Reach for your goal. Reach for the stars. Chase your dreams. Since our childhood, most of us have been inundated with philosophy that everything we want to achieve is outside rather than in. That life is about finding ways to get what we want. It is consumerism dressed up in the fads achieving our personal potential. If you grew up in the Christian Church for example, you get taught that ‘God’s mysterious will’ is nowhere near. That his will is somewhere out there. That our lives are about guessing at where his will is and what its supposed to look like. But even outside the confines of claustrophobic Christianity there is this life message that whatever we’re searching is completely and utterly separate from us. I think we have also come to do the same with morality.

We’ve gotten it in our heads that morality is a plumbline we grapple for or wrestle others over.  But what if morality is deeper than something that’s out there? What if morality has been ingrained within us? Maybe somewhere deep down embedded in the acids of our DNA is the coding for morality. Somehow people know at a very young age that stealing is wrong. Most people can try to explain it away as parental nurture, but there is more to it than that. Or that we can go to any country in the world and somewhere somehow we all know that killing is destructive behaviour.

For some, morality is something that is either taught, learned or gained through familial contact or social interaction. Yet there are people who didn’t have good parents or no parents at all and grew up without much social interaction or exposure to accessible information and yet can interact with a culture and still know the basic ‘rules’ fo morality. For others, morality seems to be something we have to achieve to or earn. That the more we do the more moral we become. If that’s true, than morality has always been a commodity we can purchase. Then morality sits in our hotel vending machines waiting for us to choose it.

But, morality isn’t a rule. It isn’t a plumbline. It isn’t a tool to determine who is in and who is out. It is something that part of each person. We don’t earn morality. It earns us. The more in touch with our humanity we become the more moral we become. Morality is a gene. But not a gene that we can see or study. Its a gene that progressively evolves over time, but unlike any other gene it is effected and altered by the decisions we make and don’t make. It is transformed by compassion and deformed by the lack of it.

Morality isn’t a characteristic that was somehow born out of the ancient Christian scriptures. It wasn’t birthed out of the introduction of evolution. It isn’t a course you can take at a university. There’s no degree you can get in morality. Morality is in us. We are all moral. Its how we choose to use that knowledge that will determine how we nurture the growth of that morality within us. So, the origins of morality lie in each human being but are grown through the intentional everyday process of making choices.

If morality is subjective than is there a plumbline is the first apparent question? If there is a plumbline it is found in a multi-systemic worldview. Morals are encouraged by living in a moral society or community. They are also spurred on by what we choose to expose our minds to. Moral subjectivity is not the enemy to the progress of any society, the enemy is when homogenous morality is used as way to marginalize people into our neat little boxes. Moral subjectivity leads a society to embrace diversity by seeing that their worldview isn’t the only right one. Moral homogeneity says everyone needs to see everything the same.

Now the problem comes when someone thinks that their moral worldview is much more valuable than the person standing next them. The moment that moral subjectivity becomes moral superiority is when things like the Holocaust or the Crusades leave open scars on our history. Events like this instill just enough fear in people that to even hear words like ‘moral subjectivity’ force them to cringe at the next global episode likely to occur because of such terminology.  Most tend to blame the development of such atrocious acts on the lack of parenting skills or chock it up to bad highschool experiences. For the most part people tend to blame events outside of the perpetrators life to help explain why they are the way are. But maybe its deeper than attempting to victimize those that have made historically destructive decisions.

Decisions belong to those who make them. The after-effects of someone’s decision are the life-long souvenirs they will carry with them. And those souvenirs are indicative of the origins of where they learned to make moral choices. If the origins of moral subjectivity lie in the heart of a person than no longer can people blame outside unseen forces. If moral subjectivity is true than one can only blame themselves. This is an incredibly empowering discovery because than it means that everyone is responsible to developm morality in light of their journey. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t objective morals to follow, it means that our development can remain subjective all the searching for the objective. That we don’t have to push, pull and prod our way through the library to find the one book that teaches us how to be all things moral. This reality leaves us with a responsibility not only to choose progress but to help one another on our journey, and by doing so we help usher in a new morality that is much needed in light of our current cultural shift.

most people render this verse to be a universal proclamation of the depravity and falleness of man. that we are all going to ‘hell in a handbasket’. but is that what is being said?

