OK, well I have. I have done that.
I know it happened to me. If somebody else says, "That didn't happen" then my choices at that point are to change my understanding of what I know happened, or understand that whoever said it *didn't* happen does not fully understand what actually happened.
Assuming that I choose the latter, then presenting empirical proof to the person that has just told me "That didn't happen" is not overly important to me, since that person has already told me that he has made his decision about the validity of what happened.
Now, I don't mean this in some kind of mean way. Here is my point. Let's say, (for the purpose of the discussion) that I know that at some point in the past, the phone rang, I was not expecting a call, but I instantly knew who was calling me. I picked up the phone, and I was right. Let's say this actually happened to me.
This might (*might*) lead me to consider that something had happened that was beyond the ken of "normal science". Simply stated, I might be led to believe that I had some sort of perception, at that time, in that place, that was "extra-sensory".
If (*if*) I chose to view this telephone conversation thing as an example of some perception that might be related to something spiritual, (as opposed to hard physical reality) then I might (*might*) be more inclined to explore such phenomena than someone who had never had the phone ring and knew who it was.
That's my right. That's not somebody else's call.
I don't have to "prove" that what I experienced could, or would, or should happen to anybody else. My personal right, here in this country, at this time, is to choose how I want to explore that phenomenon, and how I want to view it, and what importance it has for me and the way I live my life.
If I want to view that as a spiritual experience that is unexplained by the scientific community, then that's my right. I have that right.
If somebody else wants to disagree with my viewpoint, then that's fine too.
Where we run into a problem is when this other guy feels obligated to insist that I'm "'crazy", or I'm an "idiot", or I'm a "fool" BECAUSE our viewpoints do not agree. Or, when he claims that not only do I not understand "the truth", but that he does, and I'm wrong, and he's right, and I need to feel worse until I get with his program.
It's the *intention* that I am talking about here. The INTENTION.
Some people INTEND for others to do better, be wiser, be smarter, be happier. A few have the intention for others to feel worse.
This has *nothing* to do with any specific organized religion. There are "good" Christians and bad ones, for example. That does not mean that Christianity is bad, or Buddhism, or anything else. All it means is that somebody at some point in the past said, "Hey, I just answered the phone and I knew who it was before I picked it up!"
The die-hards in any religion have accepted the "truth" that *their* interpretation of the phone call is the *only* acceptable interpretation, and some of them even claim that if you don't have the light blue phone with the 12' cord, then you are going to Hell.
I don't see it that way. The way I see it is that I know what happened when the phone rang. It never happened to you, that's fine. I have no problem with that. Maybe it will some day, and you'll say "Now I know what you meant."
I know what happened. If you want empirical proof, don't ask me. Ask yourself.
Most of us already have enough trouble with the little cell-phone dudes shooting at the big walkie-talkie dudes, and the Pink Princess Phone dudes screaming that the red two-line phone dudes must die later today or early tomorrow at the very latest because they are on the wrong color phone and they are just plain evil, and all this stuff is happening on my front porch, and I'm just sitting by my phone because I know what happened with that first phone call *whether or not anybody else wants to agree with me about what happened or not*, and hoping one of these nut cases doesn't come in through the window with an automatic weapon and a book he doesn't really understand very well.
It's not the color of the phone, it's the screaming and the bullets.
And while you are asking yourself questions, ask yourself if you maybe should be a bit more courteous to other people that might be trying in their own way to understand the phone call that you didn't get yet.
Fair? |
