h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

OK, I want to get this 'out there' because it's tearing me up, and these are the sort of thoughts obsessively churning around in my head at this time of the year. I wrote a bit about it on Dmitri's thread, but I don't want to be too 'negative' there. And the thing is, I am not a negative person ... I try to see the good as much as I can. I HAVE TO do that to counter the mental problem that I have, which is that I tend to paranoia. I might have been born with a tendency towards that, but I was also made that way. Now that I am that way I try and counter it as much as I can ... but still ... there are problems that seem to be completely insoluble ... of the 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' variety.

And this thing about Christianity is one of them. I am trying to be as tolerant as I can ... but that is the very problem, for in tolerating one group it seems I am forced to be intolerant of another. So I must either do that thing of simultaneously having incompatible beliefs ... or I must make a choice towards one side or another.

Now I actually do my damnedest to make the 'incompatible beliefs' thing work. I am like the White Queen in Alice through the Looking Glass: I try and get myself to believe six impossible things before breakfast. To a degree I succeed because I don't actually know anything with 100% certainty. So, in many cases, there are two or three or four or more things that all actually might be the case. So, to a degree I believe all of them with equal certainty or uncertainty. But still ... there are limits. And trying to believe too many things leads to cognitive dissonnance ... you end up ripping your own mind to shreds. And you *need* a mind that is in some sort of working order ... at least, so it seems to me. This is one point I can't get past ... even though many people seem to function fine without minds that work right. Again, that's just how it seems to me ... but heck, *I* need my mind to work as well as possible ... with a natural limitation on my mental functioning I need every bit that I *can* get to work, to work as well as possible.

That brings me to choosing sides. This is something I am rather disinclined to do. One thing I do believe with greater certainty than almost anything else, is that we humans are all in the same boat so to speak. We face life on Earth with plenty challenges. The last thing we need is to make things harder for each other. I am therefore on everybody's side. This is only fair. We all deserve happiness - as much as we can get. We can *help* each other to be happy - or at least happier. The worst evil I can think of is anything at all that we do to detract from each other's happiness. This is another thing I just can't get past.

And of course, if we criticise each other it can detract from our happiness. But we can criticise each other *for* doing *other* things that make others (or even ourselves) unhappy. Unnecessarily, I mean. Sometimes things we do inevitably make others unhappy but still we cannot do otherwise. We therefore have to think about what is possible and what is practical as well. We also must conceive as broadly as possible what constitutes happiness. But still. Sometimes people do horrendous things to others ... sometimes to themselves ... and then I say we can give fair criticism. And we can also *take* fair cricitism. As an artist, I *expect* criticism and I deal with it in what I think is a rational manner. So I know it can be done.

Criticism is not condemnation. It is suggesting alternatives. 'Maybe this will work better ... if you like, try it.' This is the spirit in which I criticise. But people who make a big thing out of condemnation, do not understand it that way.

Making a big thing out condemnation could either be to be in 'constant condemnation mode' yourself, or to think that everything that is not praise and approval is condemnation.

I stand for the middle ground where that is concerned. I will not approve everything, but neither is my disapproval of anything total. I recognise that I am fallible and my judgments are therefore not absolute. They are relative ... taking into account my full life experience, my ponderings and musings, my education, my imagination, and my intuitions and gut feelings for whatever they are worth. Included in the latter is a basic sense for right and wrong, a sense of empathy and justice.

Right now. So confronted with groups with different beliefs and practices, I try to look at them as fairly as possible, and with as much empathy as possible. And really, looking at different groups of people: all have their strengths, all have their weaknesses. Now most of the time I have my private judgements and these I keep rigorously to myself. I am willing to tolerate what I see as wrongs if these are not excessive because *I* might be wrong about them and they might be right after all. So it is only when wrongs are really glaring and especially when they cause suffering to others that I feel an urge to speak up.

And this brings us to this whole religious conflict thing. My country is conservative protestant Christian ... something like 80% of the country's people will describe themselves that way. And this causes real problems for the other 20%. But even more, this particular religious view has problems that, I believe, gravely harm the very people that hold them. So I really would like to be able to give advice and criticism for everyone's sake ... but that is a HUGE problem, because simply by having a different opinion, I am demonised.

