Guided Thread

What is God?

When someone prays, who—or what—is being addressed? The word God can name one who hears, commands, loves, and can be answered. It can also point toward that from which everything exists: ultimate reality, infinite substance, or a depth beyond naming. Do these two movements meet, or do they make fundamentally different claims?

Religious address places a life in relation to what is ultimate. A person prays, gives thanks, protests, obeys, or asks for mercy. Jewish covenant, Christian prayer to the Father and confession of the Trinity, Islamic worship of the one God, and devotion to Krishna belong to distinct traditions, yet each allows the divine to be approached as more than an impersonal explanation.

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