On Religion
The Vatican used to have the power to kill. Now religion is practically a joke in my circles. On the fringes extremism fools the truly lost into thinking that martyrdom brings salvation or that violence will bring them peace.
Religion was designed to control the critical min by denying people the ability of self reflection or the opportunity of self improvement. Religion honored only piety (and the clergy) and painted it as the only path to salvation.
During the dark ages, Religion rule supreme, but the edifice cracked as people began to interpret the bible for themselves ( invention of the printing press). Religious houses splintered and their petty fights over nomenclature continue to this day, unfortunately claiming thousands of lives on the way, in almost perpetual conflict.
Today our lives are at a junction point like a traveler coming to a fork on a forest road. She doesn't like where she came from, but in both directions ahead the way is murky.
To be a live in 2017 is to step one foot over the line that leaves religion in the dust of history at least for those who have embraced science. But we still appreciate the mystery of the divine. Still call on it for help at the time of anguish.
And we haven't quite reached a technological point (another line in the proverbial sand) where previous generations seem barbaric in their ancient ways. It will be difficult to continue supporting a divine creator when we interplanetary, genetically alter our bodies and can program the human mind. That will be quite a line in the sand.
I am still attracted to the sense of mystery that religion offers, but I can get the same from science fiction, where the later doesn't try to claim dominion over peoples' lives, from extremism on one side to blatant consumerization on the other end (Christmas).
In a sad example, I used to have two friends in high school who fell in love. One was deeply religious, one was an atheist. They could have been so happy, it didn't work out. They couldn't reconcile their fundamental views of the world.
And that's too bad. There is enough noise out there, with people's barely hidden insecurities and overblown egos to dry up any chemistry. We don't need to build imaginary walls too.
Religion is born of a good story, at first offering hope to the poor and the forgotten. With some maturity, it becomes heralded as the new light by those in search of power, than becomes dogmatized, usually through blood and with some luck (like Christianity in Rome) gains supremacy over the land .
Yet even at it's peak, cracks fissure at the edge and the end appears on the horizon just as the new religious establishment celebrates it's moral superiority.
Just like the Roman empire, this old religion is eventually taken over by a new belief, pitched by the new power hungry looking to become the new establishment.
So the most interesting parts to explore are those of the transition where a religious conservative has standing to say that bible was what made him hard working and humble, points that we can agree on.
And this piety can be credibly reconciled with the ideas of progressive science, where one knows how crazy the universe can be and is actually eager to see evidence of something extra ordinary - that science cannot yet explain.
When both people are right, or at least justified in their arguments, conflicting ideologies and the resources their require will be settled by politicians, but with enough kindling in the fire and strong enough wind as we see from the hard right and left today, the whole super structure of society will be pushed to the brink. Like a temple at Burning Man.
Will American Christian right see the virtue of their believes as one of the pillars that makes for the great spirit of this country. Or will they, out of spite (just like the left can) ignore a path to a compromise and say, "Let it burn.", hoping to rebuild a country from the embers in their image..
The pope today seems to get it. May be he can slow the decline of his flock by another 50 years or so and teach some sensibilities to the crazies in our back yard.
My upbringing accepts to the idea of heaven, but my everyday reality rejects celestial beings looking over us.
I was born into an Eastern Orthodox family and attended church as a kid. My parents felt the religious pressure from their direct lineage (grandpa was a priest) but left me the choice on the matter.
As a child, given the right church on the right day, with its glistening yellow and blue onion domes reaching for the sky, I wondered about who created the sky and the wind and other things more timeless than my parents, the country and the politicians.
As a young, impressionable person, I felt something emanating from the elderly Russians as they humbly and passionately asked for God to save them from the ongoing misery they often endured. As I grew older, learned basic science and became more reflective, the religious stirrings left me.
Today, it’s safe to say that I’m spiritual. I’d love to see evidence of something divine, but it’s hard to buy the dominant doctrines given that they think the world is 12,000 years old and treat women like objects.
Extremism puts the principles of the perpetrators under a microscope, as people try to understand the underlying motivations. And if you logic fails in common sense, you lost me.