Now: my problem is NOT with Christianity per se. It is with a particular interpretation of Christianity ... and it matters not if in any country this is a majority or minority view. What matters is that it is twisted. And it results in twisted minds. And HEAPS of injustice.

This particular kind of Christian fundamentalism - that is what it is - is not really traditional Christianity, though it thinks it is. It is a kind of reactionary religion that only came to the fore in recent years or even centuries when certain Christian groups started to believe they were coming under serious threat from various directions, and went into 'defense mode' or even 'war mode' (since attack is supposedly the best kind of defense). The 'enemy' could be liberalism, humanism, communism, socialism, 'alternative' sexual mores, other religions - or atheism, science, environmentalism, or all of these and some others thrown into the mix as well. In defense ... or in attack ... a 'bulwark' of rigid dogma is created, that has to be an impregnable fortress of certitude - nothing else will do. And the 'Word of God' becomes a sword with which to attack and destroy.

Now backtrack to the founding of Christianity. My own view - flawed as it may be: Jesus really existed, he was a man, and importantly, a man who challenged religious traditions of his time - a non-conformist - who nevertheless did not totally wish to overthrow religion, but to cut out dead wood and to return to something purified, simpler, that made more sense. He also did suggest some truly revolutionary changes. He might very well have referred to himself as the Son of God, or even identified himself with God. That is not so strange as for instance C.S. Lewis would make it ... it is perfectly possible that a good religious teacher might say those things while actually being human. Personally *one* of my 'possible' beliefs is that we are all incarnations of God, only most of us don't realise it, while some of us are more aware and in touch with our deeper divine natures. So a particularly holy man could come along every now and then and proclaim himself to be the Son of God, or an incarnation of God, without being dangerously insane ... also without being a megalomaniac or egomaniac. It is perfectly possible that such a man could at the same time be a humble man.

So: Jesus - in my view - was a religious teacher, who was just a bit too radical and consequently evoked the ire of the traditional religious authorities and also the Roman Empire which did not want the status quo upset too much. So he was executed as a troublemaker and a warning to others.

When that happened to their beloved teacher, many of his followers might conceivably have been so traumatized that they came up with the idea of him having been resurrected. That he really was God and miraculously conquered death. That would have made his execution more easy to ‘handle’ for them. The rest of the dogma around Jesus could have followed from that idea. It is fairly certain that initially there was not all that dogma that later was woven as the official doctrine of the Church. I am personally a bit miffed at the ‘Apostle’ Paul for his role in constructing the ‘Jesus mythology’.

