Brooks to the non-rescue…again.

Technorati Tags: Religion,David Brooks,New York Times

Poor David Brooks. He just can’t seem to let go of the past.

Here’s a link to his latest The New York Times mini-screed.  In it, Brooks bemoans the individualistic times in which we live and years for a return, as Republicans these days are wont to do, to the 1950s.

Brooks longs for a return to “…commitments to family, God, craft and country.” Hm. Well, three out of four “ain’t bad.”

Family, craft and country one could understand.  God? The anthropomorphic God of the “Book?” Really?

We should commit to the metaphors of people who lived hundreds and thousands of years ago? Who dealt with life-threatening natural conditions the likes of which we have come to understand and deal with them successfully? The metaphors which wouldn’t stand the scrutiny of a skeptical analyst? Ask the families who are survivors of religious sectarian killings; what would they say about commitment to God? (Other people keep getting in the way that commitment, and no one can rationally explain why.)

Change the metaphors; use metaphors which fit the intellectual evolution of the species.

Then talk about commitment.

Otherwise, Mr. B., deal with the status quo, not the status quo ante.

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Um…well, I guess…

Technorati Tags: Religion&Ethics,Kevorkian,Hitchens,Religion,Spirituality

Here’s a little surprise; guess who’s included in this year’s Religion & Ethics Newsletter’s “In Memoriam 2011?”

Jack Kevorkian and Christopher Hitchens.

Along with unsavories, or, at least, once unsavories, such as Cardinal Foley—maybe he found God, or at least heard the snapping of growling watchdogs and contributors after his AIDS comments—we find these two who aren’t usually listed in the category of “Prominent Religious.”

Although, upon reflection, they both were certainly spiritual, and, in their own ways, pastoral. There’s also an environmentalist listed, probably the most spiritual of them all.

There’s also a Jewish songwriter, which is a nice gesture, because songwriters are also quite spiritual.

The others are/were (?) luminaries of various Christian sects. And now they know whether Hitchens was/is (?) correct, don’t they?

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Actually, God’s punishment…

Technorati Tags: Rick Perry,Conservatives,Politics,Texas,Divine Retribution

Every wonder why God doesn’t punish those people who behave antithetically to the “teachings of the ages?”

For instance, it seems obvious to clear thinkers that the wildfires in Texas are punishment for supporting Rick Perry.

Doesn’t it?

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You Know It’s a Myth

Technorati Tags: Religion,Atheists,advertising

My only objection to the billboard advertising the above is the fact that it doesn’t somewhere also state that all religious writings are metaphorical.

When will we learn?

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Plan B (Well, no one else seems to want to do it!)

Brainstorming for elements to include in Plan B (non-military efforts for the "ideological confrontation" of the century) is a worthwhile pastime; it might even be a necessary diversion--if that isn't an oxymoron.

Here's a start. Gentle Reader, feel free to add.

1) Let's develop template posters which will be placed in neighborhoods which celebrate the "martyrdom" of suicidal jihadists. Our competing posters would proclaim that there is no "Paradise" in store for anyone who murders a child in the name of Islam, nor is such a person worthy of the title of martyr.

2) On the neighborhoods of madrasas, let's drop leaflets which assert that God is not a pimp, that it is blasphemous to teach, as well as to believe, that God would provide a cohort of women to see to the after-death carnal pleasures of child-murderers.

3) Let us proclaim that dressing to express one's religious beliefs is a personal badge of honor, it loses its religiosity when it is enforced at the point of a sword, knife, or a gun barrel. Further, it is an insult to God to teach that the female is less worthy than a male. God has no gender.

4) While we are doing the above, let us not exclude any Judeo-Christian teachings or practices which are suspect--which more than likely are inspired by the inclinations of humans rather than of a deity. In other words, erase from religious teachings anything that smacks of human emotion rather than the objective balances of the universe.

5) Let us acknowledge that we do not and cannot know the nature of the Deity. All writings are, essentially, metaphorical, and that is especially true of religious writings. We speak of the unspeakable in terms which we can understand; we cannot understand something beyond our experiences; we must not continue in the error that the God of which we speak is a supra-human by necessity of the limits of our languages.

