Truth, Reason and Love

[Teremia]

But I admit that being told that the most significant experiences of my life are fuzzy nothings of no consequence feels a lot like slipping into a dark abyss.

No! No abyss! You are blessed to have had those experiences!

Remember the highly empirical dwarfs in C. S. Lewis's "Last Battle"? They sat in heaven insisting they were in a manure-filled barn. Even if they were right, would you want to be one of them, or would you come running up waterfalls towards the heart of the miraculous garden?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

But I admit that being told that the most significant experiences of my life are fuzzy nothings of no consequence feels a lot like slipping into a dark abyss.

No! No abyss! You are blessed to have had those experiences!

Yes, you are. I certainly feel blessed to have had them, against all the odds (considering that I have never been a part of any organized religion).

I have no doubt at all that my feelings often bring me closer to the truth than empirical observation or logic.

[axordil]

I would never call belief inconsequential, nor delusional. I would call it a choice we make based on our personalities and circumstances. But what I've been trying to say is that is a choice made not out of necessity, but desire: no particular choice can be empirically differentiated from any other in terms of results, and if people are genuinely happy with their choice (and it doesn't preclude someone else making their own choice), it's all one.

There's nothing wrong with picking the minivan with the cloth seats and the Bach on the CD player, or the MINI convertible with the Ben Folds, or with the cross country bike and the iPod playing Metallica, as your vehicle for getting from birth to death.

There MAY be something wrong with the Hummer, though.

[anthriel]

There's DEFINITELY something wrong with the Hummer, Ax. But that's a separate thread.

But I admit that being told that the most significant experiences of my life are fuzzy nothings of no consequence feels a lot like slipping into a dark abyss.

No! No abyss! You are blessed to have had those experiences!

Yes, you are. I certainly feel blessed to have had them, against all the odds (considering that I have never been a part of any organized religion).

I have no doubt at all that my feelings often bring me closer to the truth than empirical observation or logic.

Sir V, I have to admit I have been reading your comments in this thread with great interest. We are so alike! And even though our paths have been very different (did I have the minivan with the Bach, or the convertible Mini, she wonders, sadly suspecting the answer ) we have each come to a place of profound similarity.

I don't think that being part of an organized religion is a requisite to spirituality, although I know that it is an essential part of many people's hearts. In some cases (perhaps mine!) being part of a "religion" actually serves to quell people's spiritual sides.

And it's not the religion's fault! It just that it's easy, when presented with a rule book, to focus on the rules, and not the game. You know? At least it was for me.


Wampus, you KNOW that there are people out there who think you (and I!) are delusional, because you (and I! and I!) know and love God. The fact that they see it that way is... just a fact. (And no, I'm not saying anyone on this board is saying that! Again, the level of discourse here has been very impressive in its respect for so many different experiences).

All of us who, however tentatively, admit in public a very real connection with a very real (to us! to us!) Maker will have to deal with that.

Doesn't make it less real, though, to us.

[axordil]

In some cases (perhaps mine!) being part of a "religion" actually serves to quell people's spiritual sides.

Rumi noted that longing is itself redemptive. For me, any agency that seeks to fulfill, supplant, or eliminate longing, especially spiritual longing, is suspect.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

did I have the minivan with the Bach, or the convertible Mini, she wonders, sadly suspecting the answer

Wanna ride?

I have a lot more to say in response to your post, but I don't have the words right now. Maybe later.

[Primula Baggins]

I don't think established churches are actually trying to quell people's spiritual longing, Ax; I just think some of them aren't very good at (or interested in) fostering it.

Mainstream Christian churches particularly suffer from this syndrome, I think because fifty years ago most middle-class people who didn't want to be marked out as "different" attended one, whether they actually believed or not. There were social pressures to go, if you didn't have the excuse of being Jewish or of some even more "exotic" faith. If you were an atheist, you kept your mouth shut.

So churches (a) didn't have to provide much in exchange for people's membership and (b) were about showing people a benign and comfortably distant God using familiar rituals and pleasing stories, not about challenging people to actually find God within themselves and others.

Anthy, I'd take Voronwë's magic carpet if I were you. I hear Minis are overrated.

[Lurker]

I guess the thing is, I am usually like a . . what? Not a thick enough skin? I don't mean about "taking offense", I mean about seeing what's wrong, or horrible, or painful in the world. A long time ago I had to build a kind of artificial skin between me and everything else. I wouldn't say I'm "soft hearted", though, that's not what I mean. More of a visceral feeling, that it's so cruel (only, cruel isn't the word) that so many people are born to a life of suffering and pain. I think everyone should get a free pass, or almost everyone. Everyone has pain, everyone's heart gets broken.

