourselves. While there is nothing wrong with relating with the Divine in this way, it is a fallacy and it does need to be recognized as such. We are the Divine, we are the Universe, and we cannot neglect this reality for the comfort of distance.

We are called to be greater than we are, to strive to make the Universe around us better. We do this through internal and external action, neither neglected for the other. We see the face of the Divine in our mirrors and in those we pass on the streets, and it is how we treat them (and ourselves) that is how we treat the Divine. Prayer, while important, cannot ever replace action and interaction. No amount of debasement can make up for refusing to take action when action is called for, and in fact, debasement goes against what we’re called to do. When we debase ourselves before the Divine, we also debase the Divine itself.

There are no simple answers for what the Divine is, for every definition merely excludes. There are no boxes in which we can place the Divine, and there are no boxes we can place in ourselves that we can remove from the Divine. We need to accept that we cannot hide from reality, cannot hide from ourselves, cannot hide from the Divine. There can be a hundred thousand views of the Divine, and all of them correct. We cannot declare the Divine is as we view it, because we all see with the eyes of the Divine, and these eyes see different things. While we can misinterpret what we see, none of us are capable of verifying another’s view.

The Divine can only be discussed remotely accurately in metaphor, allusion, and contradiction. There is simply no way to boil down such a being into the mundane world of language, because every word we use limits. Our relationship with the Divine, similarly, evades language. I can give ideas and hints, but there is no way to accurately describe a relationship with the Divine, other than the fact that it must be sincere and it cannot help but be life-altering, or it’s only a relationship with yourself.

Questions:
How do you see the Divine? Do you feel words are accurate, or do they fall short?
What do you wish you could hide from the Divine? What does it mean that you can’t?
What do you think is an appropriate relationship between yourself and the Divine? Why? What does it mean to mess that relationship up?