When war with Iraq appeared imminent, I asked the minister at our local church to speak out on the teachings of Jesus concerning the folly of war. I harbored the delusion that if enough ministers in enough churches did so, perhaps the nation might avoid plunging headlong into a war for dubious – at best – reasons.
The minister declined, of course, and attempted to put me off with a typical theological cop-out.
“At some point,” he said, “it’s all in God’s hands.”
I replied, “What if you’re right and God doesn’t think this war is a good idea?”
After ten years, millions of lives lost or ruined, and trillions of dollars wasted, perhaps we have the answer.
• • •
I bring-up this sad old news because, like George W. Bush, most of the Republican candidates applying for his old job have a nasty habit of presuming they know the mind of God and assuming God is on their side. But we know what happens when you assume on such a grand scale – it can lead to you make an international ass of yourself.
Take Bush, please! Obviously, something got lost in translation – or else God lied about WMD. Or maybe not. Bush said he didn’t want to be confused with all those messy, confusing facts, so he relied on his gut to make monumental decisions. Who knows? Maybe we went to war because Bush consumed too much beer and barbecue and mistook the rumbling in his gut for the voice of God.
Believe what you will about Bush knowing God’s will, but something is dreadfully wrong with a man who views God and Gut as oracles of equal perspicacity.
Now comes Bush’s even more doltish successor as governor of Texas, Rick Perry, to claim the blessing of God on his candidacy. But again, something must have gotten lost in translation, since Sarah Palin claims God wants her to be President.
Then there’s Michelle Bachmann, who claims God sends earthquakes and hurricanes to get people’s attention. But then she also claimed the Founders ended slavery – has she never heard of the Civil War? Why does anyone pay any attention to someone so pathetically ignorant?
At least Bachmann has a flimsy excuse – she’s following the not-so-shining example of Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and other dopey high priests in the Evangelical movement. Apparently, these people are too willfully blind to see their pronouncements turn God into a horrific monster who punishes the innocent for the sins of the wicked.
• • •
Christian conservative candidates have been so wrong so often about what God wants, you’d think they’d be a bit more circumspect in their pronouncements. You’d think; but they don’t.
The same thoughtlessness that poisons their politics also poisons their faith. Many – if not most – cling steadfastly but foolishly to a literal interpretation of a compilation of books all too obviously filled with superstitious nonsense and suspect history.
They claim the poetic metaphors of Genesis as the literal truth about Creation – and the most ignorant among them claim it happened in six twenty-four hour days six-thousand years or so ago. They swallow with equally unstrained credulity the parting of the Red Sea, Jonah and the whale, virgin birth, resurrection and so much more without a shred of proof – or a moment’s thought.
Yet perversely, these same people refuse to accept the monumental evidence supporting the theory of Evolution. The perpetrators and purveyors of the thinly-disguised Creationist nonsense called Intelligent Design demand to see the complete fossil record over the last four billion years – while providing no real evidence for their claims other than something they call “irreducible complexity”, which they attribute to things like the human eye. But complexity is an argument for Evolution, not against it.
Despite extolling the godlike virtue of the eyes, these people remain willfully blind to the truth. When it comes to Evolution, the old Bible passage rings ironically true – blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.
What should trouble these people – but doesn’t – is that God always seems to agree with them. They never stop to consider they might be wrong. But what if the truth is as I posed the question to my minister – what if God doesn’t agree with them? What if God is trying to tell them something quite different?
• • •
"And God said: My Chosen People did not obey my commandments, so I sent my Son to bring an even simpler message unto them: Feed the poor. But instead, they delivered him up to be crucified. In my wrath, I set the Romans to scatter them like chaff to the wind.
In latter days, a tribe that proclaimed itself the New Chosen People somehow twisted my message to “Feed the poor” into "God wants you to be rich". Woe unto ye Blasphemers!
