God and morality

[Alexis Jacobi]

In the same way, I'm pointing out to you that you cannot restore civilization to a "Christian" condition without making people really believe in Christianity. People who know they're just being sold a civilizational fix-up kit that's devoid of actual truth claims will never have the allegiance to the Christian worldview that would renew those institutions. So your project of pseudo-Christianizing, without the expedient of making actual Christians, is doomed not to succeed in restoring anything. It was only because so many of us once believed in Christianity that these things were possible in the first place.

If you are speaking to a ‘general you’ I think I can go along. As to myself I do not have any ambitions to carry out some restoration project either for Europe or America.

[Immanuel Can]

In the same way, I'm pointing out to you that you cannot restore civilization to a "Christian" condition without making people really believe in Christianity. People who know they're just being sold a civilizational fix-up kit that's devoid of actual truth claims will never have the allegiance to the Christian worldview that would renew those institutions. So your project of pseudo-Christianizing, without the expedient of making actual Christians, is doomed not to succeed in restoring anything. It was only because so many of us once believed in Christianity that these things were possible in the first place.

If you are speaking to a ‘general you’ I think I can go along.

Yes, either way...none of us can restore civilization by relying on people to follow ethics and procedures that they don't believe are grounded in any reality....even if the delusion produced thereby stands to bolster a certain kind of desirable civilization. People are just not that successful at committing to ways of life they consider optional.

[phyllo]

If there is a longing, it's a longing to know, not a longing to believe.

I used ‘believe’ in the sense not only of merely having a hunch, or a hope, that there is something there with which one is related and that responds to one, nor merely a sort of mental habit in which one acts as if there is all of that, but also of knowledge.

That raises some possible cases.

There is something and it responds.

There is something and it does not respond.

If it responds, how does it respond? What does it do?

If it doesn't respond, why not?

Does one really need a "something" that responds or is existence of the "something" sufficient or perhaps better?

[Alexis Jacobi]

Well, I don't know if there is no God or no communication from God. Unfortunately, I'm not as enlightened about God as some seem to be.

It is more accurate to say that you have as close to zero of even theoretical knowledge about the various ways that people who have *genuine spiritual lives* and familiarity with what they report, as is possible to have. If I may be frank your knowledge base, if I have read you correctly, is comprised if some philosophical reading some years back, and an understanding of the ‘world’ achieved through NPR broadcasts.

If I had to make a statement about Gary’s position regarding the question, based on what he has written over the years, I would say

1) He speaks from near-complete ignorance in relation to the entire field of spiritual and religious life either of an old and ancient sort, nor any modern forms of its expression; 2) He has no reference-point within his own self from which “knowledge” could come (i.e. no ‘spiritual life’; 3) And yet often expresses anger at the “God” in whom he does not believe for assigning to him a rather bum deal…

[Alexis Jacobi]

If there is a longing, it's a longing to know, not a longing to believe.

I used ‘believe’ in the sense not only of merely having a hunch, or a hope, that there is something there with which one is related and that responds to one, nor merely a sort of mental habit in which one acts as if there is all of that, but also of knowledge.

That raises some possible cases.

There is something and it responds.

There is something and it does not respond.

If it responds, how does it respond? What does it do?

If it doesn't respond, why not?

Does one really need a "something" that responds or is existence of the "something" sufficient or perhaps better?

Each question incurs a charge of $99.00 each. Shall I send you a PayPal invoice or do you prefer to pay up with a CC?

[phyllo]

Nobody is amused by those kinds of responses.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Christopher Dawson from The Historic Reality of Christian Culture:

No doubt any great change of culture, like the conversion of the Roman world or the secularization of Western Christendom, is a process that extends over centuries and involves an immense variety of different factors which may belong to different planes of spiritual reality. The secularization of Western Christendom, for example, involved first the loss of Christian unity, which was itself due not to secularism but to the violence of religious passion and the conflict of rival doctrines. Secondly it involved the abdication by Christians of their responsibilities with regard to certain fields of social activity, so that we may say that nineteenth-century England was still a Christian society, but a Christian society that had diverted its energies to the pursuit of wealth. And finally it involved a loss of belief, which was to a certain extent involuntary and inevitable, since the stability of faith had already been undermined by the two processes which I have mentioned.

To state the problem in a simplified form, if one century has destroyed the unity of Christendom by religious divisions, and a second century has confined the Christian way of life to the sphere of individual conduct and allowed the outer world of society and politics to go its own way, then a third century will find that the average man will accept the external social world as the objective standard of reality and regard the inner world of faith and religion as subjective, unreal and illusory.

