(no subject)
Ok, so I promised an update on my change of worldview.
I think the prime change is that I said goodbye to christianity, at least the organized variant and nearly all of its core doctrines. There is still some uncertainty left, but for now I've decided to call this uncertainty a fear and not to listen to it. I'm a good example for what can happen when you listen to fear and giving it more than the interpretation that there might be a danger.
My reasons? Well, for a very long time now I was always uncomfortable with majorly two things about christianity. The first is this whole eternal punishment doctrine, the hellfire stuff, the damnation and the bland means of trying to justify all this. The other thing is the condemnation talk which I have witnessed especially with american christians. I feel strong pressure of conscience that this kind of talk is just wrong. Sometimes I tried to preach and aggressively condemn myself, but I don't want to go on with this, in fact I feel like an utter hypocrite for having done so.
There were a few other influences on my decision. The argument of the problem of evil was one of them. Others were the discrepancies between the archeological records and the historical claims of the bible. I've even become uncertain of the historicity of Jesus Christ himself - my metaphysical doubts nonwithstanding. There really isn't that much of trustworthy evidence besides the bible itself, and the biblical evidence is full of uncertainities itself. As a counterexample for when historicity is present, Islam is a good one. The historicity of Muhammad is very certain. There are countless accounts on his life, made by companions and contemporary scholars, and the names and the background of all these writers is known. But in the case of the bible there's so much speculation. History knows nothing for sure in that regard. (This is not to say that I'm gonna switch to Islam or so, never, it's just about its well-documented historicity.)
What I still believe? Not much. I'm at the point again where I don't know what I really believe, I may know a few things and might go by a few assumptions, but there is little conviction. But who really has convictions? What makes a conviction different to a simple belief? It seems to me that to have a conviction means to one time not to have it, before you have it. If I take that definition, I am convinced that people should strive to walk in other people's shoes before they make a judgment. If they value humility, they should practice it all the time, not when a particular ideology demands it. I've met quite a few other christians who demanded humility all the time, but outside of the biblical demands on when and how to be humble, they never were humble.
I know a few things about myself now. I know that part the hard time I had leaving christianity had to do with being scared by the recent ways of the world. Many things are about to change, but most of the time I'm not happy with the changes. A cynical kind of realism seems to be the spirit of this time, and those people I love, those with worldviews and attitudes I agree to, seem so weak. Since I've been small, I gave politics a big importance. I thought governments would have to implement changes that were necessary, that the individual or even social groups can't do that properly. I've always had a big trust in the state. Because of this, any time a politician turned out to be corrupt or at least turned out to be an ass, I was very disappointed. I hate news such as of the ukrainian Juschtschenko unveiling himself as a vain banker, or when in the polish elections some mouthy populist becomes president.
In a way, democracy unveils man's character. In tyrannies and dictatorships there's always someone to blame, a king, a dictator, a ruling class of people, etc. But in democracy, when things go wrong, then a majority of people is to blame. There isn't one or a group of perpetrators of evil, but a bunch of people unmasking their lack of virtue, their lack of understanding, their lack of wisdom, their lack of most everything what we need to survive, what we need to have our whole civilizations survive.
The really dark thing though is that should this world slip down the slope further, then there might come a time when harsh decisions have to be made. When the whole enlightenment and idealistic solutioning won't have an effect anymore. Then, at that point, things can get really troublesome, because people will be frightened and looking for a quick fix. And there'll be people who'll take advantage of this. This isn't just a remote possibility, but instead it is something that already happens at some places in the world. There are the various corrupt third world countries. There are organizations like Opus Dei for the catholics, and various right wing fundie organizations and churches for the protestants,
who would love nothing more but to turn back time and lead the church away from any liberality. There's the whole globalization thing going on, where the gains of the various corporations become increasingly untaxable by the state.
All these globalization lovers are either cynical selfists or they are terribly naive.
