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22 Aug 04 - 01:00 PM (#1253547) Subject: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST I have finally risen to #1 on my local library's list of patrons for this book [Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism by Susan Jacoby], and hope to pick it up this week. As some of you may recall, we discussed this subject after I started this thread back in May, after seeing an interview of the author on this episode of NOW with Bill Moyers. I am starting a new thread here, because I think it would be interesting to discuss how this dynamic is being subsumed by other issues in the presidential race, most recently by the wholly relevant rearguing of the legitimacy of the Vietnam war, and the conduct of American military and civilian government personnel in the execution of that war. Nowhere is the confluence of American patriotism and the Christian religion stronger than in the US military, IMO. So I wanted to inject this subject into the discussion of the differences between the parties and their candidates in this year's election in the expression of their patriotism, how it is and isn't "informed" (for a lack of a better word, although I know it sounds somewhat elitist and academic) by the traditions of American Christianity and American Secularism. I see this "holy war" as a very strong undercurrent to the battle being fought over Kerry's Vietnam service. I also think that this battle is merely a way for the mainstream public debate over the legitimacy of the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, and especially, as a way to obfuscate the horrors of who and what our soldiers become when waging war--because the one thing neither party or candidate is willing to discuss openly is the legitimacy of that war, and ESPECIALLY the conduct of our soldiers there vis a vis things like the destruction of historic sites, the bombing of civilians, the attacks on the religious symbols and sites of the Shiites, and of course, the torture scandals. Additionally, I feel that this subject Secularism vs Patriotism and the US Christian Religion, is probably the central issue driving the most important constitutional crises that have taken root in the US since the country's takeover by the Republican Right in 1980 with the election of Ronald Reagan. I think it is certainly at the root of the debacle that is the US Patriot Act, with it's Christian vs Muslim undercurrents. |
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22 Aug 04 - 01:49 PM (#1253575) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Don Firth Excellent topic for discussion. I have also risen close to the top of my library's hold list for the same book. For a world view and historical background, not specifically of this topic, but of some of the philosophical errors that have brought us to this point, I highly recommend the book I am currently reading: The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason, by Charles Freeman, here. In some of the reviews of this book, the reviewers miss an important point that Freeman makes, in fact, a major point: Greek philosophy is not one single body of thought, and should not be thought of as such as the reviewers seem to do. In what we now cavalierly toss into the same pot and call "Greek philosophy," there were two strongly opposing systems of thought. It was Aristotle versus Plato. Early on, Christianity did borrow heavily from Greek philosophy, but it borrowed from Plato rather than Aristotle. It was not until a thousand years later, with St. Thomas Aquinas, that Aristotle re-emerged, but in a highly distorted way. This whole Aristotle versus Plato schism accounts for such modern day conflicts as science and evolution versus Creationism. And this philosphical dichotomy, in turn, strongly influences American's current political climate. Don Firth |
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22 Aug 04 - 01:59 PM (#1253581) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST I agree Don. One problem with our education system is that we don't teach the lineages of particular philosophical movements, hence the confusion we are seeing today in so many of the issues being debated in this presidential election. Back in the thread I started in May, I also linked to an interview with Susan Jacoby at beliefnet, that I'd like to quote to give some even more specific context to this thread. Here are her responses to three questions I think it is important to consider here: Beliefnet: What do you mean when you say the orthodox religious view? Jacoby: I stress the orthodox or right wing religious view because I don't like it when people talk about religion versus secularism. What they really mean is a particular kind of religion versus secularism. The general press has a tendency to say religious as if all religions were alike and all religious believers had the same beliefs. Beliefnet: What are the main battles ahead between secularists and the religious right? Jacoby: First of all, I believe that this election is a battle between these groups. The religious right has a champion who is the president of the United States. This election is a battle about many things, but one of those things is between a secular view of public affairs, between people who believe in the separation of church and state, as secularists and freethinkers do, and people who don't. And the religious right does not believe in separation of church and state really. What they believe in is that their religious principles are the ones that ought to dominate government policy. There are so many other issues. Will we depart from American tradition and provide tax support in the form of vouchers, for religious schools? Will we drain off support from public schools and provide support for schools operated by everyone from the Christian right to ultra-Orthodox Jews? Number two, will we push for laws to regulate people's private lives, such as gay marriage laws, in ways that are in accordance with the principles of the Christian right? Will we appoint judges--which is, I think, arguably the most important issue in this election--who don't believe that there should be any separation of church and state? One of the more astonishing and dismaying public statements ever made was made by Antonin Scalia several years ago in an address about capital punishment to the University of Chicago Divinity School, which received very little publicity at the time, in which he said that God has the power of life and death and therefore governments, who derive their power from God, have the right to dispense life and death too. This is a horrifying thought. The idea of having judges who look to God for instructions in their decisions, not to "we the people," as our secular constitution says, it's a terrible idea. When you look to God for instruction, well everybody's God says something different to him. We can't decide government policy on the basis of people who think they have a pipeline to God. Beliefnet: Let's turn to the history of secularism. How does this history fit into American religious history? Jacoby: The secularist strain in American culture has been very strong since the beginning, but the nation's secular heritage is virtually unknown to people. A secular government was developed to protect the rights of religious minorities. Most Americans don't know that God is not mentioned in the Constitution. It was a coalition of religious Evangelicals and freethinkers or deists who joined together to get this ratified. And why did the Evangelicals want this then? Because they were a minority and they deeply feared government interference with religion. This Constitution basically placed the Episcopal Church, the established religion in the South before the Revolution, on a level playing field with all of the Evangelical Protestant denominations that were sprouting up. The effect of this was to enable them to proselytize for their own religion in ways that if there had been a union of established church and state they never would have been able to do. Ironically, it's the separation of church and state that has probably enabled religion to flourish throughout the 20th century in this country in ways that it doesn't in other developed nations. The history of secularism is also the history of a certain kind of religion. One of the interesting things that happened in this country is, between roughly 1780 and 1825 in New England, more than half of all of the once orthodox Calvinist churches transformed into the much more liberal, Unitarian churches, a development the orthodox of the day hated as much as the religious right hates secularists today. In fact, they referred to Unitarians as infidels and atheists. But those people led to a transformation of American religion. They were influenced by freethought and freethinkers were influenced by them. And later on when evolution came along, this part of American Protestantism accommodated itself to evolutionism, as it had accommodated itself to Enlightenment thought in the 18th century. |
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22 Aug 04 - 02:52 PM (#1253613) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: mack/misophist May we have a link to the Beliefnet/Jacoby interview? I'd like to read the rest of it. There were a couple of surprises there. |
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22 Aug 04 - 04:04 PM (#1253685) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST mack, I don't know why, but I can't get the blue clicky to create a link to the Beliefnet interview right now. But go to the "this episode" link I give above, and that article has link that does work. I'll try and create a link to it later. I really think Jacoby is on to something with respect to this particular presidential race, and I think the grand themes of this are currently being played out in the Kerry vs Swift Boat Veterans for Truth passion play. The merging in the 1980 presidential elections of fundamentalist Christians and right wing Republicans, resulted in the creation of the sort of Christian American patriotic militarism we are seeing played out today that does have it's roots in the culture wars of the 60s. Nothing defined the separation, the "who's who" in the US more in that era than one's position on the Vietnam war. The culture wars of the 60s happened along the American secularist/American evangelical religious fault line, and what we are seeing right now in the Kerry vs VV passion play is that fissure between cultural traditions. It's looking a lot like the "Two Traditions" passion plays of Northern Ireland in the wake of the IRA ceasefire. As Jacoby points out, the American secularists are leaderless. The American Religious Patriots have as their True Believer leader, the charismatic George Dubya. Kerry, although he has tried to maintain his secularist positions, has refused to be proudly secularist, and to take on the right wing religious patriotism zealots head on, which is what the nation NEEDS him to do. Hell, even Clinton commented upon the wishy washiness of the Kerry campaign on The Daily Show recently. And today's NY Times editorial on this whole sorry Swift Boat veterans mess chides the Democrats AND Republicans, by asking "why" was the Kerry campaign blindsided by this, and why was the McCain campaign blindsided by the same sorts of attacks in 2000, and why was Dukakis blindsided by the sorts of attacks in 1998 ad nauseum. |
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22 Aug 04 - 04:16 PM (#1253700) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bee-dubya-ell GUEST, would you care to expand a bit on your premise that Nowhere is the confluence of American patriotism and the Christian religion stronger than in the US military...? Not that I necessarilly disagree with your premise, but I'm sure many in the military would hold themselves up as shining examples of religious tolerance. They would point to the fact that there are chaplains to serve those of Catholic, Jewish and Muslim faiths as well as the Protestant majority. So, how can one say that the military has aligned itself with a Christian (and particularly fundamentalist Protestant) agenda? They would further point out that, in a combat situation, it doesn't matter what religious beliefs a soldier holds. The bonds of soldierhood presumably transcend religious differences. If an evangelical Pentecostal soldier gets gutshot by a sniper, it doesn't matter that the guy who pulls him to safety may be a Jew or a Muslim. Personally, I don't buy the military's "party line" on religion any more than I do their official stance on racial or sexual equality. They pay lip service to the idea of all soldiers giving each other due respect regardless of race, religion or gender, but their actions and, particularly, their failure to act when transgressions occur, make it obvious that it's all just posturing. Ask ten black soldiers, or ten female soldiers, or ten Muslim or Jewish soldiers if they feel they were treated as equals with white Christian soldiers and nine out of ten will probably say "No". |
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22 Aug 04 - 04:40 PM (#1253716) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: robomatic I resent a GUEST starting a thread no matter how interesting, without either joining up or signing in in some way. |
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22 Aug 04 - 04:52 PM (#1253726) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Ellenpoly Why? |
