Liberal Faith Development

Webcomic Tribute to Christopher Hitchens (continued)

2011-12-16T20:14:00.001-06:00

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Webcomic Tribute to Christopher Hitchens

2011-12-16T20:13:00.002-06:00

You need to go to the original webcomic to see the hidden comic picture (mouse over the red button below the comic).

Liberal Religious "Strawman" Arguments Directed Against "New Atheists"

2011-10-04T22:19:00.003-05:00

On 2 October 2011, a subscriber to the the Unitarian Universalist Theology email discussion list said the following:

"But in fact, it seems to me that BOTH the Christian Fundamentalists and the Secular Atheists have decided to exclude all the other points of view from the debate. Each of them allows the other to participate so that they can each have a strawman."

To borrow the Wikipedia definition, a strawman is " ... an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position."

To be fair to the various vocal atheist and freethinkers out there, most of them are aware of liberal religious voices out there. And (to paraphrase Greta Christina and others) atheists would not be speaking out against religion very much if the predominant type of religion was Unitarian Universalist, United Church of Christ, Reform Jewish, Quaker, etc (less harmful and more likely to do good in the world).

When atheist writers like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens ignore liberal religion, it's not because liberal religion doesn't exist.

It's because liberal religions are statistically insignificant and are not representative of religion as it's commonly practiced in the world.

Here are some Gallup polling et al. findings that support this view that literalism and fundamentalism are widespread in North America and not some sort of "strawman" invented by the so-called "new atheists":

92% of Americans believe in God

81% of Americans believe in Heaven

70% of Americans believe in Hell

78% of Americans believe in angels

70% of Americans believe in the Devil

40% of Americans believe in creationism

38% of American believe in evolution with God guiding the process that created humans

16% of American believe in evolution as an unguided and undirected process

This unguided and undirected aspect of evolution is the dominant view in biology and is supported by observation and experiment.

Go Google the "Luria-Delbrück experiment" to read more about the finding that mutation -- the source of variation for natural selection -- is randomly generated and undirected without any consideration for the long-term future of the organism's well-being.

If 40% or more of the North American religious expression were Unitarian Universalist or United Church of Christ, then I think you could make a good case for Dawkins et al. pushing a "strawman" fallacy.

However, 78% of North Americans rejects evolution as it is understood by the scientific community on religious grounds. Perhaps the so-called "new atheists" have a legitimate complaint about religion as it's commonly practiced.

I would suggest that this new atheist "strawman" allegation is itself a "strawman" argument directed towards atheism.

Sources:

More Than 9 in 10 Americans Continue to Believe in God

Eternal Destinations: Americans Believe in Heaven, Hell

Four in 10 Americans Believe in Strict Creationism

New Gallup poll: America still creationist (surprise!)

[Cross-posted to Philosophical Penguins]

Unexamined Male Privilege in the Atheist Movement (in Three Parts)

2011-07-06T00:45:00.002-05:00

Here are three links to a recent situation involving sexism and unexamined male privilege in the atheist movement:

These blog articles are on my other blog ("Philosophical Penguins") that deals with "Philosophy, free/open-source software, atheism, sexuality, and a lot more."

I created the other blog so I could learn more about WordPress using their free hosted service before migrating my Unitarian Universalist congregation's web site from Movable Type to WordPress.

Oh ... religious freedom is now a concern for anti-marriage equality folks

2011-06-20T20:00:00.005-05:00

With the debate on marriage equality in New York, one of the major issues is protecting the religious freedom rights of those who don't endorse marriage equality.

Today on Andrew Sullivan's "Dish" blog, he wrote about the need for religious freedom protection in any state law granting marriage equality to same-sex couples:

It's a BFD because it will also insist on maximal religious liberty for those who conscientiously oppose marriage equality. A gay rights movement that seeks to restrict any religious freedom is not worthy of the name. And it makes me glad that we have largely avoided anything that looks like that strategy, and that last-minute negotiations were flexible enough to strengthen the protections for religious groups, churches, mosques, synagogues and the like.

One needs to keep in mind that there are some churches and congregations who are being denied religious freedom and prevented from freely exercising their religious beliefs when civil marriage equality for same-sex couples is not the law.

For example, Unitarian Universalists (UU) and United Church of Christ (UCC) support marriage equality as denominations. Many UU and UCC clergy will solemnize same-sex unions in religious ceremonies today.

But UU and UCC folks are told that their clergy must disregard their religious beliefs when acting as agents of the state in solemnizing marriages where marriage equality does not exist.

That suggests that the "religious liberty" concern voiced by anti-marriage equality folks is a specious concern. They haven't worried about religious liberty when it comes to my Unitarian Universalist religion or liberal Protestant denominations like the United Church of Christ that do recognize same-sex couples as families.

I'm willing to support the religious freedoms of anti-marriage equality folks to discriminate but it looks like they don't want to repay the favor and support religious freedom for Unitarian Universalists who want to celebrate same-sex marriages in their congregations.

Six Blind Men and the Elephant Revisited

2011-05-28T13:37:00.006-05:00

I was thinking this morning about the "Six Blind Men and the Elephant" story that is commonly used in Unitarian Universalist religious education and other theological discussions as a metaphor for the wide range of diversity of theological views and views of god in our world.