So I sent a false prophet named Reagan to prey upon them and use their pride and greed to lull them into a false sense of security. To confound them further, I sent more false prophets, the high priests of the Randian Heresy, to preach among them. Fools paid them heed and followed them into madness.
I sent mad dogs of war, the demons Bush and Cheney, to impoverish them by beating their plowshares into swords. I sent a plague of locusts disguised as money-lenders to strip them bare of all their possessions; yea, even unto the equity in their houses.
I sent shrieking harpies Sarah and Michelle to torment their souls, and yet some harkened unto these vacuous temptresses. Woe unto him who is seduced by a comely countenance; for lo, it often hideth a shrill tongue and a shrewish nature.
Yet through all these plagues upon their houses, their hearts remained hardened. Must I now send Satan himself disguised as the demon Perry?"
• • •
Who’s to say my interpretation of these “signs” isn’t at least as valid as theirs? What if this is God’s message – a message that has fallen on deaf ears and closed minds?
By the way, who says God is a Conservative? Certainly, the teachings of Jesus were so radically liberal about pacifism and communism that most Christian Conservatives want nothing to do with them. No, for them religion is merely a means of getting a piece of the action in those gold-paved streets in Heaven.
Let me be clear -- this isn’t to question the Christian faith so much as it is to question those who by all appearances are genetically incapable of questioning any aspect of that faith – the people my friend Elizabeth Perryman refers to as Kindergarten Kristians.
Aristotle said the unexamined life is not worth living; I say the unexamined faith is not worth having.
©2011 Tom Cordle
TIP:
Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
Jeremiah Horrigan
koshersalaami
Kim Gamble
Stacey Youdin
Steven J. Gulitti
Ben Sen
Salon.com
Comments
And the minister you approached initially might as well have been wearing one of those T-shirts that says, "Kill Them All and Let God Sort Them Out."
Thanks, and maybe we should add that other old saw "String 'em up, it'll teach 'em a lesson."
No doubt some of these candidates foolishness is "firing for effect", but I have no doubt that Perry, Bachmann and Palin -- at least -- are True-Believers, in the sense in which Eric Hofer used that word.
Thanks, and sewbeit
Nope.
As you have well noted, the modern day interpretations have all the plowshares being pounded into swords.
It seems that so many of these people have made themselves into "God". Here's a hint: If God always agrees with you, then you are presuming to be God. It's as simple as that. And that is about as blasphemous as it gets, I think.
I have my own version of the loaves and fishes story, and perhaps that should be saved for another Sunday post. Suffice it to say, the story as it came down to us is yet another example of a supernatural explanation for a quite natural occurrence -- one we witness frequently.
Thanks, I think the Tillich quote should be emblazoned on every pulpit:
"Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it's an element of faith."
But, alas, that distinction is lost on most True-Believers.
I'll stand with Jesus on this one: "A prophet is least-honored in his own country." Ditto, his own religion -- I'm sure the Rabid Wrong would like to bring back stoning for "heretics" like me.
"But now we got weapons
Of the chemical dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions"
When God's on your side.
Thanks for this Tom, you're always worth listening to. I appreciate your care and dedication to truth and logic.
I find it astounding that so many fail to comprehend the most obvious flaw in their assumption. To wit, both sides in our Civil War assumed God was on their side and prayed to the same God for victory. To say the fact that your side won is proof God was on your side is the worst kind of sophistry -- it's a tautology.
A tautology is like a pissing contest with yourself. You, might think you won, but you smell like a loser.
To riff on the old saw, God must love stupid people, hesheit made so many of them.
I can only repeat what I said to Scarlett:
I find it astounding that so many fail to comprehend the most obvious flaw in their assumption. To wit, both sides in our Civil War assumed God was on their side and prayed to the same God for victory. To say the fact that your side won is proof God was on your side is the worst kind of sophistry -- it's a tautology.
A tautology is like a pissing contest with yourself. You, might think you won, but you smell like a loser.
