What is wrong with "liberal
religion"
Not that I am all that impressed with many forms of
conservative religion, either.
Exactly why should we presume that the ONLY alternatives to
questions about
teleology --purpose in the Universe-- reduce to Atheism
vs Monotheism ?
Given obvious problems with either viewpoint, a very
reasonable case can be
made for Deity consisting of X number of "Gods" or gods.
Or for a God and
Goddess, or for Agnosticism, radical inability despite best
efforts to really know
how to answer basic questions
But leaving all that aside, what seems to be the main
problem on the religious Left
is dismissal of Satan as a Big Problem and as forever
wrecking the Good.
To toss out Satan as a factor in the world is to give us,
IMHO, false choices,
either God did it, or nothing did it except blind nature.
To me this paradigm
is totally absurd. Below is an example of the best of the
spiritual Left
which, you may agree, ultimately misses the most important
considerations.
I am someone who enjoys debates between Atheists and
Christians
But to only convene debates between Atheists and
Christians is to close off
any number of potentially useful alternatives.
From a Christian perspective to ignore what --for
instance-- Buddhists are saying,
is to close our minds to a really important part of
humanity, exactly the wrong choice
in a world which is existentially pluralistic. And it
closes off the value
which may be gained FOR Christians FROM other faiths.
Sure, anyone who tries can identify weaknesses in Buddhism
( or Hinduism, etc ).
As they can --like it or not-- identify Christian
weaknesses. I would
still say that Christians do well in comparisons, but think
of the potential
gains if lessons from an area of strength of Buddhism,
psychology based
on principles for living a fully aware and moral life,
could be internalized.
And this is only one issue.
In all of this there are dangers, obviously. But isn't
globalism , 21st century
awareness that we are interlinked with people of other
faiths, THE BIG CHALLENGE
and, it may be said, the problem which "God" ( your choice
of exact terminology )
requires us to solve for ourselves at this time in history
?
My view of the matter, anyway.
Billy
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Huff Po
Posted: December 13, 2010 08:38
PM
Recently I watched a debate on YouTube titled "Does the
Universe have a Purpose?" This debate, which was held in
Puebla Mexico, pitted three prominent atheists against three
prominent theists, and to accentuate the contentiousness of
the topic each individual was invited in to the middle of a
boxing ring to argue their positions, where they could land
verbal punches against their opponents.
Over the last several years, in the wake of 9/11, debates
between religion and science -- faith and reason -- have
become very popular and very once combative. But these kinds
of debates are by no means a new phenomenon.
CommonSenseAtheism.com lists 564 such debates dating back to
1948, although these debates date from well before then.
2,400 years ago Plato wrote, "Atheism is a disease of the
soul before it becomes an error of understanding," and 300
years later the Roman philosopher Seneca the Younger
proclaimed, "Religion is regarded by the common people as
true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful."
And the debate continues unresolved. One need only look at
a series of blogs here on the Huffington Post, along with
the many strongly worded comments, to see that we are no
closer to coming to a conclusion than were Plato and Seneca.
The two main topics of these debates are the nature of
religion and the existence of God. It is crucial, though,
that these two topics be examined separately. It is possible
to constructively debate the merits or problems with
religion. We can all concede that people have acted wickedly
in the name of religion, that dogmatic, fundamentalist
religion has caused much suffering, and that the refusal to
accept the findings of science which are in conflict with
one's doctrine is a foolish and small-minded position. To
simply dismiss all religion, however, is not a rational or
informed position, because we can also concede that religion
has brought much good to the world, that most believers are
not literalists, that religion itself is a very diverse and
complex institution, and that insecurity, ideology and greed
for power, not religion, have been the causes of most wars
(and that to call Communism, Fascism, Nationalism and Nazism
"religions" is to so distort the definition as to make it
useless and unintelligible).
When the debate moves on to question of the existence of
God, though, the dialogue hits a brick wall. The atheist
side typically presents the position that belief in God is
an immature science and that God is a provable or
disprovable hypothesis for why things are the way they are,
which, they argue, can be easily disproved: Evolution
eliminates the need for a creator, double blind tests prove
that prayer doesn't work, psychology has demonstrated that
human beings often mistake random pattern for meaningful
purpose, observation shows that we are an insignificant spot
in the midst of a vast chaotic universe, and the death of a
single innocent child makes the belief in a benevolent,
omnipotent, omniscient God absurd, or even offensive.
