Sabbath Theology Blogging

Sabbath Theology Blogging

Our texts of the day:

"Be excellent to each other!" --Bill and Ted.

"Good and ill have not changed since yesteryear; nor are they one thing among Elves and Dwarves and another among Men. It is a man's part to discern them, as much in the Golden Wood as in his own house." --Aragorn of the Dunedain.

Over at the New Repubic's open university weblog, people are blogging about theology. I feel that I should say a word, particularly as I was struck and disturbed by Jacob Levy's contribution. As always from Jacob, it was highly intelligent, well argued, and thoughtful. But I cannot help but think that it was wrong:

Open University: THOSE WHO TAKE THEIR THEOLOGY SERIOUSLY CONTINUED: by Jacob T. Levy: It seems to me that if religion is meaningful it's serious business; if one is committed to divine truths then one is committed to the falsehood of rival claims. By my human standards "No man comes unto the father but through Me" is a terrible way to run a universe; but if there is a God I have no reason to think that His rules will conform to my contingent, twenty-first-century Western liberal human standards.... I don't think Unitarian Universalism is somehow a better religion than Catholicism or Mormonism or Orthodox Judaism just because its god seems to be so nice... my sympathies for the aesthetic and moral-psychological experience of religious belief tends to run the other way....

And so: Pope Benedict.... For a religious leader to want a smaller, purer church rather than a larger one that gets watered down so as to not effectively constrain its believers seems to me, well, like what religious leaders ought to want. That as may be, surely religious believers are in the business of drawing distinctions with, and denying the truth of, other religions....

I don't expect Catholics to take their theology less seriously than Muslims do; I certainly don't expect the Pope to take his theology anything less than wholly seriously. And what is a Catholic, committed to the truth of Catholicism, to think of Mohammed's additions to and transformations of the Christian bible?... At a minimum he or she will think it false--and, because false, evil.... [S]ince Christians (and Jews) are theologically committed to seeing Mohammed as a false prophet, they're hardly likely to feel themselves obliged to offer him the same respect and reverence as those for whom Mohammed's status as a prophet is central to their declaration of faith do....

In the post-Reformation west we've come to the view that religious argument ought to be conducted with words, not swords. But that is very different from supposing that the words in which religious argument is conducted ought to be nice touchy-feely ones--much less from supposing that religious argument ought not to take place at all...

As to Levy's second point--that religions in some sense ought to take their theology with deadly seriousness, I found it disturbing. And I have here an opposing view, by somebody who some might think has some small authority on this issue. To argue the case that it is not about having the right theology, let me turn the microphone over to the first-century Rabbi Yeshua ben Yosef, God-Saves the Anointed One of the House of David, Jesus the Christ:

NETBible: Matthew 25: 31ff: When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand: "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in. Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me."

Then shall the righteous answer him, saying: "Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? Or thirsty, and gave drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? Or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?"

And the King shall answer and say unto them: "Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done unto me."

It strikes me that Bill and Ted's injunction to "Be excellent to each other!" has much more sense--and is far more Christian (in the good sense of "Christian") than volumes of deadly serious theology committed by Pope and Imam.

I found Levy's first point to be even more disturbing. It is, if I may paraphrase, that we shouldn't let the fact that the Unitarian-Universalist God is a good God who guides all to heaven by their various roads while the Calvinist God is an evil God who before the beginning of time condemned all but a tiny remnant to eternal damnation and torture in hell make us conclude that Unitarian-Universalism is a better religion than Calvinism.

I probed what Jacob was thinking a little bit, and wrote:

Did you just say--with Hume--that if there is a God there is every reason to expect that he will be--by our lights--not Good but Evil? This bears on your belief that: "I don't think Unitarian Universalism is somehow a better religion than Catholicism or Mormonism or Orthodox Judaism just because its god seems to be so nice and inclusive..." Why not? A religion whose God is the echo inside your brain of the bad relationship you had with your father when you were three can hardly be called a good religion, can it?

To which Jacob replied by asserting what I take to be total moral relativism via human ignorance:

Brad, the "by our lights" disclaimer has to do all the work--and would prevent me from being as cutely hubristic as Hume was. If there is a God then why should we expect our (contingent, flawed, culturally-specific, temporally specific) lights to be the right ones by which to judge him? Why should we expect to understand how the pieces fit together, and whether the pieces that we perceive as evil are necessary to some good that we'd recognize as greater if only we were able to perceive it? I might not like it, but I know enough about the limits of my moral knowledge not to think that dispositive.