Aristotle's Prime Mover is beyond our ken. We do the best we can, but our best cannot be definitive.

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Fulness of Oneself

Words and memories and metaphors, Dear Reader, make up the universe of pleasure.

Not quite a week after the death of Jerry Falwell we have another interesting bit of a rememberance. Check out Larry Flynt's piece in the Los Angeles Times today.

My favorite quote, "He was definitely selling brimstone religion and would do anything to add another member to his mailing list. But in the end, I knew what he was selling, and he knew what I was selling..."

"Selling" is the operative word in Mr. Falwell's life. He was very good at it. What he sold most was himself. He was handsomely rewarded for his efforts. Look at pictures of his early days in broadcasting. Look at pictures of his final days in life. He became a corporate fat cat--the "Rev. Ike" of the white Baptist-types.

Rev. Ike and Pastor Jer. Two American success stories.

What pleasure to be reminded of Rev. Ike at this moment in history.

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She Didn't Say That...Did She?

Over at the local newspaper, The Desert Sun, a new editorial page "Community Conversation Editor," Angela Cortez, is learning the ropes.

An editorial page commentary on Jerry Falwell today, Falwell's views opened door for many, has an interesting clue as to the direction Ms Cortez is likely to take.

After a rather benign recitation of objective facts, the editorial writer concludes with this: For better or for worse, Falwell was a religious and political force in this country, and his views - while at times despicable and inexcusable - opened the door for a lot of like-minded people to have their voice heard.

Read into that whatever you like. I, for one, like to read that those "like-minded people" are "despicable and inexcusable."

I repeat my contention: Falwell died too soon; he didn't have a "deathbed" conversion/apology as was granted to Lee Atwater, another political operative whose main function in life was to "spin" the truth to achieve questionable ends.

I wonder what Ms Cortez, and/or the editorial writer, meant.

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Incessant Tap Dancing Around Religion

This week in Newsweek Fareed Zakaria wrote a piece in which he delineated the role is Islam in the Sunni-Shi'a struggle in Iraq. Essentially he pointed out that until Islam goes through the equivalent of the Protestant Reformation vis a vis Christianity there will be no lasting peace in the "western world."

Religions, like all institutions, are not cast in concrete from the instigation. As people change in their understanding of behavior and nature, religions change. Some changes are subtle, some are revolutionary. Change, though, is inevitable.

Islam is going to change and eventually the verses which allow for murderous interpretations will be relegated to virtual unimportance, just as violent verses of Judaism and Christianity have become interesting artifacts of a long passed society.

Unfortunately, some pundits of the right took a single phrase from Zakaria's work and work themselves into a slather of dispute.

Christopher Hitchens in Slate.com partakes in the discussion. It seems the war supporting pundits are fixated on the facts of the blundering treatment of the Middle East by the Europeans and Americans of the 20th century, not to mention the centuries long rivalry between various Islamic sects. A sense of history is fine, but that was not Zakaria's point.

Zakaria is telling us to do whatever we can to encourage the quick reformation of Islam.

It would be nice if the right and the left would take Zakaria's suggestion to heart and devise a strategy which would assist moderate Muslims in this very important development of their religion.

Christopher Hitchens
Fareed Zakaria
Religion

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Religious Texts and "Terror"

At some point the Muslim clerics must tackle the problem of the surahs which are clearly political in nature or totally metaphorical, and they must somehow vitiate those writings.

Let us hope that "point" is soon.


Religion

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The Andy and Sam Show

Two cultural commentators are having a bit of a to do over the web. Andrew Sullivan and Sam Harris are having a back and forth about religion. Andrew believes but has doubts, Sam does not believe, and seems to have absolutely no doubts about Andrew's doubts. You can catch Andrew's January 25 sally here.

So far there seemingly has not been a thorough discussion of the anthropomorphization of the deity, and that is a subject which is actually central to all religious debates.

The scriptural texts, when they refer to the deity, are written in metaphorical language. These metaphors assign human qualities, good and bad, to the deity.