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22 Aug 04 - 05:09 PM (#1253740) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST BWL, I'm still working on the premise, and it likely won't be fully formed for awhile yet, at least until I've read Jacoby's book I would think, to see what someone else who has given this a lot of thought, is thinking. But thanks for asking. If you don't mind, I'll defer again to the book's author, and quote an op ed piece by her at Newsday.com from July (lead up to the Dem convention) on this subject. The link is broken, so I'm copying what she had to say from the cached copy of the article at google. And here is hoping Joe Offer doesn't catch me doing this and delete the sucker! "Where politics shouldn't go" BY SUSAN JACOBY Susan Jacoby, author of the recently published "Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism, is director of the Center for Inquiry-Metro New York. July 11, 2004 One of the most untouchable issues in American politics - and so far campaign 2004 has been no exception - is the damaging proposition, deliberately fostered by government leaders, that religious devotion and patriotism are inseparable. This largely unexamined subject, which lay at the heart of the case challenging the recitation of "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, scares Democrats to death. Indeed, the question of whether God has really blessed America scared the Supreme Court so much that the justices chose to duck the issue entirely by declaring that the plaintiff, Michael Newdow, lacked standing because he did not have full custody of his daughter. Democratic Party officials were privately delighted with the decision, because it relieved John Kerry - who, even though he is a Roman Catholic, has already been tarred with the scarlet "S" for secularist - of any obligation to take a stand on the case. But the pledge is only one symbol - though symbols are important in themselves - of a deeper and more damaging assumption, promulgated aggressively by the Bush administration, that the only true patriot is a religious patriot. The triumphalist melding of religion and patriotism that permeates much of American society not only undermines the American social contract at home but runs counter to U.S. interests throughout the world. What could be more unseemly in the eyes of the world than trumpeting our oh-so-superior religious values at a time when the U.S. military is implicated in a general abuse of Iraqi prisoners that also incorporated specific insults to the Muslim faith. In Muslim culture, which does not even tolerate casual locker room nudity among men, forcing prisoners to strip naked and simulate homosexual acts is an even graver insult than it would be in other societies. At home, the equation of religion and patriotism it exclusionary - whether it comes from top government leaders or teachers in elementary school classrooms. Not only atheists and agnostics, but religious believers who also cherish the separation of church and state, are being told that their convictions count for nothing in public life. Like most Americans, I responded to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, with an immediate wave of anger and grief so powerful that it left no room for alienation. Walking around my wounded New York, as the smoke from the ruins of the World Trade Center wafted the smell of death throughout the city, I drew consolation from the knowledge that others were feeling what I was feeling - sorrow, pain and rage, coupled with the futile but irrepressible longing to turn back the clock to the hour before bodies rained from a crystalline sky. That soothing sense of unity was severed for me just three days later, when the president presided over an ecumenical prayer service in Washington's National Cathedral. Delivering an address indistinguishable from a sermon, replacing the language of civic virtue with the language of faith, the nation's chief executive might as well have been the Reverend Bush. Quoting a man who supposedly said at St. Patrick's Cathedral, "I pray to God to give us a sign that he's still here," the president went on to assure the public not only that God was still here but that he was personally looking out for America. "God's signs," Bush declared, "are not always the ones we look for. We learn in tragedy that his purposes are not always our own ... Neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, can separate us from God's love. May he bless the souls of the departed, may he comfort our own, and may he always guide our country." This adaptation of the famous passage from St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans left out the evangelist's identification of Jesus Christ as God - an omission presumably made in deference to the Jewish and Muslim representatives sharing the pulpit with the president. Bush would surely have been criticized, and rightly so, had he failed to invite representatives of non-Christian faiths to the ecumenical ceremony in memory of the victims of terrorism. But he felt perfectly free to ignore Americans who adhere to no religious faith, whose outlook is predominantly secular and who interpret history and tragedy as the work of man rather than God. There was no speaker who represented my views, no one to reject the notion of divine purpose at work in the slaughter of thousands and to proclaim the truth that grief, patriotism and outrage at injustice run just as deep in the secular as in the religious portion of the body politic. According to a religious identification survey by the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, more than 14 percent of Americans - a much larger minority than any non-Christian group - describe their outlook as "entirely or predominantly secular." There are more secular humanists than there are observant Jews or Muslims - but one would never know it from the makeup of supposedly ecumenical civic rituals that are ecumenical only for those who believe, to paraphrase Bush, that God is at the helm of our country. Bush's very presence in the pulpit represented a significant departure from the behavior of other presidents in times of crisis. Franklin D. Roosevelt did not try to assuage the shock of Pearl Harbor by using an altar as the backdrop for his declaration of war and Abraham Lincoln, who steadfastly refused to join any church even though his political advisers urged him to do so, delivered the Gettysburg Address not from a sanctuary but on the battlefield where so many soldiers had given "the last full measure of devotion." The merger of religion and patriotism is especially dangerous in wartime, because it leads naturally to the conclusion that God is on our side. And if God is on our side, it isn't hard to figure out who, with two little horns protruding from his head, is on the other side. Last year, Army Lt. General William G. Boykin, deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, explicitly told an audience of evangelical Christians that the war against terrorism was a battle against Satan. He also declared, as widely reported in the media, that he was able to defeat a Muslim warlord in Somalia because, "I knew my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol." Boykin deserved a public reprimand from his superiors for statements that should never be uttered by a military officer representing the U.S. government. Instead, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld laughed dismissively when asked about the comments at a press conference and accused reporters of being a "blood-thirsty" bunch. It is not hard to imagine the impact of such comments not only in the Muslim world but in European nations, where both the public and government leaders are baffled and put off by the religious rhetoric coming from Washington. Bush has spoken proudly, on many occasions, of America's religious liberties as one of the factors distinguishing the U.S. from radical Islamist states - but he does not respect those liberties, which flow from the separation of church and state, at home. Only last week, the Senate Judiciary Committee once again took up the nomination of one James Leon Holmes for a federal district judgeship. This is a man who, in a 2002 address to the Society of Catholic Social Scientists, proclaimed that "the final reunion of church and state will take place at the end of time, when Christ will claim definitive political power of all creation, inaugurating an entirely new society based on the supernatural." What a great and welcome contribution it would be for John Kerry to step forward and proclaim a love of country based not on dreams of a supernatural Christian government but, as the Constitution's preamble asserts, on the authority of "We the People." The framers knew what they were doing when they declined to write, "We the People under God." It is simply disgraceful that modern politicians run away from the noble secular heritage that they should embrace.
-Joe Offer- |
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22 Aug 04 - 05:42 PM (#1253767) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bee-dubya-ell Here's an alternate link to the same article in case it gets deleted: http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/printer_10103.shtml |
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22 Aug 04 - 05:55 PM (#1253784) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST BWL, here are links to places I think explain the "ordinariness" of the mixing of militarism, religion, and patriotism in the minds of way too many Americans. Military Weddings Here is a group calling itself the American Center for Law and Justice that typifies the sort of American Christian religious patriotism that has so gripped the nation in the wake of 9/11 especially, but has it's roots in the Reagan doctrines, and Republican demonization of those who opposed the Vietnam war especially. And here is an article I just found out googling, that I think explains it pretty succinctly the very question BWL raises: "The Religious Character of American Patriotism" The author says: "(A)s Americans we do not belong to a single racial group, do not share the same religion, and are mostly relative newcomers to the national soil we inhabit...What is it, then, that binds us? The answer can be found in a set of ideals and myths pervading our national consciousness that has been growing for two centuries. Whether we admit it or not, even if we claim we are not religious, we frequently tend to operate according to the prophetic vision, dogmas, and rituals of a generally unacknowledged religious tradition. Our behavior belies this as we take pilgrimages to its shrines, view its relics, sing its songs, celebrate its holy days, show respect to its saints and martyrs, and respond to its symbols. The United States is indeed a religious nation, but its unifying religion is not Christianity or any other world faith -- not even "the religion of secular humanism," as has been claimed of late. It is instead a unique national belief system best called _Americanism_." |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:08 PM (#1253791) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST And here is an example of well meaning but ultimately very confused progressive Christians attempting to define their Christian values in an "Americanism" context, to counter the dominant Christian right values that equates militarism with Christian patriotism. |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:10 PM (#1253795) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bill D I agree with robomatic, Ellenpoly....any person should use some name if they intend to carry on a debate over time. There ARE others who use "guest", and sometimes on the same thread. Calling yourself Edgar or Rumplestiltslin would in no way compromise your anonymity, and it would help us keep the discussion straight...and get you LOTS more interesting replies. The name doesn't even need to indicate gender. I can't decide whether it's excessive paranoia or just a distorted sense of values that makes some people feel that they can ignore common courtesy. |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:13 PM (#1253799) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Stilly River Sage I don't have time to read all of this now, but thanks for starting the thread. I'll trace it and catch up later. SRS |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:15 PM (#1253804) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST robomatic, Ellenpoly, and BillD, You are all, of course, free to voice your opinion on guests anywhere you please. But it certainly does seem that by doing so in this particular thread, you are engaging in the rude and disruptive behavior being complained about in at least a half dozen threads in the past week alone. So, I will respectfully ask all three of you to please be polite, and take your concerns and opinions to a thread where they can be appropriately discussed and debated, rather than hijack this thread, which is in no way concerned with the posting habits of anonymous guests. I thank you for your mature consideration in this matter. |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:27 PM (#1253817) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST And finally, here is a good article on where we are at today from the Freethought Today website, titled "America 2004: What's at Stake". It is actually an address by Eleanor Clift, who many will recognize as an establishment media talking head from her photo at the link. It is quite witty and thought-provoking. And with all those links, I'll leave you all with some time to digest this. |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:28 PM (#1253818) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bee-dubya-ell Thanks, GUEST. That need to see "Americanism" as a religion is, possibly, even more dangerous than the desire to align America with God. I can almost forgive someone who says, "We're right because God is on our side," as being misled. But someone who says, "We're right because we're Americans and America is always right," is stuck in a solipsism and wearing blinders to boot. Just back the clock up about 65 years and substitute "Germany" for "America" and see if the picture looks familiar. |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:37 PM (#1253829) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bill D GUEST...if mature consideration is your aim, YOU could post elsewhere "why I choose to be confusingly anonymous" and make links to it. I have no faith you would bother to answer in another thread. YOU chose to engage in a practice that is inherently rude & disruptive, and then you object when someone points it out. I will say no more........ |
