Asymmetric Religion and Philosophy

Every time disaster strikes, somebody should drive to Pat Robertson's house and restrain him for two weeks.

He makes religion (which is providing Haiti with spiritual and material aid as we speak) look stupid. And, it isn't because he's exposing some essential point of Christianity; it's because he's foolish.

Robertson's problem is that he takes religious truths, that God interacts with the real world and that there's cosmic justice, and simplifies them to a ridiculous degree, making this earthquake seem like an empirically verifiable cause-and-effect phenomenon.

(Omniscience means God knew it would happen. Omnipotence means He designed the world in such a way that this could happen and could have stopped it. The Devil can't cause earthquakes)

It's essential to know the above tenets. It's dumb to try to make direct connections between a particular attitude or behavior, especially amongst large groups, and a physical, mass event that happens to occur wherever there's a fault in the earth's crust.

Did Haiti's leaders make a pact with the Devil? Probably not. Is it generally not a good idea to invoke the Dark One? Yes. What role does this have in anything? Who knows?

Please Mr. Robinson, be quiet. Besides being theologically simple-minded, your utterances do nothing but give opponents of Christianity legitimate targets.

Statement by 700 club:

CBN.com – VIRGINIA BEACH, Va., January 13, 2010 -- On today’s The 700 Club, during a segment about the devastation, suffering and humanitarian effort that is needed in Haiti, Dr. Robertson also spoke about Haiti’s history. His comments were based on the widely-discussed 1791 slave rebellion led by Boukman Dutty at Bois Caiman, where the slaves allegedly made a famous pact with the devil in exchange for victory over the French. This history, combined with the horrible state of the country, has led countless scholars and religious figures over the centuries to believe the country is cursed. Dr. Robertson never stated that the earthquake was God’s wrath. If you watch the entire video segment, Dr. Robertson’s compassion for the people of Haiti is clear. He called for prayer for them. His humanitarian arm has been working to help thousands of people in Haiti over the last year, and they are currently launching a major relief and recovery effort to help the victims of this disaster. They have sent a shipment of millions of dollars worth of medications that is now in Haiti, and their disaster team leaders are expected to arrive tomorrow and begin operations to ease the suffering.

Chris Roslan

It's our Christian duty to help our brothers and sisters in Haiti. All of us should if we're in a position to do so.

The Anchoress has some ways to help.

If the nation decides to assist, for whatever reason, it's right that we dispatch our national resources to the area. The government has the infrastructure to help. That's a government-private partnership that I can get behind.

One of my most annoying traits is verbally assaulting foreigners (there's a word you don't hear anymore) with questions.

Thaddeus Mensah was one of my unfortunate victims a few weeks ago. Mr. Mensah's from Sampa, Ghana (below). He and his friend Alex Obroni run a charity in Ghana called Sampa Community Educational Project, Thaddeus here in the US and Alex in Ghana. They build schools and do other good works.

My view on foreign charity:

Generally speaking, a dollar to a person in places like Africa means a lot more than it does to somebody in Los Angeles. Here, it's the difference between a single and double Whopper. Over there, it's the difference between eating for a week or starving, going to school or staying illiterate.

Patriotism is important and there's a utilitarian dimension to helping one's neighbor first, but we should remember that we have obligations to all fellow humans (according to my beliefs and probably yours if you didn't follow a link from some Ayn Rand forum).

Thaddeus seems like a nice guy, and if you are charitably inclined, I'd like for you to consider SCEP.

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This year, thankful for (in no particular order)...:

1. soldiers who have sacrificed for their country.
2. clergy and others who sacrifice for God.
3. being an American.
4. health, mental and physical.
5. wife, that she's faithful to and loves me.
6. children.
7. having both my parents with me.
6. having a job.
9. being a teacher.
10. being a soldier.
11. my friends.
12. being able to learn, read, listen to, watch whatever I want.
13. having this outlet for self-expression.
14. you guys who are reading this right now.
15. computers and all of gadgets I enjoy.
16. being able to choose my leaders.
17. Pilgrims.