Thus the process of secularization arises not from the loss of faith but from the loss of social interest in the world of faith. It begins the moment men feel that religion is irrelevant to the common way of life and that society as such has nothing to do with the truths of faith. It is important to distinguish this secular separation between religion and society from the traditional opposition between the Church and the World — or between the present world and the world to come — which has always been so deeply rooted in the Christian tradition. It is often difficult thus to differentiate, since what is described as the “other-worldly” type of religion is in some cases directly connected with the divorce between religion and culture of which I have spoken. In other cases the opposition springs from the Christian dualism which finds expression not only in St. Augustine, or in the later mystics, but in all ages of the life of the Church from the New Testament to the twentieth century. Indeed it is this vital tension between two worlds and two planes of reality which makes the Christian way of life so difficult but which is also the source of its strength. To live for eternal truths, to possess the first fruits of eternal life, while facing every practical responsibility and meeting the demands of the present moment and place on their own ground — that is the spirit by which a Christian culture lives and is known. For Christian culture involves a ceaseless effort to widen the frontiers of the Kingdom of God — not only horizontally by increasing the number of Christians but vertically by penetrating deeper into human life and bringing every human activity into closer relations with its spiritual center.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Nobody is amused by those kinds of responses.

I suggest paying attention to the latent point: You would do far better to pose a question and then make your own effort to answer the question.

Your *questions* are shallow statements you are attempting since, to all appearances, you’ve not devoted much effort to thinking about these things.

I am now doubling the cost you will incur for each ‘question’ you refuse to answer yourself.

[MikeNovack]

Yes, either way...none of us can restore civilization by relying on people to follow ethics and procedures that they don't believe are grounded in any reality....even if the delusion produced thereby stands to bolster a certain kind of desirable civilization. People are just not that successful at committing to ways of life they consider optional.

But YOU require more than that. Let me remove negatives and restate what you said.

"We can restore civilization by relying on people to follow ethics and procedures that they believe are grounded in any reality.... and the delusion can bolster a certain kind of desirable civilization. People are just not that successful at committing to ways of life they consider optional."

Your problem with that? You think it matters whether or not their belief is rational, can be justified, IS reality? If not, if only "they believe" is required, what is the problem if they believe in the wrong religion or none? The secularist believes his/her humanism provides a basis. The Muslim, Buddhist, Jan, etc. ditto. That your beliefs may be delusion is irrelevant.

[Impenitent]

Jan said "Marsha, Marsha, Marsha"

-Imp

[Immanuel Can]

Yes, either way...none of us can restore civilization by relying on people to follow ethics and procedures that they don't believe are grounded in any reality....even if the delusion produced thereby stands to bolster a certain kind of desirable civilization. People are just not that successful at committing to ways of life they consider optional.

But YOU require more than that. Let me remove negatives and restate what you said.

"We can restore civilization by relying on people to follow ethics and procedures that they believe are grounded in any reality.... and the delusion can bolster a certain kind of desirable civilization. People are just not that successful at committing to ways of life they consider optional."

Sorry, you're distorting what I said. I didn't say how one COULD restore civilization; I merely pointed out how one COULDN'T. I told you how to be unsuccessful, not how to succeed. I don't think there is a road to success on this one, so I'm certainly not going to propose one.

Let's fix what you left out. Let's use an example we'll both agree is problematic.

People can be convinced to produce a particular civilization by any ideology, be it true or false ideology. However, my point is that they must genuinely BELIEVE in it.

For example, Islamism does produce Islamic behaviour...but that behavior is also a response to what you and I would recognize as a false ideology. The key factor is that they actually DO believe in their ideology.

But supposing every Islamist though Islam was a crock. How long would they be likely to persist in "the seven pillars," or the killing of infidels, or the sacrificing of their children, or female genital mutilation, or suicide bombing, or the establishing of sharia and a caliphate, if every Islamist believed, in the secret counsels of his heart, that Islam was really not true? Not long, right?

That your beliefs may be delusion is irrelevant.

What you rightly point out, but wrongly conclude, is that it all depends on what the person believes. Delusory beliefs do indeed issue in certain forms of life, and even particular civilizations, as Islam indicates. But my point is primarily the opposite, and I'll say why.

AJ's supposition seems to be that if Europe could restore public adherence to something like Catholic values, then we could recover Western civilization. My counter-proposal is that he would have to convince everybody to believe in Catholicism again. It couldn't be, as it is now, that most people in a given city, state or nation, were non-Catholic or merely nominal-Catholic in their beliefs, and that that weak and skeptical sort of adherence would restore Europe; for it to have any prospect of success, they'd have to believe Catholicism in actuality: a majority would have to think that they wanted to become devoted Catholics. And given the amount of secularism, Protestantism, immigration from countries with other religions (like Islam) and various other alternate ideologies in Europe, just how is such a miracle to be produced?

And if it cannot be done by any plausible or reasonable means, then what's the point of even pointing it out?

[Gary Childress]

Well, I don't know if there is no God or no communication from God. Unfortunately, I'm not as enlightened about God as some seem to be.