Now I cannot say for certain that the thing did not happen exactly as the accepted Bible says. But I somehow think it didn’t. Somehow I think Jesus was really a man, like the rest of us … with or without a divine nature, depending on whether any or all of us have that or not. And … if he was just a man … then making him that kind of Son of God is a travesty and betrayal of the real man that he was … his real teachings … and also the significance of his real death.
Because if he was not God in that particular way … then he did what he did with whatever we all have, and also lacking whatever it is that we all lack. He had stood up against religious and imperial authorities without divine knowledge, certainty and power. If he was the miracle-working omnipotent Son of God, then everything would somehow have been infinitely easier for him. Even his death. All the pain and humiliation would have been there since he was fully human … but his divine nature, amongst which is being all-knowing, would have been his guarantee: he would suffer for a short while but then he would rise from the dead and demonstrate his true divinity, would vanquish all his enemies, ultimately, in a divine show of power. But a human being going through that … goes through it with a terrible fragility, powerlessness, helplessness and uncertainty. A real human could even believe in the immortal soul … but would never know that with complete certainty, would never have the guarantee that things would turn out all right after all. For a mere human it would just be horrible death followed by personal extinction and no idea if it was all for nothing or what would happen after. (I am now disregarding the idea of an afterlife … we can never know that with complete certainty, and even if there is an afterlife it could be anything of a great many different possibilities. It is really a very, very ideal sort of afterlife that would allow you to be miraculously restored to life in your own body as the same person with all your memories and more so – now being completely divine, immortal, indestructible and all-powerful. If *that* happened to you after your death, whatever you went through previous to that point, hardly seems to count. If Jesus was just a man, then he did not have that, or the prospect of it, the consolation of it, while he actually suffered on the cross.
So: if Jesus was ‘just’ a man, then seeing him as that kind of God, is actually a betrayal … detracting from what he really did and went through.
But I don’t even have that big an issue with that. If people want to believe Jesus was/is God … fine. Like I said, I grant that in a way it might have indeed been true.
But there’s another aspect. Jesus taught people. He told them specific things. If he only existed to die for us on the cross … then why did he insist on trying to teach people things besides that … giving them advice on how to live righteously? If he just came to take our deserved punishment upon himself … he might as well have skipped all that. And this is one thing I find particularly jarring: how Jesus, in the church that worships him as the one and true God, is not considered in his teaching capacity. His teachings become a minor matter. His ‘blessed are the …’ speeches simply become nice things he said. It’s not so important that we actually live like he recommended. In fact these churches most strenuously object to the very idea of Jesus having been a moral teacher. If he was just a man … then he was merely spouting platitudes. (So … the content of what he said is not profound in itself, since whether it is meaningful or not depends on whether he was God or not.) Most important is that we believe in the overarching ultimate significance of his death on the cross.
This need for ‘belief’ of Jesus dying for us as the supreme factor, also becomes weird in the light of all the other things we are also supposed to believe. We must believe, not so much everything the Bible says, as everything the Bible supposedly says as condensed into a particular official Church dogma. There is a profound strangeness in the double-aspect of belief, namely Christ as our Saviour (the only supposed vitally necessary belief) but also the immense mountain of teachings necessary to give the context and significance for his martyrdom by which he saves us. And those teachings also differ tremendously between different fundamentalist Christian groups all of whom posit the supremacy of belief in Christ as our Saviour.
And the focus on Belief becomes so total that in the end what we actually do is of no consequence. In the church in which I was raised, it is a heresy to even suggest we try to justify ourselves with good deeds. Even if we said, ‘we must do good deeds because they are nice to do,’ it would get interpreted as heretical justification by deeds. In the eyes of this church we are all corrupt beyond redemption no matter what we do or try to do. Now *supposedly* we can only AFTER being ‘reborn’ – which means acknowledging that Christ saved us – and even this is not a personal act but a working of the Holy Spirit inside us, completely independent of our own corrupt inner wills – be capable of good deeds, which we should do as a form of gratitude for being saved. But they are not necessary at all. Good deeds are, however, seen as a proof of having been reborn after the fact … but there is again something profoundly strange in that non-Christians are seen to be capable of doing good deeds, but this not having any significance at all: they are still not reborn, not reformed, not filled with the spirit of God, not saved, going to Hell.
OK I had no idea this was going to become this long. Again I think I’ll continue this in a next posting … but for now, can you understand the strange confusion around fundamentalist religion? Again, I stress that I am not against Christianity per se. I will I hope talk a little about the various instances and interpretations of Christianity in different times and places over the last 2000 years …
… but for now there’s also this: Everything I say here counts for nothing except merely marking me as a Child of the Devil, to these people to whom my greatest achingest yearning is to try and explain these things … there is this awesome massive futility to it, this sense of slamming my whole being into a kind of irresistible Cosmic Wall … and yet, I think all these things and would so love to be able to express them to some of these people because I feel I am actually on their side and want them to know and do better, for their own and other people’s sakes.

What you're saying makes perfect sense to me, Willem. Which makes two of us, and we wear the same size tinfoil hat. Okay.

I would add: Those people are wrong about their own religion. 'Belief' is not what makes you a child of God. How could it? Then only the clever people would be children of God, because they understood something. How can you understand a reality you have not yet seen?

Faith's not the same thing as making up a set of stories to believe. Faith is trust, acting in good faith, putting yourself on the line. you can live faith and think you're an atheist.

Does anybody really think that they could get to go and live in a reality where goodness dwells, without wanting to be kind first?

Okay, keep going.

It makes sense to me too. It's the most sensible, and sensitive, post I've yet read on Christianity on this website.

Fundamentalism is a prison constructed by fear I think.

Waz

Here is one hopeful development of broadening one's outlook:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-16256171


The children are wonderful.

