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I was eight the first time a pompous man sat me down and used me as a wall to bounce off his own glory from. Apparently he deemed me intelligent enough to recognize glory.
He told me that there was no god and that he was his own god and then he promptly dived into an elaborate explanation of what happens to our bodies when we die, how there is only darkness and the worms and bugs eat us.
I could see that my fear and sadness were mistaken for awe on his end and I could clearly beyond any doubt see that he was high on his own power and very very satisfied from his rant.
This guy would both before and after this incident make many many mistakes and horrendous errors in judgment, action and morality..and I really pity anyone who would deem him a god, or any other form of authority for that matter.
But officially I was raised catholic, so from a very young age I was exposed to glorious halls with gold plated artifacts, to musical chanting and ceremony and pious, mild mannered women in black and white garb. And many many times another pompous man used me as a wall to bounce off his glory from. He was splendidly dressed in a long purple/white and gold colored dress (at least it looked like a "dress" to me) that glittered worse than a Las Vegas showgirl's. This man talked about a strict and yet loving god, who was clearly male even though his gender was never directly mentioned (you sort of get a hint, when god is called "he" throughout your childhood), a god who primarily chose his most entrusted followers from other men who would write down his laws and communicate directly with him, a god who never had daughters, only a son.
According to this pompous man, extremely horrific things would happen to us after we died, unless we obeyed this god, and the best way to obey this god would be to obey this man.
Later, after this man had died it would come out that he had made some horrendous errors in judgment, action and morality, and that anyone who viewed him as the voice of god was indeed qualified for some genuine pity.
On a lesser scale, there were other pompous guys and girls around throughout life. I left the catholic church when I was eleven, and didn't explore christianity much more, since I hadn't found any god there. I had had ample opportunities to explore the lutheran church through the Swedish state, which provided us with it, and judaism and the muslim faith through close childhood friends, but not anywhere in any of those places or situations did I see traces of any god who would speak to me.
So, in order to experience less of that wall-bouncing-glory feeling I stayed away from any of the world religions, because I felt that I had enough knowledge of glory and power by now.
But I wasn't safe. When I traveled intellectual, geeky or academic circles instead, there was always a guy there, sitting and explaining how religious folk were lesser than him, how most people were sheep and chose to crumble instead of facing truth. At best he would say in a patronizing way, that the bible perhaps provided some decent guidance for the large hordes of flawed and weak humanity (and from his tone at least, he didn't count himself on the same level as these weak hordes)
You see, there were many of these men and they were very emphatic. In theory they said different things from the man in the golden caftan, but their faces looked the same when they said it. There was that power bouncing off again.
You may wonder if there weren't any smug women around during these situations, and the answer would be yes. They were often middle men though, nuns, or gals sitting in the atheist panel on a convention, nodding. There were exceptions..but women have historically played second fiddle for so long when it comes to religion, so they often do so in the intellectual church of atheism too. Or maybe it is a question of power. See I don't doubt that power tastes sweet on the tongue of a woman as well, but she will often be plagued by the doubt of her entitlement to it, and that lack of confidence would make its mark among the ranks of the pompous.
I think I had my fill of the church of atheism and expressive agnosticism when I sat and watched a panel at a science fiction convention literally wank off on the audience many years ago. I had payed good money to sit on the receiving end of a panel "discussion" about new age and "other religion" - a panel discussion void of any real discussion mind you. All the members of the panel were atheists or agnostics and all of them were full of contempt for "new age". It was of course blatantly evident that they didn't know anything about new age, and they certainly hadn't invited anyone from that corner to have a seat. The only thing evident about new age from this panel debate was that many women were seeking it out (often leaving established churches to do so), and that new age was even more worthless than an established faith, because in new age you just picked whatever you wanted from a smörgåsbord of beliefs, and what was that really other than sheer storytelling? How pathetic.
No one touched the aspect of soul-searching, exploring or questioning, no one seemed to have an inkling that anyone involved in established faith or any new age group could have the same intellectual and psychological strength as they, and yet still choose to stay in that field and wield a dialog from there.