Atheist blogger Greta Christina describes the use of the elephant metaphor on her blog:

You've probably heard this fable before. There are different versions, but the basics are these: Six blind men are standing around an elephant, touching it to figure out what an elephant is. The one touching the trunk decides that an elephant is a big snake; the one touching its leg decides an elephant is a tree; the one touching its tail decides an elephant is a rope; etc. It's supposed to show the limitations of individual perception, and the importance of not being narrow-minded, and how people with different beliefs can all be right. Or all be wrong. You get the gist.

It was recently suggested in this blog that this fable makes a good metaphor for religion. God is too large (it was suggested), too complex, too multi-faceted, for any one person to perceive correctly. Therefore, Reason #2 in my Top Ten Reasons I Don't Believe In God -- the inconsistency of world religions -- isn't a fair critique. The fact that Muslims see God one way and Catholics another, and Hindus yet another, and Jews, and Neo-Pagans, and Taoists, and Rastafarians, and Episcopalians, and so on -- in ways that are radically different, even contradictory -- it's just different people perceiving different parts of the elephant.

Many interpretations of this story are examples of the "begging the question" logical fallacy (a type of logical fallacy in which the proposition to be proven is assumed implicitly or explicitly in the premise).

The elephant represents some central and complete unifying divine reality and the six blind men represent different theological points of view that are perceiving the "divine reality" elephant partially and incompletely.

We -- the omniscient reader -- "know" there is a "unifying reality" because we know about the elephant in the story.

However, we may not be the "omniscient reader" in the world we live in.

It's entirely possible that the six blind men who are "experiencing" the pillar, rope, tree branch, leaf, wall, and spear are really experiencing differences in psychology and culture. The metaphor doesn't even acknowledge this possibility.

To assume that a unifying "elephant" is there to explain the widely different theological perspectives in our world is simply begging the question.

Stained Glass, Plate Glass, and the "Cathedral of the World"

2010-12-29T20:16:00.005-06:00

Several months ago, my partner was teaching the "New Unitarian Universalist" adult religious education class and she shared a story in this curriculum by Forrest Church. The story is titled "Cathedral of the World."

This story uses the differing variety of colors, windows, and refraction in stained glass as a metaphor for the mystery one finds in religious exploration.

However, this story brought to mind another analogy that first read in Isaac Asimov's writings where he uses stained glass and plate glass as metaphors to talk about complex poetic writing and simple direct writing. I will write more about this metaphor later on.

A few days ago on the UU Theology email list, a list member made the following comment when discussing truth, knowledge, and religious meaning:

"You are making a distinction that I did not consider-regarding demonstrating that a concept is true removes its meaning. I think that is mainly true. We no longer get a lot of meaning out of medical cures-like we did when we thought spirits and shamans were responsible for that. Getting inoculations is no longer very meaningful. They remain meaningful in the pragmatic aspect of accomplishment-and predictability-but lose meaning in the more meaningful sense of personal meanings."

Again, this comment also brought to mind Asimov's stained glass and plate glass analogy. Asimov borrowed this analogy from Jay Kay and expanded on it to describe how he perceived his writing style.

In his memoir, he mentioned that there is writing that resembles a stained glass mosaic. A stained glass window is beautiful in itself and it lets light in through the many colored fragments. But one cannot see too clearly through them. To continue with this analogy, there is poetic writing that beautiful in itself and has great emotional impact. But this sort of writing can make comprehension more difficult.

Plate glass has no beauty of its own. Ideally, one should not even notice that it's there at all. It allows you to see what is happening in the world around you. Asimov suggests that his plain-and-direct, non-poetic writing style is analogous to plate glass. Ideas flow from the writer to the reader with few to no barriers to reader comprehension.

Colored glass mosaics have been known sense ancient times. Creating clear plate glass that doesn't distort one's view of the world is much harder. Even though it's less beautiful and less "poetic," it's much harder to make.

To take Asimov's stained glass and plate glass analogy further and apply it to the email comments quoted above, perhaps the shaman and spirit view of illness is a "stained glass" way of looking at the world. There may be more emotional meaning and poetry in this way of looking at the world. And the way of looking at the world that gives us immunizations, germ theory of disease, etc is a "plate glass" way of looking at the world. What we've lost in poetry and "meaning" we've made up in lives saved and suffering averted. Fair trade perhaps?

I want to take this analogy a bit further. Let's use the analogy of a moving car zipping down a high-speed freeway with lots of other traffic on it as a metaphor for the complex world we live in. We're cruising down the road at 70 miles per hour (approximately 115 km per hour for our European readers).

In this analogy, would we want the poetic and beautiful stained glass mosaic for our windshield? Or would we want a windshield that gives us the best possible view of world as we are hurtling down the freeway at high speed?

During the early years of the AIDS epidemic, some did try the shaman and spirit approach for understanding this disease. The shaman and spirit folks suggested that AIDS was God's curse for homosexuality. Those who were less poetic and less meaningful in their understanding suggested that a virus was responsible and there were practical things one could do to reduce risk, pain, and suffering (testing for infection, safer sex prevention, basic research into the disease with the hope of finding a future cure or vaccine, etc). Again, I'm OK with giving up some poetry if it reduces suffering in others.

I think giving up some poetry and meaning here is a fair trade.

Juan Williams and Bigotry

2010-10-22T06:24:00.005-05:00

First, here's what Juan Williams said on Bill O'Reilly's show:

"I'm not a bigot, but when I get on a plane, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."