Who do I thank? Well individuals, where appropriate (my wife for putting up with me), but God, overall. And, if I had none of the things above, I'd still thank God.

Why?

Well, my existence and the opportunity to fight for or persevere without items 1-17.

Why?

God told us to.

Why does he need thanks?

He doesn't. We do.

Why?

We need to recognize the source of everything. We need to acknowledge the order of the universe.

?

Of course not. Celebrating Halloween suggests that there's something good, not just fun, about it. It's also inappropriate to observe Halloween, as it's a day of no significance. On the other hand, Christian parents don't have to willfully resist Halloween either as long as the kids don't confuse it with anything meaningful.

I have fond memories of "Trick or Treating," watching scary shows on television, and participating in school costume parades as a youngster and I've encouraged my children to experience these things themselves.

Come on. Let them have some fun.

The problem in 2009 is that the secular/sacred polarization (secular people are more boldly anti-religious causing religious people to become defensive about their faith) has caused Halloween to stray from its fun, childish roots to become a sort of gay/pagan/anti-Christian holy day: Celebrations in West Hollywood, Santa Barbara, and other places around the country are often the most festive of the year, a time to don their id-directed costumes; witches or Wiccan priestesses actually do celebrate Halloween or "Samhain"; and women nurture their inner-hoochie by dressing in ways that would make Brittney Spears blush (this is a huge problem at my high school, too).

I don't mean tomar any of these things for those who wish to participate- I certainly don't wish to ruin it for the men who enjoy ladies dressed in "Pirate Cutey" costume- but I think parents should keep a couple of things in mind during this season.

Perception is key.. As long as Christian parents emphasize Halloween's triviality (like some secularists do for Christmas), kids should be OK. Otherwise, a Christian parent can use Halloween as an opportunity to teach about history or some contemporary issues (for Catholics, it's a wonderful chance to explain All Souls' and All Saints days.), or just ignore the controversies altogether and just let the kids have fun.

A reason to participate in Halloween is to prevent anti-Christian forces from claiming Halloween for themselves, something which will surely happen if Christians abandon Halloween altogether. Who knows what it'll evolve into, then.

Stipulation: If you live in a community where people make a big deal out of it or your child gets mixed up with some friends that do, then it may be smarter to assert your different-ness.

For a professional debate, you can hear Michael Medved and his wife argue over the issue tomorrow. I'll post the show.

Update:

Vatican condemns it.

The total historical accuracy of the "sexy pirate" costume didn't deter this Halloween reveler from choosing it.

So, following a polygamist defrauder and paying thousands of dollars for phony-baloney e-meters and other pseudo-scientific treatments wasn't enough to make Paul Haggis break from Scientology. Supporting traditional marriage, however: forget about it.

"The church's refusal to denounce the actions of these bigots, hypocrites and homophobes is cowardly," the letter says. "I can think of no other word. Silence is consent, Tommy. I refuse to consent."

Well, I too can't stand bigotry so I won't be watching the next Bond movie which, if Quantum of Solace is any indication, won't be that large a sacrifice.

A running Asymmetric belief is that individuals have a certain amount of love, hate, moral indignation, piety, work, outrage, leisure, among other things, within their soul and that the trick for people is to aim those emotions at the appropriate targets.

Earth Day is harmful in that it drinks from the same soul pool reserved for God. My son and daughter excitedly came up to me today and asked me to turn the lights off for a minute to "celebrate" ED. This is a meaningless gesture (I assume that you already know that turning the lights off and on uses up more energy than leaving them on) that mimics what people do in a "moment of silence" or any number of other religious rituals. This pseudo-religious gesture is designed, obviously, to tap into our God-given need to worship. Since it's inappropriate, however, to worship the earth, ED, therefore, wastes people's piety. I'd rather my kids pray for a minute.