To this day I will remember my heart pumping when I stood up before this little panel debate, in a room filled with their friends in the audience and said: "But religion is for many about feeling specialness, that you are special, unique, chosen to be seen by something greater, about having particular insights that separates you from "others". And what are you doing in this panel other than cultivating that exact same feeling?"
I may not have phrased it all that well, and the message certainly didn't hit home either. All the people in the panel ignored me, as did the audience, it was as if it never happened frankly. The air was still too thick with glory. I only saw two boys in their late teens, who didn't belong to this scifi gang or their friends, who had come in from the streets just to have a look around, they were the only ones smiling at me. I don't think they were into new age or christianity in the least, but they did recognize pompousness when they saw it, and they where at an age where pompousness in thirty-fortysomehting science fiction geeks beeped with a nerdy melody on their radar.
How could I explain to anyone from these ranks that new age circles were composed of the same exact form of pompousness as theirs and the priest's? There were fewer middle men than any church, and there was less aggressiveness in tone than in the church of atheism & expressive agnosticism..but yes, the same specimens of powertripping blueballs waiting for a chance to ejaculate, could be found there. But as a woman and as a "seeker", I guess the church of the new age country buffet held fewer traps, fewer risks of getting spluttered with someones' intellectual jizz. Just as it is easier to become a guru in certain circles there, it is easier to call someones bluff. All you need is your brain and a steady grip around your wallet.
I realize that this story makes it sound as if there weren't good people with self confident humbleness and insight through my life, and thankfully there were. But you see, these people did not feel that they needed to tell me their religious or intellectual beliefs, often I didn't know them until fairly late in our relationship, and it didn't play a prominent part in how it was formed.
It also sounds as if I am or was a form of eternallly flimsy religious/philosophical seeker, which isn't true either. I'm merely interested in these aspects in general.
There are things I know and things I believe, but I'm very careful when I talk about it. The fear of being pompous is one reason, but also I truly truly value an individuals' right to come to her own terms with these things. I think something very precious and specific happens when we walk that road without holding someones hand for a while, in the darkness.
And this is the dilemma: power trips and smugness or anger genuinely prevent us from walking that road, alone in the darkness of our own heads or souls. When we declare that we know something to someone, even in that simple action, there is a danger. I've seen it so many times, and I've felt the tug in myself to do it. To just declare. And I always call myself out because the reasons for it are so muddled.
But I will take the risk to say that one skill I have developed is to recognize a fellow individual who've really walked on their own like that in the dark and came out on the other side. They are atheists, christians or something completely different, but they are recognizable. They didn't just intellectually pick a side, they went through something vastly different from that. I guess the members of this club aren't flawless in the least, but I think they may be a little less prone to smugness and hasty judgment.
I was going to write something about Philip Pullman's books again, and how a movie with awesome special effects, but apparently castrated from any interesting dilemma between religion and free will, is premiering in early December. Hollywood was just too afraid of religion to criticize it too much. And yet anyone who've read Pullman's books thoroughly will say that the books (as opposed to the man himself) are not atheist. The church of atheism does not acknowledge the definite existence of the soul (a part of ourselves that is not the body) and of ghosts (sentient survival after death). So those individuals of the catholic church and other religious groups who hate the fact that the books are read and made into film, must genuinely just protest the de-crowning of "authority" in the books. If they are on secure terms with their own faith I can genuinely not see why they would not be able cope with a difference in opinion at least, since it it is evident that Pullman is not criticizing their god, even if he is, if you know what I mean.
The reason I like the books in spite of their flaws, is that the prevailing message is for people to think for themselves. And this is possible to do in church, in mosque, on a science fiction convent, in an atheist panel, and of course while reading His Dark Materials.
I am going to Sweden on November the 29th, and am staying there until December 16th. Projects will be finished here, bureaucratic procedures concluded and papers sent off in all kinds of directions. Next year will bring some changes for me and the geek, but the details of those will come later.
In Sweden I'll go to church! I think I'll be safe, even though I don't believe in god. It is the first time in 4 years that I'm in Sweden during Advent and Lucia, and I'm looking forward to it eager as a child. So I'll attend a Lucia concert filled with awesome christmas music and Scandinavian nostalgia. Someone will have to pick up the mush that is me afterward.
