"The Answer to All Your Troubles."

[Friedrich]

"Come hither, my boy, and tell me what thou seest there."
"A fool tangled in a religious snare."
--WILLIAM BLAKE.



It is 8:30 A.M. on a workday and I'm sitting at my usual table at the Starbucks on Broadway and 108th Street in Manhattan, not far from "Labyrinth" books and the local university campus. I am the kind of guy you wouldn't notice -- which is fine by me, since it is easier to observe others when they don't see YOU. I am wearing the uniform of the urban graduate student or young faculty member: light blue shirt, faded khaki pants, sensible shoes, messenger bag. I look like I can use a haircut and I seem to be sporting the regulation unshaven chin. My glasses are the tiny and rectangular type that might be taken to signal my vaguely European-Leftist sympathies, as does my peace button and the faded "Amnesty International" patch on my bag. I am sipping some designer coffee and reading the "Times," minding my own business, when I notice a guy who comes into the coffee shop and hands out flyers to the sleepy-eyed and eager beavers alike, as they stand on line for their morning brews.

It is not unusual in this city to have people hand you pamphlets (religious, political, commercial, as the case may be) at intersections or other public places, so I take it in stride when the guy -- who seems equally non-descript and is bound to be a postgraduate in philosophy -- strolls up to me and hands me one of these "advertisements." Before discussing this advertisement, it may be worthwhile to quote the entire text:

"Do you have feelings of lonelyness, or a sense of guilt and fear deep inside your heart?"

I am sufficiently intrigued by the headline to keep reading.

"Do you ever wonder about the purpose of life?"

Yes, on occasion.

"Many people are trying to find answers to these feelings. [I wonder whether we need to find "answers" to "feelings."] THE ANSWER TO YOUR PROBLEMS IS MISS ANDREWS -- READER AND ADVISOR. The religious holy woman [and] healer, God's messenger who guarantees to heal the sick and ailing, to remove all suffering and bad luck from your body. She will call your enemies by name and tell you who to keep away from. [I'm pretty good at figuring that much out for myself.] She is a religious woman who will show you with your own eyes how she will remove sorrow, sickness and pain, and all bad luck. What your eyes see, your heart must believe. The touch of her hand will heal you. She has God-given power to heal by prayer. Are you sick? Are you suffering? Do you have bad luck?"

"See this gifted lady today and be rid of them. She guarantees to reuinte the separated and solemnly swears to heal the sick, and help all who come to her. She will remove the evil spirits."

There follows an address and telephone number and (yes, you guessed it!) a website too.

In the middle of New York city, in the twenty-first century, this obvious fraud is able to prey on the gullible and stupid, which is probably most of us. She is clearly "capitalizing" -- in every sense of the word -- on the naive human hope that "spirits" and "magic" may be real, and may operate in human affairs. She is making money off of people's desire to re-establish connections with loved-ones who have passed away, usually so as to assuage their own guilt.

I wonder how many of my fellow sophisticated Manhattanites, in their power suits, wielding tiny cell phones, with wires dangling out of their ears, carrying very flat laptops in very flat attache cases, regularly consult Ms. Andrews. After all, Nancy Reagan liked to call on her astrologer and look at how far she got her "Ronny."

This "gotham soothsayer" (I couldn't resist that line, but any headline writer for the "Post" is welcome to use it) can afford to pay for an office on Broadway and, very likely, the Mercedes parked in front of it. But then, is there much difference between her customers and the people crowding into the local Synagogue, Mosque or Church to seek comfort and understanding, yet only to find the silence and indifference of a God who is, if not dead, at least on a very long vacation? If there is a difference, then what is it? How would I define it? What is religion? Why do people need it?

My feelings on this subject have shifted somewhat in recent years. I have gone from an utter and complete hostility to religious belief and suppressed contempt for anyone who expressed even mildly religious feelings, to a certain respectfulness in my attitude towards religious believers and belief. In what follows, I wish to ask what religion is about, but also why we need it, if we do, and whether we can do without it.

Why are we, as a species, burdened with this common instinct to suspend disbelief and disregard the powers of reason in a seemingly futile effort to fill the universe with magical forces and/or God or gods? Will we ever outgrow this "childishness" (Freud)? Is it childishness? Does it distract us from the worldly concerns with social justice (Marx) that should occupy us? Is it merely a way of disguising envy and hatred (Nietzsche) under a cloak of "concern" and "love"? These doubts expressed by the thinkers called the "Masters of Suspicion" by Paul Ricoeur, have now become pervasive in Western culture. Everyone is a bit cynical about religion now. Should we be?

For most educated Westerners, even if they are too polite to say it, the "gotham soothsayer" and the Pope are on roughly the same level, and so is the local rabbi or muslim cleric or the used car salesperson. In the words of my landlord, "They're all full of shit."

