[amity]

For the last five years or so, I've come around to the point where I would call myself an atheist at this point.
From my reading of posts over the last few years on RVF, I'd say most of you are in the same camp (correct me if I'm wrong).

I grew up in a staunchly Catholic family in Ireland, as a kid in the 70s and 80s, and got the full brunt of Catholic teaching (with a side order of anti-English sentiment cos of 'The Troubles' in Northen Ireland, but that's another story).
I flirted with evangelical Christianity when I was a bit older, before a chance encounter with a former Roman Catholic priest, woke me up to the ambiguousness of Biblical writings.
It gave me sufficient doubts about the validity of my beliefs that I baled out and since then, I've slowly, year on year, moved closer to the position where I find myself today, ie. Atheism.

A couple of important points.
1) When I was in the grip of Fundamentalist Christianity, I had an almost unshakeable faith, way way more than any I had as a 'common or garden' Roman Catholic.
I was certain I was going to heaven cos of my faith, and nobody could tell me otherwise.
And as I said, were it not for that chance encounter with that former priest, I might still be with this religious group today('Commited Christians' was what they called themselves).
Having been in that position, I can understand, to some degree, how the likes of ISIS and Jihadis are so rocksolid and certain in their beliefs.
When you are 'in' a group like this, you have an almost unbreakable level of belief, that can lead you, unfortunately to do unspeakable things (if that is part of the group's belief structure).

2) When I was abandoning standard Roman Catholicism for the evengelical Christian group, one of the things I found hardest to leave behind was that of the Marian apparitions.
'The story of Knock' was told to me over and over again as a child and I've been there several times, as well as to Lourdes, and there's no doubt there is a certain peace to be found in these places.
I remember being told by my fellow converts, that these apparitions were 'demonic' in nature.
It shook me to the core at the time, as it went so completely against my Catholic upbringing.
But even now, as an atheist, I still find the accounts of those apparitions fascinating.
Perphaps they can all be explained as some sort of mass hysteria induced hallucinations, but the accounts of what happened are nonetheless intriguing, particularly the Garabandal apparitions, which are quite chilling http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garabandal_apparitions

For forum members who come from or came from a religious background, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts, whether you had similar experiences.
And the Marian apparitions, has anyone, whether religious or not, heard of them before?
What is your take on them?
Would be interested to hear the thoughts of forum members who've either dabbled in, or come/came from any kind of religious background.

[Sp5]

Irish Catholicism is similar to Mexican and other Latin Catholicism in its reverence to Mary.

It's similar to Shia Islam and their reverence for Ali and Hussein. Borderline polytheism, self-mortification, etc.

[jamaicabound]

I come from an Italian family. I can't say I've ever had a strong faith however I'm definately always one to kind of defend religion as a kid growing up I was at church every sunday, went to ccd or had religion classes in school, etc.

I obviously don't follow all the stuff of the church like no premarital sex but I do think religion is important, I'll definatley bring my kids up in a religious setting, if they wanna dump it in their teen years I would have no problem with it but I think its a good foundation for morals and values and how to treat people.

I've questioned my faith and religion and one thing I focus on is all these miracles and apparitions and the saints who still look in pristine condition, there's too many strange things that happen for me to totally discount religion.

[amity]

Thanks for the replies.
Yeh it's funny, even though I don't suscribe to Catholicism or any other religion anymore, I still have a certain cultural conditioning from my religious upbringing which will probably never totally leave me.
As a twentysomething, it fucked me up, I felt tremendous guilt whenever I was with a girl and knew sex was on the cards. Most times, I couldn't go through with it, as I had been taught that pre-marital sex was sinful.
Hard to believe when I look at myself now, that I had such hang-ups back then.
And yes, it's true that religion teaches morals, but as prominent atheists like Hitchens and Harris have shown, religion doesn't have a monopoly on the teaching of morals.

[The Beast1]

Your religious upbringing will very much have an impact on your life. I was baptized catholic and went to mass regularly until my parents became Lutheran. Personally, I love Lutheranism as it is all of the fun of catholicism without the guilt. Lots more singing, no latin, and a healthy dose of germanic attitude. In my later teens and early 20s I identified as an atheist. The evangelicals helped re-ignite my belief, but it was a Lutheran church that helped sustain it.