The theist side then responds with arguments to rebut these
points: The universe is too fine-tuned to be an accident,
without a loving God there are no objective standards or
source of values, and the very fact that we can comprehend
the workings of physicality with our minds demonstrates the
existence of a purposeful creator. Atheists then counter
that there is absolutely no objective, quantifiable proof
that God exists, that religion is ignorant of, uninterested
in or dismissive of modern science, and that to believe in
something without proof is inherently dangerous, especially
when one thinks that he is acting on divine authority. The
theist responds, and so on.
The debate about the existence of God hits a brick wall
because there is an essential misunderstanding about the
nature of God: None of the proofs that atheists are looking
for, or any counter argument from the theists, would be
adequate proof. In the Peubla debate, Michael Shermer said
that he'd find convincing proof, "if you could have God grow
new limbs on amputees from the Iraq war, Christian soldiers,
praying for them to be healed. This has not happened even
Apparently God can not do even what amphibians can do." But
even if this did happen, it would not prove the existence of
God but would instead prove that there is some kind of
regenerative force or energy that responds to the right kind
of conscious thought. Likewise, a glowing presence and booming
voice appearing on the White House lawn proclaiming "I am the
Lord your God, who took you out of the land of Egypt, the
house of bondage" as the waters of the Potomac part, would
prove that there is an entity with powerful technology, and
would be no more a proof of God than an airplane to a cave
man. And irrefutable proof that Moses really did write the
first five books of the Bible, that Jesus died and was
resurrected, or that an unearthly being appeared to Muhammad
and Joseph Smith to dictate new texts, would support some of
the claims of religions but does not prove that there is a
purposeful, loving Creator and Sustainer.
The truth is that nothing -- no thing -- can prove the
existence of God.
The attempt to prove the existence of God through the
scientific method of hypothesis, controlled experimentation,
observation and documentable repeatable results is somewhat
akin to trying to discover the cause of a person's response
to a deeply moving work of art. We can examine the painting,
analyze the composition of the canvas and pigment, study the
arrangement of shapes and colors, discover the historical
context of the work and the biography of the artists, or
even conduct psychological experiments and CT scans, but
none of this will do anything to explain, understand and
share in the person's aesthetic experience. This person may
try to explain her experience, but she will ultimately fail
to convince someone who only sees pigment on canvas, and who
may conclude that her experience is delusional, and that the
study of aesthetics is a waste of time. To the person who
was so deeply impacted by the painting, though, such an
assertion completely misses the point, and does nothing to
convince her that her experience is not real, and that she
was not touched and expanded by her encounter.
In this way, arguments and experiments can not prove the
existence of God because God is not an hypothesis. For human
beings, God is the experience of a transformative
relationship with creation itself, in which we know that the
Universe is inherently meaningful, that we were created for
a staggering purpose that will unfold over eons, that love
and gratitude are the essential actual materials of our
lives and that we are holy beings.
The experience of a relationship with God is not one of
religious doctrine, does not come from statistics,
experiments or argument, and is certainly not in conflict
with science and reason in any way. It is also not about
righteous certainty or judgment. The experience of God
expands the possibilities for our lives and increases the
feeling of mystery and intellectual curiosity about the
world. Reason and observation are crucial elements in faith.
Faith and reason are not mutually exclusive and are no more
in conflict than civil engineering and poetry.
As a rabbi and person of faith, I have no interest in
proving the existence of God and certainly do not want to
convert anyone to my religion or way of thinking. What I am
passionate about, though, is helping bring others to an
experience and relationship with God because I know that
such a relationship can create powerful positive personal
and communal transformation. One brings another to the
experience of God not through philosophical or material
proof, but through living the example of gratitude, purpose,
compassion and love.
No doubt the debates about the existence of God will
continue, and we can enjoy the spectacle, but I suspect that
no amount of clever verbal exchange will do anything to
convince anyone either way.
