Finding God in High Places

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Finding God in High Places

Page Type: Article

Activities: Hiking, Mountaineering, Scrambling

Page By: shanrickv

Created/Edited: Dec 15, 2007 / Dec 16, 2007

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“I raise my eyes toward the mountains. Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.” Psalm 121: 1-2

Though I may be accused of it by some, I am far from a “Holy Roller” or teetotaler. I love a good beer. In fact, I’m a beer snob, as I will only drink microbrews or Guinness, but try to do so in that infamous land of “moderation,” whatever that means. Unfortunately, when I let my weak mind govern me I can also swear with the best or worst of them, depending on how you view profanity. Still, my Christian faith is the most important thing in my life. Catholicism came alive for me in high school and it has remained the core of who I am as a 41 year-old husband and father of 4. Perhaps the deepest experience I have of my faith is in the quiet of receiving communion during one of the few weekday Masses that I am able to attend. The intimacy I feel with God at those times carries over into my time in the mountains.

“Think about it, there must be higher love. Down in the heart or hidden in the stars above.”-Steve Winwood’s “Higher Love”

I’m not sharing this with you to evangelize or hit anyone over the head with my Bible. I just simply feel compelled to do so. There is risk involved in sharing your faith. There is vulnerability there and yet, I feel compelled. Men need to live adventures and for me that is experienced in the mountains. It is simply part of the heart that God gives us. This is not a “How To” article on how to find God in the mountains. It is far from it. I hope that I would never be so presumptuous. It is simply my story about how I came into an awareness of the wild, dangerous and loving heart of God and how I feel he has drawn me to the hills. I may get hammered for this and, frankly, I don’t care. Hammer away. It is who I am and my experience of God drawing me to the wilderness.

“Without it, life is wasted time. Look inside your heart, I’ll look inside mine.”

For me personally, I have found it impossible to escape the presence of God when I am in the hills, regardless of whether it is a local Colorado Springs foothill or the summit of Mt. Rainier. I find myself surrounded by the mercy and majesty of a creator who loves wildness. I can be deep into Cheyenne Canyon only 20 minutes from our house or alone in the Collegiate Peaks Wilderness of the Sawatch Range and I realize time and again that all of this glory was no accident. I have no problem reconciling the theory of evolution with my Christian faith. A day to God can be a thousand years to man and if he chose to bring about our beautiful Earth over millions of years as opposed to a literal seven days, so be it. Being Creator, I think he earned that right! Still, I believe it was planned always with humanity in mind. We are the crown of his creation and I can’t see the Earth as an accidental “big bang.”

“Things look so bad everywhere. In this world what is fair? We walk blind and we try to see. Falling behind in what could be.”

I can’t look into the beautiful eyes of one of my children and believe that they simply came about because a fish decided to sprout legs and climb out of primordial ooze umpteen years ago. In the same way I can’t drive up Ute Pass each morning to work while gazing upon Pikes Peak and think that it resulted just because tectonic plates got into an argument. I believe that God in his whimsical joy caused the tectonic disagreement and he did it for our pleasure. Some would look upon that as an arrogant statement. God brought about Pikes Peak for my pleasure? He gave the Red Couloir on Crestone Peak for me to climb? He caused the lush green fields of the Burren Way in Ireland just for me to gaze on upon? Yes, I believe he did. Yet, as the Casting Crowns song goes, “Who am I? … a vapor in the wind, here today and gone tomorrow.” Still, I’m a “vapor” that is “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139) … that God loves.

A note about women: they baffle me, but I mean that in a good way. The day I think I have them figured out is the day my heart grows cold. What I am writing about here predominantly deals with men and their need to be outdoors in one way or another. In no way, shape or form am I saying that women can’t experience the mountains in the same way. This is just coming from my perspective as a man. If humanity is the crown of creation, and I believe it is, women are the most beautiful jewel. I’m not talking about swimsuit models. I mean all women and their hearts of beauty that we are graced by. Though the mountains are beautiful beyond measure, they still cannot shine a light to the beauty of Eve.