I love Catholicism and the traditions that come with it. I find the whole "guilt " aspect of Catholicism hilarious. Part of my family is very much driven by that catholic guilt and it takes a discerning mind to blow through some of their BS. Saying sex and masturbation are sins and not to do them are missing why they're sins. Want a good laugh? Ask a nun why sex and masturbation are bad. Keep asking why and agree and amplify. Eventually you'll get to the point where she says, "Do as I say!" At that point, i'd question her faith as being unable to discern how sin really interacts with people's lives.

I really enjoyed the evangelical church, however after I re-read the bible I started challenging and questioning beliefs that were being practiced. Most notably, I find it repugnant that evangelicals insist on saying the bible is the literal word of God. The bible's old and new testaments were written in Hebrew and Greek respectively. They've been translated hundreds of times since then. Yet their insistence that it is the literal word of God leaves very little room for interpretation and misses some of the really powerful allegory and symbolism which is what makes christianity come alive.

I said somethings that made them apprehensive with me. Most notably the literal word of god, comparing evolution and sin as being one and the same, and also saying that churches that fail to reconcile homosexuality in a loving manner will be dealt with the same way Jesus dealt with the fruitless fig tree. My faith was once again tested at this point, but unlike pre college I felt more defined in what I was seeking from spirituality.

I ended up getting pushed to an "arms length" and soon the pastor started to become a droning mess. His sermons stopped being applicable and started harping upon the same points over and over again. I soon left and fell back to a traditional Lutheran church. The pastor is amazing. We sat down and I basically told him what I told the baptists. He looked at me, laughed, and said, "Welcome to my world!" I knew I found my place.

Anyone who tells you something is "demonic" without explaining why is an idiot. While I find apparitions and Virgin Mary's randomly appearing in the wild to be chance happenings, this is a perfect teaching moment for believers to feel like they're apart of something.

You sound more spiritually inclined than most church goers. I find that most atheists are far more spiritually inclined than most church goers and are put off by the "sheeple" behavior of most churches. Don't let their 2D understanding of faith deter you from understanding your 4D perspective of faith. You've been gifted with the spirit of discernment and most likely you will discover a rabbit hole if you really start researching theology in depth. Christianity is a good anchor post for not getting lost in the realms of spirituality.

Have you read the bible, most specifically the new testament as an adult? If you haven't, I suggest you take a look at it. You may find things that stand out that you haven't seen before. Also take a look at the book "A Place for You" by Paul Tournier. I've recommended this book a ton on this forum but it might help clear things up for you. It's super cheap since it is out of print. Take a look.

[Truth Teller]

The Marian apparitions, are, to say the least, interesting. The Church investigates every supernatural occurrence reported and finds, more often than not, that it's of natural origin. Some, however, are not.

I would also second the recommendation against calling what is done in churches true faith. Most of the churches have people who haven't really thought about it a lot, who have often been brought up in the religion. I believe that studying the theology and philosophy, then reaching your own conclusions, is the best way to do it. Christianity has a massive intellectual tradition, as does Judaism. I can't speak as to Islam, but I believe it does as well.

When I was an agnostic, I thought religion to be very simple. When I started studying it, I realized how complex it really is. This is the fundamental issue with Hitchens/Harris/Dawkins' books. They see religion very simplistically, clump it all together, then generalize and attack it. Never mind the fact that when they do try to engage with philosophy, they butcher it.

[Rap17]

If u really want a answer on religion join a Pentecostal community and see how it goes

[PeanutoftheNight]

One thing I personally like about Catholicism/Orthodox that is lacking especially in Protestant/Evangelical Christianity is the devotion to Mary. I think the reverence to a female figure is very important to the faith and to one's outlook on life. I find that in the Protestants and Evangelicals (of course I know they overlap) they spend much of their time and energy in worshiping Jesus. Jesus this, Jesus that. Yeah, I get and understand his importance (its big don't get me wrong), but often times they seem to forget there is a God the Father. By having Mary as an important figure it emphasizes an admiration of motherhood, fidelity, love, and devotion. And the extension of that, the veneration of saints, places emphasis on both men and women in history and in faith. I'm not a liberal, I don't give a crap about diversity or any of that stuff, but I do find that it is important to recognize women in society, and the sects of Christianity which deviate from the oldest lines seem to lose this.

