Project Mayhem discussion
What's Your Philosophy?
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My Understanding of God
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Sophia said: “The first post you put was "I apologize for being a little late to this debate :)" But there's really nothing to debate. It happens, we do it, but that's not necessarily the intention.” Noted ... thank you for the correction; and thank you for the welcome.
“To debate means that you're picking a side and sticking to it in order to argue or prove it, so it seems that you think you're on the Blue side and others are on the Red side. In actuality, you're holding firm to Blue (even though you admit it may vary from carolina to navy at times), and the other 'side' isn't red at all, they just don't believe in blue. And honestly, the truth behind everything is probably some shade of purple.”
It appears that I truly did pick the wrong term here :( I am not trying to convince anybody of anything. I am argumentative by nature, so debate is typically my default; however, I am genuinely curious about how others approach this topic and how they perceive other viewpoints. If I find places where my position appears weak, then I am open to change ... and in fact have already done so in some cases (I don’t have what many would consider a traditional approach to faith and religion, despite how I may sound here).
“I think the entire point everyone's trying to make is that instead of changing maps 10 times...try just not using one for a while and see if the world collapses around you or not, lol. Besides, why read a map if no one can confirm whether or not you're headed to the right location?”
Except that I have a specific destination firmly in mind. It may not be the same destination as everybody else ... or even anybody else ... but it is where I want to be with every part of my being. The problem is that all the maps are flawed and incomplete. So it is not that I am changing maps so much as I am filling in the gaps based upon common elements.
“You obviously see something wrong with it all...so just try it for a day or two. Turn the broken GPS off and I'll bet money you won't go and kill someone.”
Not all of it ... just pieces of it. Some parts I really like. And it is fairly easy to put down the map ... most Christians that I know of do it frequently ... and it seems that when I do so, it is much easier to make mistakes that I deeply regret later ... but hey, YMMV
“She is mythical....she's based on Imhotep's mother Mary who was also mythical.”
Valid opinion ... which is why I added arguably :) I had not seen the connection between Mary and Sekhmet before. Given that the Virgin birth motif is very common within many of the traditions banging around that region, I think it is a tenuous connection at best. In most cases, this theme was more symbolic that anything else ... depending on the context of the story, it was used to reinforce an image of divinity or divine blessing within monotheistic traditions.
Seek said: However.. we all delude ourselves. We have to to survive an innately meaningless existence. It all boils down to what delusional flavour we want to suck on. A little like the Buddhist concept of accepting that all is meaningless yet then choosing to follow a course of action anyway. - "controlled folly".
Not a bad comparison ... in fact, I like Zen Buddhism nearly as much as Christianity and have (and continue to) incorporate a lot of that philosophy in my own personal belief.
Just a quick note, i wasn't meaning to imply that ye, Kristjan, was seeking to evangelise. Ye aren't. I was only speaking in general terms.I think that we (talking about all of us and no one in particular) are our own worst enemies at times - falling back on our own (pre)conceived ideas about something, in this case, Christianity or Catholicism. The problem with this is that there are probably as many views of what Christianity is as there are thinking Christians. (yes, i did say thinking heh, as the ones who are merely sheep dont count ;)
Kristjan clearly isn't a sheep.
Want a chuckle? I used to be a full on fundy :D
Looking back now... shocking, utterly. But...i can understand why. Having moved away from that way of thinking/seeing/believing, does not invalidate it necessarily. Afterwards was a state of flux. Not pleasant. However, it is only now, years on, that i could suggest that it was meaningless yet still go forwards while even potentially considering taking elements of that with me, moulding it into something/anything.
Nihilism, while perhaps intellectually sensible and appealing in some ways, isn't particularly attractive nor satisfying.
Dabbling and picking the choice elements from a variety of sources may well be as healthy fer ones soul as a varied diet is fer ones body.
The problem i see is when people cant handle internalising and have to externalise. That brings up labelling, perspectives tinged in ignorance and suspicion. That results in conflict. That makes the whole soul striving a physical bad joke.
Does it have to be that way? Nope.
