Over the past 400 millennia, human beings have imagined into reality a variety of supernatural beings to assume a variety of roles, including creator, covenant-maker, savior, rule-maker, judge, parent, tribal champion, and benefactor. If you were to ascribe primary importance to a particular one of these roles, or a similar role, which one would you choose?
You are standing in a debris field where your house once stood, before Hurricane Zebedia, a category-5 storm, swept away every structure in your neighborhood, and every person, except you. You are alone. There is no one else. How much aloneness could you thereafter endure, do you think, without imagining into reality a supernatural being to be ever present with you?
If someone were to ask me if I believe in God, I would say, “yes,” but what I mean by that word does not refer to any sort of being, nor is it something that can be “explained” verbally. If anything, my God is a force, the life force (closely related to love), and if I were the only person in existence (which is not clear in your example — you seem to be talking about a neighborhood )I would have to fight very hard to want to stay alive because the expression of that force would be greatly diminished by the absence of people, but I doubt that I would resort to imagining a supernatural being because — well, that would be unimaginable. 🙂
I think of “God” as an experience, probably an experience that many, if not all, people have, but to which most people are not willing to attach the label “God.” I believe it’s my cultural conditioning that allows me to use that word. I also think there are many other words that refer to the same thing.
Nice.
I can certainly understand the many reasons, including feeling that someone or something of immense power and love is always with you, why people believe in God. But while I have had significant struggles with loneliness and other challenges, never once have I been inclined to reach for such as Being. It’s just not part of my temperament.