> Travis Edmunds <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >From: Deborah Harrell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > > Travis Edmunds <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > > >From: Deborah Harrell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
<snippage throughout>
> > > >There probably is either hypocrisy or a serious
> > > >case of 'the masses can't understand this
> complexity,
> > > >therefore we will teach them black and
white...'
> > > Is that not hypocritical by nature?....
> >If done scornfully - "stupid idiot sheep!" - it is
> >hypocritical. If done caringly - <snip> "...so we
> > must simplify and make it
> >understandable" - it is at least arrogant, but not
> >inherently malign.
> First of all, I'm not sure if hypocrisy is
> inherently malign. Are you? ....One can be a
> hypocrite without actually knowing it....
I don't think so, since "insincerity" and "the
practice of professing beliefs, feelings or virtues
that one does not hold or possess" is how my desk
dictionary defines 'hypocrisy.' That seems to show
ill intent to me, although if one does it to survive
(i.e. your life or your livelihood depend on your
convincing somebody that you believe in IPUs), I
wouldn't necessarily call it malign. One can profess
beliefs that are known to others to be false, yet
because of one's ignorance one is not being
hypocritical, merely misinformed or deluded.
> ...But in the administration simplifying the
> 'mysteries'...of God...to the public, and
> concurrently approaching those same mysteries
> themselves as something that
> is deeply intricate, lies the very nature of
> hypocrisy. And it doesn't
> matter if it's done scornfully or arrogantly, or if
> one believes that
> hypocrisy is inherently malign...Who is more worthy
> to know and contemplate the
> mysteries of God? Who gets to commune with the
> Almighty?
Good questions, and I think one of the major
differences between Catholic/Orthodox and Protestant
splitting. But if any layperson who wants to (and can
afford the time) is allowed to study these
intricacies, your latter queries are answered. I do
not assign malign intent to all or even most upper
echelon members in simplifying 'what a difference an
iota makes,' as I would not blame my car mechanic for
saying 'your axle is too worn and needs replacing'
rather than 'your CV joint lacked lubrication because
the casing was cracked, and the resultant erosion of
the gearing mechanism has damaged the axle beyond
repair' -- unless I asked for a more detailed
explanation and he would not give it to me. It takes
time and study to understand how to diagnose and fix
car problems; it isn't that I'm not capable of
understanding/learning how to rebuild a car from the
ground up, but I don't have the time or the
inclination. (Of course, that _does_ leave me open to
exploitation by unscrupulous mechanics -- so I use one
recommended by several friends, one of whose husband
_is_ a car buff and knows enough to be able to spot
fraudulent charges.)
> Now....there still
> exists a hierarchal structure in the administration
> of the religion where
> people delve deeper into 'God' than any layperson
> practitioner of the faith.
> I would say that this in itself is hypocritical....
We disagree; although there is no question that it
_is_ open to corruption/exploitation. That is why I
think that if a layperson has access to whatever
literature priests have, there is less likelihood of
that occurring. Similarly, anyone can get into PubMed
and read abstracts of studies, just as physicians do;
I cannot 'safely' tout the miracle-cure of
horsebackriding for gout, because there is no
published literature to back up my claim, and sooner
or later _somebody_ will nail me on that claim.
> Of course another question remains - is a little
> hypocrisy perhaps needed in
> order to keep the machine running smoothly?
Ah, the "Little White Lie" hypothesis. That's been
debated a bit here; I confess to using that
judiciously (frex one friend is a fan of Westie
terriers; I don't like any dog smaller than my cats,
so when she says that she feels safe with them about,
I acknowledge that little gets by them unnoticed -
which is true, and seems complimentary, but I _did
not_ say that I wished I had one, or ever intend to
get one, or would like to come over and play with her
dogs. Since I did not ask more questions about them,
or use inquisitive/enthusiastic body language, she
does not discuss them further at that time; she's
content that her babies are accounted useful (but is
aware that I wasn't interested in hearing more), I'm
content that my friend enjoys her little pals, and we
both walk away having had a pleasant interchange.
It's kind of like a business deal: neither gets
precisely what she wants (to talk extensively about
her darlings vs. not hearing a word about them), but
the currency of friendship (communication) has been
exchanged successfully. Now when we talk about
horses, which we both love, we can happily go on for
_hours_, with complete mutual satisfaction.
> ....But as interesting as I find the
> premise of - 'many people might not want clear,
> unequivocal directions' - I
> still think that not having and/or wanting those
> clear unequivocal
> directions is a blow to the very organized structure
> that we're talking
> about here. As far as I'm concerned it's more than
> 'not desirable'.
But so many organizations don't have unequivocal
directives; just think of how police are expected to
keep the peace, protect property, defend the helpless,
respect the public, nail the bad guys, comfort a lost
child, AND stop crime in progress by whatever means
necessary. Every week, papers carry stories of how
those conflicting directives result in an innocent
bystander being shot, or a criminal escaping.
Messiness is an unavoidable facet of our complex
culture; there is always room for improvement, and a
need for those who call our attention to such
problems.
> > >....I actively maintain that God
> > > may indeed exist.