As Marian apparitions come, I don't really know. The Catholic Church is incredibly careful and incredibly skeptical when it comes to Marian apparitions as with other miracles and mystical occurrences. They take their time, do their research, and use much scrutiny before considering condoning said apparition. I don't know if they really happen, and none of us can ever know unless we witness one. I would say, however, that there are many things out there that can't be explained, things that affect us and the world around us that escape our ability to know. They can't be disproven, and only can be truly proven to those who experience them. But the rarity of their occurrence, the rarity of people claiming them (even falsely) and the stringent standard the Church applies to investigating them leads me to believe there may be some credence in them, but we'll never know.

The thing I don't like about fundamentalists of any kind is excessive literal interpretation. Both the strongest in faith and the strongest Atheists use literal interpretations to bolster, or dismiss religious texts. It was interesting to see an episode of Nova, I think, that showed that the fire of Sodom & Gomorrah is consistent with an asteroid strike in the same time. There is a lot of evidence of the historicity of many biblical tales, but they aren't literal acount. They are stories of our common humanity, tales from which no person could not derive benefit. They are sources of wisdom, something people don't appreciate.

[Kish]

Our Lady of La Salette

"There will be a series of wars until the last war, which will then be fought by the ten Kings of the Antichrist, all of whom will have one and the same plan and will be the only rulers of the world. Before this comes to pass, there will be a kind of false peace in the world. People will think of nothing but amusement."

Sounds like the time we are living in now.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_La_Salette

[Dominicus]

Generally speaking, all Catholics are supposed to have a devotion to Our Lady, because of the words of Jesus on the cross: "This is your mother". Devotion means acknowledging her role as the first disciple on Earth and the facilitator of our prayers in Heaven. Some people though seem to forget that she is not a member of the Holy Trinity - that's a problem of education, not doctrine.

Marian apparitions are not necessary but may be useful (i.e, we are not required to believe they happen to be Catholics in good standing, but it may be helpful to do so). Helpful because most apparitions serve to teach us and warn us. Look up the Fatima, Akita, rue du Bac, La Salette and Guadalupe apparitions and messages. In some cases the information shared by Mary doesn't make sense for whole centuries before it's understood by researchers.

It's necessary to note that the Catholic Church doesn't jump on every reported apparition to validate their worldview. Instead, a long and careful investigation (lasting at least years) is done to discern if the apparition is truthful or not (and most of them are not). There's a lot of exalted women out there believing they have the direct line to Mary or Jesus and hold conferences on a regular basis. Doesn't quite work that way.

As a side note, I made the reverse journey from Amity - 35 years an atheist then conversion. Amity, I dont' know your story but you seem to have been heavily influenced by a man who broke his solemn promise to God. It's a bit like taking marriage advice from a divorcee IMHO.

[hydrogonian]

Well, either Catholicism is true or it isn't.

If it isn't (and I'm not saying that) then I can't see how the Marian apparitions are true. They would likely be an elaborate conspiracy toward solidifying a certain amount of belief through the modern era, and/or preparing the Billion+ Catholics in the world to fall into line in a future man made apocalyptic and then utopian scenario. What, you don't think that some peasants can be bought off?

Though, I'd never accept some Evangelist's account of them, or the account of anyone of almost any other religion. I'd evaluate the apparitions and Catholicism solely on their own merits.

If they are true, then I'd hold that this pretty much cements Catholicism as the True Faith.

Full disclosure: I don't hold myself to be a Catholic, currently, but I am a man of faith.

[debeguiled]

Hey Amity,

I traveled around Ireland and Northern Ireland for six months in the early eighties. I made a habit of attending Mass wherever I was just to get a feel for the culture. It seemed like I heard more about leaking church roofs and giving more at collection than I did about Mary.

