Rod Dreher & Political Faith
Rod Dreher, author of Crunchy Con, recently posted a list of five things he has learned from the trust he placed in the leadership which led us into Iraq. It is an honest and illuminating moment of insight into the mind of a counter-cultural evangelical (Dreher converted to Eastern Orthodoxy in 2006). His list and my analysis follows ...Modernity’s Challenge
Something about seeing an event with our own eyes pulls a concept out of vagaries and makes duplicitous arguments seem obvious. The horrible passages in the Old Testament, which call for stoning for any number of offenses (apostasy, adultery, homosexuality and planting two different types of crops in the same field) should make every Christian seriously investigate how literally anyone can afford to take the Bible. Not very seriously and certainly not literally. The recent stoning death of Dua Khalil was captured on video tape. Ask yourself this: was this ever right? Ever moral? For being gay? For getting a divorce? For blasphemy? This book is of man, at his ...Al Sharpton @ the New York Public Library
Al Sharpton now finds himself in the lime light for what others consider a prejudicial statement - about Romney and his apparently not being counted among the people of God - during a debate over the existence of God with Christopher Hitchens. The whole debate can be heard on-line here. Both employ some of the more heavily worn arguments, but both are actually quite entertaining and worth the time to hear. Sharpton forces Hitchens to differentiate between the idea of God and religion. It's an interesting argument, which Hitchens is able to turn around and essentially get Sharpton to admit his own agnosticism. With Sharpton, you know it will be entertaining; with Hitchens you ...The Wrap-Up
Sullivan and Harris exchanged the final chapters of their dialogue on the question of faith and religion last week. Like many such conversations, few were probably converted on the basis of either's argument; however, Harris was able to emphasize his assertion that spirituality has a place in atheism and Sullivan was able to forcefully articulate that his view of liberal democracy was a better way to safeguard against militant fundamentalism (of its religious & secular forms) than Harris' rejection of religion all-together. In trying to address the global crisis we agree upon, I have two responses. The first is classical liberalism, as expressed in the American constitution, and constructed by Hobbes, Locke and their Enlightenment successors. That ...Is Lou Dobbs A Freethinker?
In a further sign that the apocalypse is nigh, yesterday night Lou Dobbs interviewed Christopher Hitchens for Hitchens' new book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything and, if one were of the mind to read between the lines, can come away with the distinct impression that Dobbs is a bit of a freethinker in matters religious. Dobbs manages to expand on Hitchens' previous Daily Show interview with Jon Stewart and draw Hitchens out on his argument that one of the problems of traditional religious thinking is that it elevates faith above all else, which creates any number of problems of which our current battle with Islamic fundamentalism is only the most painful example of....The Case for Religion
My friend Rich @ TheoCentriC has a review of Keith Ward's book The Case for Religion. I'll have to admit that I'm intellectually prejudiced against anyone using Lee Strobel's format of The Case for X as indicating a good apologetic text is soon to follow, but I always enjoy Rich's commentary and trust his perspective and insight. From his review: “A convergent spirituality becomes possible in the modern world, which is not an agreement on doctrines or practices, but is an acceptance that many diverse paths of prayer and meditation converge upon one supreme reality of wisdom, compassion and bliss. That, it may be felt, is the heart of true religion” (232). If we ...2007 LA Times Festival of Books
The 2007 LA Times Festival of Books Religion & Culture Panel spoke this weekend on CSPAN and is available for watching here. It has an eclectic group of authors who spoke including Zachary Karabell (Peace Be Upon You: The Story of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish Coexistence), Christopher Hitchens (God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything), Jonathan Kirsch (A History of the End of the World: How the Most Controversial Book in the Bible Changed the Course of Western Civilization) and headed by Thane Rosenbaum. It's about one hour long and worth the time to hear the wit of Hitchens and the more nuanced arguments of the other panelists on a ...Andrew Sullivan & Sam Harris Conclude
We are left with the impression that the desire to be accepted as a homosexual by society colors a lot of Sullivan’s religious sympathies. Sullivan’s flowing literary style has always had a pensive, almost angst filled, character which the recent Bush Administration and its misadventures in Iraq have only intensified. On one hand, Sullivan would have us believe that religious moderation can be trusted to guard against its fundamentalist tendencies, but his own religious belief offered no such advance warning with President Bush and his current dance with religious nationalism. Sullivan wants Harris to believe that moderate religious belief can distinguish a symmetric worldview which allows ideas to be discarded when found to be antiquated, but retains ...Buddhism, Reason & Spirituality
One of Andrew Sullivan's readers took the time to respond to the latest exchange between Sullivan and Harris. In your dialogue with Sam, I'm surprised you have not referenced Buddhism, especially Zen Buddhism, which does a pretty good job traversing the divide between reason and faith. Buddhism, of course, is non-theistic – the question of who created the universe is set aside in favor of a focus on addressing the vicissitudes of the human condition. In various forms of Buddhism, semi-divine or transcendental beings come into the picture, Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. But the focus is always on the alleviation of individual suffering and, ultimately, awakening or enlightenment, which is often defined as seeing into the 'true' nature of things, ...Foundations Matter
While starting Chris Hedges American Fascists: the Christian Right and the War On America, I was moved by the following quote, which comes as he characterizes the foundation of his faith, provided him by his father, a Presbyterian lay-pastor: We were taught that those who claimed to speak for God, the self-appointed prophets who promised the Kingdom of God on earth, were dangerous. We had no ability to understand God's will. We did the best we could. We trusted and had faith in the mystery, the unknown before us. We made decisions - even decisions that on the outside looked unobjectionably moral - well aware of the numerous motives, some good and some bad, that ... « Previous EntriesAbout 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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