i think its important to remember that the majority of the time when paul uses a ‘you’ in his letters he isn’t directing the ‘you’ to those outside his audience, he is directing it to the readers/hearers. or even what some might call universal proclamations tend to not include the universe within which most traditional theology sets the stage for universal depravity. take for example the first few words — ‘for all’ — which the word in greek for this phrase is better rendered ‘for all of those who’. paul is dealing with a specific issue, he is also referring to an older set of scriptures, more specifically to the verse in the OT where God supposedly tells the nation of Israel that not one among you is good (there’s that ‘you’ showing up again; remember God wasn’t talking to the world, he was speaking thr0ugh a prophet to the Israelite followers). Paul is relating this terminology to make a point that this new grace that the Romans are receiving isn’t cheap grace. It comes with an inherited experience. A inherited family that they are not a part of. Then Paul goes on to talk about the idea of sin. remember the word is singular, not epidemic. and two it is directly related to personal journey that is experienced and sought out throughout our life. so he is tell them that no one in their community is who they should be. (because there were some in the community who thought they were better than others because they thought following  jesus was all about the law — this is why Paul says before and after these verses that everyone has been made right. Paul is dealing with this destructive spirit of exclusivity here. some were saying only those who follow the list of the right things to do are good enough to call themselves followers. Paul nips that whole way of thinking in the bud by cutting out the legs from underneath those who have gotten too big of a head for the group they are a part of.

the next section is this idea of falling short. the word in the greek is hystereo. it means ‘lack’. deeply rooted in the origin of the word is this idea where the effect in the cause lags behind. so instead of having a cause and effect, one right after the other, the results don’t come immediately or directly after the cause. it would be like putting some money in a vending machine and making your selection and then coming back the next day to get your selection. or using paints to paint a picture, but the picture itself doesn’t show up until hours later. it is this idea that people haven’t caught up with they are meant to be. that we are learning what it means to follow christ. everyone. not just a few. and that no one can pull rank. in fact, the word also connotes a sort of partnership. so paul is actually chastising those who are trying to be exclusive by challenging them to see that by being exclusive they are partnering with their lack, they are partnering with the ‘who’ they are not meant to be. and by doing so, they don’t make god famous (which is the idea behind the hebrew word for glory). that we don’t draw people to jesus when we think we are better than others. and a good reminder is to see that we all need jesus. Paul goes into the atonement theology on the verses between these two. but the point is clear, exclusivism stops us from being who we are meant to be.

a really good friend of mine who is an atheist shares his thoughts on bacon, god, and how christians and atheists could work together. here is his article.

                                                                                                                                                                                                          by James Millar.

 
I USED to be a vegetarian – but bacon frying in the pan smells so good doesn’t it?  It was a life choice based on the basic principle that I did not want consume a sentient being. A personal choice – a personal view. However, I was always surprised by the confrontational response I would generally receive when I revealed this detail of my life. It was a constant irritation to me, that others seemed to feel compelled to confront my belief system head-on. With a sigh, I would brace myself, yet again, for a bombardment of hackneyed counter-arguments. Not that they ever managed to shake my personal conviction that my choice was the right one for me.
My vegetarianism has now lapsed, but I still try and eat food which has been ethically sourced and have a great sympathy with the compelling arguments put forward for vegetarianism – maybe in the future I’ll be a veggie again, sausages taste so good though.
The reason I bring this up is like vegetarianism, atheism, seems to evoke a similar response. I have for many years held the belief that there was no god, no higher being guiding life, no holy spirit, that we are just animals, like any other inhabiting the world. A result of evolution – no less no more.
My name is James and I am an atheist.
There I’ve said it….I’m out the closet, because ever since I’ve held this viewpoint I have tended to keep it to myself. Perhaps it’s because I find the sight of atheist heavyweight Richard Dawkins, attempting to intellectually bludgeon the religious community slightly unsettling. I’m not driven by trying to impose my viewpoint on others, frankly I don’t care enough. But then I expect my beliefs to be respected and I don’t want to be hammered by religious dogma either.
I understand the hostility to my world view.