Thanks for the kind words. Even if Perry -- or any of that ilk -- lose the election, it won't be by much. That in and of itself is proof to me that something has gone terribly wrong with this experiment in self-govt.
I'd say fully forty percent of voters will vote for whomever the Republicans nominate -- no matter how inexperienced, bigoted or ignorant that candidate. As proof, I offer the fact that in 2008 nearly 60 million voters chose to put Sarah Palin within a 72 yr-old heartbeat of the Presidency.
Amen, says the atheist.
American history is filled with paradoxes. A Republican President issued the Emancipation Proclamation, but that party had its roots in a horrific anti-Catholic movement. The Progressive Party had its roots in Republicans like Teddy Roosevelt, who advocated for the very sort of anti-trust laws scorned by today's R's. As I recall, Fightin' Bob Lafollette of Wisc was another Republican turned Progressive.
I maintain the Republican Party of yesteryear has become the American Independent Party of George Wallace -- thanks largely to having sold its soul to religious bigots.
Dang it, why didn't I think to pass around a collection plate!! I'll be happy to take a donation, tho, Visa and Mastercard welcome of course.
I'm afraid I'm too much a mystic to be a full-blown atheist. I'm having a hard time deciding whether I'm an Agnostic or a Gnostic. But then what would you expect from a Gemini?
WAKE UP! WAKE UP! WAKE UP!
CAN YOU HEAR ME KNOCKING?
Maybe that'll get a few more folks reading something so sensible and then, heaven forfend, they may begin to consider it.
-r-
"Behold I stand at the door and knock -- and if you idiots don't wake-up and answer soon, I'm gonna kick that sucker off its hinges!"
You’ve inspired once again!
What's God got to do, got to do with it?
What's God but a second-hand devotion?
What's God got to do, got to do with it?
Who needs a mind when your thots are all slogans?
.
Another inspiration:
Cosmic Comics
written by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
illustrated by Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni
Yes... my GOD, I so try to not pay attention to them Tom
I tried to ignore the, too -- until they started electing Presidents
On the other hand, I would argue that "a horrific monster who punishes the innocent for the sins of the wicked" is a perfect description of the Christian God. It's the main reason why I wouldn't worship him, even if I believed he existed. Pity us poor atheists, who have to live in a world dominated by people who do worship such nasty characters...
When God's on your side...."
-- Bob Dylan
Tom, I happen to agree with you about the perversion that passes for Christianity in most people and institutions today. Although, sadly, I suspect it was ever thus, if the incessant schisms and resulting massacres over the centuries are anything to go by.
Thanks for the clarification, and I am only too aware of how things can be misinterpreted in print. And yes, that was the editorial "you", not thee. And I would certainly assume you smell good, tho it's a little hard to tell from this distance ;-).
Good to be back, and I'd like to share a be-attitude of my own:
"Blessed are those who run around in circles, for they shall be known as wheels; and the dogs of the Earth shall piss upon them."
Thanks for the catch on the misquote, and I seem to recall that's the second time you've corrected me on that one. Maybe the third time will be the charm and swiss-cheese brain will retain.
Yes, I'm of the opinion that the early Christians -- who I'm told called themselves Followers of the Way -- would not recognize today's Christianity. Check that -- they would, but they'd recognize it as the same old Pharisaic nonsense that held "Law was not made for Man, but Man for the Law." The longer I live, the more I realize the law too often does not help those who most need help, and too often it is not applied to those who most need it applied to them.
I have the opposite problem, God speaks to me frequently. My problem is heeding the advice
Good one. My prayer? His meds are toxic.
I always enjoy the heck out of your manner of presentation and this is no exception. I had one thought at the very end of your post when I read, “…this isn’t to question the Christian faith so much as it is to question those who by all appearances are genetically incapable of questioning any aspect of that faith …”
I understand your intention. I’m not sure you can present such a thorough exposé of the primary problem with religion without it actually questioning not only the Christian faith, but all monotheistic religions; the malleable nature of them while demanding rigid blind faith renders them dangerous.