It is more accurate to say that you have as close to zero of even theoretical knowledge about the various ways that people who have *genuine spiritual lives* and familiarity with what they report, as is possible to have. If I may be frank your knowledge base, if I have read you correctly, is comprised if some philosophical reading some years back, and an understanding of the ‘world’ achieved through NPR broadcasts.

If I had to make a statement about Gary’s position regarding the question, based on what he has written over the years, I would say

1) He speaks from near-complete ignorance in relation to the entire field of spiritual and religious life either of an old and ancient sort, nor any modern forms of its expression; 2) He has no reference-point within his own self from which “knowledge” could come (i.e. no ‘spiritual life’; 3) And yet often expresses anger at the “God” in whom he does not believe for assigning to him a rather bum deal…

I suppose you're right. I only know what is knowable, and things about God are unknowable, except for people like you who have read enough of other people's speculation to believe it counts as factual knowledge of the divine. In all that reading you've done on religion, can you say that you know anything for certain about God that I don't? Can you tell me one indisputable fact about God that I don't also know?

[phyllo]

Nobody is amused by those kinds of responses.

I suggest paying attention to the latent point: You would do far better to pose a question and then make your own effort to answer the question.

Your *questions* are shallow statements you are attempting since, to all appearances, you’ve not devoted much effort to thinking about these things.

I am now doubling the cost you will incur for each ‘question’ you refuse to answer yourself.

If I'm shallow then don't reply to me at all.

[Alexis Jacobi]

I suppose you're right. I only know what is knowable, and things about God are unknowable, except for people like you who have read enough of other people's speculation to believe it counts as factual knowledge of the divine. In all that reading you've done on religion, can you say that you know anything for certain about God? Can you tell me one indisputable fact about God?

Though I get what you are saying about the “knowable” — what is physical, tangible, measurable, etc. — I think you may also be weak (and closed-minded) in the area of reading on, to employ William James’ title The Varieties of Religious Experience. Subjective experience is locked inside the person who has it, but there are discursive expositions by people who have bothered to investigate. So I would say “There is a great deal knowable (by way of accounts) that you choose not to examine”. Or possibly it holds no interest for you?

Are “things about God unknowable?” This is the question, the issue, that is hard to get clarity about, I admit. There is a huge store of second-hand accounts, that much is certain, and they share similarities, but the fact that they arise within different cultural and mythic settings is confusing to the outside observer. So there is a mystical tradition within Catholicism (far less if at all in Protestantism) as well as in the Hindu traditions, in Islam, perhaps to some degree in Zen and Buddhism, but too there is an Occidental psychological-mystical tradition best summed up by Jung and “Jungianism”.

If there was a resounding collapse in Europe in the late nineteenth century of that “horizon’ Nietzsche said had been ‘erased’, there simultaneously arose “alternative” routes of experience of and investigation of those suppressed and uncommon paths of knowing and understanding — and having experience — of what is generally described as ‘divinity’ but perhaps not quite as much as open revelation of “God”. But that too is contradicted by, for example, our own cosmic voyager Seeds.

See even from a merely sociological approach there is a great deal that can be received and understood about that perennial quest.

So one question (and you so love questions, don’t you?) is: How is it and why is it that Gary is nearly completely on the outside of any of this? I mean, both conventional religiousness like church-going, but also any of the wild alternatives?

Having read your writing for years I note that your primary battle, in the realm of our own Christian tradition and culture, and our post-Christian phase of that, is purely negative and negating. Why is that? How has that come about?

In regard to my own self, the religious impulse that obviously is strong in me did not begin in reading nor in secondary approaches. But, and here I can be honest, if I say that the larger part of my “experience” has been, say, of a Jungian variety (psychic, psychological, symbolical, ‘visionary’) I must also be aware that it has been like a smorgasbord: East Indian mysticism (under the influence of my parents). American Indian (sweat lodges, etc) snd some psychedelic experiences which have not been a minor influence. Then Castaneda, Gestalt, the Human Potential Movement (again my parents) and all those post-Christian avenues that A. Huxley opened people up to via The Doors of Perception.

Can you tell me one indisputable fact about God?

If you recall Plato’s Seventh Epistle he pointed out that as far as the revelatory side of his philosophy went “it” occurred as a result of the application of a discipline, and that something somehow gets ‘ignited’ and then is self-nourished by the same “spark”. He also said that whatever “it” is, is not amenable to verbal expression. I think this explains at least in some sense the Catholic monastic tradition (and all other monastic traditions I am aware of). But I am quite certain that none of this — innuendo essentially — will satisfy your “left-brain” question. And the left-brain is (I gather) deeply suspicious of the “right-brain”).

[Alexis Jacobi]

If I'm shallow then don't reply to me at all.

You are certainly shallow. Yet you demand response. (It would be ungodly to refuse). The issue that must be resolved is what amount shall be assessed for shotgun questions? What do you think is fair? I am not unreasonable.