I am aware that there are contemporary scientific accounts of reality that are compatible with religious belief. I know that important scientists have held religious tenets. Highly intelligent and articulate people hold religious views and are accounted among the faithful. I am sometimes (and I use the word deliberately and ironically) "mystified" by this: Do such people believe all the mythical stuff? The "little star in Bethlem" kind of stuff? They can't. Not at this point in history. Do they have to? What does one have to believe to be religious?

I am beginning to think that actual belief in the myths is not required.

If religion is merely reflective of the knowledge that any sensitive person has, eventually, that life is fleeting and transitory, that each of us is involved in something infinitely greater than him- or herself and much more important than any of us can ever hope to be individually; and most of all, that each person's life is somehow connected to every other person's story -- if these sorts of insights are what religion is really "about," then its basis is merely "psychological," so that even if all of this mystical insight is true, this says nothing about the universe per se.

The problem with this conclusion is, of course, that science is also merely "psychological" too; it reveals a world or an empirical reality that is only "phenomenal," that is, science can only tell us about reality as apprehended by creatures with our cognitive faculties in a way amenable to handling by us. There are, according to some theories, as many as eleven dimensions, but this notion is literally incomprehensible to us because it is inconceivable by us, it cannot be "pictured" by beings with our kinds of minds, which accounts for many of our difficulties with grasping quantum mechanics. We think in images and metaphors, in stories, and the universe may be far too protean and complex an entity, too difficult a story, to be graspable by our limited faculties in its own terms. At best, we get a fragmented and distorted image in our stories, in our theories and our science, in our cosmologies -- even in our arts.

I know that I will die. People I love will die. Pain will be part of my life always. I know that much of this makes no rational or moral sense. I know that I cannot change the most important things in my life, the deck of cards that I have been given, but I can change much and must strive every day, in what is perhaps a losing effort, to do just that.

I sense the horror of so many human lives, the presence of evil and its effects in the world. I also feel elated sometimes. Among other occasions, for instance, when I walk into this Starbucks in the morning and get a smile from the young woman behind the counter with the beautiful eyes and perfect breasts, suddenly life is worth living. Mozart's music balances the news from Iraq, but in the end everything adds to the bewilderment: Why be elated or sad? Does any of it really matter in the absence of subjects to whom it may matter? If not, does that matter?

Nothing I have read on this subject has stayed with me like George Santayana's phrase that religion is the "love of life in the consciousness of impotence." If religion is a balm for our wounds and disappointments in life and if the danger of intolerance that can result from religious belief can be offset by the message of love and acceptance conveyed by most religious ethics, then perhaps ALL of the great religions may be said to be "true," at least according to a pragmatist conception of truth, because they serve human purposes -- despite their frankly mythic or poetic nature, exactly as scientific theories do.

Is it possible, then, to "love life in the consciousness of impotence"?
_________________
"I hope that you will be ..." Augustine.

[Suburbanite]

you tell a good story

[orgaelin]

He does tell a good story, and asks some good questions... rather a lot of them too!

Friedrich, I know you mentioned you are a writer, but in what capacity? Fact/fiction? I would say it is clear you're a Times reader, but you clearly have an ability which would lend itself to fiction.

When you opened the scene in this post, I liken what you did to what a charicature artist does: you notice the smallest details in a scene and amplify them to bring a sense of familiarity to the picture.

OK, that's enough complimenting!

I did strongly disagre with this statement:

She is making money off of people's desire to re-establish connections with loved-ones who have passed away, usually so as to assuage their own guilt.

Actually it's more the latter half of it that I disliked, the first part is probably correct!

I really don't think that a significant number of people want to contact their lost loved ones as a result of wanting to free themselves of guilt. It would be a very pessimistic world if that numbered highest on our priorities.

I know guilt is a tough subject, mostly because people spend all their time looking for outward cures and not realising that guilt is a self-created condition with only self-creatable solutions.

But for me, watching someone like John Edward on stage (on TV) it seems people just want to know their loved ones are ok, and that they still exist. Sure a number of people like to hear "I'm glad you're happy with the new love in your life" rather than "You unfaithful son of a...", but for most it is much, much more than that.

"love life in the consciousness of impotence"?

Perhaps that's the best way to go about it? I mean, I myself spend a great deal of time looking for 'something' without knowing what it is. I know it is some aspect of life, something that is always just beyond the horizon. It's an answer to my questions in some way.

But the philosophies I have studied from others seem to suggest that we only really find what we're looking for when we stop trying so hard. Effectively, when we give up in the face of our self-evident impotence.

Thus if we did stop trying to fing answers, and accept our 'impotence', we might find a new love for life that we never would have found because we were looking too hard.