I'll be back on American soil ready for the holidays and to tackle new things to come.
He told me that there was no god and that he was his own god and then he promptly dived into an elaborate explanation of what happens to our bodies when we die, how there is only darkness and the worms and bugs eat us.
I could see that my fear and sadness were mistaken for awe on his end and I could clearly beyond any doubt see that he was high on his own power and very very satisfied from his rant.
This guy would both before and after this incident make many many mistakes and horrendous errors in judgment, action and morality..and I really pity anyone who would deem him a god, or any other form of authority for that matter.
But officially I was raised catholic, so from a very young age I was exposed to glorious halls with gold plated artifacts, to musical chanting and ceremony and pious, mild mannered women in black and white garb. And many many times another pompous man used me as a wall to bounce off his glory from. He was splendidly dressed in a long purple/white and gold colored dress (at least it looked like a "dress" to me) that glittered worse than a Las Vegas showgirl's. This man talked about a strict and yet loving god, who was clearly male even though his gender was never directly mentioned (you sort of get a hint, when god is called "he" throughout your childhood), a god who primarily chose his most entrusted followers from other men who would write down his laws and communicate directly with him, a god who never had daughters, only a son.
According to this pompous man, extremely horrific things would happen to us after we died, unless we obeyed this god, and the best way to obey this god would be to obey this man.
Later, after this man had died it would come out that he had made some horrendous errors in judgment, action and morality, and that anyone who viewed him as the voice of god was indeed qualified for some genuine pity.
On a lesser scale, there were other pompous guys and girls around throughout life. I left the catholic church when I was eleven, and didn't explore christianity much more, since I hadn't found any god there. I had had ample opportunities to explore the lutheran church through the Swedish state, which provided us with it, and judaism and the muslim faith through close childhood friends, but not anywhere in any of those places or situations did I see traces of any god who would speak to me.
So, in order to experience less of that wall-bouncing-glory feeling I stayed away from any of the world religions, because I felt that I had enough knowledge of glory and power by now.
But I wasn't safe. When I traveled intellectual, geeky or academic circles instead, there was always a guy there, sitting and explaining how religious folk were lesser than him, how most people were sheep and chose to crumble instead of facing truth. At best he would say in a patronizing way, that the bible perhaps provided some decent guidance for the large hordes of flawed and weak humanity (and from his tone at least, he didn't count himself on the same level as these weak hordes)
You see, there were many of these men and they were very emphatic. In theory they said different things from the man in the golden caftan, but their faces looked the same when they said it. There was that power bouncing off again.
You may wonder if there weren't any smug women around during these situations, and the answer would be yes. They were often middle men though, nuns, or gals sitting in the atheist panel on a convention, nodding. There were exceptions..but women have historically played second fiddle for so long when it comes to religion, so they often do so in the intellectual church of atheism too. Or maybe it is a question of power. See I don't doubt that power tastes sweet on the tongue of a woman as well, but she will often be plagued by the doubt of her entitlement to it, and that lack of confidence would make its mark among the ranks of the pompous.
I think I had my fill of the church of atheism and expressive agnosticism when I sat and watched a panel at a science fiction convention literally wank off on the audience many years ago. I had payed good money to sit on the receiving end of a panel "discussion" about new age and "other religion" - a panel discussion void of any real discussion mind you. All the members of the panel were atheists or agnostics and all of them were full of contempt for "new age". It was of course blatantly evident that they didn't know anything about new age, and they certainly hadn't invited anyone from that corner to have a seat. The only thing evident about new age from this panel debate was that many women were seeking it out (often leaving established churches to do so), and that new age was even more worthless than an established faith, because in new age you just picked whatever you wanted from a smörgåsbord of beliefs, and what was that really other than sheer storytelling? How pathetic.
No one touched the aspect of soul-searching, exploring or questioning, no one seemed to have an inkling that anyone involved in established faith or any new age group could have the same intellectual and psychological strength as they, and yet still choose to stay in that field and wield a dialog from there.
To this day I will remember my heart pumping when I stood up before this little panel debate, in a room filled with their friends in the audience and said: "But religion is for many about feeling specialness, that you are special, unique, chosen to be seen by something greater, about having particular insights that separates you from "others". And what are you doing in this panel other than cultivating that exact same feeling?"