[I]s the echo inside your brain of the bad relationship you had with your father. Now "bad" is doing all the work. If we are the equivalent of moral and spiritual children, are we best served by a parent-god who never does what parents do: provide discipline, structure, order, and teaching? Or, if we're going the deconstructive echo route: is a good religion the echo in my brain of the moral beliefs I happen to hold even in the absence of the religion? What's the point of that?

[You've got me channeling C.S. Lewis, which is a bizarre position for me to end up in...]

But we are not that ignorant about what "good" and "evil" really are, are we? I mean, if the priests told us that God had commanded us to slay all the Amelekites, we would say that the priests were false priests and their God a false God--not that the slaying of the Amelekites is "necessary to some good that we'd recognize as greater if only we were able to perceive it"--wouldn't we?

I would respond by channeling C.S. Lewis's friend J.R.R. Tolkien:

"Good and ill have not changed since yesteryear; nor are they one thing among Elves and Dwarves and another among Men. It is a man's part to discern them, as much in the Golden Wood as in his own house." --Aragorn of the Dunedain.

Evil deeds do not cease to be evil just because a God does them. John Calvin's God, who treats almost every soul he creates not as an end but as means, and damns and tortures them for eternity to accomplish some other goal that we will never comprehend, is a doer of evil--if the word "evil" has any meaning. The Unitarian-Universalist God who uses her infinite power, infinite wisdom, infinite patience, and infinite mercy to eventually get us all on the Big Raft to Heaven by our various roads, that God is a doer of good--if the word "good" has any meaning.

If you presume that (a) there is a God who (b) is good, then priests who preach a God of Evil are ipso facto preaching a bad religion, are they not?

---

One more word: The discussion started with Sanford Levinson's pointing to an article by the creepy Richard John Neuhaus:

Open University: THOSE WHO TAKE THEIR THEOLOGY SERIOUSLY: by Sanford Levinson: With regard to Richard John Neuhaus, I warmly commend an article in which he addresses the question whether Mormons are really Christians. It's interesting not only in itself, but also, of course, with regard to the likelihood of right-wing (and traditional) Christians to support Mitt Romney.... Perhaps this is all irrelevant to the Christian Right, that it doesn't matter whether a candidate is presumptively damned unto eternity (as are, for many traditional Christians, Jews).... [W]ill Romney be allowed to describe himself as a Christian (assuming he does) without being called on it by Neuhaus and others who take their theology seriously?

I want to complain that Levinson does not explicitly lay out what Neuhaus is doing, how it self-destructs, and how it appears to be profoundly opposed to the teachings of Jesus.

Neuhaus, after all, could ask the question: "Are Mormons Children of God?" The answer would be: "Yes, we are brothers and sisters." He could ask the question: "Do Mormon Believers Teach That One Should Do Good, Fear God, and Eschew Evil?" Once again, the answer would be: "Yes, we are brothers and sisters." But Neuhaus asks the question, "Is Mormonism Christian?" to which he gives the answer: "No." And from this answer Neuhaus draws conclusions:

• Mormon theology is a "bizarre phantasmagoria of fevered religious imagination"--and that's a bad thing. (Let's not ask how anybody who takes the Revelation of St. John the Divine to be Holy Writ can think that bizarre imaginative phantasmagoria are bad.)
• The relationship between Mormonism and Christianity is like the relationship between Islam and Christianity.
• Dialogue between Mormons and Christians is not "ecumenical" but rather "interreligious."

"Ecumenical"... like so many other things, the root is "oikos"--house. "Ecumenical" dialogues are inside-the-house-dialogues, dialogues with people who you trust and like enough to invite into your house to warm themselves by your fire and toast marshmallows. If a dialogue is not "ecumenical" but "interreliglous"... well, you are saying that they're not your friends, not people who you invite in to sit by the fire. What Neuhaus is about a a Karl Schmitt move: a division of the world into "us" and "them," into "friends" and "not-friends" with Mormons on the side of the not-friends--off in the corner with the Muslims, actually--and all that would follow from that.

