T'is the Season...

Today is the winter solstice, midwinter, when the night is longest of the year and the daylight hours are the shortest.  From here the days get longer and the sun starts to work its way back higher over the horizon.

Also today, Fox News ran a Cultural Warrior segment related to this time of year-

http://www.foxnews.com/search-results/m/28027423/tis-the-season.htm

(The video did not come up in my borrowed MAC.  If there is no video, one can catch the gist by clicking the "automatically generated transcript" link.)

The atheist group commissioned a sign in Las Vegas that stated "Yes Virginia, there is no God" and makes her point that she and her group are certain that there is no empirically provable God and the whole notion is archaic.  After a discussion about the holiday falling near winter solstice, the host Laura Ingram asked what the atheist representative would think if a Catholic group commissioned a sign saying "Christians give your winter solstice meaning, (signed) Jesus."  

This argument has some entertainment value and it is obvious that both people zealously maintain their point of view.  What also is apparent is both comments are designed to be provocative and not necessarily sell either point of view.  I have written my part about feeling discomfort with occasions regarding other people's spiritual views and have recently had people share their points about meeting the occasion for what it is and the function it performs.  The Christmas season (as irritating Christians was the point of the ad...) for many IS a religious holiday as well as a time to celebrate and reaffirm family ties.  There is also a lot to be said for finding the spirit of giving and for a specific time of the year thinking of others ahead of one's self for the neighbors and pagans.  This should not be lost in the midst of people trying to find the most shocking way of displaying their point of view.  

I, for instance, am more than happy to share the season and invite comment here on my blog and see no practical value to being flagrant about my views.  If doing so would make the world a better place, it might be worth it.  But I do not see any such benefit from the sign, except reaffirm this group's view as it insults a large number of people in the community.  Not being a spokesman for pagan views, I can not speak for others.  So I will break a writing rule and use "I" often to speak using myself as an example.  What if I start the season being more efficient with my energy use?  What if I keep a cleaner yard and be a better neighbor?  What if I do my exercises and meditate regularly, and gain better control of mind and body that will make me a calm voice of reason in a sea of noise and violence?  What if I compare (and contrast) ideas and beliefs instead of concentrating on how we worship and whose way is better?  I could then in my own small way both better myself and (to plagiarize a bumper sticker) be the change I would hope for the world around me.  

With any luck, I can do this.  This may be the best way one has to make change by starting with oneself.  The sign this atheist group spent a lot of time and money commissioning essentially tells the world they don't believe in what their neighbors believe.  It does not really advance what they do believe and will change no one's mind.  As the season turns, I hope to start a change with myself, and maybe that will be contagious!  

May the Blessings of the Elements Earth, Air, Fire and Water and Deities with what faces we see be on us all and May we see, recognize and appreciate those Gifts!

The Myth of the Cosmic Soup

I can tell I forwarded the blog link to the right people this month! Thanks for the thought-provoking comments! Discussion like this is why I started this blog close to a year ago.

Let me throw out a story. This has been coming to mind for quite a while and seems to go to the points brought up in comments to the last post. Parts of the discussion from Rose had to do with finding the myths from people’s beliefs while at community events. Also, Bell made mention of “talking to my higher self” presaging her finding ritual expression. I read an article a couple of years ago that discussed, in satire, how to start your own religion. It started with a captivating story and then built on it with ritual that reflected the story and dogma that followed the rituals. It was rather clever and seemed to reflect a lot of things going on today, although the origin story he used was a thinly disguised and augmented version of Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It got me thinking about myths that answer some of the basic questions.

Once there was Life on a large scale. Initially it started as energy that cooled to become matter. Then the organs of this Life were stars that coalesced and broke down a number of times since the Big Bang. More complex chemicals were made from their destruction. There was tremendous energy available and which was released, but it was without form. These complex elements became rocky planets and gaseous atmospheres that allowed more complex chemistry to form the building blocks of life as we now know it. But chemistry on its own can not know itself or the world around it. So the energy infused and drove the chemistry of life, driving it to evolve into more complex forms of both plants and animals, but not forgetting the larger scale Life from which it came. Early on, there was no death. The early living things would build on earlier features and continue to develop without the concept of death. But eventually the forms became so complicated and complex and more self-contained that the mechanical machines of Life could only last for a finite time. The chemistry would not be renewed except to feed these machines and would cause errors in healing and reconstruction as they age. (Bones rebuild themselves every four years. But they reconstruct based on the present design and condition. So we do not get a perfect new bone every four years; we get a reconstruction over old injuries and introduced errors influenced by their use.) But the energy that drives these bodies would be eternal.

But the machine that the spirit drives eventually has to die and be recycled.

So where does the spirit go when the machine finally succumbs to age and breaks down for good? The energy that motivates the universe is still out there. What if the spirit that drives a living machine goes back to the energy of the universe (the Brahman in Hinduism, the unchanging infinite source)?