I may not have phrased it all that well, and the message certainly didn't hit home either. All the people in the panel ignored me, as did the audience, it was as if it never happened frankly. The air was still too thick with glory. I only saw two boys in their late teens, who didn't belong to this scifi gang or their friends, who had come in from the streets just to have a look around, they were the only ones smiling at me. I don't think they were into new age or christianity in the least, but they did recognize pompousness when they saw it, and they where at an age where pompousness in thirty-fortysomehting science fiction geeks beeped with a nerdy melody on their radar.
How could I explain to anyone from these ranks that new age circles were composed of the same exact form of pompousness as theirs and the priest's? There were fewer middle men than any church, and there was less aggressiveness in tone than in the church of atheism & expressive agnosticism..but yes, the same specimens of powertripping blueballs waiting for a chance to ejaculate, could be found there. But as a woman and as a "seeker", I guess the church of the new age country buffet held fewer traps, fewer risks of getting spluttered with someones' intellectual jizz. Just as it is easier to become a guru in certain circles there, it is easier to call someones bluff. All you need is your brain and a steady grip around your wallet.
I realize that this story makes it sound as if there weren't good people with self confident humbleness and insight through my life, and thankfully there were. But you see, these people did not feel that they needed to tell me their religious or intellectual beliefs, often I didn't know them until fairly late in our relationship, and it didn't play a prominent part in how it was formed.
It also sounds as if I am or was a form of eternallly flimsy religious/philosophical seeker, which isn't true either. I'm merely interested in these aspects in general.
There are things I know and things I believe, but I'm very careful when I talk about it. The fear of being pompous is one reason, but also I truly truly value an individuals' right to come to her own terms with these things. I think something very precious and specific happens when we walk that road without holding someones hand for a while, in the darkness.
And this is the dilemma: power trips and smugness or anger genuinely prevent us from walking that road, alone in the darkness of our own heads or souls. When we declare that we know something to someone, even in that simple action, there is a danger. I've seen it so many times, and I've felt the tug in myself to do it. To just declare. And I always call myself out because the reasons for it are so muddled.
But I will take the risk to say that one skill I have developed is to recognize a fellow individual who've really walked on their own like that in the dark and came out on the other side. They are atheists, christians or something completely different, but they are recognizable. They didn't just intellectually pick a side, they went through something vastly different from that. I guess the members of this club aren't flawless in the least, but I think they may be a little less prone to smugness and hasty judgment.
I was going to write something about Philip Pullman's books again, and how a movie with awesome special effects, but apparently castrated from any interesting dilemma between religion and free will, is premiering in early December. Hollywood was just too afraid of religion to criticize it too much. And yet anyone who've read Pullman's books thoroughly will say that the books (as opposed to the man himself) are not atheist. The church of atheism does not acknowledge the definite existence of the soul (a part of ourselves that is not the body) and of ghosts (sentient survival after death). So those individuals of the catholic church and other religious groups who hate the fact that the books are read and made into film, must genuinely just protest the de-crowning of "authority" in the books. If they are on secure terms with their own faith I can genuinely not see why they would not be able cope with a difference in opinion at least, since it it is evident that Pullman is not criticizing their god, even if he is, if you know what I mean.
The reason I like the books in spite of their flaws, is that the prevailing message is for people to think for themselves. And this is possible to do in church, in mosque, on a science fiction convent, in an atheist panel, and of course while reading His Dark Materials.
I am going to Sweden on November the 29th, and am staying there until December 16th. Projects will be finished here, bureaucratic procedures concluded and papers sent off in all kinds of directions. Next year will bring some changes for me and the geek, but the details of those will come later.
In Sweden I'll go to church! I think I'll be safe, even though I don't believe in god. It is the first time in 4 years that I'm in Sweden during Advent and Lucia, and I'm looking forward to it eager as a child. So I'll attend a Lucia concert filled with awesome christmas music and Scandinavian nostalgia. Someone will have to pick up the mush that is me afterward.
I'll be back on American soil ready for the holidays and to tackle new things to come.
