October 2005 Bookshelf
October brought me a very rewarding comparative religion series as well as Vonnegut's most recent series of essays, an introduction to nanotechnology, a good book on therapeutic boundaries for relationships, and a great book on the economic changes taking place in Asia.Sharing Sorrow with a Fallen Enemy
I beg of you and demand of myself a level of graciousness and a depth of desire for real solutions that has not previously always been a part of our political attitudes. The wrong thing to do now is to pour salt in the wound. A healthy political system has productive dialogue between people that disagree with each other but believe that in the act of wrestling with truth compromise shapes the best solutions. If we respond to the parts of the conservative movement that are angry and brittle with equally mean spirits, the opportunity to fashion real compromise and progress will diminish.Does Faith = Personality + Experience?
Within the question of God it becomes easier to see the role personality plays in belief. To reject the idea of a personal God requires someone willing to pull the curtain back on the Wizard of Oz. It is best to do this not as an angry person, because anger ultimately obscures our ability to see things clearly and to seek truth, regardless of whether or not it might be consistent with a way of life that we have found unhelpful or even hurtful. If you wish to begin this path, respectfully ask your fellow believers about their spiritual experiences; ask them about when they have felt God.Agnostic Obligations
Striking a balance in America is going to ride on the backs of two camps – religious liberals and moderates in conjunction with thinking rationalists and secularists. This is why in my own writing I have many occasions to apologize to my Christian friends for my own polemic tendencies. Many of my friends, specifically those who see truth in the Emergent movement, are those leaders who are honestly attempting to reconcile their faith with modernity. In what may become one of the more interesting phenomena of the next twenty years, the balance may only be found if moderate to liberal religious voices and secularists actively look to work together.So Now That We Understand Each Other
I am now ready to believe just about anything. Last Friday’s Bill Maher show on HBO proved to me that the apocalypse does in fact draw nigh: I agreed with almost everything Anne Coulter had to say about President Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers. Granted, to get Coulter and I on the same page her elitism needed to be offended (mental note, Anne, not only liberals can be guilty of snobbery).About MysteriousFaith
“If anyone can show me, and prove to me, that I am wrong in thought or deed, I will gladly change. I seek the truth, which never yet hurt anybody. It is only persistence in self-delusion and ignorance which does harm.”
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