Carl,
So, what prompted me to say what I did was that you do, periodically, make
pronouncements about the foolishness of belief in a personal deity. And
sometimes, you make those comments in response to Mustafa who, clearly, has a
different view on the matter from your's. I never had a religious education. My
parents were nominally Jewish, which meant that they celebrated "the high
holidays", and sort of celebrated Passover, but not according to the whole
tradition. So I never had a dramatic journey from belief to non belief. Perhaps
that is why I don't feel the need to counter arguments for the existence of God
with arguments in opposition to the existence of God. I did, as I've mentioned
before, go through a thought process, probably when I was in college, when I
formalized my own position on religion. However, given my social work education
which involved courses on human behavior, I've never considered religion to be
the major cause of human dysfunction, just as I've never considered our
economic system to be the basic cause of human dysfunction. Rather, I see both
as expressions of how people function. But it does seem to me that
institutions, once they have been formed, have a life of their own. A
government is not the same as the individuals who are part of it. Take Obama
out of the Presidency, and he won't be planning the assassination of people
every week.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2019 11:22 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Discussions about Religion
Miriam wrote in part:
..."Carl may never stop wanting to make amends for having been an Evangelical
Christian in the past."
Sometimes, Miriam, I think that you have a Devilish sense of humor.
When I was young, I proudly exclaimed to one and all that I never spent time or
energy regretting my past activities...or lack thereof.
But I really do have some regrets. And I would undo some hurts that my
behavior caused others. And I would go back, if I could, and do some of the
things for which I did not have the courage to do. But my many religious
experiences, like my many political experiences, and my many love affairs(many
of them imagined), all contributed to who I am today.
My past is just that, My Past! And I make no judgements on what or
how I behaved or thought. But there are things in my past that I do
not talk about, but which are just as much a part of who I am today, but of
which I would strike from my Life's Experiences. I still fight my own Goblins
and Bogymen, and would hang my head in shame if they were exposed. And yet, as
I say, they are also part of 83 plus years of living and experiencing that has
given me a grand trip through life.
It's true that I become a bit rabid at times when on the subject of religion.
But religion is just one thread woven into our human fabric.
But it is a thread that has strong influences on the entire fabric of Life.
After my days as a small child in Sunday School, learning about Jesus, Santa
Claus, the 3 Wise Men and a special woman who had God's baby, and the tooth
fairy, and the Easter Bunny, I left any doings with religion until I married my
first wife. I was 25, and she was 22. She was a Christian, and insisted that
I should attend church services every Sunday, morning and evening, and midweek
Bible study.
I took this on in the same way I've taken on every new facet of my life. I
began to explore and to question. At some point I became certain that most
people in our congregation were only paying lip service, and were not true
Believers. So I decided to find out what Belief was all about. I was
baptized, and gave myself over to Jesus Christ. I accepted the existence of
God, and the Holy Spirit. I attended a "full gospel" group, and spoke in
tongues and had visions.
It was an interesting time, with some unexplained happenings. But I never
found God. I did find many honest Believers who said they had met God, but I
also met many phonies and Users. After nearly ten years, I came to understand
that God was a feeling. Those who gave themselves over to that Feeling never
questioned it, and believed it would carry them to a higher place after their
life on Earth. While I totally respect those people who are "True Believers",
I could not resolve the many contradictions, let alone the many versions that
caused more strife in the world than it resolved. As I questioned others, the
answer was the same, although expressed in many different ways. I must
"trust". I was told that God moves in mysterious ways...I won't go into all
the events that led up to my leaving the Christian Faith, but suffice it to say
that I knew that I had to be true to myself. I could not simply trust. And to
try to sneak along on someone else's trust, well that would never work.
But the entire experience was valuable. My wife and I separated, not over
religion, butt because she could not adjust to living with a blind man. While
I was in Rehab, learning to go forward with my life, she was alone, seeing her
dreams shattered, and no one was there to lead her through to the other side.
We did marriage counseling through a Christian Counselor. Finally I moved out.
Those were hard times, leaving my daughter behind. But my wife and I did come
to resolve our personal hurt, and stayed friends until her death many years
later. Christianity worked for my first wife. As she aged she developed
Diabetes, cancer, and congestive heart failure, but her Faith never wavered.
How you, Miriam, or Roger or Mostafa deal with your Faith has to be an
individual, very personal matter. And frankly, how I feel about it should not
matter to anyone else. But it is this willingness to trust in some unknown
Power, without question, that concerns me. Until we can openly discuss and
question why we behave the way we do, and how our beliefs effect Life on Earth,
we will continue to make the same foolish mistakes over and over until we are
no more.
Carl Jarvis
On 3/5/19, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I would like to make a neutral observation. The discussions regarding
religion that have taken place among Roger, Carl, and Mustafa, do not
lead to mutual understanding or resolution of issues. Rather, they
appear to be experienced by Mustafa as attacks upon a central tenet of
his life, an important part of his identity, and thus, he attacks
back. While Roger sees these discussions as rational debate, and Carl
sees them as open discussion of personal views, Mustafa does not.
Mustafa is not going to stop believing in his faith. Roger is not
going to stop wanting to prove over and over again that he is the more
rational of the two and that his position is correct. Carl may never
stop wanting to make amends for having been an Evangelical Christian in the
past.
Miriam