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22 Aug 04 - 06:56 PM (#1253845) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Rabbi-Sol When someone makes the brash statement that "God is on my side", my retort to that person is " But are you on God's side"? The point of this being, it is not for man to make up the rules and then seek an endorsement from God, to justify them and force them down other peoples' throats. Rather, it is God who makes the rules and it is man's duty to follow them. This applies strictly to religion, not to the U.S. government which is based upon the secular laws of the constitution, and should not favor any one established religion over another. SOL ZELLER |
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22 Aug 04 - 07:43 PM (#1253891) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Ellenpoly Hey GUEST, I only asked why robomatic seems to think it inappropriate. I thought it was fine that you posted anonymously. This is an interesting thread. |
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22 Aug 04 - 08:11 PM (#1253925) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST Well I'm sorry to say that all the whining about whether I do or don't sign in is pissing me off, so with all due respect I'm out of here. I know plenty of other people who would welcome the discussion. Have a nice day. |
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22 Aug 04 - 09:12 PM (#1254003) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Don Firth Hmm . . . I posted second, then guests came for dinner. Afterward, I checked in to see how the discussion was going. Boy, that didn't last long! Don Firth (I'm gonna go read my book--the one I mentioned above) |
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22 Aug 04 - 10:24 PM (#1254051) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST Hey Don. As you can see by Guest 8:11's post, obnoxious anon guests follow anon guests like me around too. If it ever becomes possible again to hold an uninterrupted conversation here at Mudcat, we'll have to compare notes on Jacoby's book. Until that, I guess the jerks have successfully hijacked this thread too. Congratulations, you all do yourselves proud. |
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22 Aug 04 - 11:51 PM (#1254112) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: mack/misophist Bee-dubya-ell asked why the military and American religiosity are combined. Having brown up in a military environment, perhaps I can help. A. The majority of military careerists have always come from conservative rural areas. The bases themselves tend to be in rural or semi-rural areas where progressives and liberals would be unwelcome. They also tend to get into the kind of trouble that shortens their military careers. B. Many military careerists come from families with a history of military service. C. In many ways, overt and covert, the military encourages religiosity. Example: When I was in boot camp, one either went to church or did extra duty. Extra church attendence was encouraged by being permitted. D. In my experience, commanding officers often allow special access and priviliges to local clergy. Twenty years in such an environment can make anybody into a religious conservative. |
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23 Aug 04 - 12:02 AM (#1254116) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Peace Hijack it back. |
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23 Aug 04 - 01:05 AM (#1254147) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos I find it absolutely appalling that a member of the Supreme Court should be so insensitive to the history of his country that he should articulate a Divine Right of Kings policy in public or, for that matter, even THINK the bloody thought! Is Scalia so ill-educated, then, that he has no appreciation of the blood and treasure that was given up in order to undo that notion? Jesus H. Christ on a crutch!! The divine right of governments? Puhleeze. Guest, thanks for a reasoned assessment,. I will be interested, if you can get this thread back on its original; track, to follow the discussion. A |
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23 Aug 04 - 02:05 AM (#1254184) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: PoppaGator When I was in Army basic training in 1972, we were informed of where and when Sunday services were available for personnel of various religions, but the drill sergeants did not strongly encourage attendance. "If you wanna go see the Magic Show, it's at Buildling 801 at 0800 for Catholics or 0900 for Protestants." Their terminology seemed to betray an attitude of little more than bemused tolerance for the church and the clergy. In all seriousness, I have found this thread more than informative, and intend to put myself on the list for Jacoby's book at my library. |
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23 Aug 04 - 12:55 PM (#1254575) Subject: The Mad Mullah Test From: An Pluiméir Ceolmhar Bee-dubbya, Glad to see that you also have discovered what I call the "Goebbels test". In the environment in which I work, "European" is axiomatically considered to be A Good Thing, because it is associated with the outbreak of peace between France and Germany which led to the creation of the European Union. But sometimes people get carried away with their rhetoric, so my Goebbels test consists in taking any over-enthusiastic article or speech, substituting "German" for "European", imagining it originated in Germany in the 1930s and asking yourself if you're still comfortable with it. It seems to me that the US today, particularly under present management, needs its own version of the Goebbels Test. Let's call it the "Mad Mullah Test". You take an utterance by one of your leaders, substitute "Allah" for "God", "Mullahs" for "Religious leaders" and "Mosques" for "Faith-based organisations/initiatives". Then you just imagine you're in Iran, not the US of A. It's quite edifying. |
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23 Aug 04 - 01:04 PM (#1254588) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST "Hijack it back." If people have so much animosity and antipathy towards me because I choose to post anonymously that they constantly take out that animosity and antipathy on everyone in the forum in their blinkered attempts to...god only knows what it is they are trying to do to me, because after years of being on the receiving end of this abuse, I have no idea what their goal is...weeell...then that is what will happen. And please, spare me the arguments that if I just posted with something in the "From" line I wouldn't be abused, I can tell you that is simply not true, because I've done that here too. I've never been a member, nor will I ever be. I have been both named and unnamed guest. The animosity and rancor has been the same with both. I also have observed for years now, how members abuse other members, so I know how ridiculous the suggestion is that "membership has it's benefits". Not around this place it doesn't, unless you consider being a member allows you almost complete carte blanche to abuse other posters a benefit. I've done all the thread redemption work I'm willing to do in this place. I am not going to waste my time and energy on these silly sorts of petty power and control games any more. If people are going to hijack the thread, then they can have it. I'm done demeaning myself by stooping to that level, and going to battle with them over every single thread I try to post in. That is just a ridiculous control issue I want nothing to do with anymore. C'est la guerre. |
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23 Aug 04 - 01:46 PM (#1254616) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bill D whether you do or you don't, there will be plenty of discussions to enter, and most of the issues you raise will eventually BE raised...possibly by someone WITH an identity, real or anon. C'est la vie.... |
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23 Aug 04 - 02:05 PM (#1254628) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST That was sheer bloody minded arrogance shown by those who butted in and ruined a perfectly good discussion. If you have a morbid aversion to anon guests, then IGNORE them. Not everyone thinks like you, and you are spoiling it for others. We know your opinion. It isn't going to change diddley squat. Don't be so childish and disruptive. |
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23 Aug 04 - 03:08 PM (#1254670) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Don Firth Well, there we have it. I guess the "silly season" is going to be a long one this time around. I was twitted once by a super-twit for presumably getting my philosophy from episodes of "Star Trek." What brought on this particular snipe was that I quoted the words of the Klingon messiah, Kahless. Worf expresses his disillusionment at learning that the person before him was not actually Kahless, but a clone of Kahless. Kahless (the clone) responds, "But if the words are true, what does it matter who says them?" I think both Plato and Aristotle would agree with that statement. Therefore:— I have no problem at all with GUESTs posting or starting threads—with the exception of one quibble. Many a GUEST posts good stuff, ranging from cogent comments and provocative questions (provocative in the sense of stimulating thought and good discussion, as this thread started out to be), and now and then, even bits of wisdom. The reason for my quibble has manifested itself in this thread most graphically. The thread started out pretty well and then seems to have tanked. The problem is that one cannot tell which GUEST is which. One GUEST posts something that you want to respond to and another GUEST comes in and responds to your response in a manner you were not expecting, or there are a number of posts all attributed to GUEST that express a multiplicity of viewpoints, and you don't know if you're talking to two (or three, or four) different people—or one person with multiple-personality disorder. All too often it gets so chaotic that all you can do is mutter "p'TAHK!" (Klingon for "garbage!"—or worse), back out, and go to another thread—or go make a sandwich as I will soon be doing. I can understand why some folks might want to remain anonymous (to say "If you aren't up to some kind of skullduggery, why won't you identify yourself?" is roughly the same as a McCarthyite or an Ashfordite saying "if you don't have anything to hide, then why should you object to my tapping your phone?") and I can respect that. But all too often, it does make for a great deal of confusion and renders a thread unworthy of continued attention. This is not a prejudice on my part, or some kind of flame against GUESTs, it is merely an observation from about four years of experience on this forum. 'Nuff said. K'Plah! Don Firth P. S.: I shall look at the links above. It looks like some good stuff. I'll check back later. |
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23 Aug 04 - 04:08 PM (#1254711) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST And Don, thanks for contributing to the problem, instead of the solution to this whole stupid guest thing. Again. After saying you wouldn't do it ANYMORE. AGAIN. Remember Don? |