When Mass ended, there was stampede out the door, and Sunday afternoons everyone ended up at the pub, and in a much greater mood. Maybe you are looking in the wrong place of worship?

Would you call her the brown virgin with the tan veil?

[Dominicus]

Because of God's decision to respect our free will including the option of rejecting him, there will not be an authoritative apparition, sign in the sky or whatever proving without a doubt that He's out there watching us and that we must believe in Him. He doesn't want to force us to love him. The only authoritative fact will be the second coming of Jesus, but no one knows when that happens, and then it will be too late to change sides anyway.

Fun fact: the 2,000 anniversary of the Passion will be in April 2034. I sometimes wonder if Jesus will be paying us a visit then and what I can do to be a good Christian in the few years left. Having a deadline helps focusing on important things.

Faith is generally defined as deciding that a statement is true when there's "enough" rational arguments for it (i.e., no such thing as blind faith). Enough because we never get the "full" extent of information about something, so the basis of our beliefs (secular and religious) is always a limited set of available data. For me, I take the recognized Marian apparitions as true because my Church says so and I should trust it. On the other hand, my faith was recently consolidated by seeing the Holy Shroud in Torino and the Holy Tunic in Paris and learning what today's scientists can say about them.

Hydrogonian, I read somewhere that mass hallucinations don't exist (where the individual accounts of an event would match 100%), only individual ones do. So the accounts of what is seen by multiple witnesses should differ if they hallucinate. Look up the massive number of Portuguese witnesses at Fatima.

[hydrogonian]

(04-09-2016 05:44 AM)Dominicus Wrote:  

Hydrogonian, I read somewhere that mass hallucinations don't exist (where the individual accounts of an event would match 100%), only individual ones do. So the accounts of what is seen by multiple witnesses should differ if they hallucinate. Look up the massive number of Portuguese witnesses at Fatima.

It's not so much mass hallucination that I would be suspicious of, but instead a faked publicity stunt that could be rather easily concocted at that period in time given the then lack of sophistication of people toward being able to research and ferret out potential fakery.

Some well paid peasants and witnesses would be about all it would take.

Take the video that I posted, for instance. It looks like a lot of shock and awe to me, in terms of the wholly consistent peasant reaction.

Now, was that African apparition real? If it was, then why hasn't the Church hyped it?

I'd gather that people widely believe that apparition was real, in terms of those who are aware of it.

And that was on video. Being able to claim widespread witnesses and awe from peasants that rare few would ever see, outside of a couple of still photos, would be much easier.

Though, my only real point was that either you believe in Catholicism or you don't, which would be the obvious test for belief in the apparitions.

I agree with you on Faith, sort of (see above), but not on Free will. But that's a discussion for another thread.

[dispenser]

I'm a cultural Catholic.

I would say that "Catholic guilt" is a mechanism for maintaining traditional families, and a damn sight more civil than "Muslim rage."
Better for people to beat themselves up than throw acid at others.

Mary rounds out the religion. She's the perfect mother figure for Catholic women to look up to and emulate.

I would say it's a religion of self-regulation rather than a religion of force. That's its strength.
Protestantism leans too much on the old model of ancient Hebrew warlordism, where confession and guilt have no role, and can't even get that right.

[TonySandos]

The Chipotle Effect

Posted on January 27, 2015


“The world promises you comfort, but you were not made for comfort. You were made for greatness.” – His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI

Prologue: Moscow, June 1990

Natasha had great legs.

And she probably still does, wherever she may be. But on that summer day in the last full year of the existence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Natasha, dressed in a businesslike white blouse and black skirt cut just above the knee and wearing a petite pair of black stiletto pumps, captivated the attention of the 16-year-old version of me. I was in the Soviet Union as an exchange student, with an itinerary involving several weeks of traveling around the western end of the USSR, an experience I have ever since regarded as the beginning of my life as an adult. Natasha was my governmentally-supplied guide and minder. She was 24, slender, pretty, with wavy chestnut-brown hair and round glasses. Influenced by American-made Cold War movies, I had expected my guide to be a dour middle-aged male KGB functionary in a trenchcoat and a trilby. Natasha had been a pleasant surprise indeed.