“Worlds are turning and we’re just hanging on. Facing our fear and standing out there alone?”

In 2000 I started to get into mountain biking. I felt the need to get out into nature more. I realized that I was becoming an old “30 something” while succumbing to the rat race of suburban Maryland. I did a lot of biking on the C&O Canal and made plans to ride the entire 184 miles solo over 3 days. The thought of being out on my own in the deep reaches of the Potomac River in western Maryland intrigued me. However, when I did the ride I realized that I was far from alone. I felt that God was drawing me to the wilderness to be alone with him. There was a hunger in my heart to be in wild places, often with a little danger, that I could not articulate, but I knew that it was there.

“A yearning and it’s real to me. There must be someone whose feeling for me.”

I spent more and more time on Sugarloaf Mountain, a relatively small hill on the outskirts of Montgomery County. I frequently found myself gazing towards the mountain when it would come into view from I-270, one of the countless freeways that make up the concrete jungle of Washington, DC. Sugarloaf became a place of solitude for me and my dog, Grace, yet I never felt alone; there again was God with his ever present peace refreshing me in this small mountain oasis. I wish I could find the words that did his presence justice, yet all I can say is that I felt him there in my heart drawing me back to Sugarloaf. It was just a small taste of what he had in store for me.

I started hiking and climbing seriously in the summer of 2002. My wife and I were still living in Maryland at the time, but frequently came back to Colorado to visit her family. I had gazed upon Longs Peak countless times, but never thought about climbing it. I didn’t think I had what it took to climb such a prominent peak. The previous Thanksgiving we were in Estes Park and I caught the climbing bug of all places in front of a urinal. That’s right, I was taking a leak and looking at a map of Longs Peak hanging on the wall of a restaurant bathroom. I saw that there was a route to the top that did not require any serious mountaineering skills, just a lot of endurance. One thing led to another and, before I knew it, I was attempting Longs that summer with two relatives. We failed miserably. The plan was to camp in the boulder field and go for the summit the next day. We were caught in a hail storm with high winds and lightening while going over Granite Pass. I spent one of the most physically miserable nights of my life huddled in my tent in the boulder field below the summit. I was dehydrated and hypothermic and never felt more alive. I shivered in my tent in a boulder field above 12,000 feet for much of the night and God was there. I was physically spent, but the undeniable presence of this creator that I was coming to know personally in wild and dangerous places filled my REI Half Dome tent.

“Bring me a higher love. Where’s that higher love I keep thinking of?”

I limped my way down the mountain and 3 days later attempted it again with a Coloradoan named Alan Arnette. I had discovered his mountaineering website that spring and he graciously allowed me to pick his brain about Longs Peak. I spoke to him after my failed attempt and he could sense my disappointment over the phone. Three days later he took a day off work and guided my low-lander butt to the top of Longs, the monarch of Colorado’s Front Range. I will never forget the glory I felt at the top of the Keyhole when I gazed upon the most dramatic scenery I had ever encountered. Alan told me to enjoy the views, but reminded me it was no place to screw up. We made our way up the Ledges, the Trough, the Narrows and finally the Homestretch that led to the summit. I surprised myself when I became choked up after reaching the top. I always thought that reaching the summit of Longs Peak would be like scoring a game winning touchdown, but it was the farthest thing from what I experienced. I was there with Alan and about 10 other people, but more than anyone else, God was there. It was not a feeling of conquering a peak, but a realization that God had given me the grace to endure the climb of my life, up to that point, and that I was never apart from him while I did it. It was the first time that I experienced that overwhelming post-summit satisfaction of peace and I knew that it reached into my heart and far beyond just a physical accomplishment.