RATED
As your comment points out, religion has a very mixed record of promoting "peace and goodwill to men". Whether on the whole it has been more blessing or curse, far be it from me to decide. That said, on the whole, I find the teachings of Jesus offer a good guide to what I would hope is the "better angels of our nature".
Do I vacillate? Then I vacillate. I contain mountains of vacillation on this subject. But on the subject of the perversion of Jesus' teachings by so many who claim to be his followers, and the Insane Clown Posse coughed up as candidates by the Religious Wrong -- well, suffice it to say, I do not vacillate in that regard. Both are a travesty.
As you well know, you and I disagree -- agreeably -- on this subject. I think religion is worth trying to save; you think it is beyond salvation. Fair enough, but in either case, I Will Not Go Quietly and concede religion to the hacks who've usurped it.
The only thing I'll say more is that now people who are on the Right, a little bit even, they just get shouted down here and a lot of places, without even taking the trouble to read what was written. That it what it is.
I don’t wish to get into a bloody debate on this, but how do you conclude “usurped”? This is, I think, the real question.
Jesus' tears could fill an ocean for what is being done in his name
You are quite right about the Declaration declaring divine or inherent rights. You're also correct that the Founders saw the purpose of govt was to protect and promote those rights thru the establishment of utile agencies of govt. Sadly, that idea seems lost on those who claim to be acolytes of the Founders, but not of govt. Perverse isn't it?
As for your charge that those even a little bit to the right get shouted down around here, there's some truth to that. But I must say when I called bullshit on your post it was because I considered your argument exactly that -- tho I admire your persistence in trying to make your case in this forum.
I was quite surprised to see you'd removed that post rather than address the point I made that absent unions and lawyers, those individual rights promulgated by the Founders didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of being preserved in a world dominated by multinational corporations.
Besides, the non-believer's non-belief is protected as well. Grotius was right, the rights exist even in the absence of God.
The Republican religious right is exactly what any sensible Founder hoped we'd avoid. With the exception of a few short-lived movements, America had the comfort of an almost entirely civil religious observance for most of our time. The rise and persistence of the political evangelical right has led to a predictable descent into anti-democratic, anti-civil religion and caustic demonizing of "The Other" reminiscent of either of the destructive political movements of the last century...but let's be honest--it mostly resembles that infamous Right Wing one.
The only saving grace is the religious right is older, and is trying to set up their rule from the grave against a society that is evolving to reject their petty "Othering" and terminally caustic destruction of civility. There is an easy case to make that the religious right is un-American based on Founding Principles, and a far easier case that their agenda is extremely dis-American. The sooner their influence withers, the better for America.
Screw 'em.
When one calls upon the totality of religious belief to justify a viewpoint which concerns only one questionable judgment the believer may be appalled that the whole structure may collapse if this one judgment is not swallowed whole. To a huge extent much of the elaborate conceptual structure of religion is based on a meld of intense personal fears subdued by propositions that are unverifiable by actual evidence which is why its architecture is grounded in faith, in unquestioning belief.
These imprisoned fears are thereby extremely useful as instruments of control by calculating individuals intent on gaining and controlling popular power. There is nothing new in this, it has been a prominent factor in religion since its inception at the early stages of civilization. Whether or not these manipulators themselves believe in these articles of faith is irrelevant. The point is that they are powerful social tools very useful in directing policies and, as in most religious discussions, reality and rationality very rarely, if at all, are useful in confronting them.
"Nature's God" is a Deist term and in that it describes God as setting existence into motion and then allowing free will to reign. "Creator" is a generic term for the same Ultimate Authority, and the sum of it all is we are born with our Natural Rights, not that we, in the alternative definition, receive our rights through convention -- what we inherit over time. Burke versus Paine et.al., perhaps. However, due process can negate those Natural Rights, so they exist just as much as the theoretical basis of a political philosophy as a claim of rights.