Source - NY Daily News (22 October 2010)

Bigotry is an emotional response and not a rational response.

I can understand having an emotional response but I don't understand the refusal to critically examine this sort of emotional response before opening one's mouth and sharing it with the world.

If a person like Juan Williams is unwilling to do this sort of critical reflection, then maybe this person might lose his media job for very justified reasons - namely stupidity.

I'm not too worried about Juan Williams - he won't starve to death due to unemployment. He was recently hired after this incident by Fox News.

In a post-9/11 world, the person wearing "Muslim garb" (whatever the frak that might be) is the person who is least likely to be planning a serious terrorist attack. Remember the real 9/11 terrorists wore Western-style clothing so the could blend in. A terrorist who is trying to actually do the job will blend in successfully.

I close this blog post with a clip from Family Guy that pokes a bit of fun about our current xenophobia for those who dress differently:

Do "New Atheists" Ignore Liberal Religion?

2010-09-11T08:42:00.005-05:00

[Note - this blog post started out as a reply to "Islam, Fear, and Lies" on Rev. Cyn's blog.]

Do the so-called "new atheists" ignore liberal religion? Do they uncritically condemn all religion by assuming that the most extreme religious fundamentalists are representative examples of religion in practice?

These are very common criticisms of the "new atheist" writers.

However, I don't think it's a matter of the so-called "new atheists" ignoring liberal religion.

It's simply a matter of liberal religion being so tiny in numbers and influence that's it's not relevant to the questions surrounding the harm that religion causes in modern society.

As a "first-order approximation," one can ignore the influence of liberal religion in the wider religious world.

I'm sure that any suggestion that liberal religious folks ignore our lack of religious influence that begins with the equivalent of "consider a spherical cow in vacuum ... " will be condemned as too simplistic.

But there is data to back up what I'm saying.

All one needs to do is look at the exit polling data after the California Proposition 8 vote that denied marriage equality for all California residents in 2008:

Protestants were supporting Proposition 8 (65% in favor vs. 35% against).

Catholics were supporting Proposition 8 (64% in favor vs. 36% against).

Contrast the majority of religious persons voting against against marriage equality with the "none" demographic group (no religious affiliation) -- they were 90% against Prop 8 and only 10% in favor of it.

Religion appears to interfere with the ideal of supporting justice, fairness, and equality for all citizens.

And having no religion seems to be much more helpful in promoting justice in this example.

Second, some of the so-called "new atheists" like Sam Harris think that the moderate and liberal religious members of the various religious traditions are ineffective at countering their religious fundamentalist co-religionists.

Here are a few passages from Sam Harris' book The End of Faith where he discusses this:

According to Gallup, 35 percent of Americans believe that the Bible is the literal and inerrant word of the Creator of the universe. Another 48 percent believe that it is the "inspired word of the same" ... still inerrant, though certain of its passages must be interpreted symbolically before their truth can be brought to light. Only 17 percent of us remain to doubt that a personal God, in his infinite wisdom, is likely to have authored this text or, for that matter, to have created the earth with its 250,000 species of beetles. Some 46 percent of Americans take a literalist view of creation (40 percent believe that God has guided creation over the course of millions of years). This means that 120 million of us place the big bang 2,500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. If our polls are to be trusted, nearly 230 million Americans believe that a book showing neither unity of style nor internal consistency was authored by an omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent deity. A survey of Hindus, Muslims, and Jews around the world would surely yield similar results, revealing that we, as a species, have grown almost perfectly intoxicated by our myths.

***

While moderation in religion may seem a reasonable position to stake out, in light of all that we have (and have not) learned about the universe, it offers no bulwark against religious extremism and religious violence. From the perspective of those seeking to live by the letter of the texts, the religious moderate is nothing more than a failed fundamentalist. He is, in all likelihood, going to wind up in hell with the rest of the unbelievers. The problem that religious moderation poses for all of us is that it does not permit anything very critical to be said about religious literalism. We cannot say that fundamentalists are crazy, because they are merely practicing their freedom of belief; we cannot even say that they are mistaken in religious terms, because their knowledge of scripture is generally unrivaled. All we can say, as religious moderates, is that we don't like the personal and social costs that a full embrace of scripture imposes on us. This is not a new form of faith, or even a new species of scriptural exegesis; it is simply a capitulation to a variety of all-too-human interests that have nothing, in principle, to do with God. Religious moderation is the product of secular knowledge and scriptural ignorance ... and it has no bona fides, in religious terms, to put it on a par with fundamentalism. The texts themselves are unequivocal: they are perfect in all their parts. By their light, religious moderation appears to be nothing more than an unwillingness to fully submit to God's law. By failing to live by the letter of the texts, while tolerating the irrationality of those who do, religious moderates betray faith and reason equally. Unless the core dogmas of faith are called into question ... i.e., that we know there is a God, and that we know what he wants from us ... religious moderation will do nothing to lead us out of the wilderness.

Finally, some "new atheists" like Greta Christina are concerned with religion from a philosophical point of view. Greta thinks that religion is faulty from an epistemological point of view. And she would raise this philosophical objection even with moderate and liberal religious voices like the United Church of Christ:

I think science and faith are mutually exclusive.

