Posted inReligions

Shoddy religious arguments keep being repeated

One of the pleasures of having a blog devoted to the praise of churchlessness is being exposed to the strange reasonings of religious true believers. If you're a regular reader of comments here, you know what I mean.I'm sincere about the "pleasure" part. Disagreements are part of the spice of life. If everybody thought the same way, that'd be horribly boring. But I enjoy creative, strong, substantial arguments in favor of religiosity (or against science and rationality). After almost five years of hearing the same platitudinous, weak, flimsy arguments, I frequently start reading a fundamentalist's comment and think, "Oh no,…
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Posted inBooks

Floating in a boundless sea

Before Jed McKenna's "Spiritual Enlightenment" is put away on a shelf, I wanted to add some positivity to my previous mostly negative post about the book -- which I finished today.I still don't like how McKenna fictionalizes what is presented as reality: that he is an enlightened teacher who presides over a fawning group of non-dual truth seekers at his quasi-ashram in rural Iowa. And I still doubt both that enlightenment exists, at least in the fashion McKenna describes it to be, or that he has achieved the state of all-knowing clarity which McKenna annoyingly claims on page after page…
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Posted inComments

Open Thread 2

Here's another Open Thread (previous OT is still open, of course). Leave a comment about anything you want to talk about. From now on comments on other posts need to be related to the subject of the post, or they will be candidates for deletion. So an Open Thread is the place for miscellany and whatever. Feel free.
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Posted inVedanta/Advaita

Jed McKenna — an illusion of enlightenment?

In "Spiritual Enlightenment," Jed McKenna tells us that he is enlightened. In fact, he says that a lot. Which got me to thinking, now that I'm a bit over halfway through the book (which was recommended to me by an old friend)... Does enlightenment exist?If so, what the heck is it"?How would we know someone is enlightened? Other questions come to mind also, because this is one of those intriguing/exasperating books that make me say "what a bunch of crap" on one page, and "right on, brother Jed" on the next. Such as, does Jed McKenna exist as the sort…
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Posted inScience

Are auras real? Yes and no.

Recently Maggie sent me a scanned photo of her aura that was taken 10-15 years ago. She asked for a particular caption when I shared it on my blog: Maggie's Radiant Form. Glad to oblige. Maggie wanted me to point out: "There are two types, one like mine which shows the colours of your personal energies (everyone's is different) and the second Kirlian photos which is a lot of squiggles and lines. Only experts can read those with any accuracy. The first type you have to have the gift of sight or clairvoyance."I told her that I didn't know much…
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Posted inComments

Open thread

Commenting experiment: an Open Thread post. Meaning, leave a comment about anything you want to talk about. From now on comments on other posts need to be related to the subject of the post, or they will be candidates for deletion. So an Open Thread is the place for miscellany and whatever. Feel free. If this works out, I'll put up a new Open Thread weekly or so.
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Posted inWu Project

Existentialism and churchlessness: great fit

I've been rediscovering existentialist philosophy lately, since I'm re-reading Jean-Paul Sartre's "Being and Nothingness" after a long absence from the pages I densely highlighted decades ago.Sartre was an atheist. Atheist existentialism isn't the only form of this philosophy, but non-belief in God is much more compatible with an existentialist perspective than believing is.It's tough to encapsulate Sartre's outlook on life. He's a marvelously rich and complex thinker. I love getting into his head via what he wrote in "Being and Nothingness." Sartre often writes in a dense intellectual style, but (thankfully) he frequently throws in nuggets of simplicity that inspire…
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Posted inMiscellaneous

An evolved comment policy

I love to get comments on my blogs. Open discussion is a big part of what churchlessness is about. What I don't like, though, and I'm pretty sure almost all blog visitors would agree with me on this, is having to wade through comments made by people who aren't interested in furthering the purpose of this blog, but clearly have another agenda.So I'm going to be more assertive in deleting comments that are off-base. I'm tired of dealing with "flame wars," a bane of the Internet. I'm tired of responding to commenters who want this churchless blog to go away.There's…
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Posted inUncategorized

Defenders of Reality, armor up!

There used to be an old barn in a field near my house in Oregon that had a saying painted on the wall that faced the I-5 freeway: "Soldiers of the Lord, armor up!" I appreciated the martial passion and energy, but not the theology. Yeah, that's what we really need in the world right now, more frenzied religious extremists.What is needed, though, are Defenders of Reality -- soldiers of science, reason, and demonstrable evidence. Astronomer Carl Sagan sounded the warning of an attack back in 1995, in his book "The Demon-Haunted World."I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges…
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Posted inUncategorized

Troll alert

"Walker" is leaving comments as "Brian." I've proven that he is, because the IP address he used for "Brian" was the same as for "Walker." I have things to do today that may keep me from deleting his lying, trolling comments for a while. Just wanted people to know that this guy not only can't speak the truth in his own comments, he also doesn't have the guts to comment under his own name.[Update: I'm away from home today, working on a remodeling project with a nail gun. Which, believe me, is a lot more satisfying than dealing with troll'ish comments.…
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Posted inWu Project

Sartre speaks to the churchless

I read some passages from Jean-Paul Sartre's "Being and Nothingness" to my wife recently. Her reaction: "How the heck can you make sense of that?"Reasonable question. Sartre can be dense. But I love how he rambles along in his French existentialist intellectual writing style for a while, then throws in a simple clear gem that makes me go Wow! Right on, Jean-Paul.For example, how he ends these thoughts.Anguish in fact is the recognition of a possibility as my possibility; that is, it is constituted when consciousness sees itself cut off from its essence by nothingness or separated from the future…
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Posted inBuddhism

