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
Symbolism lost. Symbolism regained.
If an analogy is horizontal, a symbol is vertical. An analogy is ‘played out’ at one plane. A symbol transcends all planes. An analogy can elucidate something. It cannot deeply touch someone. X analogically represents Y, whereby Y is equally conceptual as X. An analogy has no depth. It is played out at only one Read the full article…
Science, Faith, Depth
Belief and science are often seen as opposites — belief rooted in imposed trust and connection to the unknown, and science grounded in conceptual reason and empirical proof. Yet this division limits both, reducing belief to dogma and confining science to surface-level inquiries. What if there’s a deeper realm where faith (different from belief) and Read the full article…
The Good Ritual
What constitutes the concrete appearance of a ‘good ritual’? According to me, the answer lies more in the deeper ‘why’ and in the deeper ‘how’ of the ‘what’ than in the ‘what’ itself. [please first read: ‘Rituals’] In religion(s), rituals mostly grow quite organically. What if one would want to ‘make’ a new ritual to Read the full article…