 Atheism calls into question one of the core beliefs of those with a religions conviction. The atheist doesn’t get ‘faith’ I’m afraid, he is needs convincing with scientific fact. Basically, if the argument is conceded that there is no intelligent design, no heaven and hell, no higher being guiding us through life then the house of cards collapses. If I had spent my life believing in God I might react in a similar fashion. 

Never the twain shall meet then?

I think not, there is common ground. There is a dialogue to be opened up here. I doubt there will ever be any concession on the diametrically opposing views of the existence or not of God. But I think Christians and Atheists do have a lot in common. Both have spent time pondering the big questions in life – where do we come from, why are we here, what happens when we die. More importantly though I think, both believe in promoting and nourishing the inherent goodness of the human race. Put simply; we believe that people should be good to each other.  I feel this, as a belief is far more important than a debate on the existence of a higher being. I would equally lack interest in a debate on whether fairies live at the bottom of the garden, I don’t mean to be offensive, that’s how I feel about it.
The only way in my view that the two can progress, is to leave that debate at the doorstep, and talk about humanist philosophy. I want to be decent, kind and honest to my fellow humans, not so I’m in God’s good graces, but because it feels good and I know on a fundamental level it is the right thing to do. But whatever the drive; those who care about helping others should come together, talk, take action and try and make this a world we are not ashamed to hand over to our children. Bacon’s burning, got to go!

i saw this short interesting thought on the whole Glenn Beck thing. Check it out here or below: http://www.urbanonramps.com/?p=2204 (pay special attention to the bottom lines, very good indeed)

On March 15, 2010 .

U2 – I’ll Go Crazy If I Don’t Go Crazy Tonight from David OReilly on Vimeo.

i just spent a week on a cruise ship (our first cruise, woo hoo!) where some of the time was spent with a pentecostal conference group. here are some of my hilights while there. be on the lookout for more.

if a parent tell a child that they are no good or that they have no value to give to the world. subconsciously their worldview begins to shift. their perceptions of themselves begin to morph into what they previously thought about themselves. they begin to believe these new words as the truth. and nothing but the truth. and most of them spend their lives trying to live in defiance of these ‘truths’, others become the helpless victims of really bad parenting and become the prisoners to these pseudo-realities. they believed what wasn’t true to be true of themselves. sometimes we have to deny the very truths we have been told that are true to find the truth. and sometimes we have to accept the very lies we have been told to find the truth that was hidden behind them all along. words create worlds. realitities. truths and non-truths. god did it. we can do it also.

this might be what has also gone on for centuries in the evolution of christianity. we have created pseudo-realities. false-worlds. for some the bible is a series of theological or doctrinal statements that all must sign-on to. and if not, then those who do not are either enemies to the movement or need to be converted to their pseudo-reality. their pseudo-world. this is not an attack, but rather than analysis of how we come to where we end up. if we are all honest with ourselves, we tend to want to define things either out of fear or the need to control*. this isn’t always the case, sometimes it is out of sheer curiosity and awe that we wish to discover things. this is what i want to spark in readers, that curiosity, the art of the question, doubt, narrative, romance, candlelight dinners, these are all good things.

take for example what many have done with the words of the author paul in scripture. there are a few place where paul uses words like battle, flesh, spiritual, or armour. he uses very engaging language. for most this is another reality, realm, existence or dimension that it seems at times we have to earn to be a part of. but if you read deeper and research you will find that paul was dealing with people on a human level, dealing with their everyday lives, sometimes dealing with communities who didn’t seem to have it together. his words were supposed to be encouraging not mandating a 5-point theological framework. and yet people have taken the words of paul and have created even more oppressive militaristic language of a cosmic battle going on somewhere out there for the souls of all mankind. we have taken his dealings with people and have created an alternate reality or what i call a pseudo-reality. something that wasn’t meant to be. paul was also a hebrew minded influenced writer who would also use the experiences and items around him for metaphor as well. paul would deal with some of their views on cosmology and creatively intertwine his views on how they effect our lives. he hardly said anything outside of what they wouldn’t have already known. but, he would say it differently than to what might have been acceptable. for example, the hebrews believed everything was already spiritual. in fact, one source even says that they thought eating dinner was the same as giving a sacrifice. the hellenized greek audience would have been aware of these subtle nuances we sometimes miss. but paul was having conversations with people, not creating pseudo-realities that we could use to scare each other with. if we are in any sort of battle, it is the battle to find god in the midst of all of our pseudo-realities we all have helped create.