Now one could say a great many things about this Karl Schmitt lets-divide-the-world-into-friends-and-not-friends move of Richard John Neuhaus. But let me once again turn over the heavy lifting to that first-century Rabbi Yeshua ben Yosef, God-Saves the Anointed One of the House of David, Jesus the Christ:

NETBible: Mark 9:38 ff: John answered him, saying: "Master, we saw one casting out devils in they name, and he followeth not us. And we forbad him because he followeth not us."

But Jesus said: "Forbid him not. For there is no man which shall do a miracle in my name that can lightly speak evil of me. For he that is not against us is on our part. For whoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in my name because ye belong to Christ, verily I say unto you, he shall not lose his reward."

Jesus tells his disciples exactly what to do with weirdos who claim to be acting in his name: embrace them as brothers.

Comments

[rilkefan]

You have to reference the Euthyphro Dilemma (http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/euthyphrodilemma.html) and Divine Command Theory to make any headway here.

[jim]

I don't think that I can follow Levy all the way, but I think he's right in his first claim:

"It seems to me that if religion is meaningful it's serious business; if one is committed to divine truths then one is committed to the falsehood of rival claims."

If a religion purports to demand of its followers they do what I judge to be evil -- burn widows, perhaps -- then I have to oppose it.

And I may do so successfully. I'm not sure there's such a thing as a Platonic ideal of a religion, distinct from the beliefs and practices of its adherents. If I can change the way the adherents think and behave, then I've changed the religion. If they used to think and behave in a way I would consider evil and now they don't, I've changed it for the better.

Which is why we should insist that female genital mutilation is a stain on Islam.

[dale]

Looking at the human condition pragmatically- that we cannot expect fundamental agreement or consensus on matters of specific theological or metaphysical content- what Habermas calls Post-Metaphysical thinking- is another way to come to a more benign and helpful pluralism.

It's not that one has to stop debating theology or hold dear to one's cherished beliefs. It's more that we have to recognize that others cherish their beliefs just as we do-- and in the case of fundamentalists and traditionalist, perhaps more so.

But one does need to mature spiritually to the point where one can say that my cherished beliefs are but one of the ways decent people believe.

[Big Al]

economics has some validity, religions have none. Follow the money.

[dale]

A religion, like Unitarian Universalism, which incorporates pluralism in it's core, has a leg up on those that are still struggling with the legitimate diversity of belief.

But thoughtful theologians and practitioners of all religions can and do work their way to a liberal, universalistic pluralsim. All the while maintaining the integrity of their traditions.

And of course, unbelief- atheism, agnosticism, are legitimate and reasonable ways of dealing with our existential condition as well.

[John Emerson]

In the Hungarian part of Hungary there exist a group called the Szeklers, reputedly descended from the Huns. Among them are adherents of the old Socinian / Unitarian church, which originated in that part of the world. They're reputedly quite a rough crowd.

It's my plan to put together a Szekler Unitarian goon squad and gain Levy's respect for the Unitarian church by whipping his sorry ass.

[John Emerson]

"The Hungarian part of Romania"

[sm]

Any big name religion with millions of followers includes great diversity of doctrine and practice. I mean, there was a Japanese Buddhist leader who said no one should be a monk and everyone should marry.

If this is the case, what is the value of trying to identify the "essential" or "true" theology of a given creed?

[Jacob T. Levy]

I want to just say, "A Tolkien quote trumps a CS Lewis argument" and let you have the last word, but can't let this one part go:

"But we are not that ignorant about what "good" and "evil" really are, are we?"

Heinlein: "Or perhaps I don't understand at all how such things are done. Strike that 'perhaps'-- I know as much about operations on the God level as a frog knows about Friday." (From _Job: A Comedy of Justice_, which is in a way all about the subject matter under discussion.)

If morality, good and evil, are the stuff of human existence-- the Kantian stuff of the necessary dictates of consistency of reason given our suspension between the noumenal and phenomenal moments, or the Humean stuff of that which w ehave by evolutionary experiment found to be conducive to peaceful and propsperous life together, or the Aristotelean stuff of that which is good for human flourishing-- then no, we're not so ignorant-- and religious wars are evil and burning widows or heretics is evil and sacrificing one's son is evil and murdering the firstborn sons of a nation is evil.