> > > Therefore in matters such as faith and organized
> > > religion....I also maintain
> > > that religious thinking,
> > > while obviously holding back other ways of
> thought,
> > > may be quite prodigious in and of itself.
> >Could you clarify how 'religious thinking' holds
> >back other ways of thought?
> Lets say some young bloke is abstaining from sex
> until he gets married....
> Another young fella is out there doing the
> horizontal polka with beautiful, lithe young women-
<wicked smirk> Uh, Travis, I did specify "thought,"
not carnal pleasures. (And does this religious young
man not _think_ about sex? I seriously doubt it!)
Still, to choose a particular philosophical approach
to life does negate, at least temporarily, some other
approaches. Ya cain't be both a Yankees an' Dodgers
fan at that game!
<serious> To believe in a God does not stop one from
studying what the stars can tell us about time, or the
organelles in eukaryote cells about the beginnings of
multicellular life on Earth -- although there are
those who _do_ state that these endeavors are 'against
God's will or wisdom.' Fanatics of all stripes tend
to think poorly, uncritically, and/or narrowly; my
belief in our government as one of the best in the
world does not stop me from criticizing the heck out
of the foolishness I see within it.
> >....I think that we humans want our leaders to
> >be 'better than most others,' else why would we
> >follow them?
> The lesser of two evils?
Or two weevils. ;)
> > > I'm not saying that all religions are one and
> > > the same. What I am saying is
> > > that in matters of a specific religion all parts
> > > are a part of the whole....Consequently, to
> > > exclusively segregate or
> > > endorse any one part of the whole can only take
> > > away from the whole itself.
> >You snipped my examples of how criticizing one part
> >does not mean denigrating the whole.
> Oops. Could you give 'em to me again please?
See also ## below.
-Frex the gov't above.
-The appendix (useless AFAWK) in the body (a marvel of
complexity that somehow works as well as it does).
-The lack of great acceleration in my current car,
compared to my old V-8.
> >What you are
> >doing by insisting that 'the part is the whole' is
> not
> >permitting any specific religion to be organic, but
> >demanding of it perfection.
> Not exactly. But I'd certainly like you to expand on
> that. At least more than you *did*.
## No complex system created by humans is without flaw
(I wrote on this in an earlier post). Would you deny
our right to correct a flaw in a hospital, like oh,
getting rid of the MacDonald's downstairs and
replacing it with a Subway's? [Yes, there *is* a
hospital here in Denver with a McD's!!!] Yet this
same hospital serves a poor constituency, who would be
without healthcare otherwise, so it does much good. I
can bemoan the McD's while praising the dedicated
geriatric ward staff; a member of a church can
likewise bemoan frex the stance on woman's ordination
yet praise the work on famine relief. That member may
not consider themself any less a full participant than
one who accepts the no-women-in-seminary position; in
my eyes neither is less a believer than the other,
although one is for change, and the other not. But by
what you state, that first one is being hypocritical
because they want something to be different. I am no
less a believer in, or supporter of, modern medicine
just because I criticize a decision of a hospital
admin or aspects of the pharmaceutical industry.
> .... Meaning that if all parts
> of a structured religion
> were not a part of the whole, then the very idea of
> having a structured
> religion seems kinda pointless. Why not have 'the
> god of my big toe', 'the
> goddess of my horses left eyeball' etc...?
You are again expecting of this human construct - a
specific organized religion - that it be _completely_
internally consistant. Just look at one tiny little
conundrum in the US gov't: subsidies to tobacco
farmers, and a massive public campaign to stop
smoking...how schizoid is _that_!? And as I pointed
out before, Christianity has incorporated many rituals
and aspects that have _nothing_ to do with the central
belief that 'Jesus is Lord, risen from the dead, and
our Savior.' We love our Christmas rituals - the
shopping, the tree-decorating, the massive turkey
dinner - but those are completely irrelevant to that
core belief.
Yet as Alberto noted, in Brasil Christianity has
incorporated parts of African and local/native
culture/religions, to be more accessible to that group
of people. A religion, like all human organizations,
must adapt to the particular ground and culture in
which it is planted. To be static is to eventually
wither and die; to deny innovation and change is to
become irrelevant. Tying in what I recall of one of
Himself's themes: competition and cooperation, both
internally and externally, are necessary for a human
social contruct to flourish. Why would you specify
that of all human endeavors, only a religion may
not...evolve?
> >....Travis, that makes no sense.
> Sure it does. You disagree with me on the premise of
> - all parts of a
> structured religion are a part of the whole -
> correct? Well ask yourself
> this question - if the whole is not the sum of it's
> parts, then what is the
> point of the whole? Heck, where does the whole come
> from?
Is a person less human because a leg was amputated?
Or because they suffer from schizophrenia? They may
be called 'damaged,' but they are not sub-human.
[A debate on how much one can lose or lack, and still
be human, might be interesting, but unresolvable; I
tend to lean on brain capacity/capability, but that is
only my perception. Where does the soul, or spirit or
consciousnesss if you prefer, reside, and how much can
be lost before the physical structure that tethers the
'mind' to the body disintegrates, loosing the spirit
or destroying the mind?]
Debbi
Evolving Heretic Lutheran Deism Maru ;)
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