another example would be the church in acts. in the book of acts, people experienced god directly. and they gave all of their belonging to one another. they met in each others houses. they met secretly and discreetly. they also got it wrong. a lot. they healed people randomly. they protected and cared for one another. and so many other things. but there is this over-eager desire to be like them so much that people are taking on their distinct practices, or even focusing only on certain aspects of their experiences (e.g., finding ways to re-experience ‘pentecost’ or doing ‘house-churches’). they are creating their own pseudo-realities of their experiences ‘then’. what about now? what do we do with now? it’s not that their experiences don’t have influence or don’t spark creativity, its that they aren’t relevant to our times. yes, they are relevant, but not for our time. god is in a different phase** (it seems) than he was then. but most people use the church in acts as the ultimate plumbline for how successful they are or could be. they use their models as their own. they use their models to judge others. they ask questions like ‘how come ‘they’ experience god so good and we don’t?’ and so then church life becomes something we keep doing more and more of (encouraging an over-spiritualized approach to consumerism) to get god to pay attention to us. we try and earn his magicshow. we have created a pseudo-reality that was never meant to be. the pentecostal churches seem to solely look for the ecstatics experience in god. in fact their denominational title is inspired by the early church event. and it seems they too have fallen into the trap of creating/forcing pseudo-ecstatic experiences in the place of other church practices and calling it god. i don’t want to seem to be undermining some of the experiences people are having or even begin to separate which ones are real or not. but i think we need to come to a place where we are comfortable with tearing down our own pseudo-realities and allow reality to be what it is. we must come to a place where we don’t need to feel in control of what we believe, but let belief be in control of our journey. we should be able to come to a place where these false-realities melt away leaving us with nothing more than god. but if we choose to defend, argue, prove, experience and too easily accept our pseudo-realities as the reality than we too will live life as subconcious victims to our unaware machinations of trying to control our worlds and the worlds of others. and there is more out there, it starts with us letting go of our pseudo-reality.

*am I saying that all of our inherited faith within christianity has been created by controlling or fearful people? i definitely would think if people like Augustine, Origen, Athanasius were to bear all, they too would agree that some of what we might deem as truth is just a colonization of our/their pseudo-realities.

** be on the look out for my new blog on the ‘evolutionary development of god’

jesus interacted with many people from many different backgrounds. when jesus quotes the golden rule, he isn’t the first one to utter these words, confucius did — almost 500 years before jesus was conceived. there is speculation that jesus traveled quite a bit during his 18 silent years that we have no record for. some historians/theologians surmise jesus might have traveled to what is now known as britain and europe. others guess that he might have went to india, china and the rest of the world to meet, study and learn at the feet of other spiritual leaders; such as buddha.

in fact, right near where jesus lived and grew up was a port where there were major intersections and import and export of goods around the world at that time. it is no doubt that jesus would be heard of such religions as buddhism, zoroastrianism and others. in fact, he would have been aware of the two-kingdom split of the israelites in the Tanakh (Old Testament). jesus would have interacted with other religions. in fact, even in some of the stories jesus shows his compassion toward other religions. he meets up a few different greek people, who would have been cult-practicing  ‘goa’ (anyone non-jewish). when jesus spends time with them, he doesn’t reprimand them for their practices. if anything, most of our theology of condemning other religions tends to come from Paul not jesus (compare the number of verses between the two). when jesus changes the story of the two jews walking on a dangerous road, to a jew and a samaritan (who helps the jew), he is also playing with interfaith advocacy and religious pluralism. now, for some, they might argue that jesus was advocating the philosophy that ‘all truth is god’s truth’, which i would wholeheartedly agree, . But, what if there is more to it? what if the reason why jesus didn’t comment on their religious state was because to him it didn’t matter.  it was their heart and personal transformation he desired. (now, this is conjecture, i understand, but any other retort this will be just the same — keep this in mind). yet, we spend so much of our time fighting over ‘religions’ when we can agree jesus and i might add a person like buddha (who has written down that he wished people would not turn his insight into a religious movement) wanted something more than a set of rules or doctrines.

