“I think that after we know what we mean by the word God, you will understand why we shall not want, and not need, to use it.”
Then I asked them what they meant by God.
Virginia said: “God is the whole, good and bad, only what seems bad is really good. Or God is, rather, every feeling, every emotion.”
Henry said God was everything good, but that everything was good, and bad only seemed bad to us.
Alfred said: “I don’t think bad is good, but I think that God must be everything, anyway.”
Marian tried to say that God is the vast unknown—something, which we know because we feel it.
Florence said: “I spoke to brother Arthur about it, and I now think that God is sympathy; that is, sympathy and understanding of our fellow-men; and as we reach that, we get to God.”
The others were surprised and startled by this explanation. I said I knew what Florence meant, but that she had not been able to express it clearly.
Then Ruth said that she agreed with Henry. She called God spirit.
“Yes,” I answered, “if we take spirit to mean everything. For we know nothing except through our senses, our consciousness, our understanding; so that all we know is knowledge of spirit.”