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23 Aug 04 - 06:46 PM (#1254761) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Don Firth GUEST, you are misconstruing several points here. I did not say I would no longer express my opinion. I most assuredly will, never doubt that! And I will respond if someone misquotes me or misinterprets what I say. What I did say was that I would no longer respond to those who descend to rudeness and insults, or who engage in personal attacks. And you, sir or madam, are skating pretty close to the edge. Apparently you did not read my post above very carefully. If you had, you would note that I said that I have no problem with GUESTs posting or starting threads. I only pointed out the obvious: the confusion that several people posting anonymously can precipitate, as is amply demonstrated above. I intended no personal attack against you, but for some reason, you seem to be interpreting it as such. I am not adding to the problem, as you claim. On the contrary, you seem to be the one raising the general tone of the hostility here. The GUEST who started this thread seemed like a reasonable person. Somehow, I don't think that you are that same person (another illustration of what I said above). In fact, I'm beginning to think I might just know who you really are. Time to shut down and return to reading The Closing of the Western Mind. There, Freeman lays out the discussion in a rational manner without the perpetual interruptions of philistines. And my wife, who works at the library, is bringing home the copy of Freethinkers that's being held for me. I'm looking forward to reading that also. But it doesn't appear that there will be any rational discussion of it around here. Don Firth |
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23 Aug 04 - 06:46 PM (#1254762) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST,m Seems I might have said the wrong thing there. "Hijack it back." 'If people have so much animosity and antipathy towards me . . .'. I don't even KNOW you. Why do you think I have antipathy toward you, or animosity? One of us has to get the meds changed. |
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24 Aug 04 - 06:10 PM (#1255683) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST,Frank One of the important facts i beiieve is to see how Bush got into religion in the first place. He had an alcohol problem, used coke (don't know how much) and was a mischievous frat boy until he found himself under the influence of a born-again preacher. His approach to religion is personal in that it keeps him out of trouble. It, in a way, could be said to be a kind of palliative or medicine for erratic behavior. This is characteristic of many of the born-again types who have substituted one narcotic for another. The attitude therefore is that Bush believes he has been "saved" and thereby qualified to do a little preaching. His higher allegiance might be characterized as kind of personal attibution that gets easilly into the realm of arrogance. He attibutes his role of leadership as from God, a kind of divine dispensation which is common to the behavior of extreme evangelicals. We saw this in David koresh and Jim Jones. Then we see the demonizing. Secularists are at the top of the list. Then it's a short hop to "terrorists" and "traitors". It used to be "Communists". Re: the military, there needs to be a "justification" for their role which is assigned in their view from a "higher power". Americanism gets mixed up with the notion of God in the same way as we perceive the Intifada of Hamas. God and nationalism The question of the social good of this view of religion is brought into question. Here's the bottom line. No humility if the "true believers" of this kind of religious thinking consider themselves somehow more "Godly" than others. The solution in my view is to understand the workings of the need for religion, how is gets subverted into a drug that cures bad behavior, ("opiate of the people") and how it can be restored to a better place, a concern for the betterment of society and development of conscience over guilt as an operating procedure. If a person is truly religious in my view, then, the Secularist has a place in the search for enlightenment and those views must be respected. I saw the movie "Inherit the Wind" the other night and found it to be as alive today as it was when it was made. I think one can be a Secularist and religious at the same time or be both and not belong to any church. Frank |
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24 Aug 04 - 06:19 PM (#1255694) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos Frank: In my experience -- and this is why the man makes me nervous -- that kind of powerful and sudden "saving" from the grips of dramatic tumult only works because it acts like a dam against the confusion and holds it at bay. Prior to this event B was trying to cure the tumult of confusion by drinking, which only stirred it up worse. ALL the force and confusion of his confused anger and fear and uncertainty and not-understanding is waiting to eat him for breakfast just the other side of that dyke, which is wholly comprised of his decision to anchor the universe to his religious data. Shake that and the flood breaks through and he is lost, man. Because he didn't walk his way out of the confusion, he just grabbed him some stable data that would be acceptable, and held it back and suppressed it. Good for him, of course. Except that is why he can't think much or ask many questions or examine things too closely. Because if he does he'll question his radical solution which holds everything at bay, and BAM....he'll be lost in confusion again and that is more pain than he could possibly handle. It is not a strength, it is just a massive weakness temporarily made to hold still. As such he is a walking liability and an accident waiting to happen, and not religious at all. A |
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16 Sep 07 - 10:09 AM (#2150386) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos From a discussion group elsewhere, some interesting points about the ropots of American secularism: It's useful to have the facts handy when talking to anybody who believes such things. "As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries." --Article 11, Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the United States and the Bey and Subjects of the Bey of Tripoli of Barbary, 'Authored by American diplomat Joel Barlow in 1796, the following treaty was sent to the floor of the Senate, June 7, 1797, where it was read aloud in its entirety and unanimously approved. John Adams, having seen the treaty, signed it and proudly proclaimed it to the Nation.' http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/treaty_tripoli.html "The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses." --John Adams, "A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America" (1787-88) Thomas Jefferson had this written on his tombstone: HERE WAS BURIED THOMAS JEFFERSON AUTHOR OF THE DECLARATION OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE OF THE STATUTE OF VIRGINIA FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND FATHER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA BORN APRIL 2, 1743 O.S. DIED JULY 4. 1826 "Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting "Jesus Christ," so that it would read "A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination." --Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography, re Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom http://etext.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1650.htm Here's the text of the U.S. Constitution in a variety of handy formats: http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/5 It never mentions God or deity. It mentions religion only twice, in Article VI clause 3: "The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States." And in the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" The founders meant what they wrote. > ... > Apparently, the argument over whether we're a Christian country or > not goes all the way back to the founding fathers, and the first few > administrations - where the point of view flip-flopped from President > to President. Yes, there were always people who wanted the U.S. to be a Christian nation, by which they meant to have a Christian government, and some who tried to make out that it was and that the founders meant it to be. They were wrong then and they're still wrong now. Actually, not a single one of the first seven presidents was a Christian in the sense most people then accepted (believer in the Trinity, member of a church, and partaker of communion): The Rev. Dr. Wilson, who was almost a contemporary of our earlier statesmen and presidents, and who thoroughly investigated the subject of their religious beliefs, in his sermon already mentioned affirmed that the founders of our nation were nearly all Infidels, and that of the presidents who had thus far been elected -- George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, and Andrew Jackson -- not one had professed a belief in Christianity. From this sermon I quote the following: "When the war was over and the victory over our enemies won, and the blessings and happiness of liberty and peace were secured, the Constitution was framed and God was neglected. He was not merely forgotten. He was absolutely voted out of the Constitution. The proceedings, as published by Thompson, the secretary, and the history of the day, show that the question was gravely debated whether God should be in the Constitution or not, and, after a solemn debate he was deliberately voted out of it. ... There is not only in the theory of our government no recognition of God's laws and sovereignty, but its practical operation, its administration, has been conformable to its theory. Those who have been called to administer the government have not been men making any public profession of Christianity. ... Washington was a man of valor and wisdom. He was esteemed by the whole world as a great and good man; but he was not a professing Christian." --Six Historic Americans, George Washington, by John E. Remsburg, 1906 http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/john_remsburg/ six_historic_americans/chapter_3.html When the Senate unanimously approved the Tripoli Treaty, Andrew Jackson was a Senator from Tennessee, Thomas Jefferson was Vice President and thus President of the Senate, and John Adams signed the treaty as President. This link has details on how God was voted out of the Constitution: http://candst.tripod.com/testban2.htm Note that it was Sam Adams, not John Adams, who objected to the prohibition on religious tests. John Adams, Ben Franklin, and James Madison are clearly on record as being for the prohibition on religious tests, and Washington was the chair of the Constitutional Convention that passed it. Madison was also one of the people most active in getting the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom passed, which Jefferson wrote. There you have the first four presidents and Andy Jackson. The rest aren't much more difficult to track down on this subject. The first seven (actually, apparently at least the first 19) presidents were all for a secular Republic and weren't even Christians themselves. -jsq "I could not do otherwise without transcending the limits prescribed by the Constitution for the President and without feeling that I might in some degree disturb the security which religion nowadays enjoys in this country in its complete separation from the political concerns of the General Government." --U.S. President Andrew Jackson, 12 June 1832, letter to the Synod of the Reformed Church of North America, explaining his refusal of their request that he proclaim a "day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer." http://www.adherents.com/people/pj/Andrew_Jackson.html |
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16 Sep 07 - 03:42 PM (#2150613) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger "...god only knows what it is they are trying to do to me, because after years of being on the receiving end of this abuse, I..." Speaking, I think, of how clannish church goers treat free thinkers. I've felt like that since my earliest memories. |
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16 Sep 07 - 04:29 PM (#2150647) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Stringsinger 911 was a "faith-based initiative". Frank |
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16 Sep 07 - 06:16 PM (#2150708) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger Indeed it was! |
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16 Sep 07 - 09:58 PM (#2150828) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Ron Davies Sorry, I must disagree with several posters. 1) You could easily be against the Test Acts, which had been abused in the UK to keep Catholics out of office, and still be in favor of Christianity. Most "founding fathers" were both. 2) If you want to cite Jefferson's objections to Christianity, you have a lot of evidence--though there are quotes on the other side here too. But citing John Adams as "never professing a belief in Christianity" is a vulnerable assertion. Just one of many contradicting pieces of evidence: From McCullough's recent book on Adams: Jefferson rose in opposition to a fast day, and in doing so "appeared to cast aspersions on Christianity". Said Benjamin Rush in a letter to Adams: "You rose and defended the motion, and in reply to Mr Jefferson's objections to Christianity you said you were sorry to hear such sentiments from a gentleman whom you agreed upon so many subjects, and that it was the only instance you had ever known of a man of sound sense and real genius that was an enemy to Christianity". In fact if anybody even scratches the surface of the 1796 campaign (and especially 1800) it is blazingly clear that one of the main means of attack on Jefferson was for his atheism", in contrast to John Adams. Similar quotes can be found for Washington and John Quincy Adams. Anybody who wants to cite the founding fathers as "never citing a belief in Christianity" has a boatload of quotes to parry. Which we can go into if there is interest. |
