The planets and stars beyond us, the germs within us

A "macro view" from Edwin Tenney Brewster:

As we comprehend no man's religion until we know his world-view, so we understand no man's world-view till we discover his astronomy. The earth itself is for each of us the stage on which he sets his opinions. The sun and the planets and the stars are the background against which his drama of history is played.

A "micro view" from Margulis and Sagan:

The environment is so interwoven with bacteria, and their influence is so pervasive, that there is no really convincing way to point your finger and say this is where life ends and this is where the inorganic realm of nonlife begins.

Edward Abbey on seeing the synergy and inventing God from it:

Fred explained his theory of irrational numbers, binary electives and organic equations. Would lead, he argued, when he found the key connection, to a kind of cybernetic thinking machine that could digest numerical data in such quantity and at such velocity that science itself would make a quantum leap into whole new dimensions of power over nature.

Got too much power already, Bob argued...

Power is our destiny, Fred argued in return. We are bound for Andromeda and beyond. The Earth is but a footstool to the stars. God is our goal, God is our fate, and by God if God doesn't exist we shall create the S.O.B.

Neale Donald Walsch reports having this conversation with God:

God: Do you see the balance?
Neale Donald Walsch: Of course. It is ingenious.
God: Thank you. Now please quit destroying it.

Sources

Edwin Tenney Brewster. The Understanding of Religion Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co, 1923. p 37.

Margulis, Lynn and Dorion Sagan. Microcosmos: Four Billion Years of Microbial Evolution Foreword by Lewis Thomas. California: University of California Press, 1986, 1997. pp. 92-93.

Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire, p 47

Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations With God: An Uncommon Dialogue. Book 3. Charlottesville, Va.: Hampton Roads Publishing Company, Inc., 1998.