[MD] new blog

[Michael Poloukhine]

> dmb says:I think it's quite obvious that in this world theism exists as the various forms of organized religion
MP: You may think it is obvious but you have thus far not presented any solid 
reasoning to support your conviction, just your conviction and a series of 
examples you call proof that I have shown to be less than unequivocal. 
Religions exist without theism (eg: Scientology, Wicca) and theism exists with 
no religion (eq: "I believe in a personal god") Theism is an *intellectual* MoQ 
evolutionary level of what many religions embrace, and in some cases abuse 
on an MoQ social level. But theism does not need religion to exist, and as I 
have explained does not cause the societal ills you decry (as I do along with 
you.) Theism is only their vehicle.

> dmb says:To pretend that "theism is simply "the belief in a god or gods" is simply disingenuous.
MP: No, its purely intellectual and accurate.

> dmb says:Molestation by priests is far more common than it is among preachers because of the Catholic Church demands celibacy.
MP: You just undercut your entire argument.

If your statistical analysis is *correct*, the molestation is one Christian church's 
(by the way, - check your grasp of the history of Christianity before calling for it 
to be dismantled -  its *Roman* Catholic Church) rule that encourages the 
molestation, it is not purely theistic, it is only peripherally so. Other Christian 
churches, theistic churches, that do not have the requirement see "far" less 
molestation, thus the molestation is not directly theistically based. As all the 
Christian churches are theistic, yet only one is proved to have the problem, 
theism itself can't the root cause. And given child molestation occurs plenty 
enough outside theistic context, clearly theism can't be the root cause there 
either. Given the root cause is thus shown not to be theistic, abolishing theism 
is shown to be ill-advised.

If on the other hand your statistical analysis is *incorrect*, and theism is the 
cause of the celibacy, the fact that it is far less common among churches other 
than the RC, clearly this "apparent problem" of theism can be overcome by 
religions and religions are not the problem but the solution. I can't help wonder 
if there are *any* child molesters within saber distance of the Fundamentalist 
Islamic faith that have not yet been beheaded. They are based on theism as 
well, but have the complete opposite problem of the RC Church you raise as an 
example of the ills of theism as it relates to child molestation. And yet you would 
eliminate them, an apparent solution to a theistic problem for their theism. As 
such, calling for theism to be abolished due to the failure of one theistic church 
is also shown to be ill-advised.

Quite a knot you tied with that statement.

> It's obviously a result of certain beliefs within the institution that lead to repressed and distorted sexuality.
MP: Again; "within the institution." Not within others. The theism is not the 
problem, its the institutional approach to it. BTW; do you know why and how 
long ago the RC church instituted the celibacy rule? Do you know the history of 
the RC church and anything about Eastern Orthodoxy, its predecessor? You 
should probably know more about the history of Christianity (let alone the 
history of all human religion) before claiming to have sufficient insight to call for 
the abolishing of theism entirely.

> Poloukhine said: The trouble in what you decry is not *theism*, its just plain human depravity and *social* retardation.
> dmb says:Well, if I had said theism was the only cause of depravity and social retardation you would have a good point. But I didn't so you don't.
MP: No, you miss my point. If as you insist human depravity or social 
retardation is/can be caused by theism, but can also be caused by other things, 
then you should consider why those other things, unrelated to theism, are a 
cause and be after those other things as well. And if you are, you will soon find 
that  human depravity or social retardation occur pretty much in any context, 
with any apparent "root." At some point, you MUST acknowledge and conclude 
that perhaps the things you see as the "root" are in fact only vehicles for the 
real root which is the commonailty among all the instances. Depravity is the 
problem, not the thing it chooses as its host. You are calling for the execution of 
the host to eliminate the disease. And continuing in this manner you will find 
more and more consistency of "root" until you find the common factor in all of 
them is humanity. The only answer you can arrive at by taking your logic to its 
natural conclusion is the elimination of the human race.  *Not* a very good 
approach to saving it from itself, IMO.

