The Comments Wars Continue
Curat Lex and TenaciousMcD carry on their savage attacks on one another in the comments. A third-party has asked me, via email, whether I am really "too busy" to post or whether I'm just trying to stay out of the War. Really, I have been busy, but I would like to stay out of the middle of the War.
The thing that confuses me is that CL and TMcD probably agree on a lot more than they know, since I know both of them and I know that they have never met one another. TMcD is a partisan Democrat, more so than a die-hard liberal, which he is decidedly not. CL is neither a Democrat nor a Republican--I believe he identifies as an Independent (?). They like the same kind of music. But they clearly dislike one another's Internet alter egos.
I'm all for a robust give-and-take, but I hope that people can hold off ad hominem attacks and attempting to score points based on trivia in others' comments. Over at the Volokh Conspircay, the rule is that commenters are supposed to comment on the post and not on other comments. Now, if you know me, you know I'm not crazy about rules, but that's a pretty good rule, at least most of the time. And I should add that I can police comments, if it comes to that. By the Power of Blogger.
Btw, I was actually interested in the minimal contents of the American religious creed. I disagree with TMcD that one of the two elements is GOP identification. Now, it certainly seems to me that there are GOP operatives who would like to corner the political market on the religious, but I don't think that the observant are all on one side of the partisan divide.
I think the list contains some set of the following, with the possibility of inclusion among the "religious" based on holding certain subsets of these beliefs:
* Belief in a Deity who (?) takes an active interest in human actions (as opposed to a purely explanatory Prime Mover)
* Belief in a particular account of divine revelation (Moses, Moses + Jesus, Moses + Jesus + Mohammed, Moses + Jesus + Joseph Smith)
* Belief in a code of morals with a supernatural/superhuman origin (right and wrong are not merely conventional)
* Belief that science is an incomplete explanation for observed reality and will always remain such
* Belief that religious belief and observance has social utility (in addition to truth)
Does that list leave anything important out? Is it too extensive?
posted by Number Three @ 6:28 PM
3 Comments:
Specific responses:
My point is that, for the religious, science will always be an incomplete explanation for observed phenomena, which includes the existence of the Universe. This doesn't mean that one subscribes to Intelligent Design in its more ambitious forms, only that one thinks that the existence of a Universe friendly to intelligent life is not an accident. Science can be compatible with religion, but only because, under this view, it will always be incomplete. So maybe this point is not phrased in the clearest terms. Maybe saying "Science does not provide a complete account of the observed Universe" would be better?
The afterlife: I wanted to include this, but . . . my understanding is that Jews don't believe in an afterlife. Not in anything like the same way as Christians or Muslims. I may be wrong in this, but I didn't include the afterlife because no one would argue that Orthodox or Conservative Jews aren't religious.
Now, my list was not supposed to require adherence to every single tenet, so I probably should have thrown the Afterlife in. Certainly, one doesn't have to go as far as resurrection of the body . . .
And I may be wrong on the issue of Jews and the afterlife. I really don't know; that's just my memory of things, and Lord knows, I'm no expert on Judaism.
On the other thing, no mea culpas are necessary. Sometimes it's good to let off some steam, and so long as nobody takes anything (too) personally, I think the maxim, No harm, no foul, applies. This blogging thing is all about having fun, for me, and I hope my readers. I try to entertain. I may not always succeed . . . .
Apology accepted, Curat. I'm not actually sure that we do disagree on all things fundamental, although my disagrement with your point on that seems to support your case, not mine. I did take from your dyspeptic posts that you were a knee-jerk GOP ideologue, a character in ample supply over the last decade during the rise of FOX and the meo-fascist right, and if, as Emery says, you're actually an Independent of sorts, I've misread you and apologize. Officially, my (genuine) partisanship does not reject Republicans or conservatives, per se. I have qualified respect for a number of conservative authors (Aristotle, Burke, Kirk, Voegelin, Strauss, Weaver), even when I vigorously disagree with them, and I've even voted GOP in rare races for Congress, Governor, and Prez primaries (although that last doesn't really count, except maybe in 2000 when I voted for McCain in a good-faith effort to save the GOP from the crap-storm they've bought themselves and us with Bush). What I can't abide is the now-common equation of patriotism and/or religious faith with loyalty to some far-right conception of loyalty to the GOP. I'll take it on your word and Emery's that that's not where you're coming from.
Emery, as for your post, I think your bullets here are reasonable for delineating a minimal American religious sensibility, and I agree that, for most believers, human science and rationality ARE limited in their ability to comprehend the universe in its fullness, the afterlife being one obvious example of something beyond science. I also think you're right about not including the afterlife itself in the bullets. My understanding of Judaism is the same as yours, partly because Steiner told both of us that tidbit, although some additional reading tends to confirm it. There is also a small subset of "Christian oblivionists" who read Xianity as a this-worldly ethic without afterlife. I have some sympathy for that position, since it helps avoid the problem of sublime selfishness: doing good or going to church only so that you'll get the heavenly pay-off, cha-ching. But it also has a rather glaring problem, which is its seeming contradiction to biblical text. The case against hell, however, is probably stronger than the case against heaven. If you follow Augustine's metaphysics to its logical and inevitable conclusion, there is none, just death.
Still, I think you underestimate the political dynamic at work in U.S. religion today. There are obviously a lot of very religious people who still vote Democratic on a regular basis, Jews, African-American Baptists, and Hispanic Catholics (and Pentacostals from both of the latter ethnicities) being among the largest blocks. There are whites too, although the numbers are diminishing, as Curat points out. And yet, Curat, when I go to Dem Party meetings, I frequently meet people from my church and others. My first invitation to a county Dem meeting came from a couple of little old ladies who knew me only from church and just guessed that I might be a Dem. I don't know for sure, but I suspect my minister is also a Dem; our former assistant pastor definitely was, as have been most of the Presby ministers I have known, including several college friends.
But none of this undermines my original point, the one that Curat actually confirmed by his now-retratcted questioning of my religious bona fides. In the culture itself, being a Republican is now often interpreted as a proxy for "religious," and Dems are under immediate suspicion of just faking it to "hedge their bets," as Curat so eloquently put it. In the South at least, it is very common for evangelical ministers to tell the congregants that they can't go to heaven, or that they have no place in the church if they vote for Democrats (several students have related first-hand accounts of this to me). Another student recently told me that, whenever his minister thinks people are falling asleep during a sermon, he starts ranting about the Dems on abortion and gay marriage.
Now I don't think any of this is a crime or a great injustice. If you don't like it, find a new church. But it does tell us something about the shifting winds in the culture and the increasing politicization of faith in the U.S. I would argue that this has less to do with the rise of Secular Dems than with GOP demagoguery, but there's clearly some of both.
Ninophile, that's an intersting observation. Could you elaborate on that idea a bit? First, what do you see as the major N/S "believer" difference? Second, what exactly are the familial differences from which they spring?
I have some northern family (PA), and my impression was always that their religion was a bit more staid, less evangelical, and less political than what I have encountered in the south. Harold Bloom makes an argument about how the SBC is, in effect, trying to refight the "lost cause" of the Civil War through its quest for converts, something northern Baptists wouldn't feel much need for. Is that where you're going, or somewhere else?
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