The correct statement about Grotius is the rights exist outside of any conception of God's concern for the affairs of mankind. Ol' Grotius was only a situational and very cautious "heretic."
No offense taken. I say usurped in the sense that religions rise out of what seems to be a universal human need to relate to something greater, a need that is preyed upon by a priestly caste and a ruling class to keep people in their place.
In the case of Christianity, I refer specifically to the lawyer Saul/Paul, who began the slide back toward legalism rather than love, a slide compounded drastically by Constantine and the Nicean corruption which married cross and sword, a marriage blessed by Augustine and the "just war" doctrine, a doctrine utterly at odds with the teachings of Jesus, AND with the practice of early Christians -- Followers of the Way -- who chose death rather than take up the sword as required by Roman law.
The Followers of the Way actually put into practice Jesus' teaching about pacifism; those who came later mostly gave lip service. Evangelicals see themselves embodied in that old hymn Onward Christian Soldiers, but they fail to see the importance of that little word "as", as in "marching as to war" -- not "marching off to war" -- "as" is obviously intended metaphorically, but metaphor is utterly wasted on literalists.
Such distinctions are obviously lost on the unthinking, but what can't be so easily brushed aside is the fact that latter-day people of faith have put Jesus' teachings into practice, too. I refer to Gandhi and MLK and a generation of people who put their lives on the line for the kind of equality Jesus spoke of, an equality that some believe bespeaks the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth.
That is a far cry from the money-grubbing, race-baiting, power-brokering of the Rabid Religious Right these days. I don't feel the need to elucidate any further on what a usurpation that has been of both religion and politics. Nor do I feel it necessary to elaborate on how horribly far from the teachings of Jesus is the contemporary corruption known as the Prosperity Gospel.
Thanks for attending the service -- now could you spare some changed for the collection plate ;-)
Thanks for attending the service -- now could you spare a few dollars for the collection plate? ;-)
Birdog
Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- a typical flowery Jeffersonian concoction, but are these rights or any others naturally inherent/divinely given? Do the rights of Man exist at all in the cosmic scheme of things? Are they "self-evident"?
I see no evidence to support that claim; I'd say they exist only so long as men mutually agree to them AND provide some institutional means of enforcing them. For you Teapartians and Libertardians, that's why we have -- and need -- government.
Fortunately for most of us, men seem to have some inclination toward that sort of thing, whether instilled in them by Natural Law or by God. Unfortunately for most of us, a few men don't seem so-inclined, and all too often such men become rulers.
English philosophers are given a lot of credit for influencing the thinking of the Founders about rights, but I believe credit is also due John Wycliffe, the Morningstar of the Reformation. Way back in the 1300's, he was bold enough to question the Divine Right of both Pope and King.
Wycliffe asserted the rights of Pope and King were not absolute and their authority held only held only so long *as* they comported themselves in accordance with God's will. Talk about radical -- remember, this was at a time when such talk could get you burned at the stake. Wycliffe managed to escape that fate, but fifty years after his death, the Pope had his bones dug up and burned.
Notice the little word "as" rearing its head again. Fundamentalists should hate that word if they ever understood it's meaning and intent. "Wives, be subject to your husbands AS they are subject to God." Seen in this light, all those obedient, barefoot and pregnant fundamentalist women have no duty to obey unless their husbands are doing the right thing.
Your comment is thoughtful, as always. You say: "its architecture is grounded in faith, in unquestioning belief. " While I'm afraid that is too true for too many people of faith, those who bother to examine theirs must inevitably come to the conclusion as Tillich:
"Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it's an element of faith."
I'm always bemused when someone tries to "prove" some element about their belief system. One not-so-shining example often cited is a book called The Case for Christ by Lee Stroebel, a writer who holds a mock trial whose outcome can be easily discerned from the book's title.