It is beyond logic for us to continue to assign to the deity such personality quirks as pimping--72 virgins in Paradise; or ethnic cleansing--most of the Old Testament. How very near to blasphemy is the concept that the deity is jealous? (No other gods before me.) Or petty? The farmer's sacrifice is not as worthy as the herdsman's? It's a metaphor. If you eat pork, and don't cook it enough, you'll die. And all this before the knowledge of how much heat it takes to kill the trichinae.

C'mon, Sam and Andy. Get serious. Rinse out the metaphors and see what remains; then get on with your discussion.
Andrew Sullivan
Sam Harris
Religion

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Neo-Cons and Defeat

What is it with the neo-con/Bush sycophants and their love for defeat? Redeployment isn't defeat.

If we engaged in the ideological struggle of the century, then we also need to struggle with philosophy and logic as well as with armed forces.

So far, there has been precious little attention paid to the underlying support for the murders and terrorist tactics: religious texts which can be interpreted to reward bloodletting in the name of a deity.

We have to re-think the whole approach to this struggle, include religious texts in our planning, and, while we're rethinking, it would be wise to redeploy our troops to a less vulnerable position, and thus save them for a later possible armed conflict.

One is not defeated if one wages war wisely. One observes, plans, and buys time for the most propitious moment.

Stop with defeat already. It isn't over until it's over; just ask the "defeated" Taliban in Afghanistan.
Neo-Cons
Iraq
Defeatism
Religion

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Remember the "Oral Sex" lamentations of the late 90's?

During the Clinton impeachment brouhaha, Mary Bono, R-Palm Springs, lamented, "What will I tell my children?" And that's when we were all sniggering about oral sex being in the news.

Now Slate.com led me to this link where a Washington Post writer, Alan Cooperman, pens this line: "But a third answer allows same-sex ceremonies and ordination of gay men and lesbians, while maintaining a ban on anal sex."

Catch that? Anal sex is now a fit topic for discussion in the nation's newspapers.

It's contained in a story about how "A panel of rabbis gave permission Wednesday for same-sex commitment ceremonies and ordination of gays within Conservative Judaism..." Conservative Jews, it seems, have decided to enter the 21st century.

Bono must really be in a pickle. Except her son is now at U.S.C., and her daughter is in high school. Maybe she won't have to have to worry about that discussion, after all.

I heard the phrase on NPR this morning; I wonder if mothers leapt to turn off radios playing in the kitchen.

Relax, parents. Your kids will find out somewhere else. Or maybe they'll grow up anyway and go to U.S.C.

Conservative Jews
Sex Talk
Sex Education

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Religion and Metaphors and the 21st Century

World-wide, language teachers have failed to be thorough in the uses, benefits, and, most importantly, the dangers of metaphor—that comparison between two unlike items--”His fist is a hammer.” A fist is not a hammer, but the metaphor implies a fist with strengths similar to those of a hammer.

In country after country, too many people not adequately trained to recognize metaphor are easily misled into “truths” which they otherwise would not logically assume; and most dangerous of these are those which deal with the metaphors of religion.

All “Holy” writings come from lore, evolved from the effort to make secure a specific tribe at a specific time in history. Are tribal members falling ill and dying from eating pork or shellfish? Then invent fearsome, all-knowing, yet unknowable, powers to regulate diet. Create anthropomorphized, all-powerful entities with all the positive and negative emotions of a human; and the tribal leader, thus a mere tool immunized from scrutiny, has a good, strong, never-to-be-questioned educational and regulatory tool.

Does the eventual presence of multiple, competing powers/gods threaten the stability of the tribe? Designate a single, jealous “god.”

It was reasonable for leaders thousands of years ago to use metaphor to teach people how to live safely and thrive in an unforgiving environment.

Today, parents use metaphor to concoct a “bogeyman” to teach a child caution or to give a vague, but all-powerful, reason not to do something. There does come a point when the child's bogeyman is set aside--until that child becomes an adult and, in turn, resurrects the fearsome bogeyman in order to help teach the next generation.

It is neither nor legitimate to continue structuring religious ethics and morals around an anthropomorphic metaphor. We understand natural laws; we know to kill the toxic parasites in pork through thorough cooking; we know to avoid shellfish during certain tidal episodes.

