What Do You Think?

I am in the process of directing a play. One of the actors asked me: “What do you want the audience to think about this scene?” The actor was looking for a specific answer: “Is the man guilty or not guilty?” My response was: “I don’t care what the audience thinks; I just was to know that they are thinking.” I would be fine if half the audience walked away able to justify why they felt the man guilty and the other half of the audience absolutely certain that man was not guilty. Let them discern for themselves.

It is so easily to accept someone else’s thinking as our own. So many times when I ask someone how did you decided to become a Methodist, Baptist, Jew, Muslim, etc. I’m told: “I never thought about it.” I am what I am because it is the religion of my parents, or grandparents. Really?

I was blessed that my parents encouraged me to discern for myself what Spiritual path spoke to me. And even though, I would be the 4th generation of my family to work and serve within our denomination, they wanted me to choose my church for myself.

Go, see, experience were their words of encouragement. And I did. What I discovered was my family’s New Thought, Non-denominational “Movement*” best served my Spiritual calling. And if along my Spiritual journey I “added-on” or modified my practices in some way (such as embracing the Principles of Science of Mind Philosophy) my growth was encouraged rather than reprimanded. I was empowered to think for myself.

How do you tell a good guru from a bad one? The bad guru proclaims: “There is but one path to enlightenment (God) and it must be my way or you will be lost!” The good guru says: “There are many paths to enlightenment (God). Listen to what I’ve been called to say, discern if it is true for you and then choose your own path.” What do you think?

*The Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) broke way into what was called a “movement” from the Presbyterian Church at the turn of the 19th Century. It wasn’t until the mid-1960’s that they accepted the term “denomination” in lieu of “movement”. Their guiding philosophy being; “In the essentials Unity; in all else – healthy discussion.”