to assume jesus was here to create a ‘one-way’ religion (as is traditionally asserted) is to support the belief that god is truly small. it also doesn’t allow for the reality that god could easily break out all of our boxes, even the ones in this blog. we get so caught up in who believe in what that we forget jesus just loved people. he was a hippie. we should be hippies. but because our incessant need for labels and words have kidnapped mystery, we need to continue making sense of it all rather than loving people. the gospel isn’t about how bad people are and who need a small one-religion god. the gospel is hope (that’s what it means in aramaic), and that hope looks different for a christian than it does a buddhist or an hindu or an atheist. we have to see the gospel without our own interpretations. see it as the word is — hope. with no additives or preservatives, just extreme hope. jesus took the time to listen, learn and love. a lot of christianity is still learning how to listen let alone learn from other people. yet, learn we must. love we must. or we will be nothing more than a company who thinks our product is the best and everyone else’s (as the british would say) is rubbish. which is at the heart quite counter to jesus’s message of love toward anyone and everyone.

a commercial flashes across your television screen. someone famous steps on the scene and the music cues and thir hair is somehow magically shiny, wavy and free-flowing. the commercial isn’t saling you a hair product. it isn’t even saling that you could be like the person the screen. they are saying, you aren’t like the person on the screen. it sounds the same, but it isn’t the whole premise is that you don’t have what it takes unless you buy this product. and when you do, you will be whole. fulfilled. you will no longer be broken because of what L’oreal can do for you and your hair. Women have been prisoners of the beauty myth for years and years. Long before commercials were even introduced. this obsession also existed before the Greek culture who thought life was about physical beauty. Adams’ response to Eve in biblical narrative was one of shock and surprise on how beautiful she was. Adam was stricken with Eve’s beauty. And his jaw-dropped. So, where did it come from? Maybe that’s the wrong question, but I still think its good to hear someone who has been studying this subject a lot longer than I, Naomi Wolf.

“ A whole generation of women  crippled by a male-generated myth of beauty that does not apply to them, are hungry sexually deprived, physically mutilated, and addicted to beauty rituals that leave them feeling anxious and unfulfilled. Along with masses of undifferentiated statistics (90% of women surveyed say they weigh too much), imaginative displacements (men having sexually enhancing cosmetic surgery), and perceptive analyses of cosmetic advertising (creams, shampoos, conditioners with sexual attributes substituting for failed relationships with men)…”

The beauty myth tends to be categorized as a women issue, I think I think there is something to be said about what Wolf says here. I would say the first step is to come to a place where we all agree that what is being perpetuated is a lie. And that, for men, we might have to accept we help perpetuate this lie. And yes, there are also commercials for men too, even more so now in the last 30 years or so. But, instead of playing the blame game, why don’t we do something about for the audiences involved? to believe in something like ’the beauty myth’ is to agree with all the lies in our past that have told us, we need something more. we need to hide behind our masks. that we aren’t good enough as is. at the heart of the beauty myth is consumerism. and consumerism is a drug we all take without knowing it. but that’s the power of this drug. that we aren’t aware that we’re taking it. that the lie has somehow become the truth. and we have become the very media we so despise. and so the only option is to walk away. it’s very much like the Greek muses who’s only purpose was to distract people from getting to their destination. to shipwreck them out into places unknown. but, to be honest, to divorce ourselves from the beauty myth, we are going to have to go out to the places unknown. and we have to run to get here. the longer we stay, the longer we advocate beauty as a commodity. and unfortunately, to those who make commercials, all of our a commodity.

 To the ancient Jews, beauty wasn’t at all outside. It was the person who was willing to talk through hell and back and still believe in hope. It was the young boy turned man, molested and abused at a young age, who decides to live life to the fullest regardless of his past (this is not minimizing his past). It is the woman who was abandoned by her husband for another woman and still decides to keep the baby and fight on. And there are better and worse examples that we could use to fill in the blanks. But to the ancient writers of the Torah, beauty had nothing to do with lipstick. It was who you are as a person and who you are becoming regardless of the hell you have been through. It is the person who believe the sun will shine after the rain, not simply because someone told her it would, or even because science told her it should, but because in her soul is this pearl deeply embedded within. and it whispers to her ‘one day, it will be alright’.