Hmm, i always did like the pix n' mix sections of sweet shops. I wonder if i should pay the shop a visit sometime again. I have only been outside looking in now and again recently.
Sophia said:Kristjan...The first post you put was "I apologize for being a little late to this debate :)" But there's really nothing to debate. It happens, we do it, but that's not necessarily the intention.
To debate means that you're picking a side and sticking to it in order to argue or prove it, so it seems that you think you're on the Blue side and others are on the Red side. In actuality, you're holding firm to Blue (even though you admit it may vary from carolina to navy at times), and the other 'side' isn't red at all, they just don't believe in blue. And honestly, the truth behind everything is probably some shade of purple.
=============================================
WHOO words to live by, Sophia!!!!
Well Kristjan the problem with you is you are filtering everything I say through the dogma of the Catholic church. But the common man around the world does not. They pray to Mary and Saints because they believe they can do something directly. And while men may have claimed to do all the things Mary has done, hell, unfortunately man has the capacity to lie. Mary supposedly doesn't. I know of no one who claims to have been taken up to heaven forever, sinless. I think even the most frantic of fanatics will admit to having sinned at least a little.But anyway that's meaningless because as I said you can filter what Mary and Saints mean to people through dogma, but the reality is people do see them as demigods. Even your opinion of them confirms them as having special powers. Thy can talk directly to god and have weight you won't, or else why wouldn't you just pray directly to God. You can do that. Why have saints and Mary at all? Because they fill human needs a monotheistic religion does not. If god sees everything and knows everything, why do we need a patron saint of aircraft pilots? Against ergotism? Against infertility? Please don't spout off the catholic church's reason. Any governing body has official reasons something exists that support the party line. If you can't see beyond it, you have a deficiency in understanding of humans, or of education.
As for the general agreement, the only people who don't agree to anthro and psych and socio theories of religion are.... religious leaders. The people with objectivity pretty much all agree on the basics, and one of the reasons they do not espouse is we believe in religions because there is a god and he told us to.
I don't think Kristjan is a fundie. :D I just think he has not yet realized that people make up shit that supports their position, and it does not reflect real life.
Mod
So again, I say....drop the maps! Forge your own path there. That's all you're doing anyway. No one says you can't reference other's maps...but you don't have to. You definitely seem to have the capabilities to make your own way.
About Mary....check out EDIT: website is www.ZeitgeistMovie.com (watch at least part 1...it's all cool but skip ahead to 00:11:40 or better yet, 00:13:30)
Molly said: Well Kristjan the problem with you is you are filtering everything I say through the dogma of the Catholic Church. But the common man around the world does not. I’m sorry, but I don’t think I have anything else with which to measure the accuracy of each statement. I did not grow up in the Catholic Church, and many common practices were revised or jettisoned by the Vatican II council well before I converted. This is what the Church is teaching now; this is what you are supposed to believe if you claim to be a member of the Roman Catholic Church. All I have to go on is what they taught me when I was going through the conversion process along with my experience since then. So far, I have not found the concepts that you are advancing here to be prevalent among those with whom I associate as Catholics.
“I know of no one who claims to have been taken up to heaven forever, sinless. I think even the most frantic of fanatics will admit to having sinned at least a little.”
What about the Ascent of Elijah? Or does that not qualify?
“Even your opinion of them confirms them as having special powers. Thy can talk directly to god and have weight you won't, or else why wouldn't you just pray directly to God. You can do that. Why have saints and Mary at all? Because they fill human needs a monotheistic religion does not. If god sees everything and knows everything, why do we need a patron saint of aircraft pilots? Against ergotism? Against infertility? Please don't spout off the catholic church's reason. Any governing body has official reasons something exists that support the party line. If you can't see beyond it, you have a deficiency in understanding of humans, or of education.”
First ... you can pray to any saint, patron or not, and ask for them to pray for you ... even those who are not yet dead. Sure ... you can pray directly to God ... no problem ... unless for some reason your faith is weak or you have doubts about what you are asking for ... etc. Asking others to pray for you or with you is a trademark Christian practice. It is taught that miracles happen because of faith; it is therefore not all that surprising that when you are asking everybody to pray for you that you want to line up some of the big guns. Saints have ‘weight’ because they have greater faith ... there is not much more to it then that.