Now, before you jump down my throat: I think religious believers can be scientists, and good ones. The evidence for that is pretty obvious. Most scientists throughout history have been religious believers, and many scientists today are as well. I'm not saying that having religious faith means you can't be a scientist.

I'm saying that -- as approaches to life, as approaches to understanding reality and engaging with the world -- faith and science are radically different. Science is an approach to life and learning that is willing to question anything, give up any belief or opinion, if a preponderance of evidence contradicts it. Faith is an approach to life and learning that starts with an assumption that it isn't willing to discard. The more progressive faiths are willing to bend and change to adjust to reality; but the basic assumption -- the existence of God and the soul -- can't be relinquished if you're going to maintain the faith. It's an approach to life based on an assumption that's not only unproven, but unprovable. And it's an approach to life that says it's okay to make this big, unrelinquishable assumption about the nature of reality based entirely on tradition, authority, and personal intuition.

(That's an oversimplification -- of both faith and science -- but for the purposes of this post, it'll have to do.)

And if you're a scientist with religious faith, it's very likely that, at some point, your faith and your science are going to collide. And when/if it does, you're going to have to make a choice. You're going to have to decide which approach you value more.

(The big conflict in the 20th century was obviously evolution, colliding with the idea of life being designed. In the 21st century, I think the big conflict may be neuroscience, colliding with the idea of the soul.)

If most religious folks were religious liberals (e.g. Unitarian Universalist, United Church of Christ, Quaker, Reform Jewish, Ethical Culture, etc), Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Christopher Hitchens, Greta Christina, and other "new atheist" writers probably would not be the outspoken critics of religion that they are today. There might be much quieter philosophical objections but we wouldn't be seeing the large number of best-seller books.

We deceive ourselves and others when we object to the "new atheists" first-order approximation descriptions of religion by pointing to religious liberals as a counter-example.

Excerpts from "Companions for the Journey"

2010-08-03T22:15:00.002-05:00

At All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church in Shreveport, we have a recurring sermon series where members share the journey that led them to All Souls and why the continue to stay.

On 25 July 2010, I was one of three persons who talked about these questions and here is what I said:

The journey that led me to this church
Good morning – I'm Steve Caldwell and here's the journey that me to All Souls.

Does anyone know what a Unitarian Universalist is?

Well, the punchline for this joke is “An atheist with children.”

And that joke is the short version of my journey. But there is a longer story as well.

Many years ago, my first encounter with Unitarian Universalism happened in 1981 when Susan and I had out wedding in Athens, Georgia.

We were looking for a setting for us to get married. Susan was raised as a questioning Roman Catholic by a Presbyterian mom and Catholic dad. And I wasn't very religious (much to the aggravation of my Mom).

We both had relatives who would be more comfortable with a religious wedding instead of simple justice-of-the-peace ceremony.

Susan's dad suggested that we talk to the Unitarian minister in our town. He thought this would be a solution for both of us.

I attended church occasionally but I didn't call myself a “Unitarian” or a “Unitarian Universalist” yet. In 1980-1981, “signing the book” was just too religious for me.

A few years later when I enlisted in the Air Force, I told the recruiter that I was a “Unitarian” and that is what they put on my dog tags.

Fast forward to 1987 when Delia was born. We faced a dilemma that many UU parents face. How do we let our child know what our values are and also let her discover her own values? How to achieve this delicate balance?

From our wedding experience, we knew about Unitarian Universalism but we were far away from the nearest UU congregation because we were living in a small town about 3 ½ hours north of Detroit (Wurtsmith Air Force Base - near Oscoda).

However, we discovered that the UUA have an excellent “church by mail” program for isolated families like ours (Church of the Larger Fellowship). We did some UU stuff with Delia around the holidays and such. And we added yet another wonderful person to our family when Charlie was born in 1992.

Shortly after Charlie was born, we left Northern Michigan for Rapid City, South Dakota. In Rapid City, we discovered that there was a “real” UU congregation for our family where we could meet with other Unitarian Universalists face-to-face. And they had real religious education classes for our children as well.

After 3 years in South Dakota, we moved once again to Shreveport and Bossier City in December 1995.

I had visited All Souls a few times during the autumn of 1995 before our entire family moved to Bossier City.

I remember Ron Thurston and Charlotte Crowley who were working the membership table greeting newcomers like myself when I first visited on a warm September day.

Compared to our “church by mail” experience and our small lay-led fellowship congregation in Rapid City, we were amazed by how big All Souls seemed to us at the time.

Our kids enjoyed having RE classes where half of the kids did not have “Caldwell” as their last name.

And that's the long story about how I got to All Souls.

The reasons why I've stayed
The other question that I've been asked to talk about the reasons why I've stayed.

Charlie overheard me asking Susan about this and he had one possible answer – “computer tech support.”

But I should provide a more complete answer than that.

We don't talk about “salvation” very much in Unitarian Universalist circles. I've never heard anyone in a UU setting ask “are you saved?”

Hellfire and damnation in Unitarian Universalism went out of fashion back in the early 1800s with the theological writings of Hosea Ballou and other early Universalists who rejected the idea of Heaven and Hell in the afterlife.

We do have a theology of “salvation” today – we just don't talk about it very much.

Rebecca Parker (President – Starr King School of the Ministry and one of our leading theologians) provides a short and pithy summary of our implicit theology of salvation.

“We offer salvation from those things that deny life or make life less whole.”

