http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/06/14/tomorrows.god/index.html
This story talks about Neale Donald Walsch’s book, **Tomorrow’s God, ** citing a need to revamp who or what god is and how he’ll be seen in the future.
Do the theists amongst us see this as a realistic approach to worship?
Can you dump your old ideas and begin to work within a new framework?
Sorry. 
If there is “nothing except the universe”, how is “tomorrow’s God” not “atheism”?
Animism?
ecumenicalism?
None of this stuff is too new or mind-blowing. Just sounds like weak-kneed ex-christian to me.
God has nothing to do with what people make of their religion = how they put it in practice. Im stunned that he even seems to have no clue that God is considered to be the Transcendent Eternal creator of All.
Sorry, but such people make me wonder about the sanity of those who pay attention to them.
Salaam. A
Most of the mainstream Christian denominations have been engaged in this sort of exploration for years.
What new ideas?
Based solely on the snipped comments from his phone interview in the link (because I have not read any of his works and he may be more in touch with reality in his actual exposition) it would seem that Walsch has been hanging around the far Right Christian Fundamentalists exclusively. He seems to be reacting to the expressed beliefs of those denominations outside of the general movement of Christianity.
Not challenge the bible? The bible has been under increasing review and reassessment for a hundred years (with some form of reconsideration dating back to Luther, at least, and examples of other challenges extending back to Augustine of Hippo and Jerome).
Old bearded God? That was a passing phase that originated in the Renaissance painters, hung on for a while, and has been steadily fading away from use for quite a while.
God accepting people of all religions? That is pretty standard fare in most of the older Protestant denominations and even the Catholics have made public declarations to that effect. (Getting anyone to declare that their view is not the best among the good is unlikely–if the next group over is just as good, then I ought to join whoever has the best church picnics or Christmas dances–but a general acceptance that all religion is an expression of people trying to be closer to God is well established.)
His challenges are pretty clearly aimed at people who hold to some version of Biblical literalism and exclusivity in salvation, whom he treats as the entirety of world religious expression.
He needs to get out more.
1.) Sure. There’s a whole bunch of different ways to worship God. Just note the different styles between say, a Roman Catholic church and a Baptist one. Whatever makes you feel one with God, I say go for it.
2.) If I were to “dump my old ideas” every time some guy wrote a book, I’d never make it in to church.
BTW Marley23 - 
Marley23. great minds indeed do think alike. I regret that you beat me to it.
Who is he talking about?
Also sorry, couldn’t resist
No, no, you should have asked “Who is he, I really want to know” 
But yeah, Marley23’s comeback was exactly the first thing through my head upon reading the thread title…
And I’ll join previous posters in observing that Walsch seems to be under the impression that this particular caricature of God remains the dominant interpretation of God in modern religion. It may be the favored flavor of God among fundamentalists, who lately have been specially loud and activist, or among unsophisticated followers of the historic churches, but it’s not necessarily universal.
However he does seem to gloss over one important point: for the three main Western Monotheisms, God IS someone different and set apart – he may communicate with us and care about us and choose some of us and in one case even become one of us… but he is distinctly The Boss and not our drinking buddy. So if he’s advocating a major overthrow of Judeo-Christian-Islamic theology in favor of this “new God” that is made to serve us, a lot of us are going to be wondering why bother with this “new God” and why not just give up on the whole idea.
Theists have had a “different view” of god for thousands of years. Your (and the author’s) view of god is irrelevant. Theists have millions of different approaches to what god is, why it is, and are constantly exploring this.
“When presented with new information, I change my position. What do you, sir, do with new information?”
Still waiting for your proof
For the atheists who I had no doubt would not avoid this thread to snipe at different belief systems, how would you approach the same questions? I’ve known die-hard atheists who picked up theism when and where they found it suited them. It can happen overnight, it can happen after a traumatic event. Are you open-minded enough to accept it if it shows itself to you? Are you willing to change your impression of god as a scientifically provable entity?
I only see one person “sniping” and attempting a hijack here. And I don’t mean the people making The Who references.
But cleaner!
I agree. I was expecting something new and ended up with a rather old outlook on God (IIRC).
It is interesting to see Spong write a bit of a reaction to this guy’s idea-seeing as Spong predates this guy, in this area, by a few years.
Hinduism says that God is everything and everything is God, and Judaism favors questioning God, so long as you’re polite and reasonable about it. That’s the two oldest major religions right there. “Tomorrow’s God,” my bottom. He does need to get out more.
Hell…anything’s possible. I’ll believe it when I see it.
While I don’t agree with everything he says, I believe he is on the right path.
It begain in the sixty’s, the God is dead signs, and the beginning of the remake.
New Agers were the first to say publicly God is everything, there is a Oneness to all things. That was the time of the Harmonic Conversion, dropping the differences and loving the similies.
In that era, also came the Near Death Experiences, OBEs, Bridy Murphy’s and other events that shook the old time religion down to its roots.
Thousands left the church, some looking for other ways, and some convinced God was dead.
So, yes, I think the book speaks truth, if we don’t find our path in the new God, there will be no path, and humanity will have defeated itself. Science can not be the new religion, it is full of contradictions, same as the old religion.
My NDE revealed the most loving, caring, logical God. And the wonderful thing about it is you can question anything.
Love
I don’t have a dog, or a god for that matter, in this fight, but Walsch doesn’t seem to bring anything new to the table. I see no reason to consider
his mumbo-jumbo as any more valid than anyone else’s mumbo-jumbo.
Speaking of which, I should know better than to bother trying to rebut this, but Lekatt, I doubt that anyone except you thinks that science is a “new religion”. In fact, since scientific assertions tend to be based on a body of factual evidence, they’re pretty much the antithesis of religious precepts, aren’t they?
Well, a whole lotta people (not just in Southern Asia but heavily represented there) were there waiting for the New Agers for a couple thousand years, y’know…