22:19 They prevented me in the day of my calamity: but the LORD was my stay.
22:20 He brought me forth also into a large place: he delivered me, because he delighted in me.
2 Samuel 18-20.
History is not the story of the past: History is what we do. Yes, there is a history of, but what we do now is History.
Religion has histories in particular, but religion is an activity among men on-going that is not historical.
History is our private and public enterprise in toto, a developing and undecided, unfolding event. Religion is a state of being among men in relation to Man. How men "bind" or reify religion is a matter of History; but that men do is a matter of religion.
How we see our selves and others in relation to our self-being is how we decide the worth of our lives. So I'll pass for now on the doing of Religion as History, and I'll look slightly at religion as being, as religio.
If I am God, there is no higher moral power than myself, and thus, "Everything is permitted." No one can rightly contradict me because I am God. You are God. We are all God; and therefore there is no God. Everything is relative. There is Nihilo ex nihilo. There are brief candles and dusty roads to death. Every man's death is the submergence of an island. We are all free to be nothing at all but our own nothing. We are free to embrace anything we volunteer to embrace, likely pleasure, even if such is pain. Our moral must be, at best, prudence, maybe utillity if we're somehow generous. But if we're not, then we turn from the Hobbesean nightmare to the Hobbesean dream. From every man for himself and God against all, we turn to the Leviathan.
If we are God, then anything the collective decides is god-like: Our General Will is our State, and our state is God; our representative, our avatar, is the Earthly godhead; and the people are the pure, unlike those who are not The People. We can know this by reference to the godhead who reifies the General Will, and he knows it from gnosis, a special insight into the pleroma.We do not know the General Will because we do not have the gnosis. Our avatar does. He and It are general. Our religio, our binding, is total, for to be outside the bounds of the general binding, i.e. our religion, is to be not god, hence evil. If there is actually one legitimate, god-like Reich, ein Fuhrer, and ein Volk, then those who are not of it are outside it, ex religio, excommnicare. Enemies of the State, whether they know it or not, whether they commit crimes or not. They are not of God, the political religion, i.e. the poligion.
Is Sarah Palin, in her own mind, God? Does Sarah Palin assume the State must be God and she its bridge across the caesura? I don't see this in evidence. Rather, I see Sarah Palin as one who sees herself as David did: She is worthy because she is loved as a creature in the image of God. She is not above but below, and humbly and gratefully so.
"Because he delighted in me."
27 comments:
I'm not, if anyone were to inquire, religious.
Good thought-provoking post!
Dag, I've learned by now that it is an exercise in futility to even try to argue with anyone on this issue, but please explain to me how not believing in a god in the sky handing down arbitrary moral commands (a lot of which have to do with seeing to it that he gets enough obedience and adoration) translates to "anything goes"? I do not understand the "without-god-there-is-nothing-but-atoms-in-the-void" argument. Do religious people really feel that way? Because I can tell you that this atheist, at least, does not.
And yes, Sarah Palin thinks she speaks for her god. And by the way, Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted, damn his eyes, of the Phoenix Diocese recently made this statement with regard to whether a woman should EVER be allowed an abortion TO SAVE HER LIFE: "While medical professionals should certainly try to save a pregnant mother's life, the means by which they do it can never be by killing her unborn child." Translation: LET HER DIE. The Bishop of Phoenix clearly stated that a pregnant woman with a life-endangering medical condition should die rather than be allowed an abortion. The woman is LESS than the fetus. That is what the Catholic Church thinks of women. And that is what Sarah Palin buys into, even though she is not a Catholic.
And if you're Christian and there is righteous steam coming out of your ears right now, try imagining it's a wife or daughter you profess to love who is in that predicament. LET HER DIE? If you go along with that, you don't deserve her.
I enjoy your poetic posts, Dag, but some nights I'm just not in the properly gnostic frame of mind. This is another one of those nights.
Stop making excuses for Sarah Palin. She thinks she has the right to make laws that will kill other women. Because she thinks she is loved by a god? That's moral superiority?
As usual, a non Catholic is telling the world what the Catholic faith believes. Are you even interested in knowing why your statement is false or are you just going to accuse me of patronizing you again?
Here is a fuller context of his statement"I am gravely concerned by the fact that an abortion was performed several months ago in a Catholic hospital in this diocese," Olmsted said in a statement sent to The Arizona Republic. "I am further concerned by the hospital's statement that the termination of a human life was necessary to treat the mother's underlying medical condition.