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16 Sep 07 - 10:00 PM (#2150829) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Ron Davies Actually the Test Acts were not "abused in the UK" to keep Catholics out of office, they were set up for that express purpose. |
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16 Sep 07 - 10:07 PM (#2150832) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: harpmolly I own this book and find it fascinating, a perennial re-read. I have to add some words of James Madison to Amos' excellent list of quotations: "What influence in fact have ecclesiastical establishments had on Civil Society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the Civil authority; in many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny: in no instance have they been seen the guardians of the liberties of the people." --Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments You tell 'em, Jimmy! ;D |
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16 Sep 07 - 10:16 PM (#2150836) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Ron Davies "Ecclesiastical establishments" have to do with establishment of a state religion--and was specifically aimed at recent history ( in the 18th century) of the Anglican church as a state church--an example which was to be prevented by separation of church and state. It is not an attack on religion--or Christian churches-- per se, much as Mudcatters may want to read that into it. |
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17 Sep 07 - 06:36 AM (#2150987) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: John Hardly This is confusing. Not the BS content of the thread. That's pretty obvious. But I thought we weren't allowed to post anonymously anymore. Is that only the rule when the thread content is something that the leftist majority here don't already agree with, and haven't already mentioned seven ways to sunday? Haven't I seen at least a dozen "sorry guest, but one must keep a consistant name throughout a thread if they choose to post anonymously" admonitions from Joe Offer? So this doesn't apply to fans of Moyers? That really sucks. |
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17 Sep 07 - 06:58 AM (#2150997) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: curmudgeon It's been over three years since an unknown guest posted here, John. Pay attention to detail. before complaining. |
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17 Sep 07 - 11:49 PM (#2151613) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger "It is not an attack on religion--or Christian churches-- per se, much as Mudcatters may want to read that into it." There must be a reason! |
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18 Sep 07 - 02:52 AM (#2151671) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST,neutral The founding fathers may not have set the U.S. up as a Christian nation, but it became one. As such it was invincible. Now its religion is destroyed (craftily replaced by Harry Potter's magic) and the country will soon be destroyed too. To destroy a society you must destroy the religion that binds it. Secular Humanism is the bogus "religion" that'll be praised as Clinton II slithers into office, and laws will be passed against the "hate speech" of the various religions. You will be told people need to be tolerant of others while you practice intolerance in the name of Secular Humanism. You will send Christians to prison for speaking against sodomy and claim you are doing it in the name of love. You will not stop to think of the hypocrisy in this because you have been pre-conditioned to hate Christians. GWBush is no more Christian than my dog, but his cabal's PR people have presented him to you as a Christian, and he has become the face of that religion for you. Hillary Clinton will pronounce herself a Secular Humanist and command you to rid society of intolerant people who read the Bible. Secular Humanism is a crime against logic. Secular Humanism needs to come under the same regulations that are about to apply to the rest of the religions in the U.S. If a Secular Humanist speaks against Catholics or Baptists, then the secular humanist has committed hate speech. Take their weapon away from them. |
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18 Sep 07 - 02:59 AM (#2151675) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: GUEST,redhorse at work If that's "neutral", I'd hate to see "biased" nick |
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18 Sep 07 - 03:48 AM (#2151688) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer Damn. A Secular Humanist? All this time, I thought Hillary Clinton called herself a Methodist. I've been reading a book called God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It, by Rev. Jim Wallis, founder of the Sojourners Christian social justice lobby. Wallis claims that
Wallis quotes Bush's 2003 State of the Union address: "Yet there's power, wonder-working power, in the goodness and idealism and faith of the American people." The hymn says the power is in the blood of the Lamb, and has nothing to do with American patriotism. Wallis quotes Bush's Ellis Island speech on the first anniversary of the World Trade Center attack: "This ideal of America is the hope of all mankind...That hope still lights our way. And the light shines in the darkness. And the darkness has not overcome it." Those last two sentences about light and darkness refer to the Word of God, not to America. To an honest Christian, political misuse of a Gospel verse like that is nothing less than blasphemy. Wallis says, "Bush seems to make this mistake over and over again of confusing nation, church, and God. The resulting theology is more an American civil religion than Christian faith." One more quote:
If we elect a religious person as a national leader, I would expect that person's religious beliefs to play a part in his decisions for the country - and I think it would be dishonest of a leader to never speak of his/her faith and to hide the effect those beliefs have on the leader's actions. I would certainly hope that those beliefs would guide the leader to justice and compassion. That's not what George W. is doing, however; and it's not how Ronald Reagan used religion, either - their idea is that religion is a tool to be used to enforce their own agenda. George W. seems to follow Reagan in seeing himself as "saved," and therefore sinless and infallible - and therefore, God must bless their every action and damn those who oppose them. I think that's a perversion of religious faith - but it's a perversion that's very common nowadays, and it gives all religion a bad name. Like the prophets of the Old Testament, truly faithful people often find themselves obliged to oppose or at least question those in power. Faith is not supposed to be merely a validation of those who hold political and economic power. My point? I can't agree with the ultra-secularists that all reference to religious faith must be purged from the speech of our national leaders; but I do believe it is horribly wrong for Bush and Reagan and many others to have abused and perverted religious speech to further their own agendas. The agenda of Bush and Reagan may appeal to fundamentalist Christians - but it is incompatible with the beliefs and values of many other Christians. -Joe Offer- |
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18 Sep 07 - 08:11 AM (#2151796) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger Joe - I agree with everything you say here about George W. Bush and Reagan, but I also think religion has out lived its usefulness. It might have had a purpose at one time, in the role of "forming community," but now it's in the way. I think the time has come for mono-theistic religions to take their place in the history books along side Roman, Greek, and Norse Mythology. |
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18 Sep 07 - 10:12 AM (#2151892) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos Not to mention Warner Brothers and Mickey. (I can't help it!! It just slipped out!!). A |
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18 Sep 07 - 10:30 AM (#2151903) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Mrrzy Yea verily, Riginslinger! |
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18 Sep 07 - 10:32 AM (#2151905) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Alba Too many 'Guests' at this party. Don't know who is who or what opinion is what. Can't have a discussion when you don't know who your exchanging opinions with so, sorry Guests. No name, no game. Have a good 'un. Respectfully Jude |
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18 Sep 07 - 10:35 AM (#2151908) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: John Hardly Shouldn't that be "Warner Brothers and Disney"? ...or "Bugs and Mickey". Aren't you mixing mythological hierarchies? And how could you leave out Hanna Barberra and/or Yogi? What's a good mythology without a yogi to dispense it? Yeah, that Mickey line just kills me every time it's tried. It's so damn erudite. What a good, solid comparison. |
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18 Sep 07 - 11:03 AM (#2151923) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos Well, I apologize for opening a can of worms. You're perfectly right, too...I opened it in an unbalanced form. A |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:06 PM (#2151972) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bill D "... I also think religion has out lived its usefulness. It might have had a purpose at one time, in the role of "forming community," but now it's in the way." I'm gonna stick my 99.94321% atheistic nose in here to say once more that simply defining a system that YOU don't agree with as "useless", is as big a mistake as blind faith IN that system. I know why you say this, and I agree with most of your reasons for objecting to religion, especially 'as practiced' by many; but until we can find ways to show 'believers' (1) that there are too many contradictions and (2) that it IS possible to explain the universe and justify morality in other ways, religion will continue to be not only useful, but essential. In the meantime, we DO need to press HARD for reasonable behavior by believers, and make "separation of church & state" a reality. |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:12 PM (#2151976) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger "In the meantime, we DO need to press HARD for reasonable behavior by believers..." Once it is demonstrated that people hopelessly addicted to some form of ancient superstition cannnot be depended on to engage in "rational thought," it becomes difficult to convince them of anything. |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:26 PM (#2151988) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Little Hawk The people here are all going to outlive their usefullness too. ;-) Trust me. These debates will still be raging 1,000 years from now, and we will all be gone. Remember this, look at yourself in the mirror and have a wee chuckle. |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:29 PM (#2151990) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer Well, Riginslinger, if you think religion has outlived its usefulness, I think perhaps that you see only one kind of religion - the religion of the fundamentalists. That's the kind of religion that gets the attention of the press, and many nonreligious people seem to think it's the only kind of religion possible. That sort of religion is based on xenophobic fear, seeking to exclude and condemn all who see things differently. That kind of religion seeks personal salvation, the assurance that those who belong, are saved. That kind of religion seeks moral certainty, the assurance that those who belong are right, and all others are wrong. That kind of religion sees "immorality" as something that other people do, which proves that they are damned and deserving of destruction - and so they protest against abortion and homosexuals and Muslims and "secular humanists." That's the religion of George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan, except for one thing - the focus of the Bush-Reagan "religion" is America, not God. God only exists to validate the rightness of America. Religious fundamentalism is frightening - the Bush-Reagan "religion" is far beyond that. But there's another kind of religion, a kind of religion that exists in many denominations. This kind of religion is based on shared ideals and values like peace and justice and love and family and ancestral tradition. While the fundamentalists think they have all the answers, this kind of religion is full of people who have mostly questions. These are people who seek to explore the mysteries of life - not define those mysteries into doctrinal certitude. This sort of religion tends to be very self-critical and self-aware. People like this are not even upset to know that some of their beliefs may be based on myth, particularly if those myths are helpful to them in exploring the mysteries of life. This sort of religion sees the individual as being "saved" as part of a community, by serving and healing the community, the earth, and humankind. There are two radically different forms of religion, and they just can't be lumped together and dismissed with a blanket statment that they have "outlived their usefulness." Perhaps they have, but they need to be considered separately. Perhaps "religion" is not the proper term to describe these two opposing phenomena. "Belief system" might be a more accurate term, but it's not quite accurate, either. I'll stick with "religion," but I think you will find that these two "religions" transcend religions denominations, and may even exist among those who consider themselves nonbelievers. The fearful, doctrinaire, control-oriented type seeks certitude and protection and exclusion. The idealistic type of "religion" seeks to explore and to serve - not always successfully, but always seeking to understand and to heal. I'm sure we all know both religious and nonreligious people of both types. -Joe Offer- |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:30 PM (#2151993) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: John Hardly "Once it is demonstrated that people hopelessly addicted to some form of ancient superstition cannnot be depended on to engage in "rational thought," it becomes difficult to convince them of anything." Those kinds of speculations would have more impact were they rational. |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:36 PM (#2152000) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: John Hardly Yeah, Basically, as long as people don't believe that their religious beliefs are, you know, reality... As long as they accept them as the cute affectations they are, and not some rational response that most accurately explains the world they live in... ...then that's okay. It's still not, you know, "rational", but at least the cool guys might still like you. "I'm religious......wink, wink". I apologize for being religious. I don't really mean to offend anyone. I will try find a religion without "fundamentals", without tenets so that when I choose to abide by them I can be perceived by the people who hate me as "harmless". please, oh please love me. |
