The Atheists Conundrum

[patrice]

19. I understand atheism & its critique of religion & I agree with it to the extent of the limits inhere

nt to rationalism and the nature of proof itself. That's all fine with me. I love rationalism. I don't believe in what a lot of people refer to as God either, but I will never deny their right to work all of this out for themselves as long as they abide by my criteria for how we treat one another and Earth.

Maybe I'm just more comfortable than many are with the whole idea that there are no absolutes one way or another. All truths are relative. I can't claim mine, unless I recognize that you must also claim yours, so there's no competition for me between atheism and theism, and that doesn't mean that my truth and your truth are necessarily equivalent, only "different". And I'm okay with the fact that whatever words we say, one way or another, pro or con whatever, whatever position I take, none of those words are the same thing as that to which those words ONLY refer and whatever that thing is that we are referring to, it is one whole, not just theist or just atheist, but either/both/neither. That's not only okay with me; I like it that way.

I don't know what anyone else believes, how could I? We all talk like we do, but is that even possible? I prefer to differentiate religion, ORGANIZED pre-determined belief, from wider awarenesses of truth that are freer and hence more complete as in ALSO including rationalism, NOT in spite of rationalsim . . . but I also don't mind sharing the sharing, with religious people, I guess because I think all of us are more or less wrong and that doesn't really matter anyway, because whatever is is whatever it is without us and sharing the sharing for the sake of sharing is good enough for me, it's worth what I commit to it. Religious sharing feels to me the same as sharing science feels feels to me, the same delight, two sides of the same coin, even if people do get it wrong. I can and do speak up often if anyone takes liberties with that sharing with me or with anyone else in my presence. I'm known to use the word blasphemy often and that isn't about whether somebody is getting it what I think of as right or not, just that they are saying things that it is not possible to say, which they can go ahead and do if they want to, just that I'd prefer that they recognize that that's what they are doing, saying something imperfect and they shouldn't claim otherwise. There's a reason the 1st Commandment IS the first commandment; it points to the fact that we're supposed to open ourselves to truth and stop worshipping all of the stupid labels, like "God", that we keep cranking out for what we mistakenly think of as ultimate truth, because, whatever we think/believe it is or isn't, that isn't it, that's us!

What was it all before we all came along and started blabbering about it? Whatever that is, I'm more interested in THAT phenomenology than this power struggle over something that, by our own definition of it (an omniscient, omnipotent, eternal being), we DON'T have that kind of power over it anyway. What the fuck does the word "exist" or "doesn't exist" even MEAN when you're referring to something like that?

And how could any of that matter more than how we treat one another and the world around us, a fact that happens to be what a certain very good teacher (and several others over the eons) tried to tell us a little over 2000 years ago (for whatever bullshit we have hung on THAT story) and for which he got into trouble, with his CHURCH and state, and was killed. That's enough for me; I don't need anymore than that.

And I don't hold it against that man, Jesus, that a bunch of blaspheming charlatans came along and bastardized his teachings into a business and then used that to do some pretty goddamned horrible stuff to people, including the war on and INNOCENT nation, Iraq, which I will never let American "Christianity" forget. What Jesus (and others like him over the ages) tried to show us is still true, fuck their bullshit ABOUT that that they have attached to the truth for their own needs and agendas, and that includes the "Resurrection" and "life after death" - the truth is that the tomb was EMPTY/indeterminate, but what he and others have tried to SHOW us doesn't need any of that stuff, to make it worth something.

It is good to see some sychronicity in the patterns sometimes, of the same sort that brought us the story of Yeshua despite the fact that so many have screwed that up ever since, those synchronicities are still instructive just as people like Carl G. Jung and Sir James G. Frazer in The Golden Bough and Joseph Campbell and the great poets have all pointed out. And the reason that they are instructive is because they are not just about Jesus, or Mohammed, or Buddha, or Chief Sequoyah or whoever, they are also similar to our own stories about ourselves. Whatever the heck God is or isn't, the stories are about us. It's us talking to us about us, throughout time.

Sorry about the rambling, just trying to capture a bit of a wider perspective that to me shows that all of this pro or con palaver about "God" doesn't really matters.