what’s somebody like you doing in a place like this?

Why do people feel the need to label themselves? That’s the question of the day for me.

I was on a forum that I regularly lurk and I noticed this post, which discusses the belief system of “Eckankar.” Now, I’m not even going to pretend that I have any idea what Eckankar is or where it originates or how accurate the posts in this forum are. However, for the purposes of this blog post, we’re going to assume that this much is true (as copied&pasted from the previously linked thread):

* Soul is eternal.
* Soul exists because God loves It.
* Soul is on a journey of Self- and God-Realization.
* Soul unfolds spiritually via karma and reincarnation.
* Spiritual unfoldment can be accelerated through conscious contact with the ECK, Divine Spirit.
* Contact with Divine Spirit can be made via the Spiritual Exercises of ECK and the guidance of the Mahanta, the Living ECK Master.
* You can actively explore the spiritual worlds through Soul Travel, dreams, and other spiritual techniques.
* Spiritual experience and liberation in this lifetime are available to all.

The person who made this post is most likely not Indian, which is supposedly the origin of Eckankar. Here’s my dilemma: Why does this person feel the need to label himself as Eckankar instead of saying, “I have my own beliefs and consider myself to be a spiritual person.” Furthermore, the beliefs above sound like Buddhism, Confucianism, Wicca, and watered-down Christianity thrown into a blender.

In general, everyone I come across feels the need to label themselves. For example, one of my good friends went through a phase where he went through about eight labels before deciding on Agnostic Atheist. I have another very close friend who recently went through what her mother called a “crisis of faith” and, though I don’t talk much on the topic of religion with either her or her mother, I do believe she’s having problems deciding on a label for herself, as well.

If we were to label me, I’d be a more-spiritually-inclined-than-not Atheistic Agnostic dabbling in Buddhism. Why can’t I just call myself an “independent believer?” Kind of like in politics: You hate Obama’s healthcare plan, you hate McCain and you think Palin is ridiculous… so you’re an independent. Not a moose-loving Democratic Republican. Labels, labels.

It seems like more and more intelligent people these days spend a huge portion of their lives on a search for divine truth. Do you think that divine truth will be so simple as to be written in a book (e.g. the Bible)? Do you think divine truth can be found on a Google search? Do you think you can go to the public library and check out some out-of-print books on religion and, after three days of study, decide on a certain archaic religion to be divine truth?

I don’t.

I think divine truth is something currently out of the reach of the general population. I think divine truth is just that: divine. By the very definition of the word “divine,” such a truth would emanate from god. Do you honestly think he’d ask some old philosophers to write it in a book that contradicts itself over and over again? Do you really think that the “truth” is that billions of souls are suffering in eternal agony for sins committed in a lifetime that lasted but a fraction of eternity?

I don’t.

Furthermore, if I was to label myself, I wouldn’t feel the need to make everyone else in the world be a more-spiritually-inclined-than-not Atheistic Agnostic dabbling in Buddhism because if you feel like the “divine truth” resides in being a quite-spiritually-inclined Theistic Agnostic dabbling in Wicca, that’s your personal decision through your years (hopefully) of study and meditation over what you have come to know the “divine truth” to be.

-debbie.