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18 Sep 07 - 01:49 PM (#2152010) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Bill D "Once it is demonstrated that people hopelessly addicted to some form of ancient superstition cannnot be depended on to engage in "rational thought," " well, Riginslinger, there are three (3)...count 'em..unwarrented assumptions buried in that introduction to the obvious 'truth' that "·.it becomes difficult to convince them of anything." 1) How do you "demonstrate" any such thing? 2) How do you 'prove' that it is superstition and not 'revealed truth? 3) It is not necessarily the case that 'believers' cannot also use "rational thought".. Again, I agree with much of the thrust of your concern, but it is so easy to overstate what you are trying to say. |
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18 Sep 07 - 02:10 PM (#2152027) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Big Mick I struggled for a way to describe exactly what Joe has said, and I appreciate his clear explanation. I would add that I find many secularists every bit as dogmatic as the fundamentalists. I find them, IMO, every bit as full of unjustified certainty as they convict the fundamentalists of. And before my friend Bill D launches into his patented "I believe in what science can demonstrate is true" kind of argument, I would point out that much of what science, is based on reasoned hypothesis of things that are being guessed at. I also believe that we cannot categorize all secular folks, atheists, agnostics, etc., the same way. I don't believe that Bill D and I are all that far apart on most issues. We do disagree on a very basic part of the equation, but I don't find him as close minded and patronizing as many in this, and other, threads. Joe has the right of it when trying to explain those of us who consider ourselves to be seekers, and who find the quest to understand creation, and the creator, as a never ending quest, which know can never end. Folks like myself find science as enhancing this quest, adding spice to it, helping us understand, all the while creating more questions than it answers. I would point out one more flaw in this discussion, and others like it, that I would convict the secularists (for lack of a better term) of. In your missionary zeal to point out all that is wrong with "religion" (talk about a gross generalization) you almost always ignore, or dismiss casually, that fact that much more good is done in the name of living a religious life than bad. I am not speaking here of the low hanging fruit, such as wars based on religion, etc. I am speaking of the untold masses who daily struggle to lead a life based on the tenets we hold dear. I am speaking of the religious folks leading the struggle for peace, fighting to save young lives in the streets and villages inhabited by the poor and underprivileged, I am speaking of those religious folks in the forefront of the fights against disease, poverty, and human rights abuses around the globe. That is not to say that many, many folks of the atheist/agnostic/secular crowd don't lead lives based on being principled and driven to build a better world. But the Mother Theresa's of this world didn't pop out of your movement. She wasn't attempting to proselytize, she simply dedicated her life to taking care of the most disadvantaged. The Rosa Parks, the Martin Luther Kings, et al of this world didn't just pop out of the ground. They were driven by the values of their faith and belief in something greater than ourselves. Ghandi was who he was as a result of his quest of his faith. Here is what the Mohatma had to say about faith: Faith gains in strength only when people are willing to lay down their lives for it. Faith is not like a delicate flower which would wither away the' slightest' stormy-'weather. Robust faith in oneself and brave trust of the opponent, so-called or real, is the best safeguard. A living faith cannot be manufactured by the rule of majority. What is faith if it is not translated into action? Faith is not imparted like secular subjects. It is given through the language of the heart. Every living faith must have within itself the power of rejuvenation if it is to live. Just as the body cannot exist without blood, so the soul needs matchless and pure strength of faith. Nonviolence succeeds only when we have a real living faith in God. My effort should never be to undermine another's faith but to make him a better follower of his own faith. My faith is brightest in the midst of impenetrable darkness. Nonviolence is the first article of my faith. It is also the last article of my creed. Even as a tree has a single trunk but many branches and leaves, there is one religion -human religion- but any number of faiths. I don't believe one has to be religious to be a good person. But I believe that the quest for that which is greater than us, and at the source of us all, while spawning some great evil, has spawned much more good, and at its root lies the real hope for this world evolving, with much trial and tribulation due to the human condition, for the better. Civilly and Respectfully, Mick |
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18 Sep 07 - 02:15 PM (#2152028) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger What can I say? I suppose Joe is right by suggesting that the Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush form of religious oppression is the most objectionable, and my problem might just be that for the last 30 years that's the kind of religion the public has been subjected to. |
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18 Sep 07 - 02:41 PM (#2152042) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer No, Riginslinger, the Bush-Reagan stuff is the kind of religion that dominates the media. The other kind of religion spends its money on soup kitchens and participates in justice and peace issues without wearing its religion on its sleeve. Look at all the religious people who have participated in the peace and civil rights movements through the years. They don't buy media time - but they're present and active where it counts. -Joe- |
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18 Sep 07 - 02:42 PM (#2152043) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Ebbie "But there's another kind of religion, a kind of religion that exists in many denominations. This kind of religion is based on shared ideals and values like peace and justice and love and family and ancestral tradition. While the fundamentalists think they have all the answers, this kind of religion is full of people who have mostly questions. These are people who seek to explore the mysteries of life - not define those mysteries into doctrinal certitude. This sort of religion tends to be very self-critical and self-aware. People like this (are) not even upset to know that some of their beliefs may be based on myth, particularly if those myths are helpful to them in exploring the mysteries of life. This sort of religion sees the individual as being "saved" as part of a community, by serving and healing the community, the earth, and humankind." Joe Offer "Folks like myself find science as enhancing this quest, adding spice to it, helping us understand, all the while creating more questions than it answers. Big Mick There, in a big nutshell, is my philosophy. Thank you to both. I have far more questions than I have settled upon answers but I suspect that will always be the case. And that is OK. As long as I can live in a society where questions are permissible I will be all right. |
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18 Sep 07 - 03:19 PM (#2152065) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: dick greenhaus Wasn't there something about "render unto Caesar...""? |
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18 Sep 07 - 03:25 PM (#2152074) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Big Mick Help me out here, Dick. I am missing the point you are making. Thanks, Mick |
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18 Sep 07 - 04:05 PM (#2152104) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger Joe - The one thing that charitable organizations could do to reduce poverty around the world would be to give women in underprivledged countries control over the reproductive processes of their own bodies. Most faith based organizations will do anything but that, which results in their efforts becoming both ineffective and self-serving. |
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18 Sep 07 - 04:07 PM (#2152106) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Big Mick That's the religion of George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan, except for one thing - the focus of the Bush-Reagan "religion" is America, not God. God only exists to validate the rightness of America. Religious fundamentalism is frightening - the Bush-Reagan "religion" is far beyond that. Wow, Joe. I went back and reread your post. That bit is another whole song. Great observation. Mick |
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18 Sep 07 - 04:22 PM (#2152117) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Greg B An interesting interview with an author who compares the American Christian Right with early Fascists from the last century. However, I don't necessarily buy that Joe's brand of religion (Roman Catholicism, where I too have my roots) is 'fundamentally' different in many of its official practices from the 'fundamentalist' Christians. Especially given the directions its leaders are taking it in the 21st century. I give as exemplary the following: 1) The Church of Rome continues to attempt to codify into law by use of political influence, the moral decision about what a woman can do with her own body. 2) Fr. Peter Phan, who has made the mistake of suggesting that salvation might be achieved other than through Catholic/Christian spiritualism, and put same in a book, is just the latest of any number of theologians for forwarding academic ideas which threaten the power of the magisterium. 3) The Church's subversion of civil authority in the cases of sex abuse for centuries--- and their continued efforts to conceal, thwart, subterfuge, around the issue (c.f., the Orange County California's bishop's attempt to get sealed a deposition in which he admitted that he himself has been accused of such transgressions, or Santa Rosa Bishop (CA) Walsh's abetting the escape of pervert priest Xavier Ochoa to Mexico by failing to follow mandatory reporting laws just last year. 4) The latest pronouncements by Pope Benedict have set ecumenism back 50 years. 5) The Church has actively opposed any sort of recognition of the relationship same-sex couples. 6) As an employer, the Church of Rome has a rather dismal track record as regard labor issues, from schools to hospitals to chanceries. In some cases they even defy civil law on religious grounds, such as refusing to cover oral contraceptives in their health plans where required to do so by law, union-busting activities, eclipsing of academic freedom principles, etc. Yes, the Church of Rome has a membership around the edges who operate on the "left" and pursue a "liberal" agenda. However its officialdom probably does as much as anyone to promote the election of 'God Bless America' conservatives on issue (1) above, thus throwing out social justice and peace issues with the political bath-water. On the other hand, there truly ARE liberal and open-minded religions out there, who end-to-end, make it a point of being so. The poster- child is probably the United Church of Christ. Along side them are Methodists, most of Unitarian Universalism, and what is now mainstream Anglicanism. But they are very much in the minority; certainly (with the exception of the Anglicans) not considered 'main line.' I'll take the position that any 'Church' which claims to have a special lease on 'salvation' over and above all (or even any) others HAS out-lived its usefulness in a world where you can get from Occident to Orient in a matter of hours. Any Church which places organizational self-preservation above the good of humankind in general (or worse yet, equates its own self-preservation with the good of humankind at large) is not just useless--- it may be out-and-out dangerous to the 'salvation' of the world. Unfortunately it seems to me that most Christians and Muslims find themselves in the midst of precisely that sort of 'evangelical' mind-set, both personally and organizationally. Most make no apologies for it at all. Some, such as 'progressive' Roman Catholics attempt either to deny that such is the true nature of the organization, or try to swim upstream from within. The problem is that their tithes go right into such organization's mainstreams, controlled by those who are not nearly so enlightened. As a nominal 'Christian' it makes me cringe when I, on an almost daily basis, drive past a billboard that proclaims 'In Christ Alone, Hope!' Such a narrow view has, indeed, outlived its usefulness. |
