Letters to the Editor
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I'm religious because I just like religion
Well, the memoir is a little sappy, and more than a little vague about exactly what the author believes. But I can tell a similar story: raised without religion, discovered it without all the puerile baggage kids raised in the church attach to it, and bought in.
When? At Beaverbrook Music Camp, at 14, singing the Schubert Mass in G.
Why? Because I LIKE religion. De gustibus. I like singing sacred music in Latin, I like the Metaphysical Poets, I like the Book of Common Prayer (the old one), I like icons...You'd think I was a gay male, but I'm a straight woman. I also like theology--some theology, like the Greek Fathers of the Church.
Why Christianity? Because it's our cultural packaging for whatever it is that religion is about--if indeed it is about anything. In India I'd be a Hindu, in China a Buddhist. This isn't to say I'm in it just for the packaging but that this is just the language I happen to speak, and because I'm congenitally incapable of getting any sense of transcendence, "spirituality" or whatever without high church props.
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Answered Prayers
Nice. I see Sara Miles finds some solace from prayer, but does she find answers? If not might I suggest this strange gadget:
http://theviewfromherenow.blogspot.com/2007/02/screw-top-jesus.html
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To Bill
Nice try, dude. Washington and Jefferson were not Christians. In the case of Washington, there was never any evidence to suggest that he practiced any religion at all. All he left behind were statements affirming his neutrality on the matter. And as one of the other posters pointed out, he died without receiving last rites or any minister at his bedside.
But your claim that Jefferson was a Christian just exposes you as completely ignorant. Jefferson left behind a plethora of writings where he railed against Christianity, going so far as to say "I do not find in the favored supersition of Christianity any redeeming characteristics" (rough quote from memory). He was a deist like Voltaire, which meant simply that he believed there was some kind of higher power that create the universe, but that it was aloof and amoral.
Thanks for your offer, but call me when you get your head out of your ass.
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'Prejudice' is a myth
To all you poor persecuted Christians - get over yourselves. You are a 95% majority. You have politicians falling over themselves to court you and assure you that they share your faith. You have laws being passed based on it, and tax dollars funding it. So maybe you can understand why the rest of us are a little pissed off. But you want to tell me you're persecuted? Go screw yourselves. Seriously.
Because even if our antagonism is justified, your basic claim is false. What you fail to realize is that the antagonistic comments here, mine included, are entirely IN RESPONSE to the author's holier-than-thou, "I'm so persecuted" claims. Allow me to illustrate.
According to your cute little classification scheme, I am an NYT-reading, atheistic, neo-Marxist whatever. And I just love how the author extrapolates from herself to all of us, assuming that most of us have no religious friends. In fact, just given the statistics, I'd say you'd have to be pretty sheltered or elitist to achieve such a feat. I would wager that most of us who have gone to college have a fair enough mix. Personally, I have a Catholic friend, a Muslim friend, two Hindi friends, and a Jewish friend with whom I disagree deeply not only about religion but about the topic of Israel as well. Am I saying this to pat myself on the back? No. The point is that we have never experienced any 'prejudice' from each other because we do not discuss it. And it's not like we suppress our urge to discuss it or are somehow distanced from each other because of it. It's just that among friends, discussions of religion are about as arbitrary as discussions of applied physics or celebrity gossip. Unless the religious people involved were fundamentalist monks, it has absolutely no bearing on day-to-day interaction. The point is that completely rational and intelligent peope can compartmentalize their thoughts to isolate irrational beliefs to a completely abstract sphere. HOWEVER, if one of my friends came up to me and started waxing poetic about his spiritual journey and how I just 'don't understand', I'd punch him in the face, just like I'd expect him to do if I cornered him and started drawing a philosophical proof of materialism on a chalkboard. See the difference?
I'm sure you would love to think of secular leftists as the same kind of narrow-minded bigots as fundamentalist Christians to fit your own persecution complex. Knock yourself out. But really, we're usually more amused at you than angry, until you try to preach to us. Then by all means, expect the shit to hit the fan.
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Searching for life
I understand that we need to feel that we have a purpose, that we are a part of something greater than ourselves, but you do not need to give your life to the biggest con on humanity. This is not the middle ages when belief in magic, witches and other nonsense is excuseable. You hopefully have a rational brain, belief in some book written thousands of years ago by various people who put down fantasies as truth with not one piece of evidence in support of their fantasy is totally abandoning your RATIONAL SELF for convenience. There is a reason that religon is the opiate of the masses, it is easier than dealing with life, just like it is when you are on opium. Instead of taking responsibility for your own life, you have given it to some church, who will tell you what to think, what is good, what is evil, and that this is not all there is to existence. The worse of it, is that you are following the ideas of less intelligent people thousand years ago, and what they came up with to solve their inadequacy. If you believe that there is some greater existence than ours, such as a god, then there is no need for you to seek the comfort of acceptance of the established church, of whatever religon. You can and should follow your belief, but without the hypocrisy of established religon. I personally do not believe in a "personal god", there maybe other existences, we may even elevate to another existence after this one. There are other dimensions where our "soul" may exist after this plane
on this membrane. We may even be able to transverse membranes in this other existence. But whatever the answer is, I feel if you lead a good life, you will be rewarded if their is another existence. Just keep your karma on the good side. To believe that your must worship some idol, or this idol is going to send you to some hell, or not allow you into their heaven, is an absurd notion. To believe that their exists such an entity that would be so petty as to demand that we who are nothing in comparison worship that entity describes more of a monster than a god. It would be like you having an ant farm and demanding that the ants pray to you everyday for guidance otherwise they will be lost. That the free will they think they have is just an illusion, that unless they receive this guidance and connection with their god they are lost. Then the creation of this god is more about the god than the creation, the creation is nothing without the god, this belief is a god that is self adorating by the means of its creation, and that is a contradiction in terms and beliefs, so I do not believe it to be plausible. Get a life, but your own, not some thousand year old idea built upon the ignorance of the time and the superstitions of the time, and the beliefs in slavery, inequal rights for women, the belief in revenge, the belief in capital punishment (for much lessor offenses than we would ever consider), these are just a few of the ideas that are throughout the bible, koran and other so called enlightened books of religous beliefs that have been passed down through generations. This is the 21st century, we are on the brink of conquering our own immortality, for better or worse. We need our concept of SELF to evolve with our scientific knowledge and understanding of our universe. Otherwise we will be doomed, we have pseudo science promoting that the science of the bible is the truth, and that to question that is to question their god. If that is not one of the most dangerous ideas of our day, than you are either ignorant or in denial. These religons are dangerous, they promote division with others of different faiths. This has resulted in many wars in our history, it is responsible for more wars than any other reason. You only have to look at the conflict in Iraq, which is between different sects of the same religon. And then there is Iran and the other countries who want the destruction of Israel. We have the Christian Crusades, not to let them think they are all so innocent. Do not join these lunatics to find your SELF, you will only find your SELF within yourself.