I get it, Willem, I really do. Been thinking about these things for my entire life. Ah yes, s'cuse me just pace round in circles. Pace pace pace. Just acknowledging right now. Back later with further thoughts, have to go write a Christmas piece about a plastic reindeer, a brokenhearted poet and some kind of essence mixed up with sparkles and white light. Like you do. Unless you don't.

Inspiring all. Thanks.

H

Hi folks and thanks for your comments! I see now that I missed something that should have gone on the list of ‘enemies’, namely feminism! Elektra, I am really worried about the children of this country (and this world) because there are wars for their hearts and minds, they are brainwashed with so many ideologies, so early in life they are taught who their enemies are!

I agree with you about faith, Dmitri. Faith to me means trusting in goodness, taking a chance and doing what’s right even if it doesn’t seem to be in your own selfish interests, having the courage to love others, hoping that things will turn out good and doing what you can to contribute to that.

I have atheist friends who are wonderful and try to do what they can, even though they don’t have much hope for the world and for humanity. But they have deep feelings and concepts that I would call religious. They are kind and have a reverence for life and living beings that one rarely finds in people who call themselves devoutly religious.

Waz, the thing is, I was a religious fundamentalist for about twenty years of my life. I can understand how people can succumb to it since it latches on to certain psychological aspects common to most people. Primarily, it’s the exhilaration of feeling knowledgeable and powerful in a very special way. You feel blessed, incredibly fortunate, a member of a spiritual Elite, because the Absolute Truth has been revealed to you. In my case I felt *too* blessed. I often struggled with God in prayer and asked why I should be saved and know all this when so many other peoples were in ignorance and were doomed. When I was so unworthy! My greatest yearning was to do what I could to demonstrate my gratitude to God every second of my life. I was very devout, very serious, very motivated.

And I guess this is how it is for many fundamentalists. They feel privileged and powerful, they feel blessed, and the certainty of their beliefs is a very potent motivational force. With this certainty you can go and powerfully spread your message with no doubts, with nothing at all holding you back. And you really care for the people out there. You feel it as an intense personal duty to spread the message and to save as many people as possible. I remember feeling personally responsible for helping others to the right Path and Way. SO many people were in ignorance; every person whom I could have saved but did not, going to Hell, was an incredible load on my conscience. It is literally like the world is an immense building on fire and you see these people before you and all around you and you want to help and save all of them but you are too weak, you can only save one or two, but your conscience will nag you for every single one you failed to save.

The trouble was, I was so convinced on one level, but there was a whole different world inside me that had loads of misgivings … and passionate as I felt, I never was able to bring it to the point of preaching to people and saving souls. When I started speaking with people who were not religious in the way that I was, I too quickly saw their point and stopped pushing mine.

But that is because I am unusually emphatic. Fundamentalists who are not like this, *will* push their points and sort of steamroller the other person with them. Whether this eventually works and results in ‘saving’ that person (from the fundamentalist’s point of view that is) is another matter.

Fundamentalists of every ilk are *human* beings and their convictions too are a result of common human psychology. It is just *nice* to feel knowledgeable and powerful, to feel that there is a God who is your personal friend and on your side and who is giving you His Spirit to protect you and to guide you all the way. You have enormous confidence that God is leading you right. You feel God is with you, you feel His presence, and you even believe He speaks to you. You believe the Holy Spirit is inside you and when you read the Bible, is teaching you exactly what it means and assuring you of its perfect divine correctness. You also feel this Spirit is helping you make the correct choices in your life. I know people who actually believe they can hear the Holy Spirit’s voice.

Again – I cannot say this is necessarily untrue. But having been like this … having been so certain … and then in a most horrendous way having realized that I was deluded … I can vouch that it *is* possible to think you are receiving messages from God *and* to be wrong about that. People who think they hear God’s voice should be very, very careful … and especially when that voice tells them to condemn and fight others.