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18 Sep 07 - 05:03 PM (#2152131) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: dick greenhaus Mick- I always thought that the phrase was a pretty good summary of the ideal relationship between church and state. |
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18 Sep 07 - 05:51 PM (#2152172) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Big Mick Gotcha, Dick. I actually figured it out after I posted that. Mick |
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18 Sep 07 - 06:40 PM (#2152217) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos Nubile youth or Geezer, AThlete or wheezer, Keep your faith out of the State, And render unto Caesar! Guru, saint or clod, Slob or curvy bod, Keep the State out of your faith, And render unto God! Bridge: Never never never mix the two up! If you do you're bound to cause A monumental screw-up! If you work a global scam, Or tote bricks in a hod! Just render unto Caesar, And render unto God! Throckmorton Haypennies Junior Idle Doggerel for Idle Dogs Ontario Ecumenical Press, 1975 |
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18 Sep 07 - 06:45 PM (#2152223) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer You know, Greg, I can't disagree with you - but I'm a Roman Catholic, a member of St. Teresa of Avila Parish, not really affected all that much by the Church of Rome. I acknowledge and regret and attempt to heal all the ills of the the Roman Catholic Church as an institution - but what goes on at the institutional level, has very little to do with what goes on in a congregation or within individual Catholics. Although it does provide a structure within which the local parishes exist, Rome has very little to do with the day-to-day life of ordinary Catholics. Yes, we do have fundamentalist Catholics who listen only to Rome and who view their faith as requiring absolute obedience to Rome. As for me, I got my faith passed on from my grandmother, not from Rome. Yes, Rome says abortion is wrong and most Catholics agree (me, too) - but you won't see Rome and you won't see me working actively to obstruct people who have decided to have abortions. The church and I may disagree with abortion and attempt to encourage people to choose alternatives - but only a relatively few fundamentalist Catholics use aggressive tactics to abstruct abortion. Riginslinger, I agree that responsible family planning would help a lot to reduce the number of abortions. In general, Catholic institutions do not promote birth control because it's against "official policy" (although I do know a nun who gives out condoms on request). But hey, if religious people are squeamish about promoting birth control, why condemn them? Why not send a corps of secularists to do the promotion? I suppose it depends on how you see faith and how you see religious institutions. I don't want to say this too loud, but I view the Catholic Church and my wife similarly. I really do respect my wife and her opinions. I love her, and she is a very important part of my life. But you know, sometimes what she says is just looney - and on those occasions, I politely pretend I didn't hear what she said. She and I intentionally left the "and obey" clause out of our wedding vows. I agree with your disgust with the two California bishops you mention, and I am embarrassed and appalled by their conduct. But the majority of California bishops are pretty good, and I can think of a few that are extraordinary - bishops have a performance record similar to managers in the other institutions of life, and I take what they say and do with a similar grain of salt. You mention Fr. Peter Phan, who got his theologian's license suspended because Rome didn't agree with him. Remember that this is just the temporary lifting of his license to teach as a theologian representing the Catholic Church - not a burning at the stake, and most probably not even a suspension of his paycheck. I tend to agree with Fr. Phan, but I'm not the one who controls theology licences. He'll get his license back in a year, maybe sooner. In the meantime, he can write a book or take a sabbatical or something. I think you have to distinguish between the faith and the institution. Institutions are necessary evils. Usually, they are far less than we would like them to be - but that is the nature of institutions. Fundamentalists tend to deify institutions and laws and doctrines. The majority of reasonable people of faith, tend to know how to take those institutions and laws and doctrines for what they're worth. They exist to serve and support and "institutionalize" and preserve our faith - they are not the faith itself. I was bitching about my pastor just last night - even as he was serving me a wonderful dinner in his home. I've known the guy for 25 years and I've had some bitter arguments with him. I don't reject him, though - we're friends and we work closely together, and we work through our disagreements. And if we can't come to an agreement, we sing an Irish song together or have a wee glass of single malt (or poteen, if I'm lucky), and it doesn't matter. On a day-to-day basis, Mike the Pastor is the boss in the parish, and he does his best to serve the needs and desires of his parishioners - he doesn't attempt to tell them what to do. He is rarely affected by what goes on in Rome, or in a bishop's office in another diocese in California. He regularly gets peeved at our local bishop (just as I regularly get peeved at him), but they're still on pretty good terms. -Joe- |
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19 Sep 07 - 12:40 PM (#2152716) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Greg B Joe, you're definitely typical of what Fr. Andrew Greeley describes as 'The American Catholic.' Also known as the 'cafeteria catholic.' However, I submit that in politics (which was the start of this thread) the US Catholic Bishops have a great deal more influence than they do even over the day-to-day behavior of the average contraceptive-popping American Catholic. For example, in the last couple of elections they've done things like threaten to, and actually deny, Communion to legislators who have taken the position that decisions regarding abortion are the woman's and not the government's. That has, first, put the (usually liberal on social-justice issues) politician in an awkward position personally, and harmed his chances at election. I believe it is disingenuous of you to claim that neither Rome nor the American Catholic Church at large interfere with women's rights to abortion and contraception. They absolutely do so, from wielding political influence in a fashion which puts their tax-exempt status in serious jeopardy to 'education' programs which are, at best, intellectually dishonest scare tactics and at worst absolutely hurtful and uncharitable. Or supporting things like parental notification rules in their state, and making it illegal for a minor to be assisted to cross state lines to obtain an abortion. If these aren't 'aggressive' tactics, then I don't know what is. And I disagree that the California bishops have been in any sense of the word 'good' on the abuse issue. They have been amongst the worst. Even bastions of progressivism on other social justice issues (and this IS a social justice issue) such as Cardinal Mahoney of LA have been real bastards when it comes to dealing with abuse victims. To that 'hall of shame' add former bishop (now in Ratzinger's old job) Levada of San Francisco, emeritus John Cummins of Oakland, 'Bankruptcy' Brom of San Diego, Walsh of Santa Rosa. That's just off the top of my head; I'm sure I could add to the rogue's gallery of those who've taken every legal maneuver to protect their documents and cover their assets. I believe without exception, these are regarded as 'progressive' Vatican II bishops. Until the pew-sitters who 'distance' themselves from the issues in the magisterium actually join VOTF or CTA en masse and start making some serious demands, then it's not going to get fixed. And lets not forget that that these are the same single men who marginalize women as a whole and who describe homosexuals as 'disordered' while protecting the none-too-scarce practicing homosexuals in their own midst! For Fr. Peter Pham, the suspension of his license (which hasn't happened yet, insofar as I can tell) isn't fatal; he's still a diocesean priest in a world with a heck of a shortage of same. On the other hand, for some lay theologians, it has been nearly career-ending; the lucky ones have found a home in Protestant or secular institutions. But don't minimize it. It's rather like a physician being told that he can't practice in most of the hospitals who would be interested in his services. In addition the suspension of the license often goes more to the place they get their bread-and-butter living; for example teaching general theology survey courses which have nothing to do with the cutting- edge research presented in books such as Pham's. The Catholics whom I'm proud of are the ones who've said 'no' to this whole mess and who've left behind the big real estate holdings to align themselves with alternative Catholic movements, such as the Ecumenical Catholic Communion. They are the ones who're breaking the pattern. They've stopped telling themselves that the people are great, it's the institution that is flawed. They've realized that the people are the institution. |
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19 Sep 07 - 02:44 PM (#2152824) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer Well, Greg, I'm certainly an American Catholic, but I don't think that's the defining factor. I'm an educated Catholic. I got 16 years of education in Catholic schools, and my college major in the seminary was Theology - taught by professors who got their licenses to teach from Rome. The term "Cafeteria Catholic" hits all my hot buttons. It was coined by the fundamentalist Catholics in an attempt to exclude others from their own narrow, legalistic view of Catholicism. I'll admit it's a catchy term, and it has caught on universally and wrought its intended damage very well. Even non-Catholics and former Catholics view the Catholic Church through this narrow, legalistic perspective - they rightly reject this idea of church, but I contend that what they are rejecting is a false perception of a church that doesn't exist. St. Thomas Aquinas is acclaimed as the greatest theologian the Catholic Church has ever produced (though I suppose some might give Augustine that title). I'm sure Thomas Aquinas would earn the title "Cafeteria Catholic" if he were alive today. It's the same exclusionary tactic George Bush uses when he says if you're not with us, you're against us. I guess I more-or-less agree with the "facts" you have proposed, but I think you've put some unnecessary "spin" on them ("Hall of Shame," "Rogues Gallery" of bishops). All of the problems you speak of occurred, but I submit that they are far less widespread than you contend. I've argued against all of those problems you speak about, and I know many priests and nuns and Catholic publications who have done the same. But let's take the child abuse problem, the reparation for the crimes committed by between two and five percent of the priests in the Catholic Church. In my diocese, the policy was to pay the victim $25,00 to $50,000 for pain and suffering, provide counseling or psychiatric treatment for the victim, and suspend a first-offender priest for six months to a year and send him to a residential treatment center that promised to cure the priest of his sexual problem - just like residential alcoholism treatment centers claimed to be able to cure people of those addictions. The problem was taken seriously - it's just that the solution didn't work. The current solution is to banish an offender from society and find a deep pocket