God
God, allocative aspects.
To the question of whether God is personal or impersonal, contradictory and doubtful answers are given. Not only do the respondents have different opinions among themselves, but the question seems to be difficult to figure out even for each of them.
Yes, I think the universe evolves, the universe learns whole... Sort of like a fractal, like a tree huh, it sort of... You can see us as one... When we look out into the world, we're really looking back at ourselves and our own as well... The universe looks back at itself through us.
The interviewees agree that God, whether he is personal or impersonal, has a huge reach. Existence itself can be said to be this god. Everything is included in this system, everything and everyone are parts of the same body of deity. With his soul or psyche, the individual is a part of this god: "Our individualized self is only a part of God's self. So we are, so to speak, part of God's self," says one respondent. The universe is a single living entity, where physical reality is the physical aspect of God. One respondent refers to how this has been described in the Bible:
The tree that grows over here is like nothing but God. It's not like there's a tree standing there, and somewhere else God is standing, and if he wants to, he can pull that away. But it is part of his being. And this is really... Thoughts like this are also found in Christianity... Paul is right... Because it is in God that we live and exist.
This god or larger, coordinating entity is called "Universe", "God Force", "A Strong God Energy", "Pure Love", "A Loving Force", "The Great Life System", "Something", "Cosmos", "A Higher consciousness', 'An energy', 'The universe' and 'Light'.
When Freud writes about religion, it is often about the "Father" projected into the universe who is supposed to be a guarantor of justice and prosperity. Such descriptions are more closely related to traditional religion. The interviewees in this study do not talk about any animated god figure, but more about things like "love" and "light". This comes closer to what Freud (1929/2008) refers to as the "oceanic" feeling, that is, an experience that "relates to boundlessness and connectedness with everything" (p. 406). However, Freud is equally skeptical of this.
Vitz (1977) writes about an image of God that describes him as "energy" and that seeks to cancel all opposites: "New Age mentality attempts to break down distinctions between things and their opposites, and to claim that there are no seriously important boundaries" (Kindle location 2024). God is everything and everywhere, but the newly spiritual may still miss him?
God, constitutional aspects.
God is exalted above all duality. God is neither male nor female or both. The individual must become like God: "So they say that you become one with everything when you are enlightened. Yes, but then you become God and then it becomes fantastic in the whole world", says an interviewee.
In traditional religion, God is seen as something fundamental other than man. It is not merely a difference of degree, but a difference of species between the two. Sometimes the god may not even be named. To believe that one can become or be compared to God is called blasphemy. This is where the new spirituality differs from many other spiritual or religious teachings. Wikström (1998) describes how there was a clear idea of homogenization right from the start within the new age. Prominent teachers and leaders within the movement could be compared to the biblical Jesus as they were all perceived to be animated by the same spirit.
God, vertical aspects.
God is just. He operates through the laws of nature, which for the respondents also includes the idea of reincarnation and the law of karma. Therefore, it can be argued that God is someone who helps us along the way, towards the goal of becoming more humane. That he contributes to our suffering along the way, he does this out of love. However, he would not let anyone suffer for what someone else has done. Nor will he allow us humans to, for example, blow ourselves up and the planet into the air, says one respondent: "He has nothing to gain from us all disappearing, what is he going to do then? Then he has no one to coach then".
One respondent compares God to a supervisor or teacher: "If you say that you reach your goal and become an angel, for example, then I believe that it is like the angel's boss in some way, who constantly teaches everyone around him about the vessels.” The same respondent continues, however: "But it's just a force so that in a way... you say you have God within you... He's like everywhere, so maybe it's not him, but it's probably some force that is everywhere."
The answer to the question of whether God is someone with whom the individual can have a relationship becomes contradictory. However, there are many other beings with godlike qualities that the individual can get help from. Guardian angels, angels and other highly developed individuals who can assist the individual from a spiritual dimension. When the individual has to leave the spiritual world and reincarnate in a physical body, she is assisted by sympathetic and highly developed individuals who are on the other side. These are likened to "a heavenly council". Former relatives or friends, who have died and are now in the spiritual dimension between two incarnations, can take on the task of acting as guardian angels.
There are also perfect souls who no longer need to incarnate in the physical world for their development but who have an interest in, for example, teaching us who are still here. These can sometimes communicate via so-called "channels", as mentioned above. Some animals, eg dolphins, can be highly developed and act as a "guide" for humans.
The individual can allow himself to be guided by these invisible beings. Their answers or advice are heard as "voices" or "words", however not in a way that the interviewees experience as morbid. The existence of a god is possible in parallel with this kind of other communication. One of the interviewees uses this type of communication in his work as a healer. Since she is unsure of exactly how it works, she turns to many different agencies at the same time with her prayers:
But like when I stand and give healing, then before the healing, I ask Jesus Christ, God and all my guardian angels and guides for help, because I don't really have... I don't know what it is. I know there is something higher helping me and guiding me, but I don't really know what it is.
Even the planet is seen as a living organism with parental characteristics: Mother Earth. So also visitors from other planets who watch over us. These have come further than humanity in development and have a more advanced technology. Their involvement increased after World War II, when a country used atomic bombs in warfare for the first time.
While God is a living mystery to the Christian, he does not seem to be so to the respondents. He is by all accounts difficult to get a hold of (personal or impersonal), but the respondents have clear answers to questions about God's attributes in general, his extent, his role in the world and relationship to the individual, as administrator of our karma, etc. So in some sense the new spirituality has dethroned even God. With psychoanalytic terminology, could it be said that the followers managed to see through God, "penetrated" and triumphed over him, too?