You could say that it was at the top of Longs that I actually caught the climbing bug and not the urinal in Estes Park. Yet, I knew that it was something so much more than just a hobby. Still, I could not put words to what was going on inside of me. I had this growing desire to be in the outdoors, but far from sitting at the community pool across the street. I wanted to be in the wilderness. I joked that it was my way of staving off a mid-life crisis, when it was God who was actually drawing me there.
The following spring I went to Ireland with two college friends. We spent an incredible week backpacking over the Burren Way, a 50 mile trail and road that wound its way through some of the most beautiful land in Ireland and the world for that matter. We ended our first full day of hiking when we crested a ridge of hills overlooking the small Atlantic coast town of Fanore. The ocean opened up before us with the Aran Islands to the south. A storm started to brew with high winds and rain around the ridge we were descending. It was then that we came upon what I later found out was a wild goat. It was huge and actually looked like a cross between a horse and a llama with large horns. Before I could snap a digital it stomped its hooves at me and let out this hideous snort of steam and mist just before it ran off and disappeared into the rain. There I was in the middle of a forming storm high on a ridge with the Atlantic Ocean in full view and wild animals snorting at me … and God was there. That Higher Love was there.

A few weeks later I found myself back in Colorado hiking with Alan, who was starting to become one of those people you come across that is a true friend for life. He had just returned from his second attempt of Everest and seemed quiet. We climbed Grays and Torreys Peaks after a light June snowfall. After summiting Torreys we started to make our way down and he opened up to me about his frustrations on Everest and the disappointment he felt. Here I was a novice low-lander from Maryland climbing in the snow in June on a Colorado 14er and an Everest mountaineer was confiding in me about his struggles to reach the top of the world. I found myself asking God what I ever did to be so blessed to be there in that place. Then Alan really caught me by surprise. He said we should try to climb Mt. Rainer.

Mt. Rainier is an active volcano that is the longest endurance climb in the lower 48. Once again, I doubted that I had what it took to get to the top. Still, I was drawn to it. I wanted to know if I had it in me. Before I knew it Alan had arranged a group of nine men from the U.S and Canada to do the climb through RMI. That was when my life was turned upside down.

“Bring me a higher love. Bring me a higher love.”

Shannon and I had always toyed with the idea of moving back to her native Colorado, but never seriously thought about it until the fall of 2003. Our local county government was fighting me tooth and nail to allow me to do a 3000 sq. ft. expansion of my veterinary clinic. I hate to lose, but realized that I was crashing and burning big time in this endeavor. Shannon and I prayed together and felt God was leading us to sell the clinic and move our family of 3 kids to either Colorado or my home state of Ohio. We thought the process would take 1- 2 years. A day later we found a buyer for my clinic! A couple months after that I found an animal hospital in Woodland Park to purchase. Soon after we put our house on the market and it sold within 3 days for significantly more than our asking price. I’m not so naïve as to think that God makes things easy for us, far from it, but this time he did. I thought it would be 2 years before I would be back in the mountains of Colorado. Instead, I found myself summiting Pikes Peak by the Crags route just a few short months later while I trained for Rainer.

Alan and I met up with the remainder of our group that we coined “The Rainier 9” in Washington in July, 2004. We did our one day climbing school with RMI then started for the summit the following day. After a restless night of sleep in the Camp Muir hut I found myself out on the Ingraham Glacier under a star-filled sky at 1 a.m. roped to three other men and surrounded by the other members of the “9”. Why was I there? I had a wife, 3 children and a new business to care for. What was I thinking?!? Still, I felt drawn to continue climbing Rainier. I started to struggle with doubts as I looked up at the head lamps of other climbers far above us on the Disappointment Cleaver, the crux of the climb. I thought back to the countless hours training on the stair master and elliptical and how constantly I repeated one of my favorite scriptures, Phillipians 4:13, “In him who is the source of my strength I have strength for all things.” Each time I struggled with doubts about my ability to summit I would repeat the verse. As I neared the top of the Cleaver I started to feel stronger and far from tired. At the top of the DC our group of nine sat down in the snow and took in the sunrise. I was in the midst of this cold and hostile glacier environment when the sunrise started to warm my face … and I felt the hand of God. A few thousand feet below I struggled with terrible doubts about whether I had what it took to even get this far. Now I could taste the summit. As our three rope lines pushed higher I kept repeating Phillipians 4:13 and before long I was standing on top of the snow-covered crater of a volcano at 6:30 in the morning. I had dreamt of this moment from the time Alan put the thought in my mind a year before on Grays and Torreys back in what was now my new home of Colorado. Two years before I was huddled in my tent, hypothermic and dehydrated, in the boulder field of Longs Peak. Now I had summited what many refer to as America’s “mini-Everest.” I knew that the grace and strength that God gave me to summit the longest endurance climb in the lower 48 would stay with me in a transcendent way. It was not an experience that was over and done with in three short days, but an adventure that lives with me to this day and beyond.

