Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:
I'm not only ok with Jersey Girl's version of Christianity (from what I've read), but supportive of it, too. It gives her a sense of peace, purpose, and design that's nice. I don't view her as using her religion as a political bludgeon, but rather as an internal mechanism that helps her feel placed in the universe.
When you say 'placed' in the universe, what exactly do you mean by that?
What you said about an internal mechanism. You are scary insightful. You couldn't have been more accurate if you had asked me and I answered you myself. My personality and idealist temperament make me function internally and that includes how I process and practice my beliefs.
I spend an inordinate amount of time in introspection, self reflection, contemplation, I work things out in my head longer than it takes me to actually act on my thoughts and ideas. I'm pretty darn self aware because I have spent time studying myself if you will and have tried to discover what makes me tick just like I search for what makes the other guy tick.
More evidence...
That I spend a long time in my head before I act is exactly the reason I waited to answer this post even though I saw it the day that you posted it.
Anyway, yes, religion or spirituality is part of my internal process. Prayer is a huge part of my life. No question about it. Nailed it. Nailed me.
In a way, I have a religion, too. I call myself an atheist, but I could very well see this reality as a simulation in an infinite recursion of simulations. It makes sense to me, helps me sort out one coincidence after another I notice, and it brings me a weird sort of comfort. Yet, at the end of the day I just go with the notion the universe is a physical one and that's the only one that we can know and work through if we're to have any sort of longevity as a species. I certainly wouldn't start evangelizing it and building a coalition of other 'simulationists' to influence government policy. That's the kind of religionist that needs to go the way of the dodo bird.
- Doc
Yeah I agree about the political activity. There's something terribly wrong with that. Now not in the sense as in the case of the Civil Rights movement. Something needed to change for the well being of Black Americans. It's still not changed enough, but the movement created a wave and an awareness. We used to call it consciousness raising.
But when I think about reproductive rights (and I could be wrong here) I think the work is largely done or it was done until folks started messing with it as they are right now. So long as our laws offered choice I don't see what possible difference that makes to the anti-abortion groups so long as they are able to make their own choice to continue a pregnancy to term, the other women is free to make her choice to terminate, and so do the health care professionals who address unplanned pregnancy regardless of the outcome. It's about access to education and support so far as I am concerned.
What you said about a recursion of simulations and viewing life in such a way gives you some sort of comfort as you attempt to explain coincidences in life makes all the sense in the world to me and I will tell you why. I think it is part and parcel of our human existence to attempt to explain what seems to be the inexplicable. It's normal, it's natural. You've worked out something that supports your experience and it brings you peace. I experience the world through the lens of my God being present.
In my mind it's all the same thing. It's all the same quest for understanding and making sense of what happens to us. It's just different mechanisms we use to interpret our journey through this world and through life.
In my belief I believe that there is a God who has the ability to access you. If I am wrong about that, what difference does it make so long as you have peace in your contemplations and so long as neither of us are beating the other guy bloody over what they believe.
