Love is the meaning

 As a non-theist myself, God as some sort of transcendent Being, and trying to determine exactly what such an incredible Being thinks about anything at all, is a non-starter. Nevertheless, I think existence has significance. It is not a "tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing."

Making the most of one of our worlds many "holy" books, God supposedly looked at "his" creation and saw that it was good. Most seem to interpret that as this rather strange Being looking and thinking how perfect it was, and then along comes us (or Adam, or Eve, or a serpent, or cro-magnon man, or neanderthal man) who then throw a spanner in the works by "sinning", thus messing it all up! It's all our fault!

But how about looking and seeing that it was fit for purpose. Good in that sense?

This points to the "O Felix Culpa" of the Catholic Church, even more so of the Christian Eastern Orthodox Tradition.

From Wiki:- Felix culpa is a Latin phrase that comes from the words felix, meaning "happy," "lucky," or "blessed" and culpa, meaning "fault" or "fall". In the Catholic tradition, the phrase is most often translated "happy fault", as in the Catholic Exsultet. Other translations include "blessed fall" or "fortunate fall".


Even a necessary fall, intended. Lets face it, if reward for doing good inevitable resulted in instant reward, the "good" would cease to be. It would become self-interest. We need the opposites, in which we "live and move and have our being".

Anyway, enough of that. I find more mileage in the Dharma. Forget about "beginnings" and trying to double think some Being who started it all. Such speculations are decried by the Buddha as not being conducive to actually finding the path to the end of suffering, to realising the unshakable deliverance of mind that the core texts say is the heartwood of the Dharma.

Anyway, I waffle as usual. I think there are signs everywhere of the meaning of Reality. To surrender our "selves" we find our meaning. Our own path, time and place. As in the zen master Dogen's Genjokoan:-

Therefore, if there are fish that would swim or birds that would fly only after investigating the entire ocean or sky, they would find neither path nor place. When we make this very place our own, our practice becomes the actualization of reality (genjōkōan). When we make this path our own, our activity naturally becomes actualized reality (genjōkōan).

Or, in theistic language, from the writings of the great Christian mystic Julian of Norwich, from her "Revelations of Divine Love":-

I was answered in spiritual understanding, and it was said: What, do you wish to know your Lord’s meaning in this thing? Know it well, love was his meaning. Who reveals it to you? Love. What did he reveal you? Love. Why does he reveal it to you? For Love…. So I was taught that love is our Lord’s meaning.

Yes, it is. Such is my faith.