The different perceptions is part of the problem. People keep trying to define God and to impose control over access to God. That's what religion does – it creates barriers between us and God who is love. That, IME, is why they think they can tell people who they can and cannot love and how they can love. Religion makes itself the gatekeepers between us and what is holy or divine.

The thing is, what is holy or divine resides within us. The only barriers between us and what is holy are barriers we create. God is love and God is within.

Do you recall in scripture that the Holy of Holies was sequestered behind a curtain and that only the High Priest, under the weight of proscribed ritual, could enter there to intercede for mankind with God? That curtain and the weighted rituals were a barrier between us and what is holy – i.e., God. At Jesus' death, the curtain between the faithful and the "Holy of Holies" was torn from top to bottom, unrepairable. The barrier was torn assunder.

Whatever we call the concept – holy or divine or spiritual connection – to my mind it is God. God is both name and pronoun. God is the pronoun for the divine, for the holy, for the spiritual. And, Jesus is God made flesh to live and teach the way for us to reflect into the world the image of God who is love – and, that love is the salvation Jesus offers.