"An unborn child is not a disease. While medical professionals should certainly try to save a pregnant mother's life, the means by which they do it can never be by directly killing her unborn child. The end does not justify the means."
His concern was with the fact that an abortion was performed in a Catholic hospital and with the Catholics who cooperated with the abortion(in this case a nun) and certainly for the unborn baby who was viewed as disposable and unworthy of life.
Were there any attempts made to treat the woman's condition other than abortion? The Catholic faith does not want women to die, that is patently ridiculous. YOu say the Catholic church thinks of women as less than a fetus--it appears from your statement you believe an unborn child to be less than her mother.
Sorry, here is the link to the article Icited.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37171656/ns/health-health_care/
Not believing in a sky-god handing down moral codes does, in my understanding, translate as: "Anything goes." I'll repeat that if one is ones own moral arbiter, then there is obviously no one other than another person to limit ones moral reach. If I am my ultimate moral arbiter, then I have only fear of harm from another to prevent me from any thought or deed I might like to indulge. If I am my own god. i.e. my own moral end-point, then I need ask myself only if I like (X) in order to feel good about it. If it feels good to me, then I may morally do it. If it's good for me, then I might, as moral arbiter of my own existence, assume that it's universally right. If I think so, and I don't know why I wouldn't, not seeing myself as hapax, then I might well determine that all must, according to my insight as gnostic seer, demand, for the greater good and reification of the General Will, which the general population might not grasp, as Rousseau points out unabashedly, force the right expression of the General Will on an ignorant or intransigent public. That would be a moral imperative if I were a moral agent. How could I not enforce my Will on the totality if I know, (and being a gnostic I must a priori know,) the Agathon and the telos? It would be exactly immoral of me not to act to reify the Agathon and, as Voegelin puts so prettily, "immanentise the eschaton." As Kant puts it, and I think we're all familiar with this, "If we can, then we must." My will, as gnostic god, as demiurge of the Earth, is to make my Will as a moral imperative. I think. Therefore, as Descartes puts it, "I" am. I'm not really clear about your existence. I can even have some serious doubts about that. But me, I know about my own existence, self-aware and self-referential. I need not know about you or anything else so long as I exist. How do I come about? And if I'm not here to know and project onto a self-referential reality, what about the "universe"? If I'm gone, do you ll disappear along with my solipsistic self? If I am god, and if I die, then yes, every thing goes with me, sorry for you to say so.
But assuming that you somehow exist in your own atomic state. You'll have your own moral authority, yourself, that might well have no relationship to me or my reality. If, by some impossible chance, I find that your morality is superior to mine, I will not like that, I'll simply become resentful that you're a better person than I, which is highly likely, unfortunately for me.
In "Crime and Punishment," Dostoyevsky has his character Raskolnikov acting under the mistaken impression that he is a "superior" being. R. is a medical student, when he can afford the fees, and feels that as a superior person and intellectual he has a greater right to life than others, e.g. than an old and grasping pawnbroker. R. decides to murder her and take her money to finance his medical studies, that being worthier of doing in the world than exploiting poor medical students. R. is the final arbiter of his morality. He states that: "If God does not exist, then everything is permitted." Thus begins a tale of descent into the Hell of the failed god-man. Not everything is permitted, as Porfiry makes plain, the police investigator, Mr. Fire, as it were. R.'s problem is not in being arrested and exiled to Siberia: his problem is that he is not the psychopath he'd like to think himself to be. Because of that, D.'s novel is a comedy, in the sense of Dante's "Divine Comedy." R. is not the evil genius he want to think he is. That role belongs to Svidrigaylov. His fate is the ultimate lesson of the universe of Man as God: the child-molesting vampire who does exactly as he pleases, comes and goes as he chooses. S.'s punishment is that there is no punishment. His freedom is a punishment. Because he is the centre of his own universe, everything within its sphere is permitted, including rape and murder. He's totally free, to be a slave to his passions or not to be; to live, to kill, to die. He is atomic.
I'm unclear here about your use of "sky gods." I won't assume you lump the chthonic with the transcendent. If that's the case and you fall into the category of neo-pagan, then I can wonder as well if you also syncretise further and suggest the immanent Cosmic, e.g. a Gaia presence, a reversal of and a confirmation on a new plane of the chthonic. If the latter is the case and there's a nervousness or resentment against the transcendent, then I would write about the revelation of the Jews in monotheism as the beginning of the long march to Modernity and the telos of the Rational. But I don't know what you mean. You claim to be an atheist, so I assume you mean it literally, and that you don't accept any deity at all but the accidents of existence. That would leave you and mankind as the highest arbiter of the Moral. There just isn't anything better, smarter, or more intensely aware of the remaining than Man. Man is God. Once again, your moral has to trump my revolver.