that will pay the victim a million dollars. Does the new solution work any better than the old? Should the members of my parish have to cough up a million dollars to make reparation for an offense some priest committed thirty years ago? Is it immoral for a bishop to attempt to get off paying $25,000 instead of a million bucks in reparations that won't heal the victim anyhow? Nobody has found a solution for the terrible crime of child molestation, which is committed by countless males from all walks of life - but most of those males don't have employers who have been forced to pay a million dollars for an employee's crime. Yes, the Catholic Church handled the child abuse situation badly - but no other institution or corporation has found a way to consistently handle such a situation well. Nobody has found a way to deal with child abuse. Nobody has found a "good" solution. But lacking a "good" solution, does that mean that bishops who clumsily stumble their way through the problem are "bad"? How would you solve the problem? Pay five million a victim and put all Catholics in hock for three generations? As for the abortion thing. The statistics show that Catholic women get abortions as frequently as non-Catholic women do. While I do believe that the Catholic Church needs to come to a more reasonable and realistic position on abortion and birth control, I doubt that the church has the ability to actually interfere in the birth control and abortion decisions made by most Catholic women. Catholic lay people, even those in third world countries, are not the mindless automatons you make them out to be. The anti-abortion campaign is ludicrous and ineffective. The Catholic Church as an institution is not as deeply involved in the embarrassing tactics of the anti-abortionists as you might think - even though the church is certainly opposed to abortion. Yes, certain bishops (my own included) have done some anti-abortion grandstanding that is inappropriate or worse - but many of their priests (and most of their nuns) disagree with them. There are compassionate ways to reduce the number of abortions that may be far more effective than the storm-trooper tactics of the anti-abortion fanatics. I contend that Planned Parenthood may do far more to prevent abortions than the Catholic Church does because Planned Parenthood promotes responsible family planning - but I don't expect the Catholic Church to ally itself with Planned Parenthood any time soon. I have to say, Greg, that I hate acronyms. How many people reading this thread are going to understand that VOTF means Voice of the Faithful and CTA means Call to Action? These are abbreviations for two American organizations that seek to reform the Catholic Church. I don't belong to either, but I attend Call to Action conventions and I'm on their mailing lists. I generally support the activities of Call to Action, although it is not as narrowly focused and as anti-establishment as outsiders might think. You seem to say the only proper response to the problems of the Catholic Church is to leave it. I'm not ready to do that. It's MY church, and my family has been Catholic as far back as anybody can trace (although we suspect we have some Jewish ancestors nobody admits to). I know the problems of the Church, and I work almost every day to try to find solutions to those problems. But no, I'm not ready to abandon my church to the fundamentalists and the child molestors. -Joe- |
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19 Sep 07 - 03:23 PM (#2152863) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos Hell, Joe, everybody has some Jewish ancestors whether they admit to them or not. :) Moving the Catholic Church forward so that it develops into a non-interfering, but supportive, element in society is about the best you can hope for. Richard Dawkins would argue that even that beneovlent posture retains the "abusive" ingredient of indoctrination under extreme pressure of young children, forcing them to abandon their capacity for rational empirical thought. But, I suppose that individual freedom to be part of such an organization (or not) is far more important than whether it helps or hinders the minds of young folks. A |
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19 Sep 07 - 03:56 PM (#2152896) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer "Indoctrination under extreme pressure"? I dunno, Amos. I really doubt that extreme pressure ever existed on a large scale. Yes, there were abuses, but there are abuses in every social situation. Even secular people are abusive at times. In the 1950's, I had to memorize the answers to catechism questions if I wanted to get an "A" in Religion. Is that extreme pressure? I had to memorize my multiplication tables to get an "A" in Arithmetic. Is it extreme pressure when the subject is religion, and justifiable torture when it's arithmetic? -Joe- |
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19 Sep 07 - 03:59 PM (#2152899) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Riginslinger Of course, arithmetic serves a functional purpose. |
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19 Sep 07 - 04:01 PM (#2152903) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer Yes, Arithmetic serves a function. So does "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Feeding the hungry and clothing the naked also serve a useful function - and they are functions that cannot be performed by a ten-dollar calculator. The Sermon on the Mount certainly teaches people something useful. I learned Arithmetic and all those other things in a gentle, warm environment in Catholic schools, and not under any particular pressure. I also learned Critical Thinking in Catholic schools, and a good number of folk songs, and even the final three "Communist" verses to "This Land Is Your Land" that you most probably wouldn't hear in a public school (because they're too controversial and might upset somebody). |
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19 Sep 07 - 05:55 PM (#2152992) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Greg B "Arithmetic serves a function." Oooo. An accidental math joke. Har har. |
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19 Sep 07 - 06:13 PM (#2153002) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Amos Well, Joe, there has been enough pressure just in the history of Catholocism to make a fad of tee-shirts reading "I survived Catholic school", and to fill sad Irish novels of boyhood guilt and blame by the carload. And not just Catholicism, but a variety of other branches of Christianity whose adherents have seen fit to demand, require, or enforce with punishment the proper degree of parroted reverence for their fathers, priests, reverends, sisters, mothers superior, popes, saints, seraphim and deities. It may not always be physical enforcement, but taking advantage of the emotional and intellectual confusion of the very young serves just as well, and could be interpreted as equally disrespectful of the individual human mind. OF course even that is a lot better than indoctrinating the young with criminal skills, self-destructive chemical addictions, physical beating or sexual abuse. At least a different order of impact. I am sorry if I seem to be on a rant; I am not really as vehement about this as Dawkins, for example is. And I completely respect your approach to your own tradition, whatever you may design it to be. Regards, A |
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19 Sep 07 - 06:16 PM (#2153006) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Greg B Joe, I'm allowed to use the term 'cafeteria Catholic' because I am (or was not sure which) one. I'll see your 12 years of Catholic Education, and raise you a degree in religious studies, a job as a Youth Minister, a whole lot of time as a liturgy planner and music minister, candidacy for a religious order, work at a retreat house, etc. I guess I'm a bit more jaded than a 'faithful Catholic' after having spent a good deal of my time since the year 2000 advocating for survivors of clergy sexual abuse. Go to the National Catholic Reporter and look up my Op-Ed and letters to the editor there. I'm not as militant as most members of SNAP (the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests). Still, I have to say that I have yet to see a bishop of the church of Rome do the right thing as regards these survivors. Now the whole argument about 'other guys than priests do it' is specious, and worthy of William Donohue of the Catholic League. It was a FAR bigger problem in the Catholic Clergy than in the general population, and a FAR bigger problem than the 2% numbers indicate. Hell, in my own anecdotal experience before my turning advocate, it was WAY more than 2%. The current solution is to banish an offender from society and find a deep pocket that will pay the victim a million dollars. Does the new solution work any better than the old? Should the members of my parish have to cough up a million dollars to make reparation for an offense some priest committed thirty years ago? Is it immoral for a bishop to attempt to get off paying $25,000 instead of a million bucks in reparations that won't heal the victim anyhow? Typical response from a pew sitter who hasn't bothered to learn the issues. First of all the Church systematically cajoled, threatened and badgered victims into silence. When they bothered to acknowledge them at all. Furthermore, they manipulated local (disproportionately Catholic) law enforcement into inaction. Those settlements you mentioned? They all came with a 'gag' provision that bought silence. There are a couple of reasons for the six figure (a million is rare) settlements. First, the final proceeds following attorney fees are real. When you add up everything from lost marriages to lost jobs failed 401K contributions, therapy costs, etc., the way our society deals with it is to put a monetary value on it. Yes, the lawyers did well. That's the way our tort system works, in Amerika. That's the only way the little guy gets represented. The second reason is to send a message. Knock this shit off, Your Excellency. Again, that's how Amerika works. Finally, it really is none of your damn business to judge whether the 'million bucks' will heal the victim or not. Especially when you haven't spent any time with them. Believe me, it does make a difference, because it represents something substantive. It hurts. It's hurt that makes up for the hurt that was inflicted on them. It says they don't have to be a 'nice, quiet, little, Christian forgiveness victim' any more. Most discarded the idea of 'Christian forgiveness' some time after their priest raped them anyways. What's the price on that loss? So let's see--- the priests disagree with the anti-abortion grandstanding, the nuns do too, as does the laity. But it goes on and on. What's wrong with this picture? I don't think the Ecumenical Catholic Communion folk have abandoned their church. They've reclaimed it. Hell, I don't think a Catholic who's moved to a Unitarian Universalist congregation has abandoned his church...he's widened it! |
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19 Sep 07 - 07:33 PM (#2153061) Subject: RE: BS: US Secularism, Patriotism & Religion From: Joe Offer Well, Greg - As far as experience with the Catholic Church, you and I have almost identical backgrounds. Every single thing you say you've done in the Catholic Church, I've done (and vice versa). I've been on the payroll of the Church more than once, and I spent eight years in the seminary and so on and so on and so on. And yes, I have had experience with both abusers and their victims. My experience was chiefly positive, yours was not - and I'm very sorry about that. Mine is still positive - partly because I work hard to fix the problems in the parishes where I've been, and I don't take "no" for an answer. And I know where the skeletons are buried, and I have very good connections. It also helps that I'm a retired federal investigator. OK, so a million dollars in "hush money" hurts church donors more than $30,000. Thirty grand is still a lot of money - but does either amount heal the damage done by child abuse? So what's your solution to the problem? TEN million dollars? I readily admit that the Catholic bishops botched the handling of the child abuse problem - but what institution has done a good job of handling it? I suppose the reparation payments were an indirect part of the reason I was laid off a year ago from my job as a pastoral associate. It was a job I've always wanted, so it cost ME a lot. Most non-Catholic churches are incorporated separately, so individual congregations may get hit for child molestation, not the entire denomination. That being the case, the settlements are usually much smaller - and the press coverage is much less sensational. I don't blame you one bit for becoming a Unitarian. I have lots of formerly Catholic Unitarian friends, and I'm very much at home and well-known in three Unitarian congregations in the Sacramento area. BUT don't blame me for remaining a Catholic. Don't tell me I have my eyes shut - I know all the problems. It's just that I find more good than bad in the Catholic Church, and I plan to stick around to solve the problems instead of seeking another church. In my experience, it's 95 percent good and 5 percent bad. And the bad can be awful, but I'm not going to give away my church because of the five percent. -Joe Offer- |