The small tour bus slowly chugged its way up the Sparrow Hills, and Natasha stood at the front of it, back to me, chatting casually with the driver. There were a few American exchange students in the bus, and some of their minders had come along as well. Moscow was where all of us came into the country, before splitting up and going on our separate itineraries. I would next go to Sochi, many years later the site of a Winter Olympics, where I would get drunk for the first time in my life, in a hotel bar with a group of young Afghanistan veterans reuniting as civilians for the first time since they’d come home from their service together in the war. Then I would travel to Donetsk, which as of this writing is the front line in a war that would in those days have been unimaginable. I would, in Kiev, walk through October Revolution Square, later renamed Independence Square, and future site of the Euromaidan protests that touched off that very war. And I would go to Leningrad, where, as the result of a hangover following my second youthful experience with drunkenness, I would, as Natasha looked on in horror, vomit my breakfast into the fountains of the Grand Cascade on the grounds of the Peterhof Palace.

The bus reached the top of the hills. Below, the grand expanse of Moscow stretched out into the distance, with Lenin Stadium, which had been the centerpiece of the 1980 Olympic Games, in the foreground. I fumbled for my camera (Natasha had instructed me that she’d tell me in advance if I wasn’t allowed to take pictures somewhere), but before I could get it out of its bag, we were past the summit and the shot was gone forever.

A minute or two later, we stopped at what appeared to be a nondescript, whitewashed house along a four-lane road. We ambled off the bus. The air smelled odd. Everything in the Soviet Union smelled odd. Pollution – exhaust fumes and factory smoke and un-picked-up garbage. A faint smell of burning plastic was always in the air. It had rained early in the morning – small pools of rainwater still sat peacefully in depressions in the uneven pavement – but even that didn’t help much.

This place was, Natasha explained, actually a church – the only church in Moscow that had stayed open and active through the entire history of the Soviet Union – through the revolutionary fervor, through the Stalinist terror, through World War II and the Cold War. And now, in the last full year of the USSR, there it was still. I wasn’t much of one for churches back then. In fact, I don’t know that I’d ever actually been inside a church in my entire life. My mother was and is a lukewarm semi-agnostic of half-Anglican, half-Jewish background, and my father an embittered fallen Catholic who at the time was a convinced atheist, and has since become a devotee of whatever New Age pablum happens to be in fashion with aging Baby Boomers at any particular moment. I was, at the time… nothing, really.

The day was turning pleasant. Some of the group decided to go inside the church, and some decided to skip it and stand under the shade trees that lined the wide boulevard to relax, and flirt, and enjoy the warmth of the day. Natasha went inside, as this was on the tour and it was her responsibility to show it to me. I followed.

The inside of the church could not have been a greater contrast from the outside. Whereas the exterior was nondescript and unornamented, the interior, though not large, was almost indescribably beautiful. Every inch of the walls was covered in art, as is so often true of Orthodox churches. A haze of incense hung in the air, and its smoke made visible shafts of the light streaming through the few, narrow windows which hung close to the high ceiling. Three or four old women, the faithful who had, at tremendous risk, stayed faithful all their lives, were carefully cleaning the mosaics, and the icons, and the dark wooden floor.

The rest of the group, as disinterested in high culture as any normal American teenagers, poked about the place for a bit, glanced quickly at a few of the artworks until they thought their obligation to do so had passed, and then, one or two at a time, quietly shuffled out the door and back into the warm summer air. Even Natasha left. Before long, only I and the faithful old ladies, who continued going silently about their work, remained.

I stood at the center of the small church, in solitude. Particles of dust glittered as they danced in the sunlight coming in through the windows. The incense smoke made the cool air sweet and heavy with its scent. There was a moment of unearthly quiet and stillness, of clarity, and I felt…

I felt God, there, with me in that place.

It was not a moment of faith. It was a moment of knowing. God’s presence there, in that church, at that instant, was as real and tangible as the physical presence of Natasha, or my parents, or any human being. It was the same sensation as when someone you love enters a room when you aren’t looking, but you can feel their presence; you know who it is even without seeing them. God was there, with me in that place, and in one single blinding flash, I knew it.

