Against "A Course in Miracles", Against Marianne Williamson, Against Religion.

you are an effect of God that's what it
means to say you were created in the image of God then we are conduits through which God's thoughts are extended out into the world making ourselves empty it's very the Course in Miracles is very Eastern in field because the ego is you gotta fill yourself up with information you gotta fill yourself up with the images of what you want you gotta fill yourself up with strategy and then you gotta go make it happen because the miracles is very Eastern it's about emptying ourselves so that we can be fully available in the moment and the reason you want to be still and know as the Bible says be still and know is in order to practice what the Course in Miracles calls the holy instant where you are doing nothing you are simply in a state of such complete being that on a level of thought as well as the level of behavior miracles occur miracles occur miracles occurred the present is already programmed because it is an expression of the mind of God so one of two things is always true either everything that we contribute to your happiness is already here and you're not saying it how many times have we had that and also it's that the universe is program so that either everything that could make you happy is already here or is on its way because the universe as an expression of the mind of God is already perfect it is self-organizing and it is self-correcting everything that could make you happy is already here or is on its way because the universe as an expression of the mind of God is already perfect it is self-organizing and it is self-correcting and once you know that even though on a material plane what you give away you no longer have on a spiritual plane you only get to keep what you give then you become as the Course in Miracles says generous out of self-interest your mental habit patterns fall in line that way and you don't even make it happen you just start singing oh my goodness that makes me so happy it just happened oh my goodness that is so fantastic it just happened oh my goodness that's so amazing it just happened why because the universe loves you so much that everything that could possibly contribute to your happiness is already programmed God is love even though on the Material Plane what you give away you no longer have on a spiritual plane you only get to keep what you give you won't necessarily get the short-term cash but you'll get a a a righteous flow of abundance in your life you'll get the deep stuff the real stuff the stuff that has to do with your life just working but when it happens that way you will be very clear you didn't make this happen [Music] a viewer named Kyle wrote in as follows quote I read returned to love a long time ago that's one of the books written by the same woman marianne williamson when i was in a bad spot in my life and for a long time i was tormented and thought that it must have been true until I started studying philosophy and I reply I think that's the saddest part of all that these religions including new religions really prey on human weakness your sorrow after your divorce after your grandfather died that's the opening they're looking two points really briefly marianne williamson ran for congress before and lost she's running for president in it states right now and she's gonna lose but even if she loses she wins why because we have a cycle going on here and this cycle is one of the reasons why the separation of church and state is a very important principle in modern politics whether you're talking about Christianity Judaism Islam or some new-age religion that doesn't even have a name yet she has supported her bid for president with her notoriety and her book sales as a religious leader and then her bid for president her election campaign itself becomes a platform to sell more books to increase her notoriety and influence as a religious leader she's gonna reach more people with this money-making message with this ultimately flawed and futile and false message of hope it's hope but it's false hope people can say it's positive and uplifting but it's positive and uplifting and built on a lie the same doctrines she's teaching at least hypothetically they could be preached by a Christian minister they could be preached by a Muslim Imam declare Sufi Muslim could be okay in this case it's coming from her she still identifies as Jewish interestingly even though the religion she's a member of has a whole lot to do with Jesus with a capital J be that as it may that cycle of the religious establishment using democratic elections as a platform to promote their religious career and vice versa in this vicious ongoing cycle there's a reason why so many countries have said along this broad notion of separation of church and state you know it's easy to preach veganism and it's very hard to preach sobriety and secularism by contrast I'm aware of how easy it is to tell people hey stop eating meat stop eating cheese it's going to improve your health it's gonna improve the world's ecology it's gonna help some animals at least hypothetically it's very easy to prove it's a win-win it's very easy for me to say to you on an individual level first the person man to man if you adopt this diet veganism it's gonna make your life better if you quit drinking alcohol especially in say Canada Scotland England I can tell you a lot of ways in which your life is going to get dramatically worse if you quit drinking there are a lot of people even their relationships at the office even their relationships with their boss and co-workers will get dramatically worse if they quit drinking alcohol British culture is huge on that the annual Christmas party for the employees and periodic trips to the pub we're drinking out all the others a huge part I can tell you ways in which quitting alcohol is going to make your life worse but you should do it because it's the right thing to do whether you're looking at getting into religion or getting out of religion ultimately the question is just about your personal integrity whether or not you're the sort of person who's going to stand up and say there's a difference between true and false right and wrong and it's my integrity on the online it's my integrity that's being tested here even if there were no other consequences for anyone else or even if I would benefit from allowing my integrity to be violated allowing my sense of the truth to be a little bit pliant to bend with the circumstance allowing my sense of right and wrong to be compromised I I was in a really tough situation after I split up with my wife I dumped her for the record she didn't dump me but I was basically abandoned in this small town on the east coast of Taiwan I didn't speak Chinese nobody there spoke English except a Christian missionary a white American Christian missionary an attractive female Christian missionary and you know what she was a lot more desperate for my company than I was for her she found herself in a very strange situation here she is a white American girl in a predominantly Buddhist and Taoist town small town in eastern taiwan she finds herself having to explain christianity to people who are have a background in buddhism taoism confucianism and she meets me i'm almost the only person in the whole city who speaks english there were a couple other people of course and I'm an expert in Buddhism I know a lot about Taoism I know a lot about Hinduism I know a lot about all these things but specifically my expertise in Plzen I think I probably knew more about Christianity about the New Testament about the Christian BA I think I knew more than she did about Christianity too but you know she had some level of Bible college education but you can imagine for me as an atheist what I read I had a certain kind of detached insight into the historicity of the text and so on so wow it was pretty pretty interesting for her to me me and you know what I could tell from the first time I met her she was very attracted to me I was attracted to her to hypothetical fork in the road in my life I could have seduced her I could have decided to just let my sense of true and false be a little bit pliant my sense of right and wrong be a little bit pliant and I could have married her I could have married into her church my father would have supported my father would have said to me well you know as long as you're doing it for a beautiful woman he would have said I did a lot of crazy things in my life for for beautiful women it's all right and whether or cynically or sincerely let's just face a hypothetical fact that I could have had a much better life basically I could have had a better life converting to any mainstream American religion including access to education career but above all else community going to a picnic with 50 other people who know your name you know being involved in humanitarian work something I'm still passionate about it with passion but all my life and can't really act on because I'm an isolated atheist and so on right would have had all kinds of opportunities to make the world a better place through that religion and yeah in these bizarre circumstances of being really emotionally damaged unable to see my daughter after just splitting up with my ex-wife Wow sure having someone who loves me someone who cares about me even if they're on some crazy religious mission I can see the advantages but you know what I chose to be a person of integrity I don't care if it's wrong or if it's right cuz most fundamentally what I'm never going to give up is my ability and my responsibility to distinguish wrong and right for myself and when you join a religion when you join any religion whatsoever that's based on belief that is the most fundamental thing that you give up and then you end up spending the rest of your life making excuses for the crummy founder of that religion whether you regard that as Mohammed or Moses you spend the rest of your life making excuses for their opinions about what's wrong and what's not right and you give up the process of making those decisions for yourself and dealing with the consequences yourself it's easy it's easy to preach veganism here on YouTube it's hard to preach having a life of personal integrity of commitment to doing what's right to being good to be an honest - distinguishing truth from fiction day after day after day when there's no reward and there may be very real consequences that you face do it just because it's the right thing to do [Music]