Posted inDeath/Rebirth

Death can’t be imagined

What do you think will happen to you after you die? If you're religious, many answers are possible. "I'll be in heaven." "My soul will exist without a body." "God and I will be a single consciousness."But even if you're a non-believer, there's a good chance that you still harbor notions of your continued existence. Seemingly it's super tough, if not impossible, for the human mind to conceive of nothingness. We're hard-wired to imagine that we'll always be something, rather than nothing.This is the premise of a fascinating Scientific American article by Jesse Bering, "Never Say Die: Why We Can't…
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Posted inReligions

Another reason to reject religion

I just got an email from someone who wanted to let me know about the dangerous immoralities of cults. He said this story left him speechless. Me too. Except I wanted to use a few words to write this post. The next time someone asks you, "Why are you so down on religion?" say "Oh, I don't know. Maybe it's because true believers make their children eat their own flesh." Nobel Prize winner Steven Weinberg is right: “Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing…
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Posted inRadha Soami Satsang Beas

If a satguru isn’t God, what is he?

Regular readers of this blog may have noticed that I don't write as much about my experience with Radha Soami Satsang Beas anymore. My  of posts includes just about everything I want to say about my churchy phase. Still, there's always a bit more to say. Today I answered an email from someone who wondered how to deal with unjust situations. I told him that keeping calm, cool, and collected is admirable, but there's a difference between not being unduly affected by an injustice and failing to deal with it. Action is called for when someone is trying to screw…
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Posted inPolitics

Sarah Palin’s Christianity is scarily senseless

Yesterday I thought I'd pushed the car radio button that brought up Oregon Public Broadcasting, so I wasn't all that surprised to hear Sarah Palin's distinctive voice. It appeared that she was being interviewed by someone with a Christian bent. I figured that an excerpt from the interview was being played so it could be discussed from OPB's usual moderate perspective. But Palin and the man she was speaking with kept on talking. I heard her refer to him as "Dr. Dobson." That spurred me to glance at the radio setting. Oh my God! I had stumbled onto the dark…
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Posted inTaoism/Tai Chi

Turn around, if you feel like it

Yesterday I related the following story to my Tai Chi class. Our instructor had been talking about the importance of staying empty, keeping one foot unweighted so you can easily move it in a desired direction. Being double-weighted is a no-no. That's when you're firmly planted on both feet, committed to where you are, which prevents you from fluidly being somewhere else if the situation demands it. I came across this tale in "A Short History of Chinese Philosophy." Wang Hui-Chih was living at Shan-Yin. One night he was awakened by a heavy snowfall. Opening the window he saw a…
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Posted inWu Project

Profitable spiritual investing

As the world financial crisis deepens, conversations tend to turn toward money rather than other subjects. Last night I was with a group of people who discussed the ins and outs (not to mention the ups and downs) of investing in tough times like these. I didn't have a whole lot to say. Briefly I held forth on the Buddha-like nature of index fund investing, where you don't try to beat the market through some clever scheme but rather rest content with rising and falling in concert with the overall financial tide. I told my friends, "If the world and…
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Posted inSpiritual practice/meditation

Spirituality without God

Is an atheist or agnostic spirituality possible? Sure. And I've read a book that proves it: Andre Comte-Sponville's "The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality." This morning I browsed through the final chapter again, liking it even more the second time through. My first post about the book was on the theme of desiring God isn't proof of God. That's true, but sort of negative. Comte-Sponville ends his book with a positive flourish, arguing that not only is an atheist spirituality possible, but really it is the only authentic way to establish a loving, truthful connection with the cosmos. First, what…
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Posted inReligions

Meet a young, beautiful, thoughtful, charming atheist

There's long-term hope for America, churchless-wise, if 18 year olds like Laci (a.k.a. "gogreen18") are in plentiful supply. I learned about Laci via a blog post that featured her "Why atheists care about YOUR religion" You Tube video. She lays out the case against religion persuasively in five entertaining minutes. Have a watch (guys, do your best to keep looking in her eyes – you'll fail, as I did, but try just for the futile fun of it). I also enjoyed Laci's "I'm going to hell," in no small part because I've also condemned myself to hell (for a free…
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Posted inPolitics

Pray for McCain-Palin (they need it)

Thanks to Pharyngula, I learned about a Pray for McCain-Palin web site, which I was pleased to visit, adding my voice to a poll about whether McCain's pick of Palin made me more or less likely to vote for him. I'm totally supportive of this site. It's hard to think of anyone who needs prayer more than John McCain and Sarah Palin. (Proof, here and here.) In case you're not sure about how to pray, the site provides some helpful specific prayer requests. My favorite is: Pray for the peace of mind of the candidates & their families and that…
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Posted inScience

God, the Big Bang, and a Big Bounce

It's well accepted that our universe came into being about 13.7 billion years ago with a bang. A big bang, in fact. So big, and yet so small. Because the energy which became at least 100 billion galaxies each containing about 100 billion stars, supposedly was contained within a singularity of infinite density and temperature that wasn't even a point in time and space – since a singularity is where the laws of nature (including general relativity) break down. This helps explain why the Catholic Church has looked with favor on the big bang theory, as have theologians of other…
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Posted inPolitics

McCain campaign says God wants Obama to lose

Reason number 439,816 to not vote for John McCain (don't have time to list rest of them): A minister delivering the invocation at a McCain rally asked that God protect His reputation by orchestrating an Obama loss – since non-Christians are rooting for McCain's opponent. "There are millions of people around this world praying to their god—whether it's Hindu, Buddha, Allah—that his opponent wins, for a variety of reasons. And Lord, I pray that you will guard your own reputation, because they're going to think that their God is bigger than you, if that happens," said Arnold Conrad, the former…
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Posted inGod

Is the economic crisis God’s will?

