Current mood:	calm
Current music:	Driving South - Jimi Hendrix Experience

Today's sermon
It's been a busy few days. I have mainly been writing music - first two movements of a string orchestra piece based on the Greek myths of Echo and Narcissus, the third movement will probably get planned this afternoon, and I'll write parts out over the next couple of days.

Business is going well - got a new enquiry from an Edinburgh choir whose original tour plans have fallen through (they want to go to Spain or Italy, which is going to be tricky as I don't speak Spanish or Italian, but should be manageable, as I'm organising a couple of possible tours there already and have some good information from them.)

I've just got back from church - and met another 43-year-old who came out to me. That's the second this week. How bizarre. We're meeting up for coffee next Sunday (but just coffee - a 23-year age gap is a bit much, no matter how open-minded I protest I am.)


Christianity and religion in general have been in my thoughts over the past few days, and it's time to put these down somewhere. I've always been brought up in a Christian environment, so perhaps my perceptions of other religions are limited. When I came out at the age of 19, it became very obvious that the way I felt Christianity should be was at odds with what I'd been told (although I still feel that there is something intrinsically right for me about Christianity - I couldn't change now.) I decided to look at Christianity from the ground up.

Christianity means believing that Christ was sent to save us. There are other attributes that people associate with it - charity, forgiveness, hepling others - but the fundamental meaning is that Christ was sent to save us. Therefore, we ought to look at the Gospels, as they're a record of Christ and what he said and did.

I've based my new Christian faith on this verse from Matthew: "Love the Lord God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind, and love your neighbour as yourself. All of the Law and the Prophets are based on these two commandments."

This isn't as easy as it sounds. Who is your neighbour? (answer: everyone, those who I know and those who I don't. I feel guilty over every starving child in Africa who I haven't helped, every beggar in the street who I don't give money to, etc. - I do have long-term intentions to do something about this, but right now I have no time, not enough money to make a difference to their lives, and too many excuses.) Also, this means that every action I take that affects somebody else has to be weighed up morally - am I doing the right thing? Would I understand if I was in the other person's position? Is there some way I could do things better?

Loving God isn't easy either. Loving your neighbour is one of way of doing this ("whatever you do for the least of these my brethren, you also do for me") but loving God as a being - we don't even know where to find God (I'm avoiding pronouns here.) My personal vision of God is as some kind of quantum being, able to affect the world through the thoughts and actions of human beings - and this raises the possibility that God may not be the only such being out there (I'm fairly sure God's the only one) and the question of what God gets out of this (maybe God likes the brainwaves of happy people.) How can we love God? Tough one. I'm still trying to answer that.

I don't believe in any sort of evil supernatural being - evil comes from human beings and our lack of consideration for others. I think all acts which we identify as "evil" (or a "sin" if you want to get religious on it) can be seen as due to people trying to gain something for themselves (be it money, everlasting life, a place in Heaven, whatever) and not caring (or sometimes just not realising) that this will result in others losing something that matters to them, or being harmed.

What happens when we die? Well, again, we're looking at something quantum here. I believe that our souls exist, and something goes on after we die - and there is some evidence that quantum processes are involved in human thought (okay, so it's not conclusive.) Our souls are quantum objects, and as such will be in the same "place" as God after we die.

Are we judged - does God draw a line somewhere? Will there be separation into sheep and goats? Or are we all saved by God's unconditional love? In short, do we answer for what we have done in this life?

I hope we do answer for what we've done on this earth (although the idea of God drawing a line somewhere and saying "you are saved - you, because you have taken a tiny bit more money from the poor, are not saved" is a bit odd. Maybe there's a sliding scale of salvation.) That's what keeps me going, and forces me to make choices about what I do. That's why I think Christ was sent to us - to show us how we might be saved, and what we should do - "love the Lord God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind, and love your neighbour as yourself."

Here endeth this Sunday's sermon. Next week - why there are so many Christians who I don't get along with, and not just because I'm non-heterosexual.