“Bring me a higher love. I could rise above on a higher love.”

I went home to Colorado and started to think, what’s next? What was going on inside of me that was drawing me to mountains with such force. That summer I climbed 5 new 14ers, then took up snowboarding with my son when winter set in. It wasn’t that I was looking for the next adrenaline rush. I just desired to be outside and keep growing in this experience of whatever was going on inside of me.

“I will wait for it. I’m not too late for it. Until then, I’ll sing my song to cheer the night along.”

My parents had visited that fall and my mom chased me around a bookstore with a copy of John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart, telling me that I needed to read it. To appease her I bought the book and let it sit on the shelf for a number of months. I picked it up that December and did not put it down. Finally, all that I started to desire years before while biking on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal started to make sense. Why was I so drawn to the wild? Why did I enjoy shivering in a tent pitched on a 12,000 foot high boulder field? Why did I love climbing a treacherous ridge called Disappointment Cleaver roped to three other men? Why?
Through the pages of Wild at Heart I started to discover why. Eldredge so eloquently writes that God did not create us to be just good men who go to church each Sunday and attend picnics after the service, only to restart the daily grind the following Monday. That kind of life is why Thoreau wrote that so many men lead “quiet lives of desperation” or as Eldredge writes, “resignation.” He writes that God created our hearts to live lives of freedom and love and to experience all that he created for us here on the Earth. He writes that our hearts are created good, first and foremost, contrary to what many Christians believe and wrongly teach that our hearts are “desperately wicked.”

“I could light the night up with my soul on fire. I could make the sun shine from pure desire.”

What about the heart of a man? What is it that we desire? Eldredge writes that at the core of our hearts we desire a battle to fight, an adventure to live and a beauty to fight for. I started to ask what that meant for me?

The battle I fight is in so many different parts of my life. As for the mountains, I battle myself more than I fight a hill. I have grown away from thinking that I can conquer a mountain. Rather, the more mountains I summit the more they humble me. They are there and have stood the test of time and are far from influenced by my ability to reach their summits. They are there as mighty bastions of God’s creation and they humble me as nature should. Can I change the weather on any given day that I climb? Can I make their summits any lower? No, they humble me. I do not battle against a mountain, but myself. I overcome my weakness and gain a sense of determination and accomplishment from the grace God gives me to keep climbing higher. This carries over so deeply and far into the spiritual realms of my life. The grace that I gain on a mountain allows me to battle the sin of my life, great that it is, and overcome it more and more. It makes me a better man, a better husband and a better father.

What is the adventure that we desire to live as men? Does God call us to go from one adrenaline rush to another to satisfy some longing in our hearts? Certainly not, but many men do. It is easy for us to hop from one high to the next and try to find fulfillment in it, only to leave our hearts empty. Still, we crave adventure. Deep in our hearts we desire to be in wild places. For me that is in the mountains. I love to be on an exposed snow covered ridge that falls to each side and be hit with a blast of wind. It simply stirs my soul. I stop and recall how the Psalmist wrote, “God makes the clouds His chariot and he walks on the wings of the wind.” (Psalm 104:3) We need to be in nature as men. I believe that ultimately, that is where we find God. St. Augustine wrote that, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in God.” For me that “rest” comes in the adventure of the mountains. They make me come alive and it carries into my life as a husband, father and friend. I desire to bring my family and friends into that adventure. Yes, I want to share the mountains with them and have us draw together in the hills. More so, I want that to carry over into our daily lives; to live a life of freedom and adventure where we are living for each other and not ourselves.