My response to such nonsense is to point out to such people that if they could actually prove what they say they can prove, they would have no need of faith. Sad to say, for most the logic of that is difficult for them to follow -- just as is it with Tillich's statement.
You say "The grinding, glacial mindset of the masses is a dense and obtuse cultural juggernaut." No doubt, but I don't believe that relieves any of us of the responsibility to light our match and hold it against the glacier, as your elegant metaphor would have it.
Call it a conceit, if you must, but the evidence seems to suggest all those matches might be having a collective effect:
"New research shows young Americans are dramatically less likely to go to church -- or to participate in any form of organized religion -- than their parents and grandparents.
"It's a huge change," says Harvard University professor Robert Putnam, who conducted the research.
Historically, the percentage of Americans who said they had no religious affiliation (pollsters refer to this group as the "nones") has been very small -- hovering between 5 percent and 10 percent.
However, Putnam says the percentage of "nones" has now skyrocketed to between 30 percent and 40 percent among younger Americans. "
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=7513343&page=1
It's not all good news, however. While traditional Christians are on the decline, Evangelicals are not, and I'd say that's why religion has played a growing and harmful role in our politics:
"During this same 18-year period, the number of Christians rose by 22 million, but their proportion declined. The survey found that most of that growth occurred among those who call themselves either nondenominational Christian, born again or evangelical Christian, or simply "Christian," declining to add a more specific affiliation. Nondenominational Christians, generally associated with the rise of megachurches, increased from less than 200,000 in 1990 to more than 8 million today. "
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2009/0310/p01s02-ussc.html
Thanks for visiting. I'm always amazed at the reaction I get when I say God doesn't have to comport with my beliefs, but any God I can believe in must. Apparently, this puts-off people who believe in a God who does things and demands things of them they don't believe are right and that they couldn't or wouldn't do themselves.
For example,we're told God commanded the Israelites to put every man, woman and child within the walls of a city to the sword. Can you imagine one of these church ladies putting a baby to the sword? On second thought ...
Sorry, but we're going to have to disagree. By my silence -- and yours -- I -- and you -- tacitly condone what the Pope and the Rabid Right say and do.
The people of faith that got involved in the late seventies/early eighties to defeat secular humanists are on the eve of a near total victory and will take almost complete control of this society. That is no joke. Better start composing the Theocratic Blues CD now as after the Republicans take the Senate, hold the House and elect Perry in 2012--almost all certainties-you will have many progressive-types wanting so solace. You will have to give it away or sell it cheaply, though.
The christian god is a celestial dictator. He makes us bad and sick by nature and then punishes us to everlasting hell for not becoming good. Not some hellish place for a bit of nasty punishment and possible redemption-NO! for eternity--quite a guy huh? And he loves me and you and everyone. But plans on torturing most of us forever. For those who get into his supposed heaven then it is even worse--you have to give praise to the boss forever! As Hitchens says, " It is a celestial North Korea." Yes, that great Jesus, meek and mild, introduced us to the concept of hell. See you down there, bud. Give me a wave....
Thanks for visiting. In my view, Jesus was more than a liberal -- he was a revolutionary. Unfortunately, his revolution kinda fizzled after Constantine and the Holy Rollers took over.
I have no such fear, if I am to be judged, sobeit. That's not to say I'm perfect or that I've lead an exemplary life. I simply trust that if there is a God worthy of worshiping, he/she/it must be just, and I will be judged accordingly. And if there is no judgment and no God, well, then fear is even more pointless. And in case you're wondering, Pascal's Wager holds no attraction for me.
I hope you won't mind my saying this, but your comment reflects the problem expressed by my title -- Lost in Translation. As you point out, the concept of Hell, as most of us perceive it, is absent in the Jewish tradition. That, of course, is the first clue that something is wrong with our tradition. After all, Jesus was a Jew preaching to Jews. so his words had to have a much different meaning to his audience.