When I heard this, a light bulb went off over my head. To me, this explained why I'm at All Souls and active as a Unitarian Universalist elsewhere.

I've been very active in our denomination as a curriculum trainer for the Our Whole Lives lifespan sexuality education series that we jointly developed with the United Church of Christ.

Our sexuality education curricula are just one example of the salvation what we offer – just one example of how we can save people from those things that take away life or make it less whole.

For example, a person who is struggling with negative messages about bodies and sexuality which are all too common in the Southern “Bible Belt” culture would find a message of salvation in a church like ours which teaches that our bodies and our sexuality are a good part of the human experience.

And there are plenty of other ways that we can provide salvation in this life to a world greatly in need of salvation.

The promise of salvation – along with providing computer tech support – is why I stay at All Souls.

Thank you.

The audio podcast recording with Gia Motti, Kathy Osuch, and myself can be found online here.

Salvation -- July 2010 UU Salon Topic

2010-07-25T14:29:00.007-05:00

The July 2010 UU Salon topic is "salvation." Here are the questions for all of us to consider:

What is it?
Who gets it?
How do you get it?

I'm going to start off with a short segment from my answer for the June question where I wrote about Universalism:

The UU religious educator and curriculum author Kate Erslev provided a descriptive summary of current-day Unitarian Universalist theology of salvation in her UU Identity curriculum for young adults:
Once again, in contrast to the predominant foundation of the theology of Calvinism, our roof was raised by the 19th century Universalists. Universalism gave us a roof that saved us all. They said that what saves us is the power of creative love made viable to us in the person of Jesus.

Do we need to be saved from Hell? The Universalists said that we create heaven and hell on earth. We need to be saved from the Hells that we create.
The portion of Kate's curriculum that talks about UU theology and how we view salvation was based on Rebecca Ann Parker's talk that she presented at the 2002 LREDA Fall Conference on theology of religious education. Rebecca talked about how our current-day implicit theology of savalation or soteriology comes from our Universalist heritage.

One short and pithy statement describing current-day UU theology of salvation that I heard at this conference from Rebecca Parker was that we offer salvation from those things that deny life or make it less whole.

As an Our Whole Lives educator and curriculum trainer, this simple statement about salvation explains why we offer sexuality education in our congregations. We provide sexuality education because it offers salvation in a very real sense.

This view of UU salvation may sound just too simple, but I'm OK with that.

So ... here are my answer to the questions about salvation.

What is "salvation"? -- it's anything that saves us in the here-and-now from those things that deny us life or make that life less whole.

Who gets salvation? -- In theory, it should be more available than it currently is. Many of the things that deny us salvation are human-created. But there are some things that we cannot change such as incurable disease and natural disasters. It's our job as Unitarian Universalists to help create a world where suffering is reduced even if we cannot eliminate all suffering in this world.

How do you get it? -- Ideally, we would all get salvation. Given the imperfect world we live in and the reality that there are some things we cannot change, we should work to ensure that as many people as possible should experience salvation. As we learn more about the world and each other, we may find out that what we've done in the past may have denied salvation for some.

For example, the UU Committee on Goals published results of its survey on beliefs and attitudes within the denomination on sexual orientation in 1967:

7.7% of UUs believed that homosexuality should be discouraged by law
80.2% that it should be discouraged by education, not law
12% that it should not be discouraged by law or education
0.1% that it should be encouraged

This shift in attitudes between 1967 and today means that more people are being saved from those things that make our lives less whole -- this is true for BGLT folks and their allies.

Like beauty, sexuality may lie in the eye of the beholder

2010-06-24T07:53:00.002-05:00

I'm not at the 2010 Unitarian Universalist Association General Assembly in Minneapolis, but I've read this morning that two UU bloggers have commented on their interpretation that the opening ceremony chalice lighting was "laced with sexual innuendo."

Here's the link for the opening ceremony video (chalice lighting starts at the 22:43 point in the video. The chalice lighting was delivered by Rev. Fritz Hudson, minister of the Unitarian Church of Lincoln, Nebraska.

Here's the text of his chalice lighting as printed on the UUA web site (line breaks added to make it easier to read and I've edited the web site text to better match the words spoken on the video recording - changes are within the brackets):

Into the circle of the wide prairie sky, we come together, each of us casting our personally unique circles.

—we come carrying around us the circle of those whom we love

—we come carrying upon us the circle of those whom we represent

—we come carrying within us the circle of our apprehensions & our aspirations.

Circles, in motion, whose borders touch—may repel each other, may hold their borders, may demand separate space for separate accommodation,

Or circles, in motion, whose borders touch, with a little push, a little release, may overlap

[May inter-penetrate], can even seek each others' center.

There's friction in such [inter-penetration], as circles pass through circles.

But, in all the rubbing, should two circles' centers find each other, touch, rub
the spark, the spark [like a prairie star]

can ignite a holy prairie fire.

This reading from this minister seems so full of Midwestern earnestness that I don't think his intention was sexual innuendo.

But even if he were using sexuality as a metaphor in liturgy (which may be a more constructive way to frame this than calling it "sexual innuendo"), is this a bad thing?

If your answer to this question is "yes," why do you think it's a bad thing?

I certainly hope the answer isn't some variation of "what will the neighbors think?"