The infinite energy of the universe is hard for people to see or imagine. So they make their own idea or construction of what this energy is. Some see it as the Michelangelo image of God as a gray haired perpetually old man reaching out to give the spark of life to man in the form of Adam. Some see it as a Mother Goddess who gives birth to life and to whom all life eventually returns to be reborn. Some see the various facets of nature as Gods or Goddesses representing these characteristics. Like a radio station for a particular topic, these forms are how humans try to communicate to a greater consciousness. Some people do not see the energy at all and just look to the mechanics of how the world works; first with a basic view of how things work, then Newtonian physics and now with Quantum Mechanics on the small scale and Relativity on the large scale. Science continues to search for a Unifying Theory that brings small forces and large forces together. But the further the mechanics are explored the further the actual spirit of Life seems to be out of reach. Could it be that while the tendency is to break things down into their component pieces the mechanic theorist looses track of the Big Picture where everything has a common source? Taking things apart to explore subatomic parts and then sub-subatomic realms may be like taking apart a sand castle to the point the sand actually slips between the fingers to reform as needed into something else. One thinks the grain of sand is the basic building block, but the Whole is truly more than the sum of these parts.

So people pray to a God outside themselves or a Goddess that gives birth then to whom the spirit returns. Could it be the actual energy that IS our consciousness is the common link between EVERYTHING that is alive, not just the people, animals and plants, but also the rocks and Earth and the Universe? What if part of this energy is contained in the machine we call our body only occasionally realizes that it is actually part of a larger Whole because the machine feels finite when the spirit or soul is actually infinite? And will it eventually rejoin the Whole to be re-dealt out again or stay part of the Whole, part of a big Cosmic Soup of Life? Will the experience of a lifetime within a body be lost forever or might it stay together when a unique and discrete life is needed to be formed again? We can train ourselves to both be receptive to this energy and to seek it out more clearly. But it is not the loud calling of bodily desire but the quiet stillness that shows rather than tells that we are part of something much greater.

So that is a story. It is completely un-provable yet can not be completely disproved either.

“Spiritual but not Religious”

I have been a bit slow to update my blog due to a lot happening. This seems to prove the point that change is inevitable!

Recently over the Samhain holiday, I visited with some of the Alliance people for both a party and observance of those who have already passed on. When asked to give people who have meant a lot to me who passed on, I concentrated on people I have worked with and one of my best friends who I still miss for his humor and ability to put what seems like very serious issues into perspective. We celebrated the people who have passed on (in the language of my neighbors) and who meant a lot to us and then dedicated ourselves to changing for the future.

Soon after Samhain, the wife of a friend passed away due to a long bout of lung cancer. I went to her memorial service and found I was not talking the language of the mostly Protestant Christian people around me. My friend would label me as I did recently in e-Harmony as “spiritual but not religious” and does not know about the Pagan path I am exploring. I feel we take a break from this life and come back until we get it right. That works well for me, but I can not really engage in this type of discussion with my friend at such a time. As he read Psalm 23 and got comfort from this, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” This fourth verse especially grabs the listeners as memorial services. There is much imagery that would appeal to Pagans in Psalm 23; lying down in green pastures, lead beside still waters, walk through the valley of the shadow of death, annointest one’s head with oil, cup runneth over as examples. I tend to feel that the God and Goddess look different to me than the way my friend sees them. But I can add my desire to comfort him and his family to that of the other people and remember his wife and celebrate her life as well without announcing that I do not see the divine in the same way. My friend and his wife raise horses. It was interesting to me that the horses and two donkeys were quiet for the somber sections but chimed up on the parts where people were giving rememberances of my friend’s wife. As it was, everyone was outside because my friend’s house could not seat all the mourners and we were exposed to the weather. I was concentrating on the weather and asking for the weather to miss us. A storm gave some light rain, but held off until the service was over. But as it goes, the weather came back with a ferociousness that made up for holding off for two hours. Balance was maintained...

So again I stiffled my discomfort in situations where I find myself at Christian cerimonies but find common themes where I can add my feelings and participate.

Going back to when I started this blog hoping to stimulate discussion, I indicated I am very pragmatic about my beliefs. Generally, I work in a profession that looks for proof and scientific arguments, but I find there are questions that science can not answer. One of my scientific heros, Carl Sagan, felt a discussion of death and afterlife is scientifically unprovable. Since he is now dead, he now knows the answer but has not been able to publish his results. On the spiritual side, I hope my friend’s wife finds comfort after the last year of pain. I hope she realizes and benefits from the love of her family and knows how many lives she touched. In this way, she will live on. The minister at this service (who met her while she was ill) said she wanted to visit with everyone before she died and felt she had “taken care of business” as best she could and found it was time. Where she (or we) go from here is something she only knows. Hopefully, it is a place of rest and reflection.