[Gorgo]

Belief in god(s), etc., is an expression of the belief that life is not (we are not) good enough as it is (we are), we have to create fantasies that give it (us) worth.

We can love life in the consciousness of impotence because there is no one to give us a test at the end. Impotence itself is irrelevant, as is the idea of self-worth. Life just is.

Religion is a denial of reality, not a love of reality.

[Friedrich]

Thank you all for the comments and compliments. Yes, I have written and do want to write fiction, but I am working on a book about evil at the moment (I'm about half-way through), and cannot turn to the novel I've planned until it is finished.

[Inquisitor]

Friedrich, the woman whose pamphlets lead eventually to your rather entertaining post is simply a witch and as such is an enemy of human kind. Obviously her customers are witches and sorcerers. Speaking in scientific terms to which you are more accustomed, they are biologically negative people ( degenerates) possesed by evil spirits ( mental disorders ). To a true Christian, she and her clients ( willing servants of devil ) are much more dangerous than someone like you ( person with disable soul unable to believe).

She is clearly "capitalizing" -- in every sense of the word -- on the naive human hope that "spirits" and "magic" may be real, and may operate in human affairs.

Naive? Lets assume that evil spirits are simply mental disorders, would you not agree that such evil spirits can indeed have a very real impact on human affairs?

[/quote] Do such people believe all the mythical stuff? The "little star in Bethlem" kind of stuff? They can't. Not at this point in history. Do they have to? What does one have to believe to be religious?

What about "this point in history"? Is the fact that being religious is unfashionable changes anything? Because if you refer to advances in science, then you must be aware that no science has managed to disprove existence of god, no science has managed to even disprove a single event described in the Bible for that matter.

In what follows, I wish to ask what religion is about, but also why we need it, if we do, and whether we can do without it.

I am afraid this question is way too general. What religion are we talking about? Islam? Judaism? or Christianity? Being a religios muslim would mean that you have to pray 5 times a day. Being a religios jew would mean that you hate Christians and other goyim. Being a religios Christian would mean that you accept the truth and acquire courage to seek it and face it.

Why are we, as a species, burdened with this common instinct to suspend disbelief and disregard the powers of reason in a seemingly futile effort to fill the universe with magical forces and/or God or gods? Will we ever outgrow this "childishness" (Freud)? Is it childishness? Does it distract us from the worldly concerns with social justice (Marx) that should occupy us? Is it merely a way of disguising envy and hatred (Nietzsche) under a cloak of "concern" and "love"? These doubts expressed by the thinkers called the "Masters of Suspicion" by Paul Ricoeur, have now become pervasive in Western culture. Everyone is a bit cynical about religion now. Should we be?
[quote]

Interesting authorities you use. Freud - homosexual, Marx - human hater, Nietzsche - mentally ill. Don't you find it interesting that anti religios feelings are often associated with mental pathologies?

Now, let me explain what religion is for me personally. In few words it is supreme freedom, freedom from fear.

[Friedrich]

Inquisitor:

Thank you for the ... uh, "interesting" remarks. Please forgive me, but I have to get back to the planet earth now.

[Technosoul]

You might have added the webpage link you mentioned. As most Miss Andrews are that of the famous Julie Andrews who often stars in plays in New York.

I would however like to post one link (of many) for Mr Andrews, the leading expert on alternative medicine.

http://www.tranceformation.com/trance.mv?ARTID=drweil

As a real doctor and likewise being a educated authority on all kinds of medience he once investigated a large number of althernative healers around the globe, from Amazon bush shamans to high tech people and of course modern religions of very faith.

His investigation would quickly weed out the fakes from the ones who could heal people. As he would test the people before and after they visited the faith healer.

In his last chapter he made his conclusions.

He found that belief was a major factor, that having full confidence in the person conducting the healing played a key role in attainting the result expected. He also discovered that the "newer" the cure was the better it worked. In other words if someone came up with a new way to get that miricale he would heal more people then if the belief had been around and known about for a long time. As if over time the belief would start to become stale and less effective.

He has written a large number of books and has appeared on a lot of TV shows and so forth.

It sort of falls in line with the idea that if you believe you can overcome a major problem your chances improve greatly then if you have doubts or are prone to giving up.

During the 1980s and early 1990s I spent much of my computer time at Spiritweb which was then the number one webpage for alternative religions and they had chat rooms, forums, and links for all kinds of information. This webpage was closed down a while back because the originator no longer wanted to maintain it. (retired).

http://home.tiscali.nl/gibbon/spiritweb.htm

The point being is I got to know some of the phycics on a personal bases and not relative to busness. They do not view their services as ripping people off but believe that energy must have returned energy and so paying is simply an exchange of time for time. You would not expect a plumber to fix your kitchen sink for free, and if you want some spiritual repair work you should not expect someone to do that for free, it is just how the system works nowadays. Everyone must make a living (pay bills, buy food) at their occupation, it is not a hobby.

