Beyond Beliefs- Embracing Our Shared Humanity
- theraccoonarmy
- Jun 16
- 8 min read
Updated: Oct 22
I used to think its beyond bonkers not to believe in god.
As i mentioned before , as a man of god i attributed and dedicated everything to the one , the true god.
I always a believer in god, was a Muslim for 40 years, Allah was the almighty.
i made a promise or rather sworn to myself that no matter what happened I will forever be muslim.
Born and die as one.
What if i was born as non muslim? How will i know if my religion is right or wrong?
i didnt choose it myself, I was born into Islam and nurtured as one. Certainly, not fair.
To me, insyallah, i will be rewarded jannah/heaven eventually because am muslim and
I felt sorry for others as they are unfortunately, destined to hell.
This somehow changed Jan this year,
One day i just woke up on the wrong side of the bed and realised that my life was an utter lie.
All of them.
As my life falling apart, I embraced spirituality and in this journey I found another god that feels and behaves like one.
The same god spoken by Rumi and Lao Tzu.
The god above all who is way cooler and kinder than i ever imagined.
Yes, very cool because the god saved this sinner despite all his many wrongdoings and accepted me as am.
Spirituality trancends beyond religion. If religion divide us then spirituality is the answer to unity.
Spirituality is love and kindness, to you and others. Simple and thats what life should be.
Instead of claiming superiority, spirituality embraces everybody regardless of our beliefs, believer or non believer.
Spirituality is remembrance , unbecoming everything and returning to god and to our true self.
Spirituality reminded us that we are all connected we are one. The very important basic forgotten for long time.
Nobody is more or less than the other as we are all equal, the universe the god itself experiencing life in infinite realities and possibilities.
Spirituality is about finding the god inside us, the same concept once echoed by Jesus himself.
Luke 17:21- The kingdom of heaven is within you.
The ultimate god needs no religion.
In spirituality, no middle men , medium, ritual, or places of worship needed, neither that we have to be the perfect pious all light nor travelling to exotic far such as Tibet or the deep amazon rainforest to find god.
Why go to places searching outside when god is right there in your heart.
Rumi reminded us since the 13th centuries.
He searched every places and religion and eventually found god in his heart.
Have you looked into your heart?
God simply ask us to open our heart and embrace the light.
Love , compassion and understanding to each others are the way forward.
Its inclusive where diversity and differences are valued.
Authenticity is encouraged and regarded highly.
Instead of pitting against one another , divided or fighting because of differences in our beliefs, spirituality calls for reconciliation, acknowleging the differences instead and working together towards the betterment of humanity.
That’s very beautiful .
That’s what the world needs.
So fragmentation is in essence a confusion around the question of difference and sameness( or one-ness), but the clear perception of this category is necessary in every phase of life. To be confused about what is different and what is not, is to be confused about everything. Thus, is is not an accident our fragmentary form of thought is leading a widespread range of crises, social, political, economic, ecological, physchological and etc, in the individual and society as a whole.
David Bohm on Wholeness and The Intricate Order
If that was my ‘ awakening’ I must consider myself as very lucky indeed. Lucky to take on different path and to have different perspective and approach to life.
I was learning about religions for sometime from summer last year, getting to know about Gnostic teaching for the very first time and some alternative perspectives on religion.
Saying that am no theologist and i respect all religion equally.
Back home,in Malaysia, open discussion about religion is rare and the moment you question it you are tipping into dangerous territory .
Will be frowned upon, ostracised deemed as liberal or poison to society.
Most afraid of the wraths of Allah,the hell.
In the rather conservative society , we tend to simply gallop whatever spoon-fed as truth.
We hardly hear anybody questioning religion.
On the hindsight, kudos to Siti Kassim and co for being the alternative and progressive new voices.
Thanks to gen Z for rebelling against orthodox religious and societal views.
Questioning considered as heretics or attacks to the organised religions.
Risk of being ostracised or if very unlucky in some countries met your untimely death.
To me thats a red flag, a method to silence and to control.
Religion is potential source for immense power, control and wealth
As in the history, many abused religion due to greed for their own benefits and thats nasty.
How many actually following the real teachings of each religions?
Many hiding behind religion but their actions ironically very dark.
Billions are religious or identify to particular religion, if we all embraced the actual beliefs/teachings and avoid cherry picking , cultural bias, and misinterpretations then we are in good hands.
The whole world will prosper instead of the endless sufferings .
Religion is way of life, most advocate good virtues and values but very often corrupted by us.