What is the beauty that I find myself fighting for in the mountains … and in my life? Yes, protecting the environment is worth fighting for. God gave it to us to preserve and cherish. It is in nature perhaps where we experience the presence of God the most. However, I find myself fighting for a beauty that reaches so far beyond just a Greenpeace cause. I recently climbed the Colorado 14ers Mt. Harvard and Mt. Columbia with Alan and our close friend, Robert. We did a grueling traverse between the two peaks. As I approached the summit of Harvard I felt less than whole. I simply was not 100%. I thought about not doing the traverse and calling it a day after Harvard. Then what I call the “sigh of the mountains” came over me. I reclined against a smooth rock on the summit of Harvard basking in the early morning sunlight and looked back over Horn Fork Basin that we had climbed through. Its beauty struck me to the core of my heart. The sun had risen over the ridge between the two peaks and was bathing the basin in its light. The deep green came out of the morning shadows and reminded me of the many Colorado basins and gulches and meadows that I have been so blessed to climb and hike through. It called my thoughts back to the green of the Burren Way in Ireland. I looked back over the basin and I simply sighed. I struggle to put into words how that “sigh of the mountains” reaches down into my heart, but I know that it is the heart of God touching me. I come just a few steps closer, as a pilot once wrote, to “slipping the surely bonds of Earth and touching the face of God” and I sigh deeply. It is the sigh that you want to let out when reading Shakespeare or hearing a concerto by Haydn. It is the sigh you let out when listening to Van Morrisons “Moondance” at your favorite Irish pub while sipping a Black and Tan and watching the Guinness stay above the ale. It is the sigh you let out when you experience the beauty that God has given us to cherish out of his whimsical joy, whether just for a moment or for a moment that stretches into eternity. This is the beauty that a man wants to fight for. For me I see it not just in the mountains, but in the eyes of my wife, my children, my closest friends and my parents as they age and move closer to the other side of eternity. The beauty is never just in the mountains, but the mountains bring me closer to the beauty of the people I love the most.

So this is my story of how I have found God in the mountains and have drawn closer to him. As I stated earlier it is not a “How To” article. It is simply my story. While writing it I have realized all the more that it is not me who pursues God in the hills, but God who pursues me. Though the mountains I climb are massive, they are just one small part of his creation that he so deeply desires to share with me and it is only the beginning of my walk with him in life.

I want to climb higher and higher. Perhaps someday I will stand on the summit of peaks like Orizaba, Denali or Aconcogua. There have been many cold nights that I have fallen asleep dreaming of Everest. I see myself waking in my tent on the South Col, going over the Balcony, South Summit and the Hilary Step to finally stand on top of the world. Still, I may just find myself on a Colorado 14er or struggling through a crisis of life with the people I love, but as Eldredge so profoundly ends Wild at Heart, God tells us that together, “We are climbing Everest.”

“The glory of God is man fully alive.” – St. Irenaus

Climb On!
Patrick

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	seanpeckham	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Voted 9/10	While I appreciate that mountains give us wonderful feelings that one might call "spiritual" (and for some this translates into "god"), I agree that the love of mountain beauty is much more culturally widespread than any church. I have to wonder, was your god so busy making pretty mountains that he doesn't have time to prevent his fan clubs from killing each other over him, and using him as a justification for every possible boneheaded political agenda? And couldn't he have made enough mountains for everyone to enjoy, and given everyone good enough health to climb them? Or are mountaineers the chosen people? Is getting killed in an avalanche punishment for sin? I appreciate you are expressing your own personal attitude towards the mountains, and I enjoyed the images, but God and religion, having so much historical and political baggage, are to my mind the opposite of spirituality as I experience in the mountains.
		Posted Dec 17, 2007 3:30 pm