Being, like you, an atheist, but unlike you, a rotten Human being, I find myself obsessed with what I term "The Authority of the Moral." Sarah Palin, a Christian, is likely also concerned about it, though no doubt in a different fashion. for her, the Authority of the Moral is settled and known to her. In that she is not free to decide it for herself, which I would be if I could think I know it. Sarah Palin, Christian, has the God-demanded restraint on her of not dictating the Moral to others. Sarah Palin, as a believing and practising Christian, has, according to her creed, no right to demand the morals of others. She, as a legislator, might have some power to administer law within strict bounds of our collective jurisprudence; but she doesn't have any authority of herself to decide morality for another. That's not just her innate American libertarianism, it is also part of her Protestant creed of free will. Sarah Palin can have, and very likely does have, a personal stand on moral actions of others; but regarding legislation, that is out of her hands, it being part of a process of which she is only one small cog, and that responsible to the people to fulfil as her public duty. Sarah Palin's personal code might be highly puritanical, but her public persona will not be that BECAUSE she is a Christian. She is restrained from gnostic Dear Leadership because there is, for her, a private Authority of the Moral that each individual is responsible to outside the law itself. She can act within the bounds of the law because she is not More Than the law herself. Even if, and perhaps especial so if, she feels she is in direct contact with God, then she must not act as more than secular legislator along with multitudes of others in conjunction with precedent. Her opinions are hers, but the law is not, and she will have a greater respect for the public law than for her own desires if she doesn't see herself as God alone.
In Anthony Burgess's novel, A Clockwork Orange, we are asked throughout, "What's it going to be then, eh?"
That is why we can trust Christians to do a better job of politicking than we could hope for from Gnostics like Obama.
A teenage psycho on a terror campaign through life is captured and subjected in the novel to the Ludovico Treatment, which prevents Alex from committing crimes. He physically cannot do wrong. Such is the hoped-for utopia of our current gnostic government of social engineers. That there is no chance for a man to do wrong, according to the Moral of the State. Every total aspect of man's life is managed for his own good so he cannot do wrong. And if a man cannot do wrong, then all that's left is to do right. Right? But of course, it is no such thing. So, what's it going to be then, eh?
My guess, and until I meet the lady I must guess, is that her opinion will be that given, according to her, man's free will and fallibility and basic fallenness, man is not only free to do wrong, he must do wrong and then face his redemptive punishment, if such is possible. I would assume, and do, that Palin is more likely to refrain from legislating "The Good" than is Obama.
In Anthony Burgess's novel, A Clockwork Orange, we are asked throughout, "What's it going to be then, eh?"
That is why we can trust Christians to do a better job of politicking than we could hope for from Gnostics like Obama.
A teenage psycho on a terror campaign through life is captured and subjected in the novel to the Ludovico Treatment, which prevents Alex from committing crimes. He physically cannot do wrong. Such is the hoped-for utopia of our current gnostic government of social engineers. That there is no chance for a man to do wrong, according to the Moral of the State. Every total aspect of man's life is managed for his own good so he cannot do wrong. And if a man cannot do wrong, then all that's left is to do right. Right? But of course, it is no such thing. So, what's it going to be then, eh?
My guess, and until I meet the lady I must guess, is that her opinion will be that given, according to her, man's free will and fallibility and basic fallenness, man is not only free to do wrong, he must do wrong and then face his redemptive punishment, if such is possible. I would assume, and do, that Palin is more likely to refrain from legislating "The Good" than is Obama.
I found the damn article before you did IMI, where do you think I got the quote? And the "context" changes nothing. You tell me what else that statement means other than that she must die rather than be saved by an abortion. It is the woman that the Catholic church considers disposable and unworthy of life.
Were there any attempts to treat the woman's condition? It's a HOSPITAL, what's your guess? And yes I DO consider the fetus less than the mother, it is not a human being yet.
Answer me, yes or no. Should that woman have been forced to die rather than have been saved by an abortion? I don't want any yammering about "what the Catholic church believes". And oh, just by the way, at 11 weeks if that woman dies then so does the fetus.