I’m not sure how long it all lasted. Not long, to be certain, and it did not need to be. It passed, and yet it did not ever truly pass, for it is with me to this day, and will be with me forever.

Eventually, the front door of the church opened, and Natasha, looking a bit annoyed but not really angry, stepped inside.

“Hey, it’s time to go to lunch! Are you coming?”

Of course I was coming. She couldn’t actually let the bus leave without me, after all.

“Oh… yes… I’ll be right behind you” I stammered.

She turned her back and walked out into the warm air of the summer of that last full year of the existence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. I followed, but paused before reaching the door, put my hand in my pocket, pulled out every dollar and every ruble that I had on me, stuffed it all into the donation box, and went away penniless.

Though it would be a couple of decades before I was formally baptized, it would be fair to say that I entered that church an agnostic, and left it a Christian.

* * *

Silicon Valley, Many Years Later

It was a lazy Saturday afternoon in the Silicon Valley in early autumn, a mix of cool sunshine and low, billowy clouds, and a temperature just to my liking. I was out for the day, with a little extra money on me, shopping, exploring, enjoying nothing so much as simply being there. And now it was time for lunch – with my bit of extra money I could have whatever I wanted. And what I wanted that day was Chipotle. For those of you who may not be from a land where Chipotle exists (more’s the pity for you!), it is a chain of burrito shops, a step up from fast food of the McDonalds variety and a step down from places with actual waiters. A step down in formality, at least – Chipotle burritos are renowned for tastiness, and have a particularly strong following among Silicon Valley tech types.

Silicon Valley is a nice place; flush with tech money and full of young, high-IQ optimates. On weekends, long lines of expensive cars carrying the wives of executives at companies like Google, Apple, eBay, and Oracle clog the entrances to upscale malls like Valley Fair and Santana Row. It’s not uncommon to see $250,000 Lamborghinis parked in front of coffee shops, their 25-year-old owners standing in line inside for a frappuccino or a bubble tea. It’s all very new, and very commercial. Locals joke that El Camino Real, the wide, traffic-choked boulevard that runs through the heart of the Valley, repeats itself every five miles – a store or restaurant from every imaginable chain recurring just as quickly as it makes financial sense for it to. The joke is only slightly an exaggeration.

Yet this represents something comfortable – something comforting – for a child of late-20th century suburban America. The shopping malls, the big box retailers, the chain restaurants, the wide streets lined by single-family homes with neatly-mown lawns, the office parks with late-model sedans lined up in freshly-pained spaces out front; all of these things feel like… normalcy. But of course, it is not just normalcy, but the normalcy of the most safe and prosperous age that mankind has ever known, or is likely to know again any time in the foreseeable future (it is, in fact, already in the process of slowly disintegrating).This is what generations to come, not as pampered as we, will never quite understand about this age. They almost certainly will be amazed at the aggressive hedonism that our prosperity has allowed us to fall into, but what they will never be able to truly feel (for while hedonistic pleasure is understandable to all creatures of the flesh, this will be quite alien to them) is the sheer comfort of it all, the safe and warm feeling of it, that sense of normalcy which contained as part of it in the belief, plausible for the historical blink of an eye, that it could all be maintained forever.

The particular Chipotle to which I had come had a few outdoor tables, which on a day like that were preferable to the noise and artificially-processed air inside. I sat at one with my burrito and my Coke Zero; it was past the lunch rush and I was blissfully (as I am an introvert by nature) alone. I removed my iPod from my pocket, put on my earphones, and scrolled through my podcasts for something to listen to over lunch. Being in a light mood, the RetroMacCast caught my fancy. I love retro tech from the 80s and 90s, and old Macs especially. Were the world not in the shape that it is in, were it not necessary to write what I do as AntiDem, I would probably write a blog or do a podcast along those lines myself. I ate, and listened. The food was satisfying, the air was cool, and it was quiet except for the podcast. The discussion turned to the short-lived Macintosh clones of the late 1990s – Ah, yes, I had one of those! My old Power 100! A quirky machine, but it sure served me well, and for a long time! – and I felt a bit of wistful nostalgic cheer. Everything was good, everything was comfortable, and I had not a single care or a complaint at all.