When I was a child, I used to think that if there was a god, he must be a terrible person, to not only allow pain, but to create pain. Children tend to see things in black and white. It was explained to me, but the explanation didn't make sense and it still doesn't. Only now I don't say, "if there's a god" because I'm sure there isn't.

I think that people write their own destiny or others write it for them. Just because there is injustice, war, famine in the world there is no God. Even in the bible, the God I know doesn't always come down from heaven and make things right for us. Yes, I tend to agree he is cruel sometimes, in fact, he even had his only son crucified on the cross, just to show us he is not playing favourites at all. Even Jesus, on the cross said, My God, My God why have you forsaken me.

In fact, when I was a six year old kid, I was facing death in the hands of another person, wouldn't know which way it would go. I didn't abandon my faith then, never questioned what was happening to me was God's fault, I just prayed and said "Thy will be done." For me, it was a test, why should I be afraid of death, we will eventually die whether we like it or not. That's why I often say when I'm faced with challenges my faith grows stronger. For some people it's positive thinking, to me its faith.

I'm sorry but I scratch my head sometimes when people tell me that there is no God because of stuff that are happening in their lives. God doesn't make people do bad things, it's the individual who does it. If there is a natural disaster, I would just say, sometimes we tend to forget there is a higher power that is unpredictable (like nature) other than human beings.

I apologize if I went off topic but I just want to address that.

[axordil]

Prim--

I don't know. There is a thread in many religions, not just some of the various sects of Christianity, of "we have the answers at hand, no matter what the questions, so ask away and then accept what you're told." Genuine contemplation, or heaven forbid, personal mysticism, have often been held in ambiguous esteem.

[Primula Baggins]

Certainly that's true; hence the Reformation, for example, which was partly a reaction to a church that had lost touch with the needs of the people (even discouraging them from reading the Bible for themselves because they might draw interpretations the church did not approve).

There is a tendency for any powerful, top-down institution to want to control how people perceive it and how they act as part of it.

However, as you say, this doesn't go for every Christian sect. In fact I think it doesn't go for most of them, these days.

There is a tension, for an established church, between teaching a consistent and sound set of beliefs and encouraging congregations to serve their particular members' needs and use their members' particular gifts.

[axordil]

There is a tension, for an established church, between teaching a consistent and sound set of beliefs and encouraging congregations to serve their particular members' needs and use their members' particular gifts.

And the better churches (as I see it) leverage that tension into something positive, as opposed to leveraging the more particularly gifted members out the door. But by the same token, change is inevitable, whether we're talking monolithic and worldwide or five people in a living room.

[Primula Baggins]

Change is inevitable, I agree. It will also cause pain and division, but that's always been the case. The issue of ordination of gays is already splitting my church right down to the congregational level, between people who see the current official policy as perpetuating injustice, and those who see any change to that policy as abandoning Biblical principle in a quest for relevance. And there are any number of other issues just as divisive. But we're called to work for justice. . . .

I would miss my church terribly if I didn't have it in my life, even if sometimes it seems like a big family wrangle. I wonder sometimes if people without religion are consistently able to find the same kind of group, of people who look out for each other, and work together for the benefit of the community (inside and outside of the church), and hash out issues large and small, and bring each other casseroles in time of need.

I think there's a richness in belonging to a group of widely different people who come together because, well, whatever else we believe, we agree on this one thing and it's important, so we have to make a go of everything else.

[Misha]

Change is inevitable, I agree. It will also cause pain and division, but that's always been the case. The issue of ordination of gays is already splitting my church right down to the congregational level, between people who see the current official policy as perpetuating injustice, and those who see any change to that policy as abandoning Biblical principle in a quest for relevance. And there are any number of other issues just as divisive. But we're called to work for justice. . . .

I would miss my church terribly if I didn't have it in my life, even if sometimes it seems like a big family wrangle. I wonder sometimes if people without religion are consistently able to find the same kind of group, of people who look out for each other, and work together for the benefit of the community (inside and outside of the church), and hash out issues large and small, and bring each other casseroles in time of need.

I think there's a richness in belonging to a group of widely different people who come together because, well, whatever else we believe, we agree on this one thing and it's important, so we have to make a go of everything else.

I grew up attending church, my paternal grandfather was a minister and generations surrounding him were all well immersed in Christian belief. I can't say however, that I was ever truly a "believer" in spite of being taught the law and letter of scripture. I can say that I have always had a strong sense of something I'll call "spiritual" for lack of a better word. I didn't experience this something in church. It was always something I felt and experienced within myself and typically when alone and in some encounter with nature. I think the human psyche needs to be able to experience hope and alignment with something good. The path we take to that is inherently personal.

I no longer attend church. I do miss the casseroles and there is a lot I don't miss. I have felt as though I've been released and that a great weight has been lifted. I think the "need" is gone to assimilate into something "right", (whatever that is) and I feel an assurance that I haven't lost anything by giving up church attendance. Do I believe in God? Can't say that I do - there is room for doubt.