The translations of his words that have come down to us are, to put it mildly, unreliable, since he spoke in Aramaic, a language that has no written form. Therefore, our notion of hell comes from the translation of several Greek and Hebrew words with quite different meanings than "a fiery pit where sinners burn in eternal punishment with no chance of redemption".
Frankly, our notion of Hell is owed more to the Catholic hierarchy and European rulers desire to keep adherents and subjects on a VERY short leash thru fear. History suggests it was pretty effective up until the 1700's -- and it still operates among those in the Christian faith who are incapable or unwilling to think for themselves.
If you're interested in enlightening yourself about these matters, here's a webpage:
http://www.tentmaker.org/articles/jesusteachingonhell.html
While I don't concur with everything the author has to say, his explanation is nevertheless thoughtful and informative.
PS Don't even get me started on Revelations.
Good to see you! You may have missed it in the comments, but Con corrected me -- again -- on the source of the quote "the unexamined life is not worth living". That would be Socrates not Aristotle.
And you, my dear, are living proof that those raised in the fundamentalist tradition can be "saved" if they are willing to save themselves from the tyranny of close-minded theology. I'm so happy for you that you managed to do so.
As for your comment about it being a made-up game, a friend of mine likens it to multi-level-marketing, and I'm afraid that's an all-too-apt analogy.
But in reality (a place sorely lacking in today's "political" discussions) no amount of evidence will convince the "God is my copilot" crowd.
I'm sure America is viewed very differently in Italy, but most Americans of my acquaintance do not view this as a secular country -- save in the strictest legal sense. Most Americans of my acquaintance view this as a Christian country that tolerates -- in some corners just barely and in others not at all -- persons of other faiths.
What has changed, especially over the last three decades, is the increasing political power of a certain segment of the population -- Evangelicals -- whose primary characteristic is an intolerable intolerance.
What they are too willfully blind to see is that they don't agree even with those of their own ilk, thus the plethora of detonations each claiming to have the absolute truth. If this is followed to its logical conclusion, on some grand and glorious day in the not too distant future, each True-Believer will have his or her own denomination.
Perry and the prairie fires -- hmmm, that is an interesting connection. Say, you don't suppose Perry is actually connected with that Other supernatural being do you? You know, the one in charge of the fires of Hell?
when i refer to your country as secular, i am of course talking about separation of church and state not just on paper, but in fact (unlike in my country)
i would hope that, even with the late exploit of the overall shrinking majority of white christian evangelists, born again, etc., you will not even come close to a sharia-like situation
again, i fear a double edge sword situation as attacking the perry et al, will fortify the existing base and tempt the others as, after all, god is on your side, even if, to paraphrase bachmann, he is a bit angry at you all :)
a heartfelt good luck!
saluti
I can only wish that America was as secular as you suggest. In fact, we've gotten painfully more theocratic over the last forty years or so, starting with Jimmy Carter -- who at least walked the walk, unlike Reagan and Bush the Lesser, who merely used religion as another tool to achieve their political aims.
Even Obama has been sucked into the vortex. And as I've said many times, Deists like Jefferson and Lincoln wouldn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of getting nominated these days -- let alone elected.
Satire?! How dare you blaspheme against The Word?! That passage was received transcendentally by this humble and obedient servant, who merely transcribed it as it was spoken into my ear by the Omniscient and Omnipotent One!
Speaking of lost in translation, as practiced by the Repugnants, that old saying has been mistranslated pretty successfully: You can fool some people some of the time, but you can fool fools all the time.
Or as Bush the Lesser would have it:
"There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."
Given the rise of Bush the Even Lesser (aka Rick Perry). Texans, Tennesseans and Teapartians can get fooled again.
