Spiritual Atheism

i can certainly relate with you on this (yet, again. what's new?). i grew up in a (the only) Christian (dominated) country in asia. the first time i encountered Buddhism, i was like, whoah! nice! i gotta try this!

so imagine my parents' surprise when i turned vegetarian and flew to a nearby island to get “initiation.” good thing my parents are not “fundamentalists” and they just let me go with whatever i do. they trust my judgements because i've never let them down, ever.

so anyway, thanks for sharing that Dennett quote. it gave me shivers up/down my spine  because i think Dennett is describing what i've been ranting all along: serendipitous things just flow to those who consciously flow with it.

take care and stay lucid.

~C (for Christians will always be cool)

Awesome post!  I've flip-flopped around on the whole spiritual-atheist/undefined spirituality thing a few times in my life.  I'm kinda at a point now that I don't even know what words to use to describe what I feel to my self, let alone any other selves.

Sweet quote by Daniel Dennett. I've only read one of his books - Consciousness Explained, but it blew me away.  It was amazing, and is part of what set me off on a reading whirlwind that is still persisting today.  Looking forward to what you'll have to say about this other book when you're done!

i know exactly what you mean.  It took me almost a year to be able to proudly proclaim that I practice Tao.  I think one of the reasons I was shy about it was because I did not know how to answer people's questions.  Once I learned more about my own faith and spiritual beliefs, i was less shy to discuss them. 

I think I had to come to terms with it myself.  Growing up Christian, I had to learn how to see myself as something other than a church choir girl.  Once my self-concept changes and I embraced it, my feelings surrounding it changed. 

I’m an athiest because God told me to be.

just kidding. I like God and athiestic spirituality (I also enjoy polytheistic spirituality, monotheistic spirituality, pantheistic spirituality, and panentheistic spirituality) and I like buddhism, and Lama Surya Das, and Judaism… which makes me a God-lover/server… as well as an athiest.

this is a funny ‘issue’ for me because I was raised Christian (fundamentalist) too… and while I can’t claim I converted to non-Christianity for postconventional reasons (I liked to swear and masturbate too much to remain a Christian) I did throw all belief to the winds, including atheism as a structure of belief, and that was fun. Later when it came time to start re-assembling spirituo-centric interior I let God back in. I like God, she’s fun, but… athiesm seems pretty similar to Godism. I mean, you go on jogs and laugh with people about veganism. That sounds like a good (non)godly time.

You make blogs that help people say a final ‘f*** you’ to the God they don’t believe in anymore and that’s cool too. I have some funny cartoons that could help people do that too. Like one year at a Christmas party at a relative’s house (a Christian relative who bought into that icky prayer and goddamed singing and stuff) I wrote funny cartoons on napkins. One depicted a giant hand inserted into an androgenous human rectum with a caption that said, “God has a big hand in your….. life.” Anyway that’s off … topic…

The only thing you don’t do is have fun conversations with God, like Neal Donald Walsh (except most of us don’t write our conversations down because we don’t get our voice confused with God’s lol.. just kidding I liked that book too) – and are you really missing that? Is that something you really need? You decide, then I’ll decide, and then God can decide for us (hehe). But in the end we’ll probably go with something both me, you, and Natalie Portman can agree on, ‘God is in the RAIN!’

But if we can’t agree on that, I’m at least sure we won’t be killing each other, or even yelling at each other about it. Which is good.

I should add that within all my ‘likes’ I have ‘preferences’. The theisms and wisdom traditions are not all the same to me.

Brondu said: “and I like buddhism, and Lama Surya Das, and Judaism… which makes me a God-lover/server… as well as an athiest.”

Lama Surya Das likes dogs. too bad he doesn't have the “blogging buddha within” to continue with his blogging. his could've kicked ass.

“I wrote funny cartoons on napkins. One depicted a giant hand inserted into an androgenous human rectum with a caption that said, “God has a big hand in your….. life.””

you are soo freakin' mean! can you draw this again and post it on your blog so i can link to it like Dunkin Donuts? see, if you didn't slack, you could be making big fortunes like The Flying Spaghetti Monster. brood upon it.

“The only thing you don’t do is have fun conversations with God, like Neal Donald Walsh”

that's a low blow! and besides Neal made a lot of money from that crap, er, book.