Dag, I'm Objectivist, that's Rand's philosophy. And they aren't "accidents of existence". I'm not going to try to explain the philosophy to you, if you're interested go check it out yourself. I have no interesting in chattering about gnostics, the cthonic, Rousseau, Kant, demiurges and all the rest because believe me I have heard it all before.
And as just a general comment, none of us here is a Muslim. Does that mean we should not presume to point out to Muslims what it is that they believe? Even when they won't admit it?
RRA,
Should that woman have been forced to die rather than have been saved by an abortion?
Back in the mid-1970s, a Catholic friend of mine had a mid-term abortion to save her life and because the fetus was incredibly deformed. My friend was approaching age 40, and this was her first pregnancy.
The abortion, whatever it was called, was performed at Georgetown University Hospital, a Catholic hospital. I'm sure that my friend's termination of pregnancy wasn't the first nor the last at Georgetown.
Therefore, I do not understand how Bishop Olmsted can justify what he said.
BTW, my friend went on to become pregnant two years later and delivered a healthy baby. No problems whatsoever with that pregnancy.
Oh, and IMI? This time you're condescending. And that idiot Bishop's verbal slight-of-hand about an unborn child not being a disease doesn't get a pass either. No one said the fetus was the disease, which was not specified. But preeclampsia, diabetes, and numerous other severe complications ARE diseases brought on by or complicated by the pregnancy. The woman could certainly choose to risk the full pregancy under those conditions, but it must be her choice.
The damn article? Surely you understand that a story might appear in more than one place, dont you? I have no idea where you found your story--I only wanted to link to mine--as I almost always do when I quote other people.
Yammering? Your contempt of my faith and by extention those who practice my faith is quite obvious. You have made up your mind and any answer I will give will only be the wrong one---because you--a non Catholic already "know" the real answer, dont you.
In the hope that I may yet correct another falsehood about my faith and reach someone else I will answer your question--but I am under no illusions, your hatred of the Catholic Church is well understood.
If that woman is not pregnant with another human being, I would like to know exactly what she is pregnant with? And if not pregnant with another human being, then when does that baby magically change into another human being?
The disease the woman has is not something that can be quickly treated, so from the article it appears they used abortion as a preventitive measure---to the best of my meager knowledge, pulmonary hypertension is not cured, it is managed. The article says the condition is made worse by pregnancy and possibly even fatal---well alot of things are possibly even fatal.
Abortion is legal in this country---why didn't they use another hospital? Why didn't the Catholic administrators at this hospital refer the patient to another hospital?
We believe that the mother must be treated, she must not simply be allowed to die as you say. We hold all life as sacred, none more so than the innocent unborn. However, we also realize that at times the unborn baby will die from the treatment the mother receives and while that is a great tragedy it is less horrible than abortion.
The reason we believe it is necessary to treat the mother is because very often doctors are wrong. They can only give their best educated guess as to what will happen--but they can be wrong.
In my last pregnancy I was told by my ob that I needed an abortion---that my pregnancy was "unsustainable" and that I was extremely high risk, high blood pressure and placenta previa. 15 years later my son is 6'5" 255 pound line backer --because I managed my conditions and trusted in God. Could I have died? Yes. But I could die everytime I leave my house.
Your question to which you demanded a yes or no answer is a false question. A Catholic hospital is well within their rights to refuse to do an abortion--just because they refuse to do so, does not mean the woman would be forced to die--unless you somehow believe that only Catholic hospitals are doing abortions these days.
ah yes, patrionizing and condescending because I dare to speak up for my faith. That's fine, whatever. Until I decide to stop coming to these boards I will always speak up when I see lies and half truths spread about my faith.
Perhaps we did read two separate articles, because the article I read and linked the condition was clearly specified as pulmonary hypertension---which she still has by the way---so the abortion did not "cure" her at all...in other words, she can still die from her condition if she does manage her condition. Which I believe is your entire thesis---she would die without the abortion.
So, now it appears the abortion was for convenience, doesn't it?
AOW, that's my impression as well. I assume that if this woman in Phoenix was denied the abortion she could transfer to another facility and get proper care, something she will not be able to do if the Sarah Palins of our world have their way. But the hospital was not at fault here. They acted rationally to save that woman's life and she was able to make the difficult decision herself.
It's the dogma and that bishop's callous indifference to her life that are at issue. Olmstead's statement is pretty unequivocal and it will be interesting to see if he tries to backpedal out of it. He tries to dance around the issue by mouthing platitudes about the fetus not being a disease (who ever said it was?) and leaving the implications of his statements hanging.