Why have patron saints? Simply because it is fun :) Like having a school mascot ... We got all these Saints banging around in the Canon, what else should we do with them? If I need help with my finances, I’ll seek out an accountant ... if I wish for some miracle on behalf of my accountant (like not doing anything to make the IRS audit my tax return;) it seems pretty natural to look for a big gun that has some sort of attested affinity for accountants yes? I mean seriously ... look at the number and type of subjects covered and you can’t possibly equate them all as demigods.
What’s with the deficient education crack? You do realize that is a logical fallacy right?
As for the general agreement, the only people who don't agree to anthro and psych and socio theories of religion are.... religious leaders. The people with objectivity pretty much all agree on the basics, and one of the reasons they do not espouse is we believe in religions because there is a god and he told us to.
Not really ... there is still a lot of debate going on and several non-religious based theories that actually dismiss them: eg. http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange...
Uh, Kristjan, your link is to a book report of one book by one person. It hardly explodes the fact that most people in the field agree on the reasons for religion as NOT being because god truly exists.And the deficient education thing isn't a crack at all. you don't seem to have any understanding that people do not behave like governing bodies want to say they do, and you couch your disagreement of the very real, provable, and obvious fact people DO worship saints and Mary in repeated chruch dogma. Which is either stupidity, or that you haven't studied.
And you don't seem stupid. Just naive? Robotic? But certainly nice. I am not trying to insult you. Plenty of great people are ill educated, or naive, and I like robots a lot.
Molly said: It hardly explodes the fact that most people in the field agree on the reasons for religion as NOT being because god truly exists. My bad ... I thought we were arguing about something else. I will concede that the existence of a deity is not a requirement for religion, nor does religion exist simply because God exists. If you thought that was my position, I apologize for the confusion. Of course ... the link was only supposed to be AN example to illustrate that the reasons man invented religion are still not fully understood and are still subject to debate.
Domo arigato
Excellent, Kristjan. I did think that, so thank you for the clarification.IF
misunderstanding remedied
GOTO
thank you
We can never prove what happens in the distant past, unless we invent time travel, and then people will still argue over it.
at this moment:my concept of God/Creator/Divine embraces every living thing as an expression of the One, our infinite Source for the life energy that sustains us.
i believe Jesus, Buddha, Ghandi and some others are all different but similar expressions of God (as we all are) whose energies resonate at higher levels and come to remind us of the magnificence possible in our lives if we can grasp and apply the concepts of i=you=we=us all.
my current challenge is to remember and respect that all human beings are same but different.
Mod
Why haven't you spoken up sooner??? (Well...you told me) But damn.
You really really need to check out "Initiation" by Elisabeth Haich!
My response would be much the same as in the "Transmutation" section.This added:
Though, I love reading every idea and every thought, every philosophy that ponders the question of God. And, the concept is so often present in my own writing, I can not say anything other than this....
I nearly died giving birth to my second child. The real thing NDE!!! Chemical reaction in the brain set off by near death, some strange effect from blood loss, OR profe of afterlife? Frankly, I don't give a shit. What I saw/felt has left me unafraid of death. I am not wrestling with my mortality, I am living and enjoying life.
God or not, I have chosen to believe that there is something divine in this universe that only death will explain.
Or, NoT!!!
I'm really late on this thread, but...I've enjoyed reading all of the discussion thus far. Many good points have been made, so I won't reiterate points I believe in too much (I hope).;)I was once, as some of you may have already read, a missionary, a follower in a religion that I now see as another system of belief, man made, to give people a reason for their existence. However, I now see religion as yet another way to control the masses while making LARGE sums of money (money being an entirely seperate discussion I won't go into). George Carlin joked, about being a Catholic: "I was a Catholic, until I reached the age of...Reason." (I heard this after I had reached the age of reason so I had a good chuckle.) How could God be an all knowing all loving God, decide who could return to heaven or who was going to hell based on what religion they believed. I could not believe that if I followed the Mormon religion to a T, I would go to heaven but my best friend, a devout Catholic, wouldn't just because he was of a different faith. He is just as honest and ethical as I try to be. So this shut down my belief in what most religions say are the standards for getting into heaven, if there is one.