“But in the end we’ll probably go with something both me, you, and Natalie Portman can agree on, ‘God is in the RAIN!’”

i agree. Natalie Portman is indeed, the HOTTEST, EVER!

“I should add that within all my ‘likes’ I have ‘preferences’. The theisms and wisdom traditions are not all the same to me.”

very ballsy, but true. i agree.

seriously, this is the reason why i did not convert to Buddhism or to whatever religion. i'm still proud of my Christian heritage. it will always be part of this bodymind until this bodymind's atoms get recycled by the Kosmos.

this is also the reason why during intimate times when i'm alone with “my” thoughts and meta-thoughts, i still call on “God.” why? i don't know, it's just preference i guess. but i think The Urantia Book had put it succintly when it said:

“And God-consciousness is equivalent to the integration of the self with the universe, and on its highest levels of spiritual reality. Only the spirit content of any value is imperishable. Even that which is true, beautiful, and good may not perish in human experience. If man does not choose to survive, then does the surviving Adjuster conserve those realities born of love and nurtured in service. And all these things are a part of the Universal Father. The Father is living love, and this life of the Father is in his Sons. And the spirit of the Father is in his Sons' sons–mortal men. When all is said and done, the Father idea is still the highest human concept of God.”

take that you female shovenist pigs! just kidding. i HEART you ALL. that is all.

~C (for Christians are not lame)

oh wow. That’s a great quote from the Urantia book (which I own and enjoy) and I too will admit that I call on “God” for similar reasons during intimate times. I kind of beat around that bush last time out, but it’s true for me as well. I’m also proud of my Christian heritage and will stomp out a rousing ‘When we all get to heaven’ or ‘Christ arose’ or ‘It is well with my soul’ anytime you ask.

Regarding the cartoon, I think I might able to arrange something. I’ll be taking that requested picture as soon as I get my damned digital camera to work, and at that time I’m sure I’ll be able to come out with that comic. I drew a whole bunch of them, perhaps I will be able to find some and a few will retain their humor (though if I recall some were signicantly off-color, which added to the hilarity since we were at somebody’s house eating their food and engaging in their Christian tradition).

Brondu said: “Regarding the cartoon, I think I might able to arrange something. I’ll be taking that requested picture as soon as I get my damned digital camera to work, and at that time I’m sure I’ll be able to come out with that comic.”

speaking of cartoons, use these tools, and upload your crap to RETICULUM REX, you foo!

~C (for Comics)

Hi Maile,

If you believe in an 'immortal soul' or the possibility of 'supernatural's does that mean you are somehow lesser of a person?

Gettin a slight vibe of 'fundamentalism' in the insinuation that you can't be as 'awe-struck' if you hold to a supernatural vibe—as if that makes you inherently delusive or something.

I mean, you can be fundamentalist against certain beliefs just as much for right?

That's what always turned me off about Dennett. Me thinks he doth protest too much. Like he is fighting a skeleton in his own closet or something.

Just wondering where all the light-hearted believers are…. any ideas Brondu??  ; o )
DJP

P.S. I am commenting more on Dennett's quote than on anything else. Nor do I think/feel that religion and/or spirituality are inherently delusion-producing. Being human definitely is… but not being spiritual or religious or believing in this, that, or the other thing.  ; o )

P.P.S. I would say… that delusion is a property of human sentience. Dennett may miss the boat in not seeing the delusions of grandeur in religion and spirituality as symptomatic of something other than religion and/or spirituality. That same propensity to delusion is capable of infecting minds in any arena or realm of study/inqquiry. Whether Vedanta or Veganism.  ; o )

Maile said: “Er… not to get on topic here, but I think you guys would like the Dennett book.  He talks about the prevalence not just of the belief in God but also the belief in the importance of the belief (ie. one may not believe in the Christian god but may go through the motions out of fear or duty, etc.).”

yes, Dennett rocks in my book too. though i haven't read any of his books. but i read his stuff here. i'll take up your recommendation when i get the chance. but i still have lots of Maxim magazines to consume. LOL.

but before i digress into a juvenile male shovenistic pig again… ok. back to topic. for those who are interested in some good ole' fluffy food fight between Dennett and Wilber, check out this quote:

“You can master 100 per cent of quantum physics without transforming consciousness; but you cannot in any fashion master Zen without doing so. You do not have to transform to understand Dennett's Consciousness Explained; you merely translate. But you must transform to actually understand Plotinus' Enneads. You are already adequate to Dennett, because you both have already transformed to rationality, and thus the referents of Dennett's sentences can be easily seen by you (whether or not you agree, you can at least see what he is referring to, because his referents exist in the rational worldspace, plain as day). But if you have not transformed to (or at least strongly glimpsed) the causal and nondual realms (transpersonal and postformal), you will not be able to see the referents of most of Plotinus' sentences. They will make no sense to you. You will think Plotinus is `seeing things' – and he is, and so could you and I, if we both transform to those postformal worldspaces, whereupon the referents of Plotinus' sentences, referents that exist in the causal and nondual worldspaces, become plain as day. And that transformation is an absolutely unavoidable part of the paradigm (the injunction) of an integral approach to consciousness.”

those guys can also be sooo freakin' anal! that's why i revert to reading Maxim. can you blame me now?

~C (for Consumer of Maxim)

don't worry Maile, DJP can sometimes gets cranky. he's really a cool dude. i think he just needs to play blues with his guitar some more ;-)

~C (for Cranky DJP)

look at this crazy hot post!

Clearly there are a lot of ins, a lot of outs, and a lot of what-have-yous. My first experience with Dennett is the quote on this blog, which I neither assimilated nor amalgamated very thoroughly and consequentally am left unqualified for a discussion as to the merits or demerits of the vibes he be spraying.

If Ken Wilber says that the referent’s of Dennett’s sentences translate to translation then I would imagine there is a danger (not a very dangerous danger, though because it’s just translation) that a reductionistic rationality-induced rigidity might set in but I don’t know… there have been healthy, rational reconstructions of the transrational that avoid exiling supernaturality to the relam of the occult or otherwise obscene (obscene not to be equated or associated with fundamentalism which is far worse than obscene.. hehehehe just kidding). I wouldn’t know what brand Dennett is talking about one way or the other because I’ve never read the man(? - woman?)…

In all of this I think Maile is faultless and pure, like a snow white lamb on the eve of Yom Kippur (what a stunning blend of iconography and symbology). Or is she?

As you can see, David Jon, my good friend, I am in and out of my element at the same time. I’m not sure what I have to add. ~C4 is kicking some ass today, though (except he said ‘can sometimes gets’). Some unGodly, righteous ass.

Brian David.

PS: If I may answer Maile’s inquiry - does it make me theistic if I see interconnectivity and whatnot? No…. it makes you panentheistic. HAHAHAHAHAAAAAA. Just kidding. I’m not going to answer that one for you. Craft a fleshy cosmology and see if you don’t find a smiling Abba just waiting to exercise a potent brand of starchy masculinity accompanied by mercy through judgement via radical compassion brought on by conscious immersion and the natural wellsprings of knowledge it produces, funneled as it were back into the compassionatory embrace. Tough love….

Brondu said: “~C4 is kicking some ass today, though (except he said ‘can sometimes gets’). Some unGodly, righteous ass.”

jeesh. sorry Brondu. English is not my first language you know.

ok. back to topic!

~C (for Canadians are cool, except Brondu)

Sorry Maile,

To hear about your struggles with your extended family like that. I wasn't trying to touch on a sore spot with you. It's just that I think Dennett is half-a-toad more often than not. He has is own brand of fundamentalism he is pushing that is a belief in non-belief. I tend to prefer the more open-ended, less arrogant approach to examining the big questions about Life and Death.

And like I said, I was zeroing on the Dennett quote. I have read several of his books and have found myself more than occasionally pissed off at his narrow-mindedness as he accuses others of their delusions. I am always leery, Maile, of someone who wants to point to other people's faults and not examine their own asshole-ish, bitchy, cranky (what me, cranky… hell no… I oughtta!), closed-minded, myopic side of the ledger.

That said, Dennett does have somewhat of a sense of humour and makes good arguments (as far as they go, which oftentimes isn't very far, in my book).

