God or not

The Principle gives credit to both science and religion in maneuvering mankind from the dark ages into the twilight of present day. The introduction to the movement’s main book - called Divine Principle - describes the labor and accomplishments of both approaches. It concludes that both have gone as far as it goes and that a new, more comprehensive approach is now required.

The author avoids a discussion on the topic whether God exists or not. Instead he tries to reconcile contradictions between secular, humanistic approaches and various religious views. In doing so he does make a case for the assumption that our universe has a conscious, creative origin outside space and time.

Let’s face it, ultimately the assumption that a god exists is just that – an assumption. The same applies to the view that no god exists and everything developed by coincidence. Most of the time it doesn’t really matter what one believes. Columbus could still have discovered America independent of the sun’s role in the greater picture – as long as he assumed that the earth is spherical. A scientist engaging in molecular research also doesn’t need a final conclusion on the issue. However, if the context is wide enough, at some point all begins to matter.

I find the assumption that the universe has an origin makes more sense than the opposite. It allows to introduce a plan and purpose into the development of the universe. This in turn can explain why such a complex system could develop out of a big ball of pre-matter within the pitifully short time of 15 billion years.

Without something like a plan it is difficult to explain any upward development, meaning: progress from simple to less simple to complex to very complex. Order has the tendency to disappear in the absence of an ordering effort. Thus the assumption that anything can grow out of a large ball of pre-matter based on pre-laws if we just wait long enough is just as questionable as the idea that some guy created the world in less than a week a few thousand years ago (Bible).

We have three options:

• we assume there is a creator,
• we assume no god exists
• we don’t care.

The Principle assumes that a god exists and then uses a systematic approach to develop an interesting system of thought. Read on.