	Poor Climber	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Hasn't voted	Than perhaps you should write an article on your opinion of the mountains and spirituality.
		Posted Dec 17, 2007 4:29 pm


	shanrickv	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Hasn't voted	Sean, After reading the second paragraph of your post I can't help but wonder where all that came from after reading my article. Did you actually read it? All of it? It's as if you are blaming me for the crusades and every conservative Republican blunder, many that they are, without even knowing me. Do you really think I believe that avalanche deaths are the result of the climbers sin?!? Get serious! Where you are even beginning to come up with that in response to what I wrote is beyond me and gladly so. Just because my experience of faith has been different from your's does not mean that I'm part of a God "fan club" that justifies killing people. Give me a break! We speak of "intolerance" and we throw that term around in our overly sanctimonious political correctness. Certainly many Christians are totally intolerant of other people and their beliefs simply because they are different from those they hold. I will not even try to make excuses for them. What you need to realize is that you are no different. That may sting, but go back and actually read your second paragraph and then think about the baggage you are carrying and don't put it on me. If you are ever in Colorado Springs let me know and we can go have a good beer together. Perhaps that way you can realize that just because I'm a Catholic who is open with his beliefs does not make me a right wing nut job. I'm going snowboarding this weekend and I'll say a prayer that I don't get caught in an avalanche. Hope that doesn't upset you too much! Climb On! Patrick
		Posted Dec 18, 2007 12:21 pm


	ascendingzion	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Hasn't voted	"ethno-centric" . . . That's really not necessary and actually rather biased and anti-american on your part. If you all are really so concerned with the "the other" and any offense then please don't engage in that behavior yourself. Also, please make informed comments as Christianity hardly can be attributed to any particular ethnicity. . . Judaism yes, but Christianity, hardly. I would also add to others that this discussion simply would not exist if a Hindu in India or a Buddhist in Tibet had shared their own thoughts and sacred texts. Are you really concerned about anyone being offended or are you personally frustrated by a religion you dislike?
		Posted Dec 23, 2007 5:46 pm


	seanpeckham	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Voted 9/10	Poor Climber: do you really want SummitPost to degenerate into a contest with people trying to claim that their own particular kind of spirituality has a monopoly on the mountains? I don't think so, so I'm not going to participate the way you suggest. It is precisely the aversion to such a possibility that has people uneasy about the present article, despite its obvious (and for my part, undisputed) merit in photography and personal expression. What we can all agree on is that the mountains give us wonderful feelings, and "spiritual" may be an appropriate word for describing the way we experience those feelings. What we can't, and never will, agree on, is that any one person's or culture's god, religion, or spiritual paradigm correctly dictates to us how we should experience or interpret these feelings.
		Posted Dec 26, 2007 1:09 pm


	seanpeckham	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Voted 9/10	shanrickv: I'm sorry, I didn't realize you might take my second paragraph personally. It wasn't intended that way, and I never got any impression you are some sort of "right wing nut job". I'm sure that if I ever met you and we forgot about this getting off on the wrong foot, we could enjoy having a beer together or going hiking together. Considering that you'd be willing to do that after the way my post apparently came across to you, I am impressed with your good-naturedness. Those comments in my post are just things that come to my mind when I think of the notion that the mountains were created by God or bring us to God. It was just my reaction to the general premise of the article, not anything I inferred you personally somehow believe. It simply strikes me as absurd and rather egocentric on the part of a mountaineer to think that a being who apparently doesn't care to alleviate the real and pointless suffering in the world, even when inflicted in his name by his followers, nevertheless is concerned with my personal spiritual happiness (or safety from avalanches) while I'm following my indulgent little muse in the mountains. Seriously, I can afford not to have spiritual experiences in the mountains if it is distracting God from doing something useful like turning bombs and bullets into food or eliminating disease or even just settling the endless fight over which political faction speaks for him...assuming he exists and gives a shit. I am trying to express incredulity, not intolerance. The problem with attributing our mountain spirituality to the Catholic God is that all of us experience some kind of spirituality in the mountains, but not all of us believe in the Catholic god (or even some generic judeo-christian god, or some vague god-in-general). It is as though it is being suggested that those people are also getting their spirituality from your god, but are ignorant or in denial about that supposed fact. Now if you were to portray your god as a construct of your own mind or culture, rather than some real being that is there whether we admit it or not, then you could associate your mountain experiences with that god without inherently implying that everyone else's experiences are also associated with that god (but they are too stupid, sinful, unspiritual, or whatever to realize it). I understand you did not intend to imply this, but it seems inevitably to follow from the most general premises of your article. You just cannot logically escape the exclusivity of monotheism, and its claim to a monopoly on "correct" spirituality (remember "thou shalt have no other gods before me"?). Please understand that I do not mean any disrespect to your personal spirituality, or your right to express it on SP; I expect there is lots of overlap between how you and I react to being in the mountains. It's just this implication I am objecting to, which I think is a legitimate point regardless of how biased I am against religion because of baggage I supposedly have (so let's not go there).
		Posted Dec 26, 2007 3:18 pm


