SENSE OR FAITH: Freedom or Bondage for Humankind, Part Three

F.: "Faith" has been defined as “a belief in God” or as “complete trust” or as “belief with strong conviction in things that cannot be proved.”

BELIEF IN GOD
Belief in that which has never been witnessed will inspire belief in many things not observable: angels; demons; saints; an omnipresent god of evil as well as an omnipresent god of good; a god of good that is supposedly omnipotent but who cannot—or chooses not to—destroy the god of bad; and an all-powerful being in another world that micro-manages events in this world and gives rewards to some but punishments to others, all the while claiming to love unconditionally. The conditioning that results in such magical thinking also leads persons to believe in many other things that exist only in their distorted perceptions, such as personal power, or the power to control the path of a storm via prayer, or the power to make it rain or not rain, or the ability to bring a blessing or a curse to others. "Faith" produces magical thinking which removes persons from being in touch with Reality, therefore leaving them out of touch with reality (a.k.a., insane).

COMPLETE TRUST
It is normal for children to be so naive that they can have complete trust. They believe parents who tell them that there’s a Santa Claus, an Easter Bunny, and a Tooth Fairy. They believe parents who tell them that cows are sacred. They believe the authorities who tell them that god will send them to an eternal sex orgy if they will only kill themselves while killing members of other religions. Some learn that cows aren’t sacred; others learn that there’s no Santa, Magic Bunny or Magic Fairy. They learn that they were lied to by people in authority whom they respected and by persons whom they, wrongly, had trusted completely. Amazingly, though, they continue to have blind faith and complete trust in all of the other concepts that those same liars tell them. Such blind faith and unquestioning trust, however, is about being a child. As an adult, blind faith in authority is not only childish but is also dangerous because it separates persons from reality and traps them in distorted thinking and makes them (and often others) suffer the consequences of their distorted thinking. Why would adults be trapped in the naivete of children and continue to have complete trust in the fiction presented by authority figures? Because as children they were conditioned through use of rewards and punishments to accept unquestioningly the dictates they received from authorities; as adults, therefore, they continue to behave as children. They are driven to seek rewards now and "later" and to try to avoid punishments now and "forever more." Like children, they continue to seek approval from authority figures, leaving others in control of the way they "feel." Few persons ever realize that the only "reward" available is freedom from belief in the lies that drive them, that steal their ability to make independent choices, and that trap them in dependency. Few persons ever realize that the only "punishment" is living under the control of a "mind," believing that it is your mind while all along it is their mind. And their "mind" is nothing more than an accumulation of beliefs and concepts that can be traced back thousands of years...beliefs and concepts that were dreamed up by ignorant, arrogant men and are now taken as gospel truth by persons who have been programmed to accept all that they are told with unquestioning, complete trust.

A BELIEF WITH STRONG CONVICTION IN THINGS THAT CANNOT BE PROVED
To believe with strong conviction in anything that cannot be proved is the very essence of being blind, illogical, and trapped in delusion. The tool that controlling persons use to hook others into such blind, illogical, and delusional thinking is blind faith. It is blind faith that allows the consciousness to be vulnerable to being warped. The consciousness of Pavlov’s dogs became so warped that the dogs responded to a bell in the way that normal dogs only respond to the smell of meat. As a result of conditioning, the dogs had “strong convictions” about something that was false, but they could not realize their mistaken beliefs because of the conditioning; thus, they questioned nothing and insanely salivated without logical or real cause. Conditioned persons with their “strong convictions” (or, "blind faith") are as helpless and as illogical in their conduct and beliefs as Pavlov’s dogs. Just as conditioned dogs are delusional, so conditioned persons are delusional.

Because the “journey” to Realization begins with a questioning of everything that one has ever been told, then “faith” is obviously a roadblock on the path to Realization; blind faith is a barrier to those persons who would move beyond living a life under the influence of conditioning; blind faith is a hindrance to ever being freed from the effects of programming; blind faith is an impediment to breaking free of the bondage of enculturation; blind faith is an obstruction to ever being free of the widely-held nonsense that was dreamed up by ignorant men of ancient times and believed in by ignorant persons of modern times; blind faith is the tool of those who would control others and is the drug that leaves those “others” vulnerable to being controlled. Being “restored to your senses” means (a) living naturally through full and conscious use of the five basic senses and (b) being in touch with the sixth sense as well. Further, being “restored to your senses” means being out-of-touch with nonsense and in touch with Reality. And the irony is that the Realized (who make no judgments about "moral" or "immoral" and who label nothing as "good" or "bad") automatically live in the manner that persons of judgment would call "moral living." Are you living naturally, unnaturally, or supernaturally? Have you seen that what you have always taken to be “your” beliefs are not yours at all? How free do you want to be? Freedom comes with “getting rid of,” never with “getting.” Please enter the silence of contemplation.