Going nuts over the environment, as many kids do because of public school catechism (see the results of this study- a third of kids think that the world is going to end by the time they're grown because of environmental degradation. Good work, wackos!)- leads to expensive, dumb policies like everything that comes out of Al Gore's mouth. It also uses up the anxiety that kids should maybe feel for more real threats like the national debt by the time they're grown or, in the case of my oldest son, what I'd do to him if he doesn't clean up the garage this weekend.

On the other hand, we shouldn't let the extremists mess up legitimate concern for the environment. California is a much better place to live since the catalytic converter allowed us to use unleaded gasoline. I'm glad we've cleaned up the water. I like bald eagles. National parks are great.

When I was growing up, the Guirado house probably had the smallest carbon footprint in East Los Angeles. My own super-conservative dad would go around the house turning the lights off. He recycled before it was cool. He hardly bought me anything (he would get my brother stuff). Star Wars toys? Ha! I might as well have asked for Faberge eggs. My brother would break those toys that my dad did buy for me before I ever played with them. Only Tom Daschle liked to drive less: My dad never took us to the movies- I think we went to see Superman II when it came out in the dollar theaters, while Superman IV was playing in the real theaters- and I didn't get any clothes until I was 12, when my dad bought me a hat so that I could look out the window, and...whoa, sorry; using up a little of my resentment reserves.

Anyways, papi didn't do this because he feared Natural retribution; he was just a frugal man. In the same spirit of practicality, my oldest son came home with a box full of energy-saving things- deadly mercury-filled fluorescent light bulbs (much more dangerous than trace levels of arsenic or Alar, and that we wouldn't need if we built more nuclear power plants), water-saving shower heads (California would have much more water if it didn't let its water go into the ocean to protect a dart fish or something).

I helped him set up the experiments, installed stuff. It's good to save energy, not for its own sake, but because its smart. I also like having the choice and would like the freedom to splurge and buy an incandescent bulb every once in a while.

My advice to environmentalists would be to "cool it" if you don't want something like an anti-environmental Martin Luther nailing a 95 thesis to Al Gore's mansion to protest modern indulgences (carbon credits).

One of the advantages to being religious is that you can consult something authoritative when confronted with difficult moral choices (conversely, it makes it much harder to rationalize your selfishness- darn!).

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Yes, although it's not as bad as you might think.

Atheism has lost its social stigma. People who were nominally Christian are now calling themselves "non-religious." Those who are religious are more attracted to Churches who take the basic tenets of Christianity seriously.

The percentage of Americans who adhered to no particular religion jumped from 8.2 percent in 1990 to 15 percent last year, the third American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) conducted over 10 months last year by pollsters from Trinity College in Connecticut, showed.

When the survey was conducted in 2001, 14.1 percent of respondents said they were not religious.

"Americans are slowly becoming less Christian... The challenge to Christianity does not come from other world religions or new religious movements, but rather from a rejection of all organized religions," said a report of last year's survey, in which 54,461 people took part.

The percentage of Christians in the United States declined slightly between 2001 and 2008 from 76.7 percent to 76 percent, after seeing a precipitous fall since 1990, when 86.2 percent said they were Christian.

Two Connecticut legislators are going after the Catholic Church. Their bill wants to impose upon them a council to make decisions instead of the Church. Of course, that's not the way that the Catholic Church works.

Three points:

1. Having the correct enemies is as important as having the proper friends. Until we're all united under the rule of the the Lord, people will war or argue. I don't know about the legislators, but I imagine that they don't have the same goals as the Church.

2. Government (as opposed to individuals or private groups) persecution of the Church is only new in the United States. Since it's inception, governments have tried to fight with the Church. Nero, Diocletian, HREs Henry IV and Frederick, Henry II, French Revolution, Spanish Civil War, Fascism, Communism, etc.

3. The Church is guaranteed to survive someplace on earth, but that doesn't mean that we shouldn't defend it. We can call or email the legislators and let them know what we think.