[MD] Religion is not created by man. Men are created by religion.

[John Carl]

Erin,

I'm a slow responder.  An infrequent poster.
A generally lazy person.  But even a year later, I gotta respond to this...

On Tue, May 2, 2017 at 6:53 AM, <erinnoonan74 at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> Hi all,
>
> I am so sorry to hear of the passing of Mr. Pirsig.  My thoughts, prayers,
> and heart go out to his family.
> He has had such an influence on so many people of different faiths that I
> have been thinking about his above quote about religion.  I wanted to share
> a quote I came across that reminded me of Pirsig.   First a short intro to
> the author.  This was written by Rudolf Allers M.D.,Ph.D. (1883-1963).
>  Allers was an Austrian psychiatrist – a Catholic taught by Sigmund Freud.
> He later distanced himself from psychoanalysis.  When the Nazis took
> Austria Allers emigrated to the United States. He was master of Viktor
> Frankl and a friend of St. Edith Stein
>
>  “A man may think well of himself because he is conscious of devoting his
> energy to the pursuit of some goal he wants to reach, because he is indeed
> enthusiastic about it, because his whole personality has become wrapped up
> in his purpose. But there are few people who care to find out whether these
> goals really deserve the spending of so much of energy, and whether it is
> right to let them occupy so large a place in life, or whether their
> objective importance justifies  the mental reactions associated them. This
> question is not asked  because man loves to believe that objective values
> exist necessarily wherever his personal likings are engaged. This primitive
> attitude has been strengthened by the unlucky course philosophy has taken
> for more than a century.  The philosophers have told mankind too often that
> there are no objective values, that values do not exist at all outside the
> mind, that they are but the result of human predilection, and the
> projection, as it were, into the world of reality , of the subjective
> attitudes.......
> Every being strives for the good.  This may be used as a kind of
> definition of what is good or a value: good is what every being wants. This
> is quite true so long as it is taken in the right sense.  Every striving
> indeed is significant of some good having been sighted.   The study of
> strivings or human wants may, therefore, serve as a point of departure for
> an inquiry into the nature and the order of values. But is absolutely wrong
> to conclude that striving creates, so to say, the value; in fact it is the
> value or the good existing in reality or capable of existing there which
> causes the wishes, the wants, the cravings and strivings of man to arise.
> Modern mind has become thoroughly imbued with the utterly mistaken idea of
> the subjectivity of values.”
>
> Erin
>



What I see now , is  Christianity objectifying the subject - the
absolutizing of the self - that reinforces the metaphysical underpinnings
that this"subjectivity of values" has knocked askew, leaving society in an
existential crisis.  This seen most prominently in the Prosperity Gospel, -
Trump voters, mostly.   but  permeating the entire evangelical culture.

 Christianity has become the all-inclusive loving religion wherein  God
Himself sacrificed His very being, for me.  ME, me. me.  Ol' numero uno -
The Self  -  An oft-heard homily is "Jesus would have died for just one
sinner".    I don't know where they get that sentiment, but I don't know
where they get the whole prosperity gospel itself, since it's certainly not
biblical.  If there was anybody more vilified by Christ than the rich, it
was the religious.  So when those two  go hand in hand, you know something
is about to get crucified.

I fear for  the Truth.

jc