I think that there are many good principles and tenets in scripture that are solid and noteworthy. I also think that the influence of humanity screws them up.

I'm pleased to see this thread - and I'll echo Anthy's sentiment that the responses have been intelligently and gracefully posed.

[Primula Baggins]

I didn't mean to imply that I thought people who don't attend church are missing out thereby—as a pastor's daughter I do understand that it can be a place of pressure and expectation, especially if you end up not believing.

I was simply expressing the hope that there are other social structures that can fill that void for those who would sense it. Not everyone does, of course; many people are grateful to escape from the requirements of community, and many communities are not nurturing in the sense I was talking about.

My good fortune is to belong to a diverse, warm, intellectually lively community of faith and, as I said, if I lost that I would miss it profoundly. If I could for some reason no longer believe, I would still miss that sense of community and purpose and of being uncritically welcomed, accepted, and asked to do meaningful work.

[axordil]

I was simply expressing the hope that there are other social structures that can fill that void for those who would sense it.

Like HoF? Minus the cassaroles of course, but I can make those myself.

[baby tuckoo]

Ax, would you make one for Misha?


FedEx could get it there in a day.

[Primula Baggins]

You know how I feel about this place. And it does supply a lot of that. But (a) RL community has a particular value and (b) there is also a different flavor when people come together to do more than just enjoy each other's company (even if they greatly enjoy it) and talk (even if it's high-quality talk laced with humor and insight). In other words, it means something to work together with people, to build something worthwhile.

I find it satisfying to do shirriffing work here, to try to help people out when they need something for example. But in my church we're all working toward something, together. Whereas HoF is its own reason for existing.

[baby tuckoo]

The distinction, Prim, is lost on poor baby tuckoo.

Perhaps you could elaborate on the thing you all are working toward, together, and distinguish that thing from whatever reason HoF has for existing.

I seek not to glorify HoF or to demean your church, but both could make equal claim to "working for the social good", whether or not that is their declared purpose.


Most people would jerk the knee and respond that physical presence in a community that gathers to worship is a heftier kitty than the one that shows up occasionally just to be fed. True, it is harder to quit the community you live in than the digital world you drop in on. But many do it anyway, and many attend services on a temporal basis. So it also is on most message boards and in many coffee houses and in many poker games.

The virtues of proximity that exist in the synod can be countered by the virtues of variety that exist in the ether.

Yes, they will feel different, but I don't see how the sense of purpose is different. If it is nothing more than that god is present in one but not the other, then I must respectfully fail to understand your point of cleavage.

[Primula Baggins]

No, it's not the presence of God (after all, I believe God is present not only at church but everywhere ).

And the variety is no less at church than here—variety in interests, age, background, temperament, work, education, politics, sexual orientation, talents. . . . And I am there with my husband and children, something we all share, which is certainly not true of this place.

The main mission of my own church, in serving the community, is to work for economic justice and for peace. We talk about both here, but we're not out there as a community trying to accomplish anything. My church isn't turning the world upside down, but we do help run a community kitchen, donate regularly to a local food bank, provide emergency housing and financial assistance for homeless people, gather relief supplies for disaster response here and overseas, and provide space for AA, Alanon, and Narcanon meetings throughout the week. We have a program providing space and adult help for homeless kids to do their homework. Our intern pastor serves as chaplain in a local nursing home, and our pastor is a peace activist and has also successfully campaigned for local laws to regulate predatory lenders (payday loans, car title loans). He's also testified at hearings in the state legislature to accomplish the same thing statewide. We regularly send groups on mission trips whose main purpose is to help build Habitat for Humanity houses in Mexico and in poor U.S. communities.

I am sure plenty of people here do similar service for their own causes and in their own way, and the list would probably be amazing. But it's not the same as a community working together and supporting each other toward the same overall purpose.

[Lurker]

I agree with Prim, god is everywhere but unlike other people I don't go to church to "socialize" nor do I go there to work for something together. To me, the church is where I could just shut out the world around me, meditate and pray.

I don't want to get into the "politics" of who is going to be the next "organizer" of a certain activity, yadda, yadda, a few people gets upset, they call themselves Christians, and yet they are snarling or gossiping about each other after mass. I was a "youth leader" once and it really frustrated me when the "elders" (older parishoners) started telling me what to do, how to conduct our activities, that I had to have our "youth meetings" outside the church vicinity. I don't want to sin (something un-Christian like) just because I'm getting stressed out, I don't want to set a bad example to the younger people I try to lead. I still volunteer in the parish but not as an organizer or a leadership role.

I guess that's why a lot of people are frustrated with "organized" religion cause most of the time because the people who are part of it doesn't give a very good example of how its like to be a good Christian.