	kamil	"thou shalt have no other gods before me"
	Voted 10/10	Well, I understand it in a bit different way: thou shalt not let the money, the career, the hatred etc. become your god :) Just my 2 cents. cheers, kamil
		Posted Dec 27, 2007 1:55 pm


	shanrickv	Re: bhudda begs to differ
	Hasn't voted	Hi Sean, Thanks for the apology. It is definitely appreciated. That being said, I feel there are some things that would be good for me to clarify without going into a huge theological discussion. If you want, this can certainly go to PMs if that would be better. OK, so here goes. First off, I know you apologized and I don't want to beat a dead bush, but when you take a tone like you did in your original post people are definitely going to take it personally. Don't be surprised by this. Remember the "God fan club" and "killing people" comment? As for God and all the pain and suffering there is in the world, I don't believe that it is his fault, but I do most certainly believe that he "gives a shit." I think he "gives a shit" much more than we ever know or could begin to imagine. As a Christian I believe that God is love and that love is freely given. However, if that is what we call "agape" love, then it is never forced on us. How could it be if it is love in the truest sense? It has been said that those with power can make someone do just about anything. The exception is that they can never make someone love them. If God is love, and I believe he is, then he would never force his love, grace, beauty or peace upon us. If he did we would be nothing but pawns. No, as humanity we are sleeping in the bed we have made and I can't blame God for that. Finally, I'm a monotheist and I won't apologize for a belief that I hold. To complicate things further, I believe in the Trinity, three Gods in one: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. How is that for a mystery! You can believe that or not believe it, but it what I have found to be true and I won't apologize for it or walk on eggshells. Sean, you replied, "It is as though it is being suggested that those people are also getting their spirituality from your god, but are ignorant or in denial about that supposed fact." That is the farthest thing from what I wrote and certainly not what I believe in my heart. I can't help but feel that you're making presumptions and infering things that simply are not there. I have to ask you again, did you read my article? Did you read all of it? I stated, "This is not a “How To” article on how to find God in the mountains. It is far from it. I hope that I would never be so presumptuous. It is simply my story about how I came into an awareness of the wild, dangerous and loving heart of God and how I feel he has drawn me to the hills." People are going to have beliefs about God, Sean. They are often rock solid beliefs that they hold at the core of their hearts and that yet, differ greatly from those you hold. Does that mean that I'm "suggesting" that you are ignorant or in denial and ultimately drawing your spirituality from my God? No, it means that I'm a Catholic who believes in the Trinity along with millions of other Catholics and Christians of other denominations around the world. It is what I have found to be true in my heart and I won't apologize for it or hide it under a table. It is who I am. Climb On! Patrick
		Posted Dec 27, 2007 3:34 pm

radson

...