Religious terrorism, physical and psychological, stems from those negative human characteristics that have been attributed to deities. Logic and policy cannot any longer accept those negatives.

It is arrogance to claim that a deity can be jealous. Pettiness in such power? Anger? In a perfect entity? Such posturing is not only illogical, it shows a lack of trust in the congregants. Worse, it condemns thousands to ignorance and imperils everyone.

Thomas Aquinas, when pressed, used Aristotle’s definition of “God”-- “the Prime Mover”--whatever force gave impetus to the universe. By implication, this Christian theologian tells us all else is metaphor.“God” is not dead, having never “lived” in the human sense of the word. “God” is vaster than the deities of earth. “God” is beyond our ken, but not beyond our daily experiences.

The time has come to honor the religious metaphors of the past as once useful tools, but in these dangerous times we must find a new metaphor that is able to deal with the realities of the moment. These realities necessarily mean developing a metaphor for a sense of oneness with the universe, which is strongly akin to the metaphor of the past but which also demands recognition of, and responsibility for, the place of each individual in the panoply of the universe; and, especially, a oneness with others.

Coupled with the need for this new metaphor is the more general urgency to integrate into education an understanding of the importance of anthropology, sociology, and history; giving us more complete comprehension of this complicated world and enabling all to lead more secure lives.

The basic wisdom of the centuries is immutable; the metaphors used to teach that wisdom are not immutable. Teachers of reading and ministers of the soul must learn to trust a well-educated population.

There will be people who will read this as an attack on their religious beliefs. It is not; the metaphor is not the belief; the truth within the metaphor is the belief. The metaphor is the “handle” we use to express our innate spirituality.We need teachers to be more thorough and spiritual leaders to be more honest. The metaphor is not the message.

With the world teetering on an internal religious war between two factions of the Islamic religion, not to mention a possible bloody struggle between Islamists and religionists of the two other religions of "the Book," it's time for all leaders, secular and sectarian, to come clean about their particular religious metaphors.
Metaphor and Myth
Religion

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What's in a name? #2

The newspapers are playing coy with whether or not to call the blood-letting in Baghdad a "civil war." (See Slate Magazine 11/25/06 "Today's Papers: Very Black Friday.")

That's almost foolishness. The American "war on terror" ended a couple of years ago, as far as the Iraqi theater is concerned (we'll fondly remember the ITO, I dare say when the rest of the stuff hits the fan). What our "boots" are experiencing now is a ring-side, court-side, 50-yard line seat to a religious war; and it's a war in which we have a stake.

Just as did the other two religions of "the Book," Islam is going through a metaphorical growing spell on its way to institutional maturity. And we are appalled at the contemporary consequences.

It's acknowledged by most that we went into Iraq with insufficient knowledge of the total picture of Iraqi society. What we must do now is not allow ourselves to be mired in our pre-2003 thinking. Without understanding that the theocracy underlying the politics of the area, we will never be able to prevail in the fight against Islamic extremist fundamentalists.

The newspapers should stop being shy about naming what's happening in Iraq. A religious war, by any other name, is still a religious war.

The course of safety for our democracy depends on how we handle ourselves in this sectarian struggle, and let's not confuse the issue with continued references to terrorism as the nature of the carnage has changed.
Islam
Media
Religious War

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Alas, Andrew, it's just words.

Andrew Sullivan is expending a great deal of effort and utilizing his considerable skill as a writer and debater defending his "doubt" regarding his Catholic religion.

Words. Words. Words. In defense of what? Sullivan knows, yea, he argues about the inability to "know" God, "A skeptic may affirm, as I do, the notion of an objective truth - but insist on the weakness of the human mind to know it [God] fully," that we are living with an anthropomorphized "deity." This deity has all the conunrums of human psychology. If anything, the religions of the book are virtual blasphemics, since they reduce the very concept of the Prime Mover to a querulous superhuman, with all the pettiness of an insecure despot.

Be honest, Andrew.

Cherish the community, disdain the irrelevant trappings. Much social good comes from the community and the sharing; those are the worthy elements. Debating doubt is intellectual masturbation.

Agape.
Andrew Sullivan
Religion

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