IMI, I missed the specific disease on the first read-through. The abortion was not meant to "cure" her of pulmonary hypertension. The disease is uncurable and sometimes fatal on its own. The determination was made that it would for sure be fatal if she tried to continue this pregnancy. And if you consider that an "inconvenience" I don't really know what to say to you. I try to avoid people who consider someone else's death an "inconvenience".
But your "faith" makes that all holy, doesn't it? And my commitment to reason makes me a "sinner" unwilling to die on the say-so of your sky god, then thanks for the compliment.
There is ZERO CHANCE that Roe vs Wade will be invalidated nationally. Given the other 'litmus test' issues, anyone who chooses to press for legal reversal of Roe vs Wade either outright or by choosing judges who will do so, WILL BE DEFEATED. And even if successful by SCOTUS appts AT APPT TIME.. name in our history ONE judge who became more conservative after appt.
Even Oliver Wendell Holmes became more 'liberal' over time.
Row vs Wade IS settled law, and if there are states whose local community SUPPORTS it's reversal, that's where such views will be reflected, not nationally.
Anyone care if Mississippi and Louisiana find a constitutional way to 'end' abortion?
ok, and now comes the intellectual cop out--twist my words around into a personal attack. Please re-read the article again. It does not say "for sure" she would die.
You still have not answered my question to you.
---If that woman is not pregnant with another human being, I would like to know exactly what she is pregnant with? And if not pregnant with another human being, then when does that baby magically change into another human being? --- no yammering now, please.
My desire to protect unborn children from abortion does not stem from my faith--my faith happily echoes my belief that an unborn baby is still a human being and deserves to be treated as a human being.
Your whole argument seems to be that this hospital had it refused to perform the abortion should have been forced to perform the abortion---which sounds alot like the position of the Obama regime.
In case you don't already know: at just three weeks after conception the baby's heart has formed and begins to beat.
By seven weeks an unborn baby has identifiable arms and legs, has measurable brain activity, by nine weeks an unborn baby has the ability to feel pain, by ten weeks the fingers and toes are clearly visible, so are the ears...that sounds pretty human to me
http://www.priestsforlife.org/diary.html
Epam, I hope you are right about Roe v. Wade, which has always been insufficient (should have been based on a woman's self-ownership instead of "privacy"). If Mississippi, Louisiana, Kansas, Colorado et al pass their own laws outlawing abortion then it does mean having to travel to other states, but that is how our constitutional system works. The "feminists" ought to be working on a system to aid such women, but they are too busy thinking up rationalizations for Islamic abuse of females.
IMI: She is pregnant with a fetus, which is not yet another human being, except in your religious dogma that says a god in the sky mystically made it one at the moment of conception. Ears and toes do not equal minds. On the other hand, one might argue that the "mother" is really nothing more than a compilation of fingers and toes and a heartbeat because, after all, her mind may not be pure and obedient? She is not "innocent", i.e., mindless, therefore she is less "pleasing" to your god. You coo over her semi-formed fetus and dismiss the issue of her own life as one of "convenience". The hospital made the decision on its own. The patient's right is to seek treatment elsewhere if she did not agree with the decision.
IMI, most of the posters here are Christians. You can always ask them to ban me. It would make things a lot less contentious around here. And your god will reward you, I'm sure, at least in your own mind.
One of the things I will NEVER understand is why in this land, when we have the scientific OBJECTIVE moment of when WE humans here on earth can no longer argue as to whether a fetus is a human we ignore it to argue items which can have no basis in fact. Only faith.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to know HERE if there is a God. It is IMPOSSIBLE to know if a fetus is a human being at conception, except thru arguments of faith, but we DO know the age at which WE render a fetus as human being by virtue of the youngest premature fetus we save to life. That date which changes as our science and efforts improve is an inarguable objective number of weeks.
It would seem to me rather than these bitter arguments which can NEVER be settled we would all be far better served by crafting the law around this date.
Maybe its because i've been drinking today, but this thread is way too deep for me...
Is Sarah Palin god? Um, was Ronald Reagan god? WTF?
From my perspective Sarah Palin makes a good potential leader of the free world because she knows how to motivate others (hockey coach, kickass governor) and she seems to GET the Islamic Jihad. She also seems popular and that means she has a chance of winning. Period.
Allen West, Bill Whittle and possibly Glenn Beck and Jon Voight also fall into that category.
And that's aabout all I have to say about that.
That sums it up well, Anon. Thanks for getting to the heart of the matter.
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