“Sickest Buddhist” video spotlights spiritual hypocrisy

Oh, yeah, in my true believing days I knew people who were so damn proud of how humble they were. And who acted like jerks while preaching high-minded morality to others. So I could relate to Arj Barker's slickly produced and smile inducing video where he raps out his claim to being the Sickest Buddhist. (embedded at end of this post) You can read the lyrics if you can't understand all of them, thanks to YogaDork. Sample:I’m the illest Buddhist you’ve seenall the ladies wanna meditate with meI look so serene when I bust a lotusbut i don’t have an…
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Posted inChristianity/Jesus

Sacrificing a child for religion gets two months jail time

Here's some bad news for children being abused or killed in the name of religion: last Friday an Oregon judge sentenced Carl Worthington to two months in jail for sacrificing his child, Ava, in the name of Jesus.It's disturbing that this legal slap on the wrist is all Worthington got for committing an atrocious crime. As Oregonian columnist Susan Nielsen said today, religious crazies benefit from a double standard under my state's laws.  This trial should inspire Oregon to look outside its borders and consider the following: First, other states aren't so deferential to parents who withhold lifesaving medical care…
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Posted inUncategorized

My enormous ego wonders if ego is real

Yesterday Walker left a comment on a recent post that included an insult:Your valiant attempts to encourage Brian to examine his own comments is wasted, he is blinded by his own enormous ego.Well, let's say attempted insult. Because I responded by telling Walker that we must be ego-brothers. After all, what would make someone say that another person has an enormous ego except...ego?So we must be talking degrees of enormity here. Now, with another male organ it's a compliment to be told, "You've got a big one!" But with the ego, smaller usually is considered better-- especially by religions.Buddhism and…
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Posted inUncategorized

Getting rid of religious garbage…also garbage?

It's great to dispose of garbage that's been hanging around, whether physical or conceptual. But it isn't easy to do this perfectly purely. Back in my Systems Science graduate school days, in the late 1970's, I remember a classmate asking a heartfelt question: "I've started to recycle my plastics. But the best place to put the containers is in a plastic bag -- which can't be recycled. What can I do with the bag?" Similarly, in Rational Mysticism science writer John Horgan speaks about how Zen (and similar disciplines) is viewed "as a kind of rubbish-removal system that cleanses the…
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Posted inUncategorized

Imagine what it’s like to be God in human form

To me, there's no evidence that God exists, not in the sense of an all-knowing, all-powerful personal consciousness, or something of the sort.So I can't wrap my mind around the question, "What would it feel like to be God?" However, I do wonder what it's like to be a human who is considered to be God in human form: GIHF.As some Vedanta folks point out, there are quite a few historical contenders for a GIHF appellation. Jesus, Buddha, Rama, Krishna, Moses, Muhammad, Chaitanya, Ramakrishna are cited, though some of these names are questionable candidates. (Buddha didn't teach there was a…
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Posted inUncategorized

Churchless are on the march! (And looking good)

Ah, there's nothing more enjoyable than watching a beautiful Romanian atheist sit on the edge of her bed and seduce me with wise words about the ridiculousness of religion. Well, let's say there's only a few things more enjoyable. Thanks to Pharyngula, I was turned on to a great You Tube video, "Fool!" The girl is gorgeous, intelligent, and knows her science stuff. What's not to like? I thought her final remarks about atheists being on the march, soon to pop up everywhere, were terrific. Humor is one of the best retorts to fundamentalist fools, who usually are deadly dogmatically…
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Posted inChristianity/Jesus

Child sacrifice gets a yellow light in Oregon

Today an Oregon jury came to a verdict in what I call a child sacrifice case. Carl and Raylene Worthington let their 15-month old daughter, Ava, die because their bizarre variety of Christianity teaches that Jesus cures illnesses, not doctors.All I needed to know to conclude that Ava's parents should rot in jail for a really long time was summed up by Ava's grandfather, Guy, in a newspaper story.Worthington said no one in his family has seen a doctor and has no use for them. Instead, they put their trust in God, he said."Jesus Christ almighty can cure anything," Worthington…
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Posted inScience

I defend science against an unfair attack

I enjoy reading every comment posted on my blogs. Even those I strongly disagree with. Hey, especially those, in this sense: When what we value is attacked, our reaction tells us a lot about ourselves.Before I read the comment that Jayme posted yesterday, I knew that I loved science and the scientific method. But experiencing what I felt when I read his unfair attacks on science made me realize this more deeply.So, thank you, Jayme. I respect the passion with which you ripped into science and scientists. Now I'll exercise my right to respond with some of the same energy.Some…
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Posted inReality

Here’s the big cosmic question: “What’s the question?”

Back in my true believing days, I figured that I knew both the questions to ask and what the answers were. For example:Q. How does one return to God?A. Get initiated by a perfect living guru, and follow his teachings about meditation and other matters.A Christian, on the other hand, would think along these lines:Q. How is one saved from sin?A. By accepting Jesus as his or her personal savior. Of course, the questions presume quite a bit. In my case, that there is a God. And it is possible (plus desirable) to return to God. In the Christian case,…
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