It was then that the thought came to me: What really is so wrong with this world? Surely, all this comfort, all this ease, all this prosperity – it should be enough to make me contented, shouldn’t it? Is it not a waste – of time, of energy, of happiness to which I could devote these moments – to make myself miserable by railing and raging against this, of all things? Shouldn’t I just enjoy it all instead?

This was not like those times when, in despair, I find myself wondering whether my efforts are futile in the face of a system that is far beyond my abilities to affect; or even worse, when I wonder whether the left may actually be correct, and this – in all its materialistic, soulless, hedonistic existential horror – might really be the end of history. No, there was no dread in what I felt; quite the opposite. I felt safe and warm and comfortable, and all of the things wrong with this age suddenly all seemed very distant and abstract and not so very worth worrying about.

And it was when, in one single blinding flash, that I felt the touch of Elua upon me.

But perhaps here some explanation is in order.

Neoreactionaries often speak of Gnon, the “crab-god” they have created to embody the ideas of teleology, of consequences, of inevitability – no more and no less that the simple yet somehow, in the current age, revolutionary idea that implementing bad ideas will lead to bad consequences. The implications of the existence of Gnon, whose horrifying visage hangs heavy over the merry bustle of every civilization (whether they believe in him or not, for he is one of those realities that continues to exist no matter if you do or don’t), is that maintaining a civilization is hard, tireless work; that monsters are always waiting in the darkness to devour those who slack off in this task, whether it be because they have become soft and lazy, or incapable and feeble, or even (perhaps especially) due to the hubris of believing that they are so advanced that such drudgery is beneath them and they can instead devote their energies towards utopian schemes meant to perfect the human condition. Gnon – who is compatible with both a theistic and non-theistic worldview – punishes these sins: this sloth, this gluttony, this foolishness, this pride, this hubris. Gnon is seen both in the God who rained fire and brimstone down on Sodom and Gomorrah, and also in the collapse of Marxism in all of its supposed “inevitability”. Gnon is to be feared, for he is a destroyer god, and a merciless one. There is no bargaining with him, no reasoning with him, no begging for mercy with him. If you fail, if you slip, if you trust the wrong people or the wrong ideas, if you are foolish or careless, he will destroy you and everything you care about. He exists as a caution to you, and you had better take heed.

In opposition to Gnon, Scott Alexander has placed Elua, a god who he has appropriated from the novels of science fiction author Jacqueline Carey. Rather than explaining Elua to you myself, I’ll let Dr. Alexander explain it in his own words (with apologies to him, I’ve mashed up bits of two of his columns here):


“Somewhere in this darkness is another god. He has also had many names. In the [Carey] books, his name was Elua. He is the god of kindness and flowers and free love and all soft and fragile things. Of art and science and philosophy and love. Of niceness, community, and civilization. All the other gods are gods of blood and fire, and Elua is just like ‘Love as thou wilt’ and ‘All knowledge is worth having’. He is a god of humans.

Other gods get placated until we’re strong enough to take them on. Elua gets worshipped.”

Elua is not the god that humanity deserves, nor the one that it needs – but he is the god that we want. Indeed he is a god of humans, and he is the reason for the warning that if you agree with your god about everything, take caution, because you made him up. Whereas the God of the Bible has commandments etched in stone that must be obeyed, and Gnon is the heartless god of consequences, Elua is the god of no commandments and no consequences. “Love as thou wilt” – and worry not about disease, or about the effects on your children, or about inheritance, or about the descent of your culture into coarseness and licentiousness. “All knowledge is worth having” – even terrible yet seductive ideas that have led to the pointless deaths of millions. Elua, always, in every circumstance, tells us what we want to hear. He tells us to spend, and that the bill will never come due. He tells us to eat and drink, and that we will never get fat, and there will be no hangover the next morning. In other words, Elua is a charlatan. If in Moscow I met the genuine God, then at Chipotle I encountered a fraud of one.

