Never experienced God? Don't worry, you are not alone!

We are in Luneburg now and staying with Michael, Andrea and Ravael. I have been here so often, have spent so much beautiful time here that I was very happy to reach Luneburg again. Just like always, this time, too, Michael and I work together with his patients. One aspect that we talked about with one of them yesterday is quite interesting.

After a short introduction of who I am, Michael’s patient asked me: ‘Do you believe in God?’ I answered ‘No, not anymore.’ Of course the next question was ‘Why not?’ and my straight-forward reply was: ‘Because I don’t experience God.’

It is true, I don’t have any experience of God and the experience of others cannot help me. It does not make me believe in God if I read that Jesus talked to God, Mohammed experienced God or Tulsi or Surdas felt God. It even does not help me if my best friend tells me he has lots of experiences with God – as long as I have not had any, I cannot say that I believe in God! If you experience fear, it doesn’t make me afraid. If you eat something, it does not fill my stomach. In the same way, I don’t believe in God just because you do!

We are not actually talking here about the question whether God exists or not but we are talking about the experience of God. Even if God exists, I have not made the experience that he does and until I make that experience, I will also claim that whatever you experienced and believe that it was God, is only an illusion.

Yes, I think that religion created the atmosphere that makes people think they experience God when they have difficulties explaining something. Religion creates an image, a picture of God and tells people in which situations you will be able to feel him. They are already suggesting when and how you can have the experience of God – it is thus not a surprise that religious people have such experiences often. When you take yourself out of this field of suggestions, you may have the same feeling that I have: that you don’t experience God even then when religion tells you that you would.

Many people say for example that you can experience God when a person dies who was close to you. When my mother died, just half a year ago, I was by her side. I felt how life left her body, how her limbs got heavier and her breathing stopped. I was there but I did not feel God getting her soul, I did not see any angels stepping down and I did not see a small ball of light unite with a big one. I was with her the whole night and all the time until we burned her but I did not experience anything divine.

Maybe some of the people around me did. Some of the religious people among our staff, some of the mourners who were with us from the early morning hours. Even if one experiences God, it will always be an individual experience.

And in my eyes, this experience could as well be an illusion, a production of your mind which has received lots of information on how such an experience should look like. It doesn’t mean that what you experience is real though! If someone takes drugs, he may experience a lot similar illusions. He sees angels, aura of people and things, he may even talk to God. You would say he is high and his experience was not real. I could say the same about you – your emotions made you high and your experience was not real.

That is why I don’t believe in God. I believe in love because I have seen how love can accomplish great things. I feel that things work with love. What God is for you could be love for me. I experience it and say it is real for me – and whatever you experience is real for you!