Jerusalem — City of God
This is meant to be(come) the city where people of all creeds can be together in Open Religion (see this category). No deeply religious insight, feeling, or motivation needs to be discarded. If you are religious, please try to deepen the feeling ― an endless direction.
If a non-enemy of thy enemy can only be thy enemy, there is only mistake.
Why a European city?
It’s not a principled matter. Jerusalem happens to be central to three prominent religions. While it is currently a cradle of mayhem between the three, precisely that makes the challenge dignified. If you can make it there, you can make it everywhere. Bringing these three religions together in a decent way shows all faiths can be brought together — globally.
Yet the challenge does not lie in bringing them down to commonalities. On the contrary, each should be made more worthy of God’s attention by finding out what appeals to Him — to the core, whatever that means. Any religion is a search for the ultimate. Only in discerning the non-obvious can God be found.
Kingdom of Heaven
The city of Jerusalem can be seen as a symbol for the ‘kingdom of Heaven,’ which is a symbol for the kingdom inside, the ‘deeper self,’ but warmer and more personal.
It is from this kingdom of Heaven that may sprout a Compassionate future of joy and lenience of suffering.
Concretely
Jerusalem is full of holy places, real or unreal, but never simply imagined. It’s where Jesus carried his cross, thrice stumbling and persevering.
It’s where Salomon’s temple held an eternal promise. The temple evaporated while the promise only became stronger — as it should be.
It’s where Mohammed went on a journey to Heaven. Was it with the intention to invite Heaven to come to Earth?
In all three cases, we’re waiting for something. Meanwhile, there’s enough inspiration to fill a lifetime. May both be about the same?
More concretely
One can see Jerusalem integrally as an especially holy place that may invite people to meditate Openly about religion. This would be a meditation close to God. Something more special can hardly be imagined. Of course, that is not where different religions fight each other.
It’s the closest to feeling in Heaven — a feeling of abundant religiosity with ample room for many translations of the one thing that is really happening. There is only one thing. Translations don’t make them different things.
Even more concretely
Within the confines of the concrete city of Jerusalem, we might organize happenings, workshops, and other beings-together to celebrate this abundance — endless abundance, endless in-depth togetherness. If need be, this can be done in defiance of the world. “It’s not possible.“ is nonsense. “This will not happen.” is nonsense.
Let people talk.
Meanwhile, we can do it!
Challenging? At least, we will have been in Heaven.
Related Posts
Religion and Compassion
Compassion = Open Religion? Please read first [see: “Essence of Compassion“] to get a feel of appropriate un-easiness. That is always a good start towards Compassion. Compassion, the road towards nonbelief A belief in a conceptual anything is not religious in my use of terminology. I foresee a gentle slope towards Open Religion [see: “What Read the full article…
AURELIS and ‘Esotericism’
If it’s your intention to be open all the way, then you have to be open to all sides and not closed to some specific one. Unless it would be the of being-closed itself. This certainly is important when it’s not easy, when people tend to misunderstand, when people interpret their attachment to certain ideas Read the full article…
Words Like ‘Soul’ Are Not the Exclusive Right of Religion
Not of any specific religion, nor of ‘religion’ in general. It is therefore high time for a kind of ‘science of the deeper self’ that distinguishes itself from ‘religion’ in the sense that it is not based on a dogma or a story. You can compare it with astronomy that has emancipated from astrology +/- Read the full article…