And yet Elua really is a god of humans – he is a god that humans want to worship, because he is the reflection and embodiment of their own desires, whether noble or tawdry – and I, too, am human. There in that place – though I must admit, far from the only time in my life – I was seduced; I allowed myself to momentarily drift into the dominion of Elua and the lotus-eaters who follow him. As in Moscow, the experience lasted for only a moment, and, as in Moscow, the experience never completely leaves me, nor can it, because in Modernity the pull of Elua is everywhere around me: in the shopping malls, in the chain stores, in the wide streets and the mown lawns, and even in my lunch. It is in the ease and comfort and security of it all – things to which, because I am human, I cannot help but have an attachment. But if I am able to break free of Elua – to reject him as a liar and a cheat, to face the true ugliness hidden not far beneath the surface of Modernity, and to rebel against it – most Moderns, understandably, cannot. Elua comforts them, placates them, assuages their doubts, and gives them lotuses to eat – 500 channels of cable television, craft beers, oversized SUVs, spectacularly dirty internet pornography, and wonderfully tasty burritos. In return, they embrace Elua (they may voice an occasional “It’s an awful shame” about the worst aspects of the moral state of the world he presides over, but little more), because they so desperately want to believe his promises, and to not believe that what he offers will result either in Gnon’s consequences or God’s judgment.

The reason that I cannot maintain faith in Elua is both because I have come to understand the truth embodied in Gnon and because I have felt the touch of the one true God. Gnon will not allow illusions, no matter how beautiful, to carry on forever. And as for God, his commandments are often unpleasant, wearying, and burdensome – they require discipline and hard work and self-denial – but in them are also truth, nobility, and decency. Those who follow them – who fight for them – may at some point find themselves denied the comforts that Elua promises, but down that path is also a measure of greatness (perhaps the greatness of a martyr or a saint, or only the simple greatness of a traditional wife and mother), and that is the one thing that Elua cannot offer.

https://antidem.wordpress.com/2015/01/27...le-effect/

[911]

Good post Tony, but... Chipotle's, in the Bay Area? the original home of the burrito?!?

[Aurini]

(04-10-2016 01:46 AM)TonySandos Wrote:  

The Chipotle Effect

Posted on January 27, 2015

Before finishing the post - and before realizing you'd been kind enough to include one of my videos - I sent the following to AntiDem:

Quote:

Same thing happened to me when i walked into the Church I was eventually baptized and confirmed at
"I... am finally in my Father's home."

[johnbozzz]

What branch of Catholicism is the least monotheistic in nature?

[debeguiled]

(04-19-2016 08:43 PM)johnbozzz Wrote:  

What branch of Catholicism is the least monotheistic in nature?

Catholicism is a monotheistic religion. They don't worship the saints and Mary, they venerate them.

[johnbozzz]

(04-20-2016 12:32 PM)debeguiled Wrote:  

(04-19-2016 08:43 PM)johnbozzz Wrote:  

What branch of Catholicism is the least monotheistic in nature?

Catholicism is a monotheistic religion. They don't worship the saints and Mary, they venerate them.

Thank you.
If I recall correctly, the Lutheran church seems to place a great deal more emphasis on Jesus than Mary or the Holy Ghost, right?

[amity]

Resurrecting this thread as I saw a film recently based on a Marian Apparation in France.
I would recommend it, if you get a chance to see it.
It's reawakened my interest in the various apparitions that have occurred throughout Europe and beyond.
The movie for it's part is relatively unjudemental re the apparition, it doesn't tell you what opinions to have on this intriguing subject, it just tells the story and lets you draw your own conclusions.

[Wutang]

Slightly off topic but that post about Eula from about 2 years ago really struck me. When he was being described as "not the god that humanity deserves, nor the one that it needs – but he is the god that we want" I kept thinking of the so called "humanism" that's so trendy among the educated of Western society. I'm sure the people who subscribe to this ideology would no doubt see themselves as being too clever and advanced to believe in some sort of god but it's striking how so their beliefs really just comes to the deification of mankind or "they-kind" as I'm sure they would rather use these days. I'm also sure these people would talk about how rational and scientific their beliefs are but I wonder how much the animalistic desire for hedonism and self-gratification as well as the opposition to having to a higher authority figure/power placing limits on them are driving factors.