Belief Is Not A Virtue

Belief is tricky.  I don't think it is as simple as "letting go".  I don't think a believer can make a decision to not believe in their deity any more than I could make a decision to believe in one.

I think one can decide to protect a belief.  You can make efforts to safeguard it from difficult questions.

I think the best anyone can do is to try to bring all of your thoughts and ideas into the examination process.  One can choose to do that.

I recall, as I was entering the deconstruction process, deciding that I was going to put all of my beliefs on the table.  I didn't do this lightly.  I FEARED unbelief.

I remember a discussion I had with a believing friend after I left the faith.  He was frustrated with my lack of belief in his god and seemed to take it as a personal insult.  In a moment of frustration, he declared, "Well, at LEAST I BELIEVE in something!"  He was protecting his belief by defining the state of belief itself as a virtue.

But holding to an idea isn't a virtue.  And it is problematic when we give ideas a permanent place in our identity.

No Options

I have been listening to some Vance speeches and catching interviews with the Maga crowds attending the rallies.  Their words and attitudes remind me of a kerfuffle Cracker Barrel had a few years ago.

The homestyle restaurant had decided to offer Impossible Sausage (non-meat) on its breakfast menu.  For reasons I will never understand, this caused some outrage and triggered a boycott.  Here are some reactions -

"Congratulations!  Be woke, go broke!"

"Stop forcing fake meat!"

"Won't be eating there anymore!"

 "I just want a restaurant that is normal, with normal food on the menu!"

Of course, Impossible Meat didn't REPLACE their morning sausage, it was merely an option.  Nevertheless, the choice was interpreted by many as woke, forced, and abnormal.

This is the attitude I hear from JD Vance and the Maga crowd.  At their core is an irritation and frustration when their fellow Americans have options on life's menu.  They dream of a day when THEY can control what choices are available to YOU.

Soulless

I didn't vote for McCain or Romney, but I never thought they were bad men. In fact, one can peruse my blog articles from those years and there were multiple times I defended them and found areas of agreement.

However, I have always had disdain for Trump... going back decades. From the first time I heard him interviewed on Stern when I was in college. This meme encapsulates why.

Trump has no interior life.

No reflection.

No contemplation.

He is nothing more than an exposed nerve, desiring no other stimulus than adulation. The real joys of living escape his awareness.

He isn't evil.

He is soulless.

When I can rein in my disdain, all I feel for him is pity.

If you have read CS Lewis's The Great Divorce, he brings to mind the Tragedian - pulling on the chain of what little remains of his humanity.

Vance is Lying

I grew up in fundamentalist Christianity which today has morphed into Christian Nationalism.  Vance is trying to reframe his "cat lady" comment but it reveals his attitude and the attitude of that slice of religious politician and voter.  They simply cannot understand or accept choice and freedom.  Those things are antithetical to their worldview.  

There is only one right way to live... theirs.  Anything else is wrong and must be rooted out.  They believe people can only be happy when living life their way.  They can never be happy until YOU live life their way.  They take other perspectives as an insult.  They are offended by things that have nothing to do with them because everything must be about them.

I have often said that trying to get the Left on the same page is like herding cats.  That's a good thing.  I am a moderate, centrist, liberal and I argue with those within my political sphere.  I disagree with members of my own "team" on various things.  But at the end of the day, the Left end of the political spectrum allows a tent for those arguments.

On the contrary, the Right, over the past 10 years, has sidelined and primaried every voice that does not fall into lockstep.  Liz Cheney, the conservatives conservative, has no place in their vision for America.  Republicans like Bill Kristol no longer have a political home.  Mitt Romney, who ran for president under their banner, is sidelined and despised (in Utah he was booed at our convention).

So, when Vance declares that he was just being sarcastic, he is lying.  He does not believe in freedom... other than the freedom to think his thoughts and live life his way.

Just People

I was a big fan of Lewis when I was a believer. When I became an atheist, I went back over his writings and found so many of his arguments I revered as a believer to be too simplistic.

Having been a non-believer for over a decade now, I have come to once again enjoy his insights. Sure, I think he got a lot of stuff wrong... but he got a lot of stuff right too.

I think the balance comes when we quit thinking of authors, priests, parents, and other authority figures as demi-gods - imparting wisdom from on high. Instead, he was just a guy living through his experiences and sharing them. Find the nuggets and shrug at the rest. We are all just people trying "to get through this thing called life."

No Fear

One of the retorts I often get from a fundamentalist/nationalistic believer when they learn that I am an atheist is, "What if you are wrong? What if when you die, you meet God?"

They expect that I would dread such a moment. But that isn't the case at all. I think it would be cool.

See, they have imagined a petulant and capricious god. One who needs its ego stroked and surrounds itself with sycophants. They expect their god to be just like them.

I would expect to meet a deity who is better than the best humans I have known and read about.

I take their scriptures more seriously than they do. Within those pages we read that God is Love.

There is no fear in Love.

Life

In the play, Shadowlands, CS Lewis asks one of his friends if he is content.  He responds, "I am as I am.  The world is as it is.  Whether I am content with that has very little to do with it."

His friend is a bit of a cynic, so it comes off that way in the play but I find myself hearing a certain amount of Zen in that statement.  I never want to become a cynic, but I find accepting that life is going to do what it is going to do helpful.

Question Your Script

 

I started watching Game of Thrones again with my brothers down in Florida. Like every incredible piece of art, you get something different on each visit. This round Arya Stark has stood out to me. Walter Brueggemann says that we all live by a script that is imparted to us as we grow up and that script is based on the narrative of our culture.

Arya examined the script she had been given and decided to question it. She began to discard and free herself from the parts she didn't accept.

Wisdom. 

Anticipation and Dread

A new school year always fills me with anticipation and dread.  The dread part comes from wondering what new whatever the state is going to throw on my plate.  Track this new data strand.  Start doing this new assessment monthly.  Attend these new meetings/classes.  Here's a new program to add to the old program, etc.

What NEVER happens is, "Because you are doing this new thing, you no longer have to do that old thing."  Rarely does anything on our plate get officially removed.  We just squeeze.

Sometimes things whither on the vine.  That thing we had to do because it was the political hot topic at the moment loses priority with a fickle legislature... and it gets less of my time each year until it disappears.

Do I want to add gardening to our class day?  Sure, why not?  Throw it on the pile, we'll get to it.

Something Larger than Ourselves

There is a scene in Game of Thrones where the followers of the Lord of Light are trying to get Sandor Clegane to join them.  They attempt to woo him with thoughts of being part of something greater than yourself.  He replies, "Lots of horrible shit gets done in this world for something larger than ourselves." 

Nowadays, I am hesitant to formally align myself with various groups or causes.  I spent a lifetime in my religion serving "something larger" than myself and encouraging others to join me.  I regret that during that time, though there were good things too, I said and did a lot of "horrible shit".

Be skeptical, question motives, keep your eyes open.