I've been spending a lot of time recently staring at computer or television screens that show the current depressing state of the United States stock market, which reflects a global financial crisis. I'm not a masochist. I just find this whole meltdown fascinating on all sorts of levels: personal, societal, philosophical. My core emotional reaction to the 40% decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average this year has mirrored my descent into churchlessness. At first, I felt uncomfortable. But now I'm feeling a sort of strange bliss that's akin to the sensation of being strapped into a roller coaster. All…
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Posted inSpiritual practice/meditation

Make your own path

It isn't often that I get inspired by a bank ad. More accurately, it's been never. Until last Sunday, when I noticed the big bold print in an Umpqua Bank advertisement in the Salem newspaper. If you make your own path, you can't lose your way. Ooh! So Zen. As was one of the questions in last night's presidential debate between Obama and McCain. What don't you know and how will you learn it? Terrific question. The answers were just OK, something about expecting the unexpected. Which fits with the Umpqua Bank philosophy. Many spiritual and religious faiths stress the…
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Posted inSpiritual practice/meditation

Say your spirituality in one sentence

If you were cast away on a mental desert island and could only bring one spiritual sentence along, what would it be? Tough choice. I like words. I read a lot. I write a lot. I enjoy pondering what lies beyond the ponderable. My shelves are filled with many favorite books, each containing favorite lines. In the end, though, I'd have to stick with what I've called the best one-sentence metaphysics ever written (by Philip K. Dick): Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. Now, I'm not saying that I believe this sentence. What…
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Posted inSpiritual practice/meditation

Sink down to heaven

Rise up! Elevate your consciousness! Soar to the heavens! Spirituality usually is viewed as involving some sort of ascent. Earthly concerns supposedly hold us down, while divinity lies on a more ethereal plane of reality. I used to believe this. I've spent countless (almost) hours in meditation seeking to focus all of my attention at a point inside my forehead – the Third Eye, or eye center – after which, I was told, my soul consciousness would be transported into higher spiritual regions. Writing a book about Plotinus, a Greek mystic philosopher, helped move me to a different viewpoint. Plotinus…
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Posted inUniverse

What?! The universe isn’t all about me?!

Warning: if you're comfortable feeling that the cosmos is designed around you, or humanity in general, what you're about to read runs the risk of putting some leaks in your belief bubble. I'm not only speaking to the religious, even though theology and metaphysics is where you'll find the most egregious examples of Homo sapiens centeredness. The churchless also are prone to self-centered grandiosity. I know, because I am one. For me, faithlessness came down the track of my psyche long before humility. Understand, I'm not claiming any sort of ego-loss now. I'm still as full of myself as ever.…
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Posted inPersonal/Stories

What else is there to say?

Once again, Edward nailed it (or rather, me) right on the head in a cogent comment. Regarding my previous musing, he said: Brian, reading this post I got the feeling that you won't have to write much longer, you are almost done... I like those words, almost done. Conjures up an image of being slowly cooked, like a roast pig turning on a spit. I've been feeling a non-Biblical apple in my mouth make me grin more. Doesn't seem like the churchless heat has been turned up all that high, but clearly it's been causing some changes. Anyway, you're right,…
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Posted inReligions

No problem, no religions

Life is full of problems. But is life itself a problem? At the moment I feel like my wife and I have more than our usual quota of difficulties to deal with. Our septic system is acting up, not draining as it should. The dog had diarrhea last night, with a result best left undescribed. Jury duty calls me tomorrow morning at a time much earlier than I usually function. My dentist gave me a referral to an endodontist for a possible gum graft, which hopefully sounds worse than it actually is. No doubt about it: life, at times, is…
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Posted inUniversism

Who needs useless Universism?

My frustrating involvement with Universism ended a few years ago when this supposed non-religion turned out to be as fundamentalist freaky as any other faith (if you click on that link, scroll down past this post to find the history of my Universist involvement). I hadn't thought about this naturalist philosophy, which foundered under the massive ego and administrative cluelessness of its founder, Ford Vox, until I received an email a few days ago from someone who wondered Why Universism? Good question. I've shared Alexander Szeto's message below. His list of humanist / naturalist organizations is a handy guide. I…
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Posted inPolitics

I’m praying that Sarah Palin never becomes V.P.

Though Sarah Palin's hotness makes her more appealing to look at, compared to the usual wrinkled right-wing religious white guys, her Christian zealotry is just as scarily ridiculous. Scary, because here's a God is on my side true believer who could, just possibly, heaven help us, be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Oh, wait! We already have a president like that. So what's the problem with another one? Lots. By comparison, Sarah Palin actually makes George Bush look minimally competent and well-informed. So her astounding fatuous cluelessness, when combined with her trite Christian fundamentalism, results in an exceptionally dangerous…
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