The new-spiritual god did not create humans, since we have existed for all eternity. Therefore, there is also no underlying debt or reason to feel or show him any gratitude. Nor has this god let his son die on a cross to lighten our burdens. Nor is there any debt of gratitude there. This god does not help or assist us in any active way. Man is thus independent, both in relation to the earthly parents and to God. However, Arlebrand (1992) believes that there is a missing object behind the neo-spiritual search. This search has degenerated into “spiritual materialism and consumerism. Without contact with God, man is forced to fall back on the worship of himself and his personal needs... Man is ultimately not looking for 'something', but 'someone'" (p. 224f).
At the same time, the image of God that emerges is rather strange. He is not powerful or strict, like the god of the Old Testament, but rather aloof, indifferent, or with an almost instrumental relationship with people. It is not exactly the image of a "good parent" that comes to the fore, seen through the eyes of attachment theory. He lets people suffer, but he does this out of love, explains one of the respondents. For us to become perfect. At the same time, it is clear from the interview responses that there are many people in the world who will have to suffer greatly in the future. It is close at hand to ask whether the image of God and the attitude towards the outside world do not interact in some way, and whether the relationship with God has not been characterized by "identification with aggressors".
One of the respondents believes that the state of the world shows that there must be a competing force in existence: "But I believe in more than just god, if you say so, so I'm not a monotheist in the sense that there is a god and so is it humanity, or so” (p2).
The world is indeed created by a kind of higher power, or powers, but it was not intended so to speak as it now looks, it was not intended as... the original as divine creation... In that case it would have been all good, and actually a kind of perfection actually... So an imperfect world must reflect an imperfect creator, if you think it is a creator, or vice versa (p2).
God, horizontal aspects.
We meet God, among other things, through our fellow human beings, who are partial aspects of this all-encompassing deity: "But if EVERYTHING is God, then you live in a constant correspondence with God. When we meet a fellow human being... so it's a partial aspect of god," says an interviewee. It is possible to feel a deep connection with the entire creation, as everything in existence is connected by visible or invisible ties. This brings a sense of meaning and community:
Yes, it has to do with the fact that everything is then connected, if you are then into this with thoughts and feelings and everything like that, then just like the whole world is connected, even... I mean there are different waves of life, with man, with the animal kingdom, with the plant kingdom, and with the mineral kingdom, and they are somehow more connected than one might think (p2).
No one is ever separated from God. No one needs to feel alone. It also becomes natural to share, even of one's possessions. The conviction takes on an ethical meaning:
I don't feel alone, so, alone SO... I don't feel separated from... but I feel like I'm a part of... So life becomes MORE meaningful, it becomes more meaningful to SHARE, for example. Because everything I do, I'm actually doing it to myself, because I'm connected to everything... I'm not separated. It's not like that... Oh, MY stuff, like, like this (p10).
I have a… Not the god we worship in church, or, no, not THAT… I don't believe in God, or Jesus, as a PERSON like that. I don't have that faith. But I believe this... God is within YOU, within everyone. And then, just this one... The message is love for all, it is MY faith. And then that we are all little divine beings, more or less (p7).
Granqvist (2014) has found differences in the image of God in traditional believers and people who are interested in new age or new spirituality. The former have a "safe haven" or a sense of someone greater and wiser than themselves to turn to, while the latter seem to lack this. Perhaps one can say that the neo-spiritual god possesses some horizontal (allocative, as well as constitutional), but largely lacks vertical, properties?
God, capacitative aspects.
God has no opportunity to intervene and change the destiny of the individual. But from another perspective, it is still possible to see everything as a collaboration or communication with God, where even the painful experiences are part of a remaking of man. That this is something God participates in out of love:
He helps us further, and there is nothing else to develop on than suffering. And the faster we learn that it is love and humanity that matters, and peace, he will show us the way. And since we cannot learn unless we suffer, this will continue. So it is out of love (p3).
Christians have a tendency to submit to God and expect Him to come and sort out their problems. They are also too focused on how they are doing in this one life, and fail to see that this is only a small piece of a much larger panorama. Furthermore, they do not understand that the individual himself bears responsibility for his destiny. With the new spirituality, the image of God changes, what he can and cannot do, and thus also the expectations the individual may have about someone who will fix problems and set things right. The prayer has a function, but for the individual himself, one of the respondents describes it as. A form of self-care.
Nor is it a god who will intervene or in any real sense answer the individual's prayers. God already knows what to pray for, says one respondent, with reference to the Sermon on the Mount in the Bible. One respondent believes that God is not aware of us to a greater degree than we are aware of the cells in our body.
"He's like everywhere, so maybe it's not him, but it's some force that's everywhere..." (p3).
God is neither evil nor good: “So there is no good and evil, there is no such duality, because God is everything, even evil so to speak. So it is only us who see evil as evil, because that contradiction does not exist in God" (p1).
God cannot directly influence the fate of the individual, but is more of a kind of administrator of the individual's own karma, both the pleasant and the unpleasant. God resembles a kind of rounding mark for the individual's own energies. An administrator of the suffering of the individual. The theodicy problem is thus solved.
A god who gives hope, says that the individual is good enough
God, declinative aspects.
A god who soothes, comforts
God, terminal aspects.
God as the one who welcomes, nights, shall guard