Reply #23: I think there are inherent problems

[rrneck]

with trying to use language at all to describe the experience of belief. Oceans of ink and forests of trees have been consumed in the effort, and still when you ask ten believers you may get eleven answers.

Using language to describe the experience itself, or one's conception of a deity if such is the case, will always result in a simulacrum. Efforts to control the language are an appeal to force and eventually lead to sectarian strife.

Rather than own a pale shadow of what we believe and try to require others to adhere to our understanding of it, how about we search for common perceptions and compare our understanding of them together. Or maybe we could even listen to what others see in us, and measure that against our experience?