And along these line I would say only that in the wake of the unraveling of religion and community in the last century--which happened, basically, over most of the world--there has been a desperate attempt to re-initiate a type of society that is dead, and that can never be regained. Along with this attempt has come large doses of elegy and misrecognition of the past--which Jan San perceives and criticizes here--and these have been no more successful than any other part of the attempt at conjuring up what is gone. It's a lot like the attempt currently underway in many East European countries to reconstruct--or at least to yearn for the reconstruction--of the "real socialist" states.
There's nothing funny or ridiculous about this nostalgia, in either case, because the suffering it derives from is quite real. The capitalist future has turned out to be a nightmare in countries conveniently labeled as sites of pure predation by the global system. The conversion of East Europe into one vast economic development zone of cheap exploitable labor started almost immediately, at least in areas that were "lucky" enough not to be wholly abandoned. "Peripheral states" was the term used to describe these places for a time, at least until the description became too dangerously obvious, and the situation became generalized to almost every state. The point is that it's similar to the yearning after some imagined past where the religious centering of community offered security--a return-to-the-womb fantasy based on the impossible recovery of an extinct type of community. The elegaic fantasy here, like the situation in the East, is equally based on real quandries, not specifically economic in nature but with some economic aspects to them: the sense of spiritual rootlessness and the material dislocation that go along with global capital.
These are the problems of modernity, once again, and once again, there is no way forward--beyond elegy and its fantasies--except to be truly modern. Anything else will just work to bring about another cycle in this process, and the result will be someone even worse than Perry or Bachmann.
Revolt.
Rated.
As usual, your argument is well-made; but even if I agreed with your conclusion, I don't think your argument is with me. If you read the commentary accompanying this post, I hope I've revealed myself as what one might call a post-religious person. That said, I hope I didn't leave the impression I'm also a post-spiritual person -- and to my mind there's a difference.
From your argument, I assume you are an atheist, and like most of that stripe, you assume the use of the word God makes one religious and a believer in some sort of biblical divinity; it does not. As I wrote in a previous post, I'm not foolish enough to attempt to define a concept beyond conceptualization.
I use the word God in the same way as Creator or Great Spirit is used in NA traditions. That is, as a kind of shorthand for the Great Mystery. And a Great Mystery is exactly what I believe God to be.
You are free, of course, to exclude God from your cosmology; but as Mill argued, I think quite successfully, that absent evidence, it is as illogical to deny the existence of a Supreme Being, however ill-defined, as it is to insist on the existence of such a Being. To me it's simply a question beyond logical proof -- and therefore, logically, a matter of faith.
But beyond pure logic, the difficulty remains of trying to structure a civilized society without reference to that which most human beings seem to have some sort of innate affinity for -- that is to say, just such a Supreme Being. Furthermore, as long as such seems to be a irreducible aspect of the human psyche, I don't think it wise to leave God in the all-too-obviously ill-equipped hands, mouths and minds of the Religious Wrong.
And even if I accept your argument, I'm left in a quandary. If God is killed off, what would you substitute as a foundation for civilization and right behavior? Logic? I would argue unmitigated logic leads to the kinds of horrors committed by Nazi logicians like Speer and Mengele. Philosophy? Have two philosophers ever agreed wholly about anything?
Some seem to believe God should be replaced by the Market. Well, it is all too obvious that leads to Hell on Earth. I much prefer Prophets to Profits.
I could go on -- Infinitely -- but I've addressed this subject in depth in several previous posts, including this one:
God, Man and Singularity
.
Sorry, I missed your comment the first time around, but yes you can see why this post my have awakened my suppressed superstitions
I wish you were right about religiosity being only a political ploy, but I'm afraid some of these people actually believe the drivel they throw-up. Bachmann would be at the head of that list.
Thank you for your kind words. I don't know as I'm a Christian, at least as that has come to mean, as I am a Follower of the Way, which is what early followers of Jesus called themselves -- before Paul, Constantine, Augustine, et al usurped the faith. That said, I understand the teachings of Jesus far better than I practice them.