Hymnary.org - another resource for smaller congregations

2010-06-19T21:55:00.007-05:00

Back in January 2010, I mentioned the "smallchurchmusic.com" as an online resource for mp3 audio recordings that can be used to sing some of the public domain melody songs in the Unitarian Universalist hymnal.

Last night, I discovered another online resource -- hymnary.org. This web site has scores that can be printed out and MIDI transcriptions of public domain hymns that can be edited and used in smaller congregations to accompany singing.

Both of these online music resources can be used by smaller congregations who cannot afford a paid pianist or organist and also don't have a volunteer keyboard musician in their membership's talent pool.

Universalism in Our History and Where We Are Today

2010-06-12T23:01:00.004-05:00

Recently on the "The UU Salon" blog, the topic of Universalism was introduced for discussion during the month of June 2010:

Universalism, the "other U." What does it mean to you? Do you resonate with Universalism, or not? What about the Universalist perspective challenges or comforts you? This is what I've been thinking about lately, and I'll post on it over at Earthbound Spirit in a day or two.

First, classic "No Hell" Universalism was important prerequisite for the development of freethought within Unitarian Universalism and our society.

Universalism has spread beyond the earlier Universalist Church of America and the present-day Unitarian Universalist Association to moderate and liberal Christianity. And this is more important than we realize.

As long as the threat of eternal torment in Hell was a possibility, it would be hard for those who concerned for the well-being of others to let them have freedom of belief.

Sam Harris talks about the problem that Hell in religion poses for freedom of belief in his book The End of Faith:

Many religious moderates have taken the apparent high road of pluralism, asserting the equal validity of all faiths, but in doing so they neglect the irredeemably sectarian truth claims of each. As long as a Christian believes that only his baptized brethen will be saved on the Day of Judgment, he cannot possibly "respect" the beliefs of others, for he knows that the flames of hell have been stoked by these various ideas and await their adherents even now.

So ... moving away from the traditional religious idea that there is only one (traditional Christian) way to avoid Hell allows us to have the religious diversity we have today within Unitarian Universalism and beyond.

Both UU Christians and UU Humanists owe a debt of gratitude to this weakening of the Hell concept. And so do many, many more within Unitarian Universalism.

Second, the movement away from atonement in Universalist theologies of salvation to other ways of gaining salvation was an important part of our current-day Unitarian Universalist theological development.

The UU religious educator and curriculum author Kate Erslev provided a descriptive summary of current-day Unitarian Universalist theology of salvation in her UU Identity curriculum for young adults:

Once again, in contrast to the predominant foundation of the theology of Calvinism, our roof was raised by the 19th century Universalists. Universalism gave us a roof that saved us all. They said that what saves us is the power of creative love made viable to us in the person of Jesus.

Do we need to be saved from Hell? The Universalists said that we create heaven and hell on earth. We need to be saved from the Hells that we create.

The portion of Kate's curriculum that talks about UU theology and how we view salvation was based on Rebecca Ann Parker's talk that she presented at the 2002 LREDA Fall Conference on theology of religious education. Rebecca talked about how our current-day implicit theology of savalation or soteriology comes from our Universalist heritage.

One short and pithy statement describing current-day UU theology of salvation that I heard at this conference from Rebecca Parker was that we offer salvation from those things that deny life or make it less whole.

As an Our Whole Lives educator and curriculum trainer, this simple statement about salvation explains why we offer sexuality education in our congregations. We provide sexuality education because it offers salvation in a very real sense.

UUA Demographic Trends and "Tipping Points"

2010-04-24T09:49:00.021-05:00

The Unitarian Universalist Association President Rev. Peter Morales just released a "Policy Governance" (tm) monitoring report titled Monitoring Report—Global Ends (dated March 2010). In this report, Rev. Morales writes about some troubling growth trends:

On the other hand, certain trends are profoundly disturbing. Progressive people are becoming more secular. One only need to look to Europe, where liberal religion in general and Unitarian Universalism are tiny. Here at home, our very modest rate of growth, always well below the growth of the population, has ceased. We are no longer growing.

Also in this report, Rev. Morales also discusses the regional differences in growth trends:

The chart above shows that three of our regions (Southland, Western and Mid Atlantic) have grown significantly. Unfortunately, the North Atlantic is in serious decline. In a decade it has gone from our second largest region to our smallest.

Here is the chart showing the North Atlantic regional growth trends over the past decade:

And here is the chart showing the Western regional growth trends over the past decade:

The North Atlantic Region and the Western Region are experiencing different growth trends.

Even though the historical roots for both Unitarianism and Universalism run deep in New England, our numbers are shrinking in New England.

This shrinkage in New England may related to the increase in the "None" religious demographic affiliation in this region. And this region may have reached a "tipping point" demographically for Unitarian Universalism (more to follow on this speculation).