Hasn't voted

I assume your faith started much earlier than bethlehem. Bethlehem was just Part II. I am not Bhuddist, but bhuddists do not believe in central deity, so therefore is a belief system quite inconsistent from your own.

I am not in the mood to argue religion today, you definitely have teh right to your beliefs but I find it a real turn-off on summitpost's main page and hope it is not a trend. I enjoy the articles on photography and navigation and have never considered summitpost sterile.

Posted Dec 17, 2007 4:45 pm

NSmith

Great Article

Hasn't voted

Thanks for sharing this article! I really enjoyed it.

Posted Dec 17, 2007 6:00 pm

rdmc

Awesome!

Voted 10/10

The heavens and the earth do declare GOD'S glory... And I am so thankful that I live in America, where I still currently have freedom of religion and freedom of speech.

How can we look at HIS amazing creation and doubt HIS intelligent design?

Thanks for not being ashamed to share. It is each unique individual and our freedoms that make this life and even SP great.

Posted Dec 17, 2007 6:13 pm


	shanrickv	Re: Awesome!
	Hasn't voted	Thanks for your kind words! They mean a lot. Glad you enjoyed the article. Climb On! Patrick
		Posted Dec 18, 2007 12:50 pm

mrwsierra

nice article here...

Voted 10/10

the glory of the hills impacts us all and touches us in different ways.

I love your mixture of images. Thanks for sharing. The goat in the snow shot is really great.

Peaceful journeying.

Posted Dec 17, 2007 6:27 pm


	shanrickv	Re: nice article here...
	Hasn't voted	Thanks! That goat shot was pure luck. I was just sitting on a rock, flipped my digital to black and white and took the picture. I had no idea at the time that it would come out so well. I was too cold! Climb On! Patrick
		Posted Dec 18, 2007 12:48 pm

Travis_

controversial

Hasn't voted

I agree that this article is very well written and beautifully laid out, but as we can already see it is a little controversial to be a featured article. Probably best for SummitPost to remain neutral in regards to religion and other sensitive subjects. By having this feature article SummitPost is portraying a Christian slant, whether deliberate or not. What’s next, an article denouncing evolution and promoting intelligent design?

Posted Dec 17, 2007 7:35 pm


	moonspots	Re: controversial
	Hasn't voted	Controversial? Not in the least. This is his view of the mountains, of God, of himself, and his summits. No controversy there. Climb on!
		Posted Dec 17, 2007 10:37 pm


	Indiana Mad-Man	Re: controversial
	Voted 10/10	I don't understand the controversy people are claiming about this article. SP is a website assembled and run by individuals and inviduals all have different motivations and inspiration, especially in regards to climbing. How can we throw all those perspectives out and make this a purely utilitarian website? Also, why should we expect SP to be neutral on religion. If a Christian posts his perspectives on climbing, should administrators be required to post an article written by a member of every other faith? Of course not. If a Hindu or Buddhist decides to post his perspective it should be featured as well because freedom of religion does not mean people are restricted from expressing their perspectives. Also, this is a fantastic article and it is great to see a Christian willing to express his viewpoints even though they may be in the minority.
		Posted Dec 18, 2007 9:53 am


	TiogaBradford	Re: controversial
	Voted 10/10	Well said!
		Posted Dec 18, 2007 3:51 pm


	rdmc	Re: controversial
	Voted 10/10	I so agree!!!!!
		Posted Dec 18, 2007 5:54 pm

zealous89

The Mount of the Lord

Voted 10/10

I would like to thank you for your beautiful and inspiring article. There it is definitely a power in the mountains, whether someone wants to call it God or something else. The power and purity that draws us there is something we can all share, whatever ideology we profess. I found absolutely nothing offensive about your article. I think you beautifully put into words the emotions we feel, whether we are Christian, Buddhist, Islamic, atheist, or anything else. We are drawn because of the feelings we share when we ascend to these beautiful environments. If someone wants to profess their beliefs, there is nothing wrong with that. Again, thank you for your insightful comments.

Posted Dec 18, 2007 12:46 am

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