Does God Speak to You?

and you might think that you never receive messages from God, it's like, actually you do, it's your conscience and that annoying little thing

does

n't do exactly what you want it to do, it tends to improve you on a fairly regular basis and reminds you of your various needs and inadequacies and you might think it's you talking, but then you might wonder why he's telling you things you don't want to hear at the moment and why you can't control them, and both are extraordinarily good. The objections and what you would call it the equation of conscience with the God within, let's say, is it something that I just invented or is there a very pronounced and deep thread of Catholic thought in particular that identifies conscience with the voice of God. within and it is an idea that arises in the Old Testament with the prophet Moses and who is the prophet who appears with Christ when he is transfigured on the mountain is Moses and Elijah Elijah who is the first person to postulate that God is not in nature but There's the still small voice inside, so that's what comes to Jonah and says exactly what conscience always says: you have to go do something you'd rather not do, you have to admit something you don't want to do, you have to do something. to undertake. some corrective action that you don't want to take you have to atone for your bloody sins and sometimes other people's sins and then the voice comes to Jonah and says: you know there is a city some distance away from you, Nineveh and it is full of your enemies and that's why the people of Nineveh are the historical enemies of the Israelites at that time and, even though it is a city of your enemies, I want you to go there because I'm not very happy with the Ninevites they have.

I veered off the path and I'm thinking about giving them a good hit and if they don't straighten up there won't be any of them left and I'm like, you know, deliberating on whether or not to make my choice in that regard. It's acceptable and I thought about sending you there just to see if they fix it and Jonah thinks so. I don't think so friend, first of all, I soon see them going to hell in a basket because they are my enemies and they are the usual enemies of the Israelite people, so why would I care if they live or die?

And since they are my enemies, it might be better if they burn in hell, as far as I'm concerned, so no, I don't. I don't think he's going to go there and there's 150,000 of them and one of me and I'm his enemy and so this sounds like a really bad strategy as far as I'm concerned so Jonah

does

what people always do and he thinks I think I'll go the other direction, which is exactly what you do when you're asked to say something you know damn well you should say and you don't, and you also think of your Pride and nonsense that you can get away with it and You can't because you never get your way, and if you think you do, that is the same voice of Pride telling you that you are capable of bending or twisting the fabric of reality itself. without him going back and taking you out and that's not a wise thing to think anyway Jonah goes the other direction, takes a boat and goes to Parts Unknown there's no way in hell he's going to Nineveh and then what happens?

Well, Jonas. He is called to

speak

and he does not do it and then his life begins to destabilize as yours will if they call you to

speak

and you remain silent and then the waves rise and the wind blows and the boat that is Jonah's Jonah in the That If the ark or the ship of State (you can think of it either way) is now in danger and that is exactly what happens to the ship of State when the people on board refuse to say what they have to say and, Instead, they flee and then the waves rise and the wind blows and the ship is in danger and the sailors, a pretty superstitious bunch, think hey, there's probably someone on this ship who's not quite right with God and that's something. pretty good to actually think about when when uh when your shopkeepers are starting to lock up your ice cream because thieves come at night to steal it, which seems to be what's happening in New York right now and you think the waves are starting to get up and the wind is starting to blow and maybe it's because people don't say what they have to say and that's why the sailors ask Jonah if everything is okay with the god you worship and you and Jonah, who is still a relatively honest man, they say: well, no, actually you know. had a direct commandment from yahwah and they say well who is this yahwe and they and he say he is the creator of the entire universe which makes him first among the gods and the sailors are pretty short on this because they are worshiping these low? -level gods who may be in charge of the local tavern or something and now they came up with yahwa and he's like the King of the universe and now you have Jonah who defied a direct commandment and they think well, that doesn't seem like a very good idea if you really believe in this guy and yet the sailors are even really good guys and try to get to Port so they don't have to throw P Joan overboard, but it's God dealing with the creator of the universe, so the waves just get bigger and that's not so good and finally they think okay, okay, throw them overboard and he's overboard and then what's the moral of the story?

It's like keeping your mouth closed when you have something to say and letting the cat take your tongue when it asks and you'll end up drowning in the back of your brain and you're like, well, that's pretty harsh, it's like no, that's not nothing, I'm serious, that's nothing if you think that the danger of death is the worst that can happen. For you, if you go off the straight and narrow path, you know nothing about life, there are things that are much worse than death and if you have even a modicum of familiarity with the catastrophic history of the 20th century and all the brutality that accompanied With all the silence and lies, you would know perfectly well that death is one of the things you should fear the least and therefore what happens to Jonah is drowning, that is quite miserable, but that is nothing, the Beast emerges from Hell and takes away.

