Excellent.. Off-topic, but needed saying..
Month: July 2012
North Adelaide Baptist Church
It seems Dispirited is the basis for this sermon: THE SERMON: listen here…
Yes indeed..
“Why We Should be Cultivating Ritual, Not Piety” by Per Smith..
I have broke (briefly) the re-blog thing: so manual – worth a read nonetheless!
Over at the new Patheos blog, Science on Religion, Connor Wood poses the no longer rhetorical question: “Does religion make us moral?” He presents this question in order to highlight the implications raised by the recent publication of Yale psychologist Paul Bloom, who as Connor notes is an atheist:
It might seem surprising, then, that Bloom has recently published a paper in the Annual Review of Psychology detailing, in part, all the good that religion can do. Religion, Bloom points out, does actually seem to make people more altruistic and generous. Religious people give more to charities than non-religious people, including secular charities. And IRS tax receipts show that states where people are more religious have much higher rates of charitable giving than less religious states. Meanwhile, lab experiments show that participating in religious rituals primes people to be more generous and caring toward one another.
The link is http://irritually.org/2012/06/15/why-we-should-be-cultivating-ritual-not-piety/ – and the rest is worth a look…
Ok, ok: not about spiritual matters-but felt like re-blogging it..
One theme of this summer’s Olympic sports coverage will be the weak challenge by British athletes in the men’s and women’s middle distances – in the women’s 800 metres for example, UK athletics have been able to fill just one of the three potential spaces . There is no expectation of a serious medal challenge at any distance between the 400 metre and Mo Farah at 5k
It hasn’t always been like that. There was of course the Ovett-Coe-Cram moment, but in the thirty years before that, UK middle distance running was generally competitive; and (as I’ve posted before) elite UK marathon times have been getting consistently slower, year by year, for a while. Where did the previous tradition of middle-distance running come from?
Once answer, I suspect, is the figure of Alf Tupper, who was a staple of many working-class childhoods, from his first appearance in the Rover in 1949. Aged 18…
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Meanwhile, at American Buddhist Perspective..
More interesting stuff from Justin, on models of thought in Buddhism:
I am often asked “why ‘impose’ Western models of thought on Buddhism?” as if discussing the nature of Buddhist philosophy or ethics is some sort of new colonialist/imperialist activity. The fact is, the Buddha used countless models, analogies, and illustrative examples in his teachings. READ MORE
When I have more energy, I think there is much to be said on how Buddhism engages models of teaching… Till then, I’ll make do with a quote from the Mahaparinibbana Sutta;
I have set forth the Dhamma without making any distinction of esoteric and exoteric doctrine; there is nothing, Ananda, with regard to the teachings that the Tathagata holds to the last with the closed fist of a teacher who keeps some things back.
Rabbi Jason Rosenberg from Tampa reviews Dispirited..
At http://cbatampa.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/but-not-religious.html, Rabbi Jason Rosenberg from Tampa reviews Dispirited.
Below is a flavour of the piece…
There’s always a lot of talk about the idea of being “spiritual but not religious.” It certainly is a fairly common refrain, and it’s no surprise that proponents (and leaders) of organized religion are often against it. I’ll admit to having pretty mixed feelings on the matter*. On the one hand, I’m really not all that eager to attack people who are, more or less, minding their own business. It’s one of the ways in which religious people like myself often allow themselves to engage in mean-spirited pettiness. Not very religious, or spiritual, frankly.
* If you read this blog at all regularly, this should come as no shock to you!
And, maybe more significantly, it’s often not fair. At the very least, it’s using the same broad brush that many of us religious types hate being used on us. I mean, when someone says, “religion is all superstitious nonsense,” I usually protest about the word “all.” It’s manifestly true that some religion is superstitious nonsense. Maybe much of it. READ THE FULL REVIEW…
Another interesting review – it doesn’t wholly agree, but engages with what seem serious questions..
Interesting review..
Mortality..
[Apologies for slow blogging / response of late. Those who know me will be aware of the reasons behind this. It may continue for some time, I fear. I will probably continue to tweet due twitter’s brevity, but blog posts – and certainly responses – will be fewer/slower.]
Below is a quote from the Pabbatopama Sutta, found in the Samyutta Nikaya (of the Buddhist Pali Canon). I omit the second part- which offers post-death rewards to those who follow the Buddha, Dhamma & Sangha, not because it’s irrelevant, but because it is not my primary concern here.
All religions (and quite a few things that claim not to be) seem to offer some rescue from death. I am tempted to see it as one of those features that distinguish religious phenomena from religion-like socio-political phenomena. What I do like, below, however, is the sense of inevitability- that it rolls over us all. It reminds me of Matthew 5.45 (For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. ESV, 2001), and reminds us that irrespective of post-mortem claims, this world is indifferent to us.
While others may choose to focus on the consolations that faith offers post-death, I am much more interested in this indifference. It seems instructive. Post-death threats and promises have not promoted ethics, and many religious thinkers have also taken this view. I am sure that there are those who believe (and claim evidence, but this is another matter), to an extent, that death is survivable: but I am not interested in that. The evidence is sketchy (at very best), and this world is without us once we die. It is this world that interests me. A mortal being is what we are to this world. Even if we look beyond death, this world is a place where we are mortal. It is only effected by what we do before death. What happens beyond is irrelevant.
Like massive boulders
mountains pressing against the sky
moving in from all sides
crushing the four directions,
so aging and death
come rolling over living beings:
noble warriors, brahmans, merchants
workers, outcastes, & scavengers
They spare nothing
They trample everything.
Here elephant troops can hold no ground
nor can chariots or infantry
nor can a battle of wit
or wealth win out
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn03/sn03.025.than.html
I am not convinced of all Chapman says, but this is an interesting review of what is an unquestionably important book..
Dispirited 