But if there is an omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipresent Creator who has nonetheless created beings with free will-- if somehow the human condition is somehow compatible with such a thing-- then, although I keep using the word "benevolence," it must not mean what I think it means. How can I have any idea how sucha being would, or could, be able to reconcile its omnipotence with our free will, and what rules would govern such a reconciliation? How could I know what morality would mean to a being who was not suspended between the noumenal and phenomenal worlds, to whom the metaphysical was not opaque, who did not occupy the circumstances of justice, and who was its own telos? Yes, I do think I'm ignorant of what morality could mean in that context.

Now, this doesn't trouble me on an ongoing basis because I don't subscribe to the belief in that Creator, and so I think we know what good and evil are-- for humans, among humans. But if I'm wrong about that, then it seems likely that morality looks quite different from how it looks to me.

(A PS to John Emerson, here and at Unfogged: I think that European Socinian Unitarianism is quite different from North American post-merger Unitarian-Universalism-- it's a much more discrete and particular doctrine, lacking what Brad takes to be the virtue and I take to be the vice of being a religion that somehow aspires to be compatible with all religions.)

[John Emerson]

That's why we're sending them after you, Jacob.

[larry birnbaum]

As someone whose notion of religion is that it is historically interesting and up to a point a worthwhile cultural inheritence, I think I agree with Levy -- I expect that people who seriously believe that they are inheritors of a unique received truth from the heavens might feel obligated to attack pretenders to the same throne. On the other hand, I also think that people who seriously believe that they are inheritors of a unique received truth from the heavens
are not entirely unlike people who seriously believe the dog next door is telling them to kill people.

[John Emerson]

Larry, Son of Sam is now the Christian leader of a cult.

Son of Sam.

http://nymag.com/news/crimelaw/20327/

[andres]

Hmmm. My own contribution to the quoting game:

"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction."

Blaise Pascal, Pensee #895. No teary-eyed, mushy-brained Unitarian Universalist he, but a Christian thinker who took his theology seriously.

One has to draw a clear line between seeking the truth about God and challenging false doctrines on one hand and raising the flag of Crusade and religious murder on the other. Or else one ends up like Mel Gibson or more recently Pope Benedict, having to grease one foot in order to unwedge it from one's mouth.

Where I try to draw the line is that creeds different from mine can only be challenged on the basis of what they teach about human conduct in this reality, based on their accepted sacred codes (and not on cultural accretions such as the Haddith or Manusmriti or Confessions). A foreign creed cannot be challenged simply on the basis of who it chooses to call its god(s) or prophet(s); that is to turn religion into a secular undertaking in which commoners kill each other over the question of who will be their ruler.

If I reject Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, I do so not because I deny that Jesus was the son of god or that Mohammed was Allah's prophet, but because there are doctrines in their sacred books that completely stick in my craw. I cannot accept a religion where god kills innocent firstborn children or advocates genocide, or war for any reason other than direct self defense.

A foreign creed can be challenged (regardless of whether you use "ecumenical" or "interreligious" to describe the challenge) only when it declares that some living things (especially humans) are not worthy of god's love (or of "being excellent to each other"). God's major manifestation in this reality is that of an inner voice that constantly implores you to treat all living things with kindness, love and respect. When sacred codes turn against this inner voice, they turn away from god.

This is the only type of challenge, imo, that does not lead to the hell of religious war, of Germany in the 1630's or of Iraq today. It is all too easy for interreligiou "words" to add another s and become "swords" when the type of challenge is actually one about narrow minutiae rather than on the nature of good and evil.

[Henry]

The text on the Good Samaritan is even more appropriate than the one that Brad quoted. A member of a despised group of heretics is better suited to inherit eternal life for his compassion than a priest or a Levite who passes by.

[bakho]

The Pope certainly takes his religion seriously. That is not the problem.

Presenting made up bullshit about other people's religion as fact is his problem. Religious people dis other religions all the time. This is how we get to have religious wars.

[Lee A. Arnold]

These questions are going to affect us for a long time, given the religious nature of dangerous conflict in the world.

Theology is a word map over a change in being, so every time you write it, it will be different.

Instead let's apply the scientific method. Begin by describing something new: not the belief-system you must swallow to goad you out of your trap, but the list of psychological changes to go through, if you are to be at all successful.