The idea that there is "One God" seems a bit absurd. I can't claim to be Athiest, but I'm close. It has been put to me, by others, that we are our own god. Is this possible, maybe. Ideas of free will, consciousness, and determinism come in to play in all religions and philosophy, but what are they and do we actually possess them and the ability to control them. I think not. Our universe is an atomic makeup so complex that if you think about it too much you will have an aneurysm. Whether or not there was or is a Divine Creator is a moot point. There are only texts that try to justify the existence of our universe and ouselves. How it happened we may never know. There are too many theories and beliefs making it too much to comprehend, which is why Man made religion.
There is no proof, only faith, that God exists and I cannot, at this time, accept this. The fundamental morals of religion and the concept of god keep people in check, however, they also breed hate and intolerance. In an idealistic world, we would not need God, our own ethics and values, supposing they are of good intent, should be enough to make this thing we call a world go 'round.
I think I've rambled enough, but I hope to have made a point. I've chosen not to believe in "A God", only good ethics and values. Pondering how the universe came to be will only lead to more circular, sometimes unanswerable questions. Believe what works for you and I'll believe what works for me.
Mod
I was watching this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=2WHf5HFDk10
the other day and it really made me think about Faith. Faith is just another word for gullibility when looked at in the Christian sense. They have twisted that word around just like they twist around the word 'theory'. Creationists think a theory is a guess, when it's really a repeatedly proven and supported, yet non-empirical fact. It's not a law because there is really not a way to recreate the big bang.
So the same holds true with faith. Faith is the surety in something happening validly. I have faith that the sun will rise tomorrow because it does it all the time. I have faith that my next breath will contain oxygen because it's been proven that that's what is in our atmosphere and that is what our bodies need to survive. I have faith that my mother loves me because she acts like it and doesn't just say it.
I CAN'T have faith in an invisible being depicted in a 2000 year old book that was written by men claiming to have been told by the very subject of the book to write.
Nom, that was a beautiful thing that you've written. I'm so glad that you are ok and that you can look on what must have been a frightening experience so positively. Personally, I agree. I believe we go back to whatever the source energy is that we originated from after we pass and I am quite comfortable knowing that it's not going to be some burning hell or a boring white fluffy place where all I can do is play a harp and pay homage to, what they'd have you believe, is a bearded white man for all of eternity.
Nom, please expound upon what you experienced and how that altered your way of thinking and living. It's really fascinating to hear about this from someone who won't massage into an ad for bible study, lol.
And Father we need to come up with a name for being between atheist and religious, lol. Then maybe we can force people to convert to our way of thinking and say they'll die and rot forever if they don't and charge them every week for a pep talk. :-)
To expound---The experience was horrific! Pain can do strange things to you, like cause you to scream obscenities at people trying to help you and much worse!
I internally bled for 3 days before emergency surgery was performed. I went in for a 2-3 day stay for c-section and remained for two weeks. They replaced my blood volume, minus one bag. It gets really gory so I will stop there.
Anyway, it was the last night of bleeding before my doc came back from here week-end vacation (of, course) up until then they thought it was all in my head, at most, a bladder infection causing the pain. (Humm...Weird when you are telling them the pain is in your Kidneys.) What was happening was the amount of blood flooding my abdominal cavity and swelling had shut down The Urethra the run from bladder to kidney. My kidneys had shut down for the most part and I was bleeding to death. They thought I would need an emergency hysterectomy, but managed to salvage my womb.
I won't go into to much detail about what I saw/felt/experienced, because no one would get it, and maybe what happened to me, is a product of my internal belief system and is unique to me. What I will tell you, is the level of serenity is nothing you can find in the deepest meditation. The experience itself was very detailed and yet surreal and how it left me was pivotal.
