The God within comes in many forms, pulling ideas from Eastern religions, Christianity, and deism to form a nebulous "God is within you" religion. The idea that ultimately, your innermost voice is that of God, because your innermost being is God.
Douthat does fail to make the distinction between pantheism (God is everything, and that is all that is) and panentheisim (God is within everything but is beyond matter). Panentheism is uncharacteristically undefined, while examples of both types are all lumped together. The point of the chapter remains that while the God within movement borrows from many religions, it does not define itself by any particular religion. It ends up being a nebulous support of self, in which people aren't challenged to change themselves, because that self is actually God.
The thesis of this religion is that "somewhere within us all, there does exist a supreme Self that is out true identity, universal and devine". (E Gilbert). The key, the proponent say is not in organized region, rather God is beyond that, and therefore, heaven is available to us all here on earth.
The problem is that the God Within movement promises much, but fails to deliver: "... It's striking that the things that therapeutic, God Within religion doesn't seem to have delivered to Americans are the very things that it claims to be best suited to provide-contentment, happiness, well-being, and, above all, the ability to forge successful relationships with fellow human beings. Instead, the solipsism and narcissism that shadow Got Within theology seen to he gradually overwhelming our ability to live in community with one another."
Nationalism is another form of heresy common today in both sides of politics. Douthat states, "the obvious resemblance between America and the Christian Church - both pan-ethnic, universalizing bodies that promise to create a new man out of the old one, and redeem a fallen and corrupted world - has tempted many Americans to regard the United States as a whole as a New Israel, a holy nation, a people set apart." I can completely relate to this. Growing up and attending a Christian school for middle school, high school, and undergrad college, I heard this argument either implicitly or explicitly with surprising frequency.
As our policital parties continue to become more polarized, the effect of this has actually become more dramatic. "Instead of balencing each other out, the two heresies of nationalism have taken turns in the driver's seat of both political coalitions, giving us messianism from the party in power and apocalyptism from the party out of power, regardless of which party is which."
As our policital parties continue to become more polarized, the effect of this has actually become more dramatic. "Instead of balencing each other out, the two heresies of nationalism have taken turns in the driver's seat of both political coalitions, giving us messianism from the party in power and apocalyptism from the party out of power, regardless of which party is which."