Therefore, make a list of (A) states of being, as reported by mystics and saints, (B) the psycho-technologies to get there, and (C) resulting powers [of the states of being] that preside at each step, as are reported. Take these items only if they are mentioned across all the traditions, and put them in their most common order:

(A--1st state of being)--(1) Waking consciousness;
(B--psycho-technology)--(2) Practice of virtuous conduct and purification;
(C--presiding result)--(3) Quiet and inner strength;
(B--psycho-technology)--(4) Direct the mind to one object, and hold it for as long as possible;
(C--presiding result)--(5) Counterattack by the Sins, that is, the Preventers of holding the mind on one object: Greek Christian "missing the mark," Vedantism "hindrances," Buddhism "unwholesome roots," Islamic Sufism "Satan's character traits;"
(B--psycho-technology)--(6) Reapply the mind again and again to one object, and hold it for as long as possible;

--At this point there is a jump of many months or years until you can--

(B--psycho-technology)--(7) Maintain a continuous, non-discursive flow;

--At this point there is a jump of only a few days or weeks until there comes--

(A--2nd state of being)--(8) Fusion of subject and object, foreground and background;
(C--presiding result)--(9) Sins and roots remain, to resurface throughout;
(C--presiding result)--(10) Powers, visions, pseudo-nirvanas;
(C--presiding result)--(11) "Illuminated wisdom-love;"

--And then it may take decades until the following is perfected--

(B--psycho-technology)--(12) Renounce and sacrifice #9,10,11, and one's own self;

--Which immediately leads to--

(A--3rd state of being)--(13) "Extinction," "deiformity," "aloneness;"
(C--presiding result)--(14) Freedom and detachment.

These steps are found, almost exactly in this sequence order, in Patanjali, Shankara, Buddaghosa, John of the Cross, and Ibn ‘Arabi.

None of these mystics, nor dozens of others it would appear, made much use of the theologies of their religions. Yet these are the people who came closest to God-consciousness.

You could however describe a set a criteria which all theologies have in relation to this basic path. All of them, for example, contain a conceptual explanation of the originating division, or some would say “fallenness,” from the 3rd state of consciousness. This may or may not be bound up with the proposal for its remedy.

Only the most psychologically-advanced religions, Vedantism and Buddhism, separate out #8 and give it its own name and even go further into subdivisions of states. However, #8 is clearly described by John of the Cross, (perhaps the most intellectually advanced of Christian mystics?)

Interestingly, #8 maps rather directly onto Stanislav Grof's first step in the process of psychedelic psychotherapy: (1) Aesthetic Experience. Yet the "presiding results" start rapidly to diverge, -- perhaps because there is a different structure to the intentional volition. In psychedelic therapy, as I recall, you are somewhat rammed throught the experience, whether you are ready or not. Among many other results this can lead to terrible fear with apocalyptic visions, because the confrontation with ego-death is wholly persuasive and can seem like a genuine medical crisis. The Book of Revelation is often forwarded as a perfect description of this.

The more devotional paths, such as bhakti yoga and Christianity, jump off around #4 into direct worship of god or the avatar. Christianity is in this sense just one large Hindu cult.

It must be allowed however that Christ is unique in performing at least three separate practical functions: i.) as a model for the practice of virtuous acts and purification at step #2; ii.) as the object of self-abnegating devotion; and iii.) the story of his sacrifice on the cross gives a set of images that directly maps onto the ego-death from #12 to 13.

It is perhaps this functional efficiency of Christ which leads many of his yet-unrealized followers (stuck somewhere between steps #2 to 10, and by this time spinning madly) to boast of the superiority of their religion. In short, it is Vanity, the root for Christians (and Muslims in particular too) of all of the Satan's other hindrances.

This incessant trumpeting of the Christian experience is not only annoying to other religions, but it permanently prevents these particular Christians from making the sacrifice of all ideas that is necessary to get to their own Beatific Vision (#13-14.)

(P.S.) Since the Roman Church, in an early century, released its priests from the requirement to be in a state of grace while giving mass (let us presume they were talking about something like at least step #8!) we can only speculate on the spiritual condition of its hierarchy. Scientifically I always check first for sweat on the brow.

[Murdoch]

Possession of Truth is a licence to kill.

Error has no rights.

Facts are determined by evidence; Truth is proclaimed by Authority.

Against all oppressors -- republican, islamic, religious -- we should be screaming "Evidence! Evidence! Evidence!"

The trouble with even Nice religions is they accustom people to accepting stories as True that are not based on Facts. People believe received opinion is factual, and it's not.