The real problem I have is with the weakness of those who have vision, who are honest and trustworthy, who believe in the good values, who appreciate those ideals which mankind has already proven to be capable of making a reality many times.
One of the symptoms of this is that I met more "good" people in the hospital of mental health than on the street. What I really hate are those people who confuse being blessed with being stubborn or being ignorant. Yes, I really hate them, and I can't stand to see them with their fat fingers trying to mess with the filigrane clockwork of society.
It's easy to see why even a great thinker might choose christianity as his religion - in this religion the world is doomed and there's a clear division between the sinful and the righteous, and between their fate, so worrying about the world becomes a non-issue.
What can a humanist do if someone attacks him? He can insult, he can ignore, he can appeal to the law - but he can't give a threat like the one of hellfire. Personally I'm not frightened of hellfire, what really stings me is that there are people who use that threat freely. When he poisons the whole athmosphere with his fascism.
I have only small shield, the thought that humanity was ALWAYS mostly a rat race, and that it's only the medias which make it appear as if it's all so overwhelming. If I go by the people I know personally, then it's not so bad. My parents are good to me, the children of my sisters aren't anything like the violent gang kids, and neither did they turn to the other extreme. My two main friends, Wolfgang and Jens, are both reasonable people and not into hurting others. The people I was with at school were pretty much all ok as well, and none of them was some violent ass. And neither did they embrace dark ideologies or religions.
Perhaps my worry results from loving my small world of people and ideas, and fearing that there are intrusions of alien elements into it which I do not want to see.
Either way, I got to find some way. Now that I turned my back to christianity, I'll have to find a new way. One thing I noticed is that when I abstain from going to newssites, I am generally a much more calm and relaxed person. When I abstain for a while, I have more joy in my daily activities and get more awareness for the beautiful things that happen to me. It doesn't seem quite right to ignore the bigger world though. Yet at the same time I don't think it has much value to get so worked up about what I can't change. Or better, what I can't change in the sense of the chance for it just being too small. Perhaps I should be a more consequential loner - if the other people want a crappy world, let 'em have it, why should I care when I am never asked?
I think the prime change is that I said goodbye to christianity, at least the organized variant and nearly all of its core doctrines. There is still some uncertainty left, but for now I've decided to call this uncertainty a fear and not to listen to it. I'm a good example for what can happen when you listen to fear and giving it more than the interpretation that there might be a danger.
My reasons? Well, for a very long time now I was always uncomfortable with majorly two things about christianity. The first is this whole eternal punishment doctrine, the hellfire stuff, the damnation and the bland means of trying to justify all this. The other thing is the condemnation talk which I have witnessed especially with american christians. I feel strong pressure of conscience that this kind of talk is just wrong. Sometimes I tried to preach and aggressively condemn myself, but I don't want to go on with this, in fact I feel like an utter hypocrite for having done so.
There were a few other influences on my decision. The argument of the problem of evil was one of them. Others were the discrepancies between the archeological records and the historical claims of the bible. I've even become uncertain of the historicity of Jesus Christ himself - my metaphysical doubts nonwithstanding. There really isn't that much of trustworthy evidence besides the bible itself, and the biblical evidence is full of uncertainities itself. As a counterexample for when historicity is present, Islam is a good one. The historicity of Muhammad is very certain. There are countless accounts on his life, made by companions and contemporary scholars, and the names and the background of all these writers is known. But in the case of the bible there's so much speculation. History knows nothing for sure in that regard. (This is not to say that I'm gonna switch to Islam or so, never, it's just about its well-documented historicity.)
What I still believe? Not much. I'm at the point again where I don't know what I really believe, I may know a few things and might go by a few assumptions, but there is little conviction. But who really has convictions? What makes a conviction different to a simple belief? It seems to me that to have a conviction means to one time not to have it, before you have it. If I take that definition, I am convinced that people should strive to walk in other people's shoes before they make a judgment. If they value humility, they should practice it all the time, not when a particular ideology demands it. I've met quite a few other christians who demanded humility all the time, but outside of the biblical demands on when and how to be humble, they never were humble.
