[MD] Platt's Pure Critique of Pantheism

[John Carl]

Hi Mary,

I'm interested in your question,

> When you live down here you quickly learn to cater to religious people.  You
> sort of pander like a sycophant.  It's the safest way.  I've been prayed
> over, invited to "pack the pew" night, looked at askance, and maligned at
> various times over the years enough to know it's best just to not bring it
> up at all, and if you get backed into a corner, just smile sweetly and lie,
> lie, lie your way out of it.  Why is this so?
>


one of my favorite questions, why.  But I'm not sure in this case
which "why" you are seeking.

Why do they invite you and seek group conformity  so hard?  That's not
hard to understand, it's a common enough phenomena in group formation,
the attempt to convert the outsider to "the way".  There's a
self-perpetuating system to social groups that's easy to comprehend in
an intellectual way.  Woo hoo!  Intellect can be such fun!

Or do you wonder why you react the way you do?  Deflecting rather than
confronting or trying to convert them to your view, even though they
are in the majority?

Straighten that out for me and I'll do my best to answer your query.

I'm sort of curious as to how you notice  lying.  Does it bother you
to lie?  Do you see morality as existing separate from religion and
how do you define for yourself what is good and not good?

In my family I have this one uncle who makes a big deal about being an
atheist.  When I was a teenager, I sent his daughter, my cousin Beth a
poster of Robert Plant that I bought at a Led Zeppelin concert and he
threw it away!  I was highly offended.  I wondered where an atheist
gets off all moralistic?

Maybe because they recognize that without values life would be
dangerously chaotic and so those he "feels" are important are all the
more fundamental to his ego.

I know he feels it incumbent to send my mom, his sister, links and
articles about the logic and benefit of atheism.  I'm pretty sure she
sends him links and articles about the logic and benefit of
Christianity.  So they dialogue this way.  This morning, I stopped by
her house and she mentioned uncle Bob, and that she'd gotten so fed up
with Bob's needling and hurtful rejection of her God, that she prayed
for permission to just give up on him.  That is, unless the Lord sent
her a clear sign, she'd just have nothing to do with him anymore.  As
soon as she got up off the floor the phone rang and it was her brother
Bob calling who said, Hey sis, I just wanted to call and let you know
how much I love you.

My ma slammed the phone down and cursed, Damn, now i'm gonna have to
put up with that atheist son of bitch forever, because of God.

So I think in the main, it's a good idea to stay an atheist because
God makes you do stuff you really don't want to do.

Take care,

John