[John Emerson]

Levy, if the Szekely Unitarian Particularists ever get hold of you, God forbid, they'll make you wish that you never dissed the wimpy American Unitarian Universalists. I'm just sayin'.

[John Emerson]

More seriously, it seems to me that Levy did a double reverse flip. Many religions say "We are the only true religions". Unitarians say "All religions have some truth in them, but they should be tolerant." Levy says "All religions have some truth in them, and they should not be tolerant."

[Exactly. The substance is horrifying. But the technical difficulty of the dive.... Of course, only religions that fear what other religions would do to them will support liberal secular norms of tolerance...]

[RT]

Brad: re your discussion with Jacob Levy, I think you've chosen good texts, and come to the only right conclusion.

However, I agree with Levy about taking one's theology and its implications seriously. (I'd contend that one of the deep problems with evangelical Christianity is the absence of theology, which is why you can never win a religious argument with a fundie preacher: the Bible is inerrant and means what it says, except when it doesn't.) As my text, I would cite Jesus' two commandments as the core of Christian theology: "you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself." The latter commandment harmonizes quite well with Bill and Ted.

[Where do you think Bill and Ted got it from? But they might have gotten it from Rabbi Hillel. Indeed, Rabbi Yeshua might have gotten it from Hillel.]

Regarding whether the Mormons are Christians, I'd say this: the Latter Day Saints and the rest of Christianity are different religions, rather than different denominations, but I'm not gonna get worked up over it.

Why different religions? Because different denominations of the same religion don't 'convert' persons of different denominations; they're already believers. Mormons actively seek to convert Christians. In doing so, they're saying the differences between LDS and non-LDS Christianity are fundamental, rather than of lesser significance. They believe that with respect to Christianity, they're the real McCoy and the rest of us Christians aren't. Of course, that belief is reciprocated by many non-LDS Christians.

My feeling is that, on either side, that sort of attitude just gets in the way. The Mormons are what they are, we non-LDS Christians are what we are, and I happen to think very highly of the Mormons I've had the opportunity to spend time with. As a hymn I remember from childhood said: "Who serves my Father as a son is surely kin to me." Amen to that.

And beyond that, I yield to Jesus' two commandments. Theology is worth taking seriously, but what's more important - to *believe* that Jesus' two commandments are the basis for all right thought and action, or to simply *act* on those two commandments, even if one has no idea that some Palestinian Jew put them into words 2000 years ago?

[Matt]

Blah. Whatever his small virtues as a write may by, can we agree that it's quite silly to quote Heinlein as any sort of moral or religious authority? (And I'm not even referencing the incest stuff, which is just boring, but rather that he's really not much of a moral thinker, perhaps a step above Rand but not likely much, and that's saying very little.)

[Randolph Fritz]

It is striking how little Jesus talked about evil, how much he talked about good, and so many of his followers reverse that relationship. "By their fruits ye shall know them" is still a valuable rule, as is the question, "Who then is brother to the man who fell among thieves?"

I suppose I have to read Benedict's speech now, just to find out the context. Bleh.

[P O'Neill]

I'd be more convinced that Benedict was taking theology seriously if he would elucidate the aspects of George W. Bush's religious beliefs that seriously depart from Catholic thought. How many times has Bush used the line "the desire for freedom is inscribed by the Almighty in every human soul" -- and used that as justification for his Iraq policy? But for Catholics, God is mysterious. We don't know what he wants, and we certainly don't claim to be implementing those desires in political decisions. Also, a fair readings of the teachings of Jesus is that he intended the life of the faithful to be difficult -- the reconciliation of daily life with the demands of faith. But for Bush, faith simply complements his political beliefs. Low taxes and smaller government? Sure -- the armies of compassion will take care of the rest. Everyone is happy, including (he would say, God). So please Benedict, let's indeed take theology seriously, vis-a-vis our fellow Christians, and show that you weren't just picking what you thought would be an easy fight.

[John Emerson]

Yes, and the Muslims and Jews were all expelled very nicely and politely, with hugs all around. 3,000 is really a very small number of people to torture to death.

[Mike Huben]

If you take seriously the idea that you cannot understand god's intentions (perhaps because he is so far above us or whatever), then you cannot ascertain whether any holy text represents god's intentions. Any confidence you have in a text is based on your own understandings of god's intentions, which you admitted you cannot understand.