That’s the fear aspect now. When you have this fantastic absolute pristine perfect Truth … anything, anything at all contradicting any aspect of it … anything detracting from it in the least way … becomes a threat, and not even something like the threat of global nuclear war. Far, far worse: a threat against people’s immortal souls. War, even war that wipes out all life on Earth, merely harms the body. But lies and falsehoods that can turn people away from God harms the immortal soul, causing it to end in eternal Hell! That is a calamity worse than the destruction of the entire Universe! A single soul that lands in Hell is a horror too awful to contemplate. That was what it was for me when I was a fundamentalist. That was the fear aspect. That is why this Truth had to be so vehemently defended. Even if some people were *outwardly* hurt by it. It was necessary for saving souls, for winning people to God. Every single falsehood and untruth was seen as coming from Satan with the express goal of causing the downfall of people. And there were SO many people in the world who were not on the right path! The fear was for *their* sakes. As a saved person, you never really feared for your own sake because God had chosen you and even if you were to be martyred most horribly, God would never let you go and you would be by His side after death.

The beautiful visions of bliss after death, the new Earth and Heaven, the new Jerusalem … being with all the saints of all the ages, with the angels, with Jesus and with God … where you can see them, speak with them, with no more worries and no more fears, just beauty and wonder and joy *forever* … is something of a potency that has to be experienced to be believed. And in your ordinary life, feeling the divine presence, being sure you can sense this Holy Spirit working in you … you felt you could do anything. It really is like a drug.

The thing is, my imagination gave me all of that. The teachings came alive and fused with my body and mind and infused my every experience.

If it was all good and harmless it would be OK. But it isn’t. This specific fundamentalism – due to its specific blind spots – does harm people, and seriously. It breeds feelings of elitism, excluding others. This fortress of certainty repulses people seen as attacking it; the fortified walls keep ‘enemies’ out but also keep ‘friends’ in … and they never get out and see what a beautiful, wonderful and varied world there is outside those walls.

And the enmity is unnecessary! Once you are willing to let go of this absolute certainty … it feels like a massive and monstrous loss … but then in uncertainty you are able to actually move forward and grow again and you realize it was actually a massive and monstrous burden on your shoulder that now is off. You realize people you thought to be your enemies actually have much in common with you and could equally well be your friends. You learn that ‘friends’ do not have to agree about everything. You find out you can actually respect their views and talk with them. You realize that the threat of eternal Hell hanging over everyone’s head all the time is a major downer. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be careful because there IS evil out there that we and others can fall prey to. But there is not so much of it … it is NOT the case that Satan rules the world and misleads everyone except for a handful of devout that’s faithful to God.

Fundamentalism can cut many ways. Another kind is atheist fundamentalism. The problem for me with that is that, again, people presume more than what they can know. I am pretty sure after all the experiences I’ve had, that there are strange forces in the world and that behind the concrete things we can see, there is a Bigger Order. But I still don’t know precisely what it is and how it works. I see that there is always a need for uncertainty and an acknowledgement of ignorance. There is very probably far, far more going on than what we, or contemporary science, knows about. But the real problem with fundamentalists is … whatever they believe, they are unwilling to hear out others with different beliefs. Communication being impossible, an impasse results and this paves the way for violent and unethical means being used to either convince or conquer the other.

I get you.

I grew up with the 'old-time religion', but without the fundamentalism. (Which was invented by somebody else, we think it was the Reformed Presbyterians.) Anyhow, I was raised to believe you didn't tell God his business. And you didn't believe you were particularly 'holy'.

When those fundementalists came in and took over 'my' church, I gave 'em hell. They threw me out. I went over to the Quaker meeting, and I don't miss those people. Let God sort 'em out.

He who loves is my brother, be he Muslim, Hindu, Zoroastrian, whatever.

Yay! . Ah yes. Its scary indeed. I was once sentenced to two thousand lifetimes of suffering, because I challenged the influential leader of a very scary cult, eye to eye, face to face, soul to soul. I wish I had taped it. I think I came out with some of my finest prose. heheh. I don't know what religion they were, it was sort of like a corrupted mishmash of many religions.

A few years ago a very brave soul, and former devotee, wrote a very uncompromising book about it all, once he finally got out. So I have company in Hell. heheh.

I hurt too much about it all. All if it. All the division, and cruelty and brainwashing.

What's that amazing Leonard Cohen line .. let's see ...

.... Leonard Cohen/Anthem

Wish I'd said that. heheh. Ah well.

cc