He puts it in his mouth and drags it into the depths and you could say well what the depths are, what this whale is, it is the jaws of hell. Well, how do you know that he is there for 3 days, those are the same three days that Christ spends tearing? hell, it says in the story of Jonah that it is a beast from hell, that is an indication that the parallels are there as well as the direct representations, and it is part of the standard mythological landscape and what it means is that look if you don't say what what do you have. say when it's your turn to speak it's not just your life you're putting in danger but the entire bloody social contract So what did Saniton observe in the Gulag Archipelago, which was perhaps the greatest study on totalitarian atrocity and psychological reasons?

There are also practical reasons for the existence of that atrocity. Soulja Nen's conclusion was that a totalitarian state is not a dictator who oppresses the freedom-loving masses. That's a fool's view of the world. It is the universal control of the lie over every soul, every one, not a single man in a totalitarian state is willing to stand up and say what he knows to be true and that is the totalitarian state. So what happens if you don't say well what you have to say then you go to hell and take? everyone you love with you and that's what happens and then I'll close with this and that's not like a story, it's a story, but it's also what really happens as clearly as you can tell and that's another reason why I don't It takes courage to say what you have to say when you are called to speak, it takes wisdom and that is not the same thing, okay and I will close with this.

There is something to think about here too. I have been writing about the story of Abraham Abraham is an interesting story, so it begins with a guy who is already in Paradise, at least he is in the paradise of Socialist Utopia and I want to say that in that he has been given everything you need, so it's yours. the state has fulfilled for him the Marxist victim of each according to his needs. Abraham has rich parents, he has everything he needs in his store, he can lie there and let half-naked slave girls wave palm leaves over him and eat peeled grapes, and He does it until he's like 75 years old and no wonder, anyway, a voice comes up to him and says, okay, buddy, up and Adam, it's time to get away from your store and get away from your mom and get away from your dad and get away from your family and your tribe and you go out into the world and have an adventure and then Abraham listens, strange as it may seem, he listens and goes out on his adventure and it's one bloody, catastrophic catastrophe after another, it's famine and tyranny and the conspiracy of the Egyptian aristocracy to steal his beautiful wife and war. and the death and the necessary call for the sacrifice of his son is just a cataclysm and through all of that God promises him that if he keeps the faith he will be the father of the nations and what does that mean.

If you have the adventure of your life then everything that can be granted to you will be granted to you and then you will ask yourself how you have the adventure of your life and the answer is you tell the truth you exercise your right and responsibility with freedom of expression you tell the truth and then you might say well, why is it an adventure? Well, first I could say try it, but I could say, let's explain why it's an adventure and also why it's your adventure. you are lying whatever happens to you that is not your adventure if you are lying and something happens to you that is the adventure of the spirit of LIE the lie that you think you have told but that in reality possesses you and the adventure of the spirit of LIE is hell and that's not a good idea so it's not you who is having that affair because if it were you it would be you who would be talking and if it was you talking that would be your truth that would be the truth that would be your affair and then you could say well, yes it's my truth , it's me, but why is it an adventure?

And I can tell you why. Imagine that you are having a conversation with someone and you have already decided what you want the outcome of the conversation to be. you want something from that person you want them to sleep with you you want them to give you money you want them to admire you you want them to think you're beautiful you have some instrumental goal in mind and maybe it's even a bit Noble goal, but it's essential: you craft your words to manipulate the situation so that you get from the person you're communicating with what you want and you might get it and then maybe you say well, what's wrong with that and what?

What's wrong with that? It's like, what the hell do you know? I'm serious, haven't you ever achieved something you were aiming for? That was the wrong thing to do, that happens to you. All the time I want to say that sometimes you fail too and you know that obviously that's not pleasant, but the worst kind of failure is getting exactly what you're looking for and finding out that the lies you had to tell to get it turned out to be giving up what you do for hand you something that not only had no value but was actually contrary to your best interests and then you could say well, how could you exist in the other world of the world any other way?

Because you have to have a plan for yourself. You have to aim for something, you have to want something to communicate and you might say, well, that's actually not true. You can replace that instrumental longing with faith and here is the basis of faith, a form of faith, the basis of the highest form of Faith is the decision to accept the proposition that whatever happens if you live in the truth is , by definition, the best that can happen despite your inability as a consequence of your limitations to have the wisdom to see that and that is a statement. of faith because there is no way to demonstrate the validity of that proposition before promulgating the hypothesis, you have to commit to it, well, let's make it practical.

I manipulate you and get what I want, but then I find out I didn't want what I wanted. and so instead I don't manipulate you, what I do every time I speak is make things as clear for myself and everyone else as possible and let the devil take the consequences and then what is the consequence of that? You have no idea what's going to happen next, right, you throw caution to the wind, you have no idea, you think well, I better not say that because this could happen, it's like you just have to let it go, it's like no, this is what needs to be said. now and no matter what, Bring It On, well that's an adventure, right, it's an adventure and if you do it enough then you'll have the adventure of your life and then if you have the adventure of your life, it's so fucking interesting, so attractive and so exciting that it justifies the misery of your existence, so I know and that's why I say what I have to say and that's why I said what I had to say tonight and thank you very much.