Is Astrology religion for those of us with no religion?

[_Maksutov]

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/opin ... aling.html

The author seems to be saying that gay people in particular are leaving religion for astrology and other New Age interests.

"But wait — queers don’t have a monopoly on crystals, tarot or astrology, you say. Of course we don’t; pagan rituals and practices have been around for thousands of years.

Yet show me a larger group of people who’ve been more discarded by their childhood religions, or who’ve turned their backs on cultures, traditions and gods that don’t serve, love or want them as they are. Oh, look — it’s the queers waving back at you, plumes of smoke from smudge sticks wafting behind us like spiritual chemtrails as we sage away those negative vibes."

Thoughts?

[_Themis]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzhG9580bTs

by the way Healing crystals don't work.

[_honorentheos]

Thoughts?

I thought the end of the article was interesting.

Why is all of this so trendy now, though? Is astrology a religion for those of us with no religion? Are we, the hated millennials, obsessed with the idea of glimpsing our future because it feels terrifying and President Trump is going to get us all nuked anyway? Is it easier to just buy a heart-shaped rose quartz than deal with feelings or existential questions or to work on ourselves?

Nah.

The meteoric rise of New Age practices may be trendy, but it’s one way millennials are acknowledging that the current system isn’t working. We’re trying out new things that are actually old things; we’re seeing what else could make life a little more meaningful, a little more bearable.

And if something helps you during a time of stress in your life, it’s worth it — even if you suspect it might be turning you into a caricature of the kind of lesbian you swore you’d never be.

When my turn came at the register, I handed over my red carnelian and the clerk gently wrapped it in tissue. “You have a good day,” he said, giving it back. I cradled it, trying to decide which windowsill I would put it in at my house. The one with the morning light, I thought. Right next to my mom’s thin gold necklace, the one I always put in my mouth as I sat on her lap in church.

Now, I’m not stupid. I may be a woo-woo, crystal-worshiping homosexual, but I know that a polished red rock is not going to heal my tailbone. It’s not going to bring my mom back either. It may not do a thing. But none of us know anything about anything, really. So why not be open to the possibility of hope?

It made me think about ritual and shared community identity and wonder if what she is touching on isn't an increase in the belief in supernatural healing, but that some aspects of new age so-called spirituality is becoming successful in integration with queer identity? So even if she sees it as woo-woo and it won't magically do anything, she sees something in the practice and its relationship to her identity that still makes sense.

[_subgenius]

makes sense for LGBT crowd to go backwards in spiritual development.

[_honorentheos]

makes sense for LGBT crowd to go backwards in spiritual development.

Says the guy whose religion demands a Newtonian view of physics combined with Genesis being a historical account written by the hand of Moses.

[_canpakes]

by the way Healing crystals don't work.

Not entirely true. If you pack them into bullet holes, they can stem the loss of blood, somewhat.

[_canpakes]

makes sense for LGBT crowd to go backwards in spiritual development.

But you believe in Kolob, and trust that ‘prophets’ are telling you the truth when they claim that someday the Earth will be celestialized into a giant crystal.

It appears that you also share this fascination for spiritual rocks and crystals.

[_Ameliya]

Astrology is not a religion. It is more of a mathematical science that links the universal bodies to the experience we face in this planet.

[_Chap]

Astrology is not a religion. It is more of a mathematical science that links the universal bodies to the experience we face in this planet.

Your characterisation of the nature of the astrological project is in essentials accurate. Up to the 17th century, the methods for calculating the positions of the heavenly bodies constructed by people like Ptolemy, Copernicus and Tycho were mainly used by astrologers - who felt that the more accurate the positions calculated, the better their horoscopes would be. Ptolemy himself wrote a major astrological text. Astrology was widely seen as a perfectly respectable department of natural philosophy (though there were always some critical voices). It fitted well into the world-view of a patterned and purposeful universe with human beings at the centre, linked together by cosmic sympathies and interactions between large and small-scale phenomena.

But by the end of the 17th century, when what is usually called the 'Scientific Revolution' got under way in Europe, this was no longer the case. That was partly because the world-view on which astrology was based, in which human beings were at the centre of the cosmos was widely seen as simply wrong, and the earth became just another planet. It was also because astrology failed to win its way into the club of experimental science - subject to the discipline of systematic testing of predictions based on non-subjective criteria. On those criteria the only planetary influences that could be verified were their gravitational fields. Astrology was simply not able to cut the mustard, and went the way of alchemy.

And that's more or less were we are today. There's nothing wrong with doing research into the way that human activity interplays with cyclic factors in the environment - but a glance at an early astrological textbook will soon show how very very much less ambitious that kind of research is from astrology as it was once practised.

[_subgenius]

makes sense for LGBT crowd to go backwards in spiritual development.

Says the guy whose religion demands a Newtonian view of physics combined with Genesis being a historical account written by the hand of Moses.

so you agree that the LGBT seeking any religion is a farce, got it.