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> He's discussing one way out of the trap of conforming to group/tribal beliefs. If you put your fear of God (in other words, some power higher than, and distin
by UncleOxidant 5y ago
> He's discussing one way out of the trap of conforming to group/tribal beliefs. If you put your fear of God (in other words, some power higher than, and distinctly external to, any social group) you begin to liberate yourself from caring too much about what other people think.
This is well said. I believe it was the theologian Stanley Hauerwas who said in the 70s that the decline of religion in America would inevitably lead to the rise of political tribalism - seems prescient.
"There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship [...] is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It's the truth. Worship your own body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you. On one level, we all know this stuff already - it's been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, bromides, epigrams, parables: the skeleton of every great story. The trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness." David Foster Wallace
- mbrodersen 5y agoI am pretty sure I don’t warship anything. Not even logical thinking or reasoning. Nothing is perfect. Everything is flawed or limited in applicability. No human is either 100% good or evil. Everything depends on context. So what is there to worship?
- Mitzz 5y agoDietrich Bonhoeffer (as I understand him) would undoubtedly say that Jesus Christ is both perfect God and perfect Man, and therefore Jesus Christ is what there is to worship. Based upon my understanding of him, his allegiance to Jesus Christ is what motivated his actions that resulted in his death at the hands of the Nazis. edit: typo
- mbrodersen 5y agoMy argument was that I (for one) doesn’t worship Jesus Christ, the Buddha, Ra the sun god, humans, myself or anything else. So the argument that we all worship something is false. Dietrich might have been worshipping a god or humans but that is besides the point.
- Mitzz 5y agoFair enough.
- pkphilip 5y agoThe term "worship" isn't limited to the worship of any deity alone - as the quote itself indicates. It includes worship of things such as beauty, youthfulness, fame, wealth... or whatever that consumes your thinking
- mbrodersen 5y agoAgree. And I don’t worship any of those. Which was my original point.
- pstuart 5y ago> So what is there to worship? David Bowie.
- mbrodersen 5y agoThat made me smile :-)
- dandotway 5y ago> Nothing is perfect If logical thinking is, as you say, imperfect, is it possible that your own conclusion that no perfect things exist is itself an imperfect conclusion? If you use this word perfect, you at least have the Idea of Perfect, even if no perfect things exist. This kind of funny talk I'm using about Ideas of perfect things goes back 2400 years to Plato and his Theory of Forms[1]. According to the philosopher-logician A. N. Whitehead: The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms
- mbrodersen 5y agoYep it is fun to think about. Especially when you realise that information is not abstract but physics. I recommend reading the “Constructor Theory of Information” if you haven’t already. It is free online.
- AlbertCory 5y agoThanks, never heard of Stanley Hauerwas. Of course, I wouldn't take David Foster Wallace (or anyone who killed himself, actually) as an authority on anything.
- gastroturf 5y agoI could not find that particular statement by Hauerwas, but it seems to be a (valid, IMO) narrow interpretation of his perspective in this paper[1]. Do you have an exact citation? Prescient indeed, and to me, disturbing. [1]: https://stanleyhauerwas.org/the-importance-of-being-catholic-a-protestant-view/ https://stanleyhauerwas.org/the-importance-of-being-catholic... edit: typo
- UncleOxidant 5y agoSorry, not Hauerwas, Lesslie Newbign, probably in his Foolishness of the Greeks from '86, but I suspect he wrote earlier on the topic as well. See: https://www.pastortheologians.com/articles/2020/10/28/politics-after-christendom-lessons-from-lesslie-newbigin https://www.pastortheologians.com/articles/2020/10/28/politi...