For any text you accept, or any text you deny, you can make an infinite number of untestable theories of whether it is true or false all based on god's intentions.

[John Emerson]

Not just secular leftism, but the whole modern world -- democracy, secularism, liberalism, etc. -- came into being in the fight against the Inquisition and allied forces. Stalin did not have that importance.

The mere 3,000 people burned at a stake weren't quietly disappeared in a one shot operation. It was a long series of horrible public events involving one or a handful of victims which was meant to strike fear in the hearts of everyone whose Catholicism wasn't perfect. Spain only got over the Inquisition in the last few decades.

The Western democracies were so unwilling to ally themselves with Stalinism that they refused to help the elected Spanish Republican government defend itself from a Fascist coup, eve though the Republic at the time of the coup, was not Communist. After 1940 or so, events took their course and there was not much choice.

[a different chris]

I think these people get some things so wrong that I don't know where to start:

>obliged to offer him the same respect and reverence

Most of us don't feel "obliged to" do anything about Mohammed personally - the dude's dead. Dead dead dead, and as an athiest I am quite sure he is beyond caring what I think about him, but in any case I cannot "offer" him squat. Not a penny, not a loaf of bread, not my lifelong obedience. 'Cause the dude, again, just isn't there in any sense I can percieve.

I feel obliged to give his followers, the ones that have convinced me that they are following his teachings because they believe therein lies the secret of a better world, respect. I respect them because although I don't believe in the supernatural, I don't know everything and quite possibly there really is Allah and his prophet *was* Mohammed.

And the same goes for serious Christians and Jews and Buddists and....

Reverence? I'm not sure what the word exactly means, nor do I think anybody else does. So I'm not commenting on that.

In any case I don't know what the hell Levy is actually trying to say.

I do reserve the right to disrespect anybody who spouts a theology and clearly does not live by it.

[Warren]

"If ...God had commanded us to slay all the Amelekites."

Well, if God commands us, we should do it. If the priests say God commands it, then either we believe the priests or not. If we do, then we should do it.

I am sure Brad is being very honest when he says he really doesn't like this idea. That it makes him unhappy. But if God likes, it, Brad doesn't get a vote. God, apparently, liked hurricate Katrina better than New Orleans. God often makes choices that make us unhappy. This is normal for God.

[andres]

Er, Warren, God did not make us into unthinking automatons who believe that some specially designated members have inside knowledge of God while the rest do not. We do not have control over Hurricane Katrina (though people _could_ have gotten out of its way a lot faster if Bush and FEMA had done their job). But we do have control about our own choices, including the choice of whether to listen to some priest who tells us to kill all the Amelekites because God wills it. One of our choices is to tell the priest, "your full of c*** and don't know God any better than we do".

The world would be a much better place if we admitted that though we can have faith in a particular conception of God, God is inherently _unknowable_, and he therefore cannot command us to do anything.

[reason]

Warren...
"Well, if God commands us, we should do it."

Why exactly? As I understand the arguments that have been floating around Gods have different morality than we do. Why don't we stick to our morality and let Gods do their own dirty work? (After all they are supposed to be omnipotent.) Any believers out there who can answer that one?

[James Killus]

Many years ago, my mother worked for a photographer who was a nice man, but belonged to the Church of Christ. Once a year, from a sense of duty, he sat her down and tried to convert her to C of C, because, as a Methodist, C of C doctrine was that she was going to hell.

In many parts of the Bible Belt, it is a "mixed marriage" when a Baptist marries a Lutheran, and interdenominational "conversions" happen all the time. So LDS is no different from any other Christian sect (I was going to say "weird Christian sect, but decided against it for several reasons).

"I believe that there is no God. I'm beyond atheism. Atheism is not believing in God. Not believing in God is easy -- you can't prove a negative, so there's no work to do. You can't prove that there isn't an elephant inside the trunk of my car. You sure? How about now? Maybe he was just hiding before. Check again. Did I mention that my personal heartfelt definition of the word "elephant" includes mystery, order, goodness, love and a spare tire?"
--Penn Jillette

[Stephen Frug]

Unless I'm missing some joke or reference, I think you meant "Carl Schmitt". (Google knows a bunch of "Karl Schmitts", but you mean the Nazi political theorist, right?)