First, you may be asking what exactly are "Nones." Here's a description from the American Religious Identification Survey 2008 report on this demographic group (American Nones: The Profile of the No Religion Population):

One of the most widely noted findings from the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS 2008), which was released in March 2009, was the substantial increase in the No Religion segment of the U.S. population, whom we designate as "Nones." The Nones increased from 8.1% of the U.S. adult population in 1990 to 15% in 2008 and from 14 to 34 million adults. Their numbers far exceed the combined total of all the non-Christian religious groups in the U.S. Who exactly are the Nones? "None" is not a movement, but a label for a diverse group of people who do not identify with any of the myriad of religious options in the American religious marketplace – the irreligious, the unreligious, the anti-religious, and the anti-clerical. Some believe in God; some do not. Some may participate occasionally in religious rituals; others never will. Nones are easily misunderstood. On the one hand, only a small minority are atheists. On the other hand, it is also not correct to describe them as "unchurched" or "unaffiliated" on the assumption that they are mainly theists and religious searchers who are temporarily between congregations. Yet another incorrect assumption is that large proportions of Nones are anti-rationalist proponents of New Age and supernatural ideas. As we will show, they are more likely to be rational skeptics.

Here's a list of the North Atlantic Region Districts provided by the UUA web site so we know what states are in which district:

Ballou Channing (Massachusetts, Rhode Island)
Clara Barton (Connecticut, Massachusetts)
Massachusetts Bay (Massachusetts)
Northern New England (New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont)

The Western Region is experiencing growth but this region also has a high percentage of "Nones" compared to the national average of 15% of the total U.S. adult population. Here's a list of the Western Region Districts provided by the UUA web site so we will know what states are in which district:

Mountain Desert (Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, Wyoming)
Pacific Central (California, Hawaii, Nevada)
Pacific Northwest (Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Washington)
Pacific Southwest (Arizona, California, Nevada)

Here's a listing of the North Atlantic Region states listed in rank-order by percentage of "Nones" in the adult population:

#1 - Vermont (34% "None")
#2 - New Hampshire (29% "None")
#4 - Maine (25% "None")
#10 - Massachusetts (22% "None")
#13 - Rhode Island (19% "None")
#28 - Connecticut (14% "None")

And here's a listing of the Western Region states listed in rank-order by percentage of "Nones" in the adult population (please note that the ARIS report did not have data on Alaska or Hawaii so they're not listed below for that reason):

#3 - Wyoming (28% "None")
#4 - Washington (25% "None")
#6 - Nevada (24% "None")
#6 - Oregon (24% "None")
#8 - Idaho (23% "None")
#11 - Colorado (21% "None")
#11 - Montana (21% "None")
#14 - California (18% "None")
#16 - Arizona (17% "None")
#19 - New Mexico (16% "None")
#28 - Utah (14% "None")
#36 - Texas (12% "None" - Western Texas near El Paso is part of the Mountain Desert District while the majority of the state is part of the Southwest District)

Both the North Atlantic Region and Western Region have higher percentages of "Nones" when compared to the US average. However, the most-recent ARIS report shows that New England has taken the lead on this trend.

I'm wondering if we've reached a "tipping point" in New England with respect to this increasing percentage of "Nones" (a "tipping point" describes " ... any process in which, beyond a certain point, the rate at which the process proceeds increases dramatically").

As the "None" demographic increases in other regions to 25-30% and beyond, will we see shrinkage of Unitarian Universalist congregational membership numbers? Are the growth trends in New England a warning for the rest of the UUA? How do we best market ourselves in a culture that is becoming increasingly secular?

The ARIS report suggests that adult "Nones" could account for around one-quarter of the American population in two decades.

This could be an important demographic trend for our future.

Although "Nones" are presently 15% of the total US adult population, 22% of Americans aged 18-29 years self-identify as Nones. As this growing "None" adult population become parents, they may not see a need to join Unitarian Universalist congregations or enroll their children in Unitarian Universalist religious education programs.

What do you think?

smallchurchmusic.com -- A Useful Music Resource for Small Unitarian Universalist Congregations and Fellowships

2010-01-10T09:51:00.010-06:00

Yesterday, I was helping a friend who attends a nearby smaller lay-led Unitarian Universalist fellowship find prerecorded instrumental music to accompany congregational singing.

Many of the familiar Unitarian Universalist hymns are also available on audio CD for use in congregational singing, and she has used these resources before (a useful listing of what is available can be found online on the Church of the Larger Fellowship web site).

However, she couldn't find any music to accompany "Here We Have Gathered" (#360 in Singing the Living Tradition). The melody for this hymn is called "Old 124th" in the hymnal. That indicates that it's a traditional hymn melody and probably in the public domain ("Turn back, O man, forswear thy foolish ways" as I discovered later).

We did a quick Google search for "hymn mp3" and found "smallchurchmusic.com" -- an online archive of music Resources for congregational and small group singing (mp3 files, midi files, PDF scores, and lyrics available. The public domain music on their web site can be downloaded freely. The copyright-protected music requires a small fee for use. According to this web site, there are 2560 public domain mp3 files available for download on it.

So ... a quick download of the "Old 124th" mp3 audio file and then burning it to audio CD will now mean that a small lay-led congregation that has lost its pianist will be able to sing "Here We Have Gathered" with organ accompaniment.

More on Ministerial Formation and Education

2010-01-10T09:00:00.007-06:00

Rev. Tony Lorenzen (minister of Pathways Unitarian Universalist Church) posted a link to this article published by The Christian Century on his Facebook page.

The article seems relevant to the recent Unitarian Universalist blog discussions on "ministerial formation" and "ministerial credentialing."

Here's a short quote from the article:

Some senior pastors of large and influential congregations do not have a seminary degree, including Brian McLaren, who has served as pastor for a vibrant and growing congregation and been one of the main inspirations of the emergent church movement. Increasingly bishops and other judicatory leaders are less interested in whether someone went to seminary than in whether the person is an effective leader.