Perspective. Priorities. What junk was I holding onto that didn't serve me? I have not had a drinking problem since; I don't want to damage a body that fought so hard to stay alive for me. I have always had a deeply rooted sense of purpose, after it was like validation to my soul. You are here! Deserve it! Act! I felt half in this world for a couple weeks while recovering, like those moments were still too real to let my mind return to the mundane.
Since, that day I have recognized that any number of things could have caused my NDE, but I don't care about them. That means nothing to me and does nothing to change the effect on my life. Be it brain chemicals or whatever? It isn't about finding out the cause, it is about allowing the effect to synthesize with my life now.
I feel like I passed some mythical test of body and mind. I have more clarity and simplicity.
Mod
Slugs and I were just talking about death in a sad sense, this is lovely because even though I could never be in your shoes with what you experienced exactly, I still wholly understand what you mean. It's nice to think of your life as being purposeful and worthy instead of a countdown or something like that. I agree....You are here! Deserve! Act!!
Beautiful.
Life at it worst is wonderful! And, my feeling is death is the answer to a riddle that has been bugging us for a life time. That final Ah-ha!My experience in the hospital confirmed on thing for sure. We Matter! Life is good even when it sucks! Even the pain is important! I would rather not suffer, but since I am human and it happens, the best I can do is allow it. Allowing it teaches, fighting it hinders.
One more thing that I believe, NDE is not needed to find clarity. Silence might be more important. Mental and physical. It allows you the break you need from the chatter of the memes. Silence and gut wrenching hard work.
In my opinion.
Mod
Mod
I had more to say on that, but I'll stop.
It seems this thread is a little dead right now, but I had a chat with a friend the other day I think fits here.We were discussing Krakauer's theory in Under the Banner of Heaven that religion condones violence. There is a philosophy professor here that is christian, but is still quite liberal. He, however, still holds to the belief that the violence that occurs is not christian and is not condoned in the christian belief. (At least that's what I got out of the discussion.) I disagreed. As there have already been posts made concerning this I won't go further on that.
Our conversation turned a bit, giving me a different way to look at life. I have been reading some atheist approaches, as I think a lot of us have, and he gave me a link that says Dawkins, Hitchens, etc. need to go back to the drawing board. Interesting, I thought. Then he said, "yeah, find another way to critique religion. I like Richard Rorty's approach, to critique cruelty in all forms and to balance that critique with pragmatics." Then another change to not worrying about religion at all when he said, "rather than study whether god exists, I think we should study art", continuing with, "that, for me, comes from a friend who told me in answer to my question about his belief in god... 'I don't care he said', and then continued, 'I'm more interested in beauty' meaning aesthetics. My personal interest, is in how that desire for religion and the desire for artistic expression / enjoyment arise as basic human characteristics. I just think that to personalize it as god is a mistake and, can lead to fucking your life up but, it's not a point that [the professor] would agree with! But, I like to try to give respect to his position."
I think we both agreed on this matter, and as for aesthetics, something new for me to think about, rather than think/worry about the existence of god. So, my new goal for now, is to enjoy life, beauty, and the arts. It just seems healthier for me right now.
wow... i am so far behind on all of these comments... i will have to take a few days to give feedback, questions... so please extend patience...
I can respect that, even if i think you may be deluding yerself.
However.. we all delude ourselves. We have to to survive an innately meaningless existence. It all boils down to what delusional flavour we want to suck on.
A little like the Buddhist concept of accepting that all is meaningless yet then choosing to follow a course of action anyway. - "controlled folly".
If it is left there, happy days!
It gets well shitty however when people insist upon evangelising for a certain flavour OR against a certain flavour.
I think this thread has reached an impasse, which was always going to be inevitable. None of us here were or are going to be convinced of a "God" through reading and writing in this topic ;)
A wee tale i read is fitting me thinks, it goes something like this:
Before a man is enlightened: he gets up, tends his fields, comes home, eats dinner, goes to bed and makes love with his woman.
After a man is enlightened: he gets up, tends his fields, comes home, eats dinner, goes to bed and makes love with his woman.
The greatest secret in the world may be that there is no secret!
Perhaps our search for peace, through an answer, arises from our disconcerting meaningless questions that so disquietens us.