The religion itself is pure and beautiful as long as it's free from manipulation and abuse from the malicious party.
We in Malaysia considered ourselves lucky as despite being a multi religion and multiracial country we remain moderate in religion and able live together in peace and harmony.
There is zero place for extremist beliefs in any religions anywhere.
Most back home identify either as Muslim, Christian or Buddhist
The majority are kind hearted people who respect each others and play significant roles to the country despite religious incongruence.
Religious disharmony does happen but usually isolated incidence.
Here in Dublin, a good friend of mine, was the first among us being very vocal against Islam particularly the Holy Quran.
He would have all the detective work done and would not missed the slightest chance to educate us on his new found truths.
He eventually, declared himself as an atheist but contrary to my previous response , i simply listened to his confession as respect to his journey and choices.
For myself, at that time even prior to embracing spirituality I wasnt bothered so much with those newfound "truth" because i wasn't strictly religious to start with and didn't see how the new said informations would change the way am living.
Even when i was in the conservative Malaysia i didnt feel threatened at any point because of Islam.
I respected the majority and i do believe changes will happen but will definitely take some time.
Our best bet is with the younger generations and its happening
In this age of enlightment and explosion of knowledge am hopeful, the sun is rising on the horizon.
I didn't have to provoke them or felt needed to be openly gay.
There is time and place for everything.
In fact, there are many gay around and nobody really going to prosecute you unless politically motivated.
Another point is, I might be gay and loosely practising muslim but my goal in life is to always be kind person, to me and to others.
It’s nice to be nice and thats how i live and aspire my life to be even before i known spirituality.
Religion with billions of believers are still hugely relevant in these modern era and will always be.
The right to religion should be respected and honoured.
Then , we have another group,the atheist who dont believe in god.
From their perspective, the lack of emperical evidence, the presence of evil and injustices in the world, the differences between holy scriptures are some of the arguments against god which do carry some weights.
When i was a muslim, i was reminded that if you dont believe in Allah , you are 'Kuffar" which means your will end up in the hell or ' Jahannam"
Its was hard for me to understand atheist logics.
Its hard not to believe in god.
I say no to organised religions but i strongly believe there is true god, the One.
The One who is always inside us.
The One who needs neither middle men nor religion.
The One from where all of us came from.
The great but humble one who been waiting for us to remember for very long by time.
If you care to look inside you will have your answer.
Your life must have been so perfect , that you blinded by god’ grace.
Or too imperfects that you hurted and mistakenly turned your back against god.
The evidences are everywhere all around us for those who willing to see with their heart.
The universe is all in perfect order from the smallest atoms/subatoms to celestial bodies to galaxies.
Even man made creations need supervision and monitoring and still hardly perfect.
How is the vast infinite universe run on its own with such precision and order?
Its mind boggling.
God didnt play dice according to Einstein.
I was once wrongly loathed the atheist and non muslim.
To me Islam was the true religion and the rest just doomed for hell no matter whether they are good person or not.
I also thought the beliefs were first and we have to be exclusive meaning either spirituality, religion or atheism.
But in the inclusive spirituality,the beliefs are second and good virtues and values first and the priority.
Thats very beautiful teaching-Emphasizing on the positive values that unite and promote togetherness rather than the differences which more than often contributed to negativity.
Regardless of our beliefs, majority of us believe in being a good person and living as one.
Its not us to say or judge if a person is worthy or not
A good person is worthy no matter what their beliefs are.
This is in line with the teaching that god is benovelent
God is all knowing all forgiving
God exist outside time and space and would have a complete knowing of a particular person.
God knows everything, the past, the present and the future.
Thus , god comprehend beyond what we can understand beyond our limited senses.
Many religions promote, love, kindness and compassion.
Many atheist also embody and live the same values as well.
Good and bad people exist on both sides.
DIfferences in our beliefs didnt break us apart because we shared the same langguage of love and compassion.
Our common shared positives values make the world a better place.
Instead of emphasising on the differences in beliefs that will likely lead to provoke and cause separation/dysharmony we should really focus on those shared positives values to create a more compassionate and harmonious world.
All of us are worthy despite our differences.
We are not better than others because of our beliefs but rather based on our actions and how we treat each others.
lets practise empathy- To cultivate deeper understanding and relationship with others.
Lets celebrate diversity- Wheter in perspectives, cultures or beliefs which are the essential in human experience.
lets love each others, we are one we are all connected.
Lets live as we instead of the I.