Anywho, don't sweat the converso…. we are all more or less sane folks here. And please don't let anything I wrote be an impediment, further convincing you that certain topics are better left unspoken.

Thoreauistically Yours,
DJP

P.S. My argument is that there is this sense of ego-investiture in stances that fundamentalists take… like Dennett (a hard materialist-fundamentalist I would say). That need to have the 'final word,' to 'close the door on an argument' once and for all speaks to me of someone who is trapped by a need for certainty and closure. And that may forver be a tough gig to pull off in a Cosmos so open, a world so vast… a dharma so imponderable as this.

To/for Daniel Dennett: How is constructing an identity of your 'self'
 as a spiritual atheist 'letting your self go.'

As far as I know, 'letting your self go' is not the sole province of spiritual atheism, if Dennett wants to call it that. It is part and parcel of all the world's Great Traditions. In fact, it is deemed the sumum bonum (the highest good).

'Not I, but Christ in me.'  Saint Paul

“Your glory lies where you cease to exist.”   Ramana Maharshi

So, in that sense I agree with Mr. Dennett. I just don't think his argument is a new one, nor an argument/point solely open to spiritual atheists. It is a truth available to whomever… be it a mono-theist, a poly-theist, an a-theist, a pan-theist, or a the-theist.

?-theistically yours,
DJP

jeesh, DJP, it's Holy Week fer Chrissakes! :)

DJP has got some good, funny, well-rounded things to say(sing), methinks…
very coooooool stuff….
oh man, poor Dennett. I can’t stick up for him, though… for two reasons: A: I’ve never read him, and B: I suspect DJP has got a HANDLE on things.. you might call this a lack of investigative curiosity, or an unwilligness to discover things for myself.. but you might also say that making a qualitative assessment about whether or not I am going to listen to somebody’s opinion based on what I have seen of them is also a form of investigative curiosity and a means of discovering things for myself. In this way, just as in ways of realizing the beauty of Spirit as permeated in the ever-present arising of Isness, there is more than one way to skin a cat and some ways are better than others(for instance you’d never just want skin the cat while the cat was alive - which isn’t intended to be an analogous statement, believe me) and then there are still more ways to interpret what you’ve done after you’ve skinned the cat, if you can even remember what skinning the cat was like, and usually skinning the cat screws you up pretty bad and you are faced with the choice of surrender or healthy reconstruction of interior as an athiest or otherwise and generally you should do both if you’re not too screwed up after skinning a cat to think about such things.. (that was analogous)

in the end, though, it all comes down to that four quadrant actualization of incarnational nonduality… which is: my newest story (AHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA)

man, Brondu! have you been smoking cat hair again?

anyway, just to get back on topic and make this thread more uber-juicy, here's a serendipitous post from The Dilbert Blog which i think is related to this thread…

“I’m reading a fascinating new book called Misquoting Jesus, by Bart Ehrman. The author is an expert at looking at ancient documents, especially biblical stuff, and figuring out what’s original work and what got altered by subsequent scribes. Apparently there are a lot of experts in that field. [ read more… ]”

as always, it's more fun to read the comments on the Dilbert Blog. lol!

it IS fun to read the comments… I even posted one. Of course, the cat hair had an influence on what I posted so the moderator might turn me down… we shall see…

I’m afraid this was off topic, but I’m sure it will be swept aside in the eventuality that is a torrent of relevant postings in response to the brilliantly controversial items of conversation we’ve raised.

where's your comment Brondu? btw, i just checked the Dilbert Blog and my B1-bomber full of crap comment is already posted. woooot! you are going down Scott, you are going down!

yeah he opted out of posting my comment (it was something about Jesus being locked in my basement and God as a female being pleased with his work) so I posted a different one on his newest blog. He toooooootally didn’t hestitate to put that one up.

man! you are soo geeky even on the Dilbert Blog! ok. let's get back on topic before Maile kick us out!

hey Brondu, your blasphemous comment got posted after all. LOL.

my comment just got posted too. i planted a very devious rant there including a link to this thread too. lol. The Dilbert Blog Troll is sooo evil!

Happy Easter!

lol.. what a Happy Easter it is for Maile.. this comment is skyrocketingly HOT thanks to the Dilber Blog Troll