I know a few things about myself now. I know that part the hard time I had leaving christianity had to do with being scared by the recent ways of the world. Many things are about to change, but most of the time I'm not happy with the changes. A cynical kind of realism seems to be the spirit of this time, and those people I love, those with worldviews and attitudes I agree to, seem so weak. Since I've been small, I gave politics a big importance. I thought governments would have to implement changes that were necessary, that the individual or even social groups can't do that properly. I've always had a big trust in the state. Because of this, any time a politician turned out to be corrupt or at least turned out to be an ass, I was very disappointed. I hate news such as of the ukrainian Juschtschenko unveiling himself as a vain banker, or when in the polish elections some mouthy populist becomes president.
In a way, democracy unveils man's character. In tyrannies and dictatorships there's always someone to blame, a king, a dictator, a ruling class of people, etc. But in democracy, when things go wrong, then a majority of people is to blame. There isn't one or a group of perpetrators of evil, but a bunch of people unmasking their lack of virtue, their lack of understanding, their lack of wisdom, their lack of most everything what we need to survive, what we need to have our whole civilizations survive.
The really dark thing though is that should this world slip down the slope further, then there might come a time when harsh decisions have to be made. When the whole enlightenment and idealistic solutioning won't have an effect anymore. Then, at that point, things can get really troublesome, because people will be frightened and looking for a quick fix. And there'll be people who'll take advantage of this. This isn't just a remote possibility, but instead it is something that already happens at some places in the world. There are the various corrupt third world countries. There are organizations like Opus Dei for the catholics, and various right wing fundie organizations and churches for the protestants,
who would love nothing more but to turn back time and lead the church away from any liberality. There's the whole globalization thing going on, where the gains of the various corporations become increasingly untaxable by the state.
All these globalization lovers are either cynical selfists or they are terribly naive.
The real problem I have is with the weakness of those who have vision, who are honest and trustworthy, who believe in the good values, who appreciate those ideals which mankind has already proven to be capable of making a reality many times.
One of the symptoms of this is that I met more "good" people in the hospital of mental health than on the street. What I really hate are those people who confuse being blessed with being stubborn or being ignorant. Yes, I really hate them, and I can't stand to see them with their fat fingers trying to mess with the filigrane clockwork of society.
It's easy to see why even a great thinker might choose christianity as his religion - in this religion the world is doomed and there's a clear division between the sinful and the righteous, and between their fate, so worrying about the world becomes a non-issue.
What can a humanist do if someone attacks him? He can insult, he can ignore, he can appeal to the law - but he can't give a threat like the one of hellfire. Personally I'm not frightened of hellfire, what really stings me is that there are people who use that threat freely. When he poisons the whole athmosphere with his fascism.
I have only small shield, the thought that humanity was ALWAYS mostly a rat race, and that it's only the medias which make it appear as if it's all so overwhelming. If I go by the people I know personally, then it's not so bad. My parents are good to me, the children of my sisters aren't anything like the violent gang kids, and neither did they turn to the other extreme. My two main friends, Wolfgang and Jens, are both reasonable people and not into hurting others. The people I was with at school were pretty much all ok as well, and none of them was some violent ass. And neither did they embrace dark ideologies or religions.
Perhaps my worry results from loving my small world of people and ideas, and fearing that there are intrusions of alien elements into it which I do not want to see.
Either way, I got to find some way. Now that I turned my back to christianity, I'll have to find a new way. One thing I noticed is that when I abstain from going to newssites, I am generally a much more calm and relaxed person. When I abstain for a while, I have more joy in my daily activities and get more awareness for the beautiful things that happen to me. It doesn't seem quite right to ignore the bigger world though. Yet at the same time I don't think it has much value to get so worked up about what I can't change. Or better, what I can't change in the sense of the chance for it just being too small. Perhaps I should be a more consequential loner - if the other people want a crappy world, let 'em have it, why should I care when I am never asked?