> dmb says: I don't think we can decide the future shape of social evolution. It's too big and complex.
MP: But that is *exactly* what you are doing by calling for the elimination of 
theism from anyone's beliefs but your own.

> dmb says:But each of us can each begin to improve the world by working with our own hands and working out what's in our own hearts. You know, we don't change the world per se. We just BE the change in our own lives and that's especially true with respect to spiritual things.
MP: And many, MANY people do exactly that with phenomenally Quality results 
through religion based on *theism.* So why throw the theism baby out with the 
dirty religious bathwater?

> dmb says: We ought not worship the divine as and external being, we ought to become divine through transformational practices. The historical forms of religion can certainly help in that respect but fundamentally all the Western forms of theism would call that blasphemy and they have been known to kill people for saying such things. Instead of believing that Jesus died for your sins, as the all the churches teach, it is important to realize that you are the one that needs to die for your sins, although this is not a literal death. That distortion is not a shocking or horrible as the stuff that makes headlines but it is also a very, very sad state of affairs. In that sense, theism PREVENTS spiritual fulfilment among the vast majority of its believers.
MP: I'm not sure what to say at this point. You clearly have your view of what 
religion *is* and are for some reason willing to subjugate your intellectual 
capacities to attack it, and worse to attack *theism* as if its the same thing as 
religion. The more we talk, the more I think you see it is only specific slices of 
religion you have issues with, not all of it, and as such I'd point out, not theism. 
The more we more talk, the more I am struck by how I could just as easily be 
having this discussion with a religious zealot. You have a theistic belief set and 
being convinced its correct feel entirely justified in imposing it one everyone, 
even in the face of its intellectual contradictions, all the while preaching that it is 
in the interest of fostering the individual spiritual growth of those whose 
individual spiritual paths you decry. That is, I say this without intention to insult 
but with conviction, religious zealotry.

I'm Christian. Yet my understanding of the teachings of Christ, as taught to me 
by my church (OCA) are *exactly* what you describe, much to your surprise I'm 
sure. We *are* called to be divine, as divine as we can be given we are 
corporeal, but called nonetheless. We were made for it. God just wants us back 
with Him in that sense. He sent us Christ to show us it can be done. And once 
you see this, life is about striving to transform yourself in His image in our 
human life on this world. And many, MANY people do exactly that with 
*phenomenally* Quality results through religion, and not only Christian ones. 
And those religions are based on *theism.*

There are plenty of problems in the world. Many of them connected to or even 
caused by organized religion. But *theism* itself is not the root cause, it is only 
on occasion the vehicle for otherwise independently existential entities such as 
depravity, fanaticism, social degeneracy. And lacking theism as a vehicle, those 
ills will simply find another. Consistently. But theism on the other hand, one's 
own belief in a god or gods is the *direct* cause of MUCH good in the world. 
Being so specific and personal, it is a very specific sort of good. It is a 
*personal* transformative event that leads to an unavoidable *personal* goal to 
strive toward the divine. It is a *personal* Dynamic quality event. How it is 
latched, how one individual maintains the static quality is where trouble can 
start, usually in the higher evolutionary solutions to it, namely social ones. But 
the trouble is the static quality solution, not the Dynamic Quality event.

Theism brought us higher Quality. Eliminating it (not sure how you ever could, 
btw; see USSR, Pol Pot, etc.) because it is used as a vehicle by societal ills is 
to kill the host to cure the disease. It is to give up a Dynamic quality for failure to 
find evolutionary evolved static quality to hold on to it. I say no; lets keep striving 
intellectually to find that static quality that latches the Dynamic quality of theism 
in a way that evolves with society, in way that, finding it, ADDS to the Quality 
evolution of society. Lets step forward from the last step, not step back and 
pretend we never made it simply because in our own intellectual laziness we 
couldn't manage a way to hang on to it.