Notice that people pay much more for Starbuck coffee because they are sold on the idea that it is new, it is the in-thing to drink, and because they mask the taste with many options. But it is still a drug that we use as a stemulent. I never really fell for that new "spiritual" concept for coffee so I just buy the normal stuff and get a whole can of make-it-your self coffee that can last all week for the price of just one cup of their deceptive coffee.

Technosoul.

[orgaelin]

Technosoul, you're brilliant!

I wonder if you know/knew my brother from Spiritweb? His name (online) is Arkanon.

[Friedrich]

Thanks again everyone for the comments. (I like the "CAFE MOCHA" at $3.95 a pop.) I am about to get a caffeine hit right now.

[castille]

Inquisitor, you live up to your name. You talk like Adolf Hitler at a book BBQ.

Hey, you would've made a great Spanish torturer in 1492!

[Technosoul]

Originally posted by orgaelin, Technosoul, you're brilliant! I wonder if you know/knew my brother from Spiritweb? His name (online) is Arkanon.

The name rings a bell, but cannot recall any details of conversations with him. I used the same nickname as here, but at that chatroom you could log on with any nickname once you signed up. So I also used other nicknames for my other alter egos. Such as RainDance, Jesus, and for fun... Pat Robotson.

I did most of my talking at the Stonehenge Chat Room.

Technosoul.

[Inquisitor]

Inquisitor: Thank you for the ... uh, "interesting" remarks. Please forgive me, but I have to get back to the planet earth now.

Jn 3:12 If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?

The point is I spoke about witches and sorcerers in scientific terms.

Inquisitor, you live up to your name. You talk like Adolf Hitler at a book BBQ. Hey, you would've made a great Spanish torturer in 1492!

So who exactly do you compare me with? Adolph Hitler? I have no respect for him or his doctrine. He was a global patsy used by satanic forces.

A spanish inquisitor? I have respect for these people for they were truly people of faith. However it is wrong for Church to exterminate biological evil. This is a task for earthly government ( providing of course this government cares for its subjects). As to torture, there is no torture I can inflict on a mortal body which even mildly compares to the suffering of heretic's immortal soul.

[Technosoul]

So now are you guys talking about eternal suffering in hell for not believing?

One of the names for hell came about because they also used that name for the city dump outside of town. A phyiscal place for dumping garbage and the unwanted shafts of the wheat crops, they had a large pit dug and they would dump stuff in it, they would then have a fire in the pit to destroy the unwanted garbage.

So they used the city dump and that burning pit as an anology for making a point. Which has nothing to do with afterlife punishments or rewards.

Allow me to try to explain this the best that I can.

Our mind is the womb in which the seeds of truth are planted, we labour with those ideas and in due season can give birth to the ideas - in our words. If the mind is as pure as a virgin our words are of a virgin birth because they were not implanted by anyone worldly person. The "word" is the child of the indwelling spirit of truth. Aka - the revelation. And anyone can be the bride (male or female because it is not related to our physical body but related to the mind as being the womb, or the soil, which is planted and later harvested.

If however the seeds fall into a mind that is not good soil then the tree of life (the idea and the words) cannot take root and grow and be birthed into the world outside as "knowledge".

As the word is harvested we seperate the good parts from the useless parts, and we keep and consume the good parts, and the usless part we simply send it out with the garbage (into the round file - or over to "butterface" aka - hell).

However because of certain missunderstandings some people thought the masters were talking about the physical body burning in the pit instead of comprehending the philosophy of the riddle, and/or that book burning is a good idea if we think the contents are useless for advocating our point of view.

So, can anyone pick up on any of those clues?

technosoul.

[orgaelin]

Technosoul, I wonder if your metaphor might work even better if you worked in the idea of weeds? I mean, we can get bad ideas, like weeds, in our minds and they choke out all sense of reason (good seeds) and lead to people being like Inquisitor!

[castille]

No, I think Inquisitor is an evil spiritual entity created by a dark god who wants to destroy the world. I'll go get my long sword +1.

[orgaelin]

Castille, you're right. Either that or he's just completely insane... or he really could be Hitler reborn. Tough call isn't it?

[orgaelin]

Friedrich, I don't know if you're still following this post after its total divergeance from the original subject...

But I wanted to ask you more about your book(s)... you're writing a book about evil? What's your slant? Would I want to read it?

I also wanted to ask you about the process that goes on in your head when you 'create' a scene. Do you use a real memory? What makes you pick out one detail over another? How is it you turn a picture into a sentence so well?!

[Friedrich]

Iquisitor:

When you're right, you're right.

"A truth ceases to be a truth when more than one person believes in it."

--Oscar Wilde.

Is this true?