The genie is not likely to be put back in the bottle. The M.Div. will probably not have the same authority in the future as it's had in the past. It will be similar to the M.B.A.—a valuable degree if it has formed people well and is obtained from a strong program, but not a necessary credential.

The article is titled "Pastors by degree" by L. Gregory Jones (Dean of Duke University Divinity School).

I wonder if this ministerial formation change in the emergent church movement and megachurch movement will find its way into Unitarian Universalism.

January 2010 Youth Leadership Report to UUA Board

2009-12-09T23:09:00.003-06:00

The January 2010 report to the UUA Board on Youth Leadership and Ministry has been released on the UUA-updates email list ("News of the UUA, its board, staff, and committees, with links to information on UUA.org")

The report ("Report to the UUA Board of Trustees on Youth Leadership") covers the following topics:

Chronology of Major Youth Ministry Initiatives 2004 - Present
UUA Administration’s Vision for Youth Ministry
Where Are We Now on National and District Youth Leadership?
Trainings and Opportunities
Resources
What Are Models of Youth Leadership in Other Denominations?
United Church of Christ
Union for Reform Judaism
Presbyterian Church USA
Appendix A: Links to Relevant Documents

You can download a PDF copy of this report using this link. Thanks to Carol Agate for providing this report to the UUA-updates list subscribers.

Ministerial Formation - why do we have a "one size fits all" approach?

2009-11-24T20:40:00.006-06:00

There have been some recent blog coversations about Unitarian Universalist ministerial formation on PolityWonk ("How UU Ministry Got to Be So Expensive"), iMinister ("The Cost of Ministerial Formation," "The cost of Ministerial Formation II"), and Rev. Cyn ("Ministerial Formation").

I wonder if our current "one size fits all" ministerial formation process is part of the problem.

Currently, Unitarian Universalists who wish to become ministers must complete the following milestones:

bachelor's degree
graduate degree at seminary
clinical pastoral education
career assessment
internship
Regional Subcommittee approval
Ministerial Fellowship Committee approval

However, the "one size fits all" model isn't used with Unitarian Universalist religious educators in their professional development.

The "Religious Education Credentialing" program has three levels of religious educator credentialing with varying amounts of education and study.

Having multiple levels of credentialing would allow for Unitarian Universalist ministers to enter a ministry career with less student loan debt.

A ministerial formation path without the excessive student loan debt would allow for more entrepreneurial risk-taking with less economic risk. Greater entrepreneurial risk-taking would allow us to experiment more in how we plant congregations and how we grow congregations. Perhaps even "emergent" Unitarian Universalist congregations?

This multi-tier credentialing system is OK for the religious professionals who work with our children and youth.

What do you think?

"Deepity" and Modern Theology

2009-11-17T21:17:00.008-06:00

Does anyone think that a "Sokal Affair" experiment with modern theological scholarship is overdue?

The section where Daniel Dennett talks about "deepity" in theological thought happens at 30:25 in his talk.

One cannot say with 100% certainty that reindeer cannot fly ...

2009-11-14T15:33:00.003-06:00

Theodicy Explained ...

2009-10-19T07:12:00.004-05:00

Thanks to "Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal" for this concise explanation.

Dogs, Altruism, and Morality

2009-10-12T19:27:00.004-05:00

Francis Collins has argued that altruism isn't proof for God in the world but it is a strong indication for God in an essay contributed to the Templeton Foundation:

Do not get me wrong. I am not arguing that the existence of the moral law somehow proves God’s existence. Such proofs cannot be provided by the study of nature. And there is an inherent danger in arguing that the moral law points to some sort of supernatural intervention in the early days of human history; this has the flavor of a "God of the gaps" argument. After all, much still remains to be understood about evolution's influence on human nature. But even if radically altruistic human acts can ultimately be explained on the basis of evolutionary mechanisms, this would do nothing to exclude God’s hand. For if God chose the process of evolution in the beginning to create humans in imago Dei, it would also be perfectly reasonable for God to have used this same process to instill knowledge of the moral law.

However, it appears that altruism isn't uniquely human. Not only have we seen altruism and morality in our primate relatives.

We see morality in canines too.

Unitarian Universalist History and Blasphemy Day

2009-10-01T21:34:00.003-05:00

With the recent posts on MoxieLife and Chaliceblog about "Blasphemy Day" (30 September - remember to mark your calendars for next year's celebration), I thought it would be fun to point out a Unitarian Universalist historical connection with this celebration of blasphemy.

The last person to serve time in prison for blasphemy in the United States was Abner Kneeland.

He was found guilty of blasphemy by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1838 for saying the following blasphemous statements in violation of state law:

1. Universalists believe in a god which I do not; but believe that their god, with all his moral attributes (aside from nature itself) is nothing more than a mere chimera of their own imagination.

2. Universalists believe in Christ, which I do not; but believe that the whole story concerning him is as much a fable and a fiction as that of the god Prometheus, the tragedy of whose death is said to have been acted on the stage in the theatre at Athens, five hundred years before the Christian era.

3. Universalists believe in miracles, which I do not; but believe that every pretension to them can be accounted for on natural principles, or else is to be attributed to mere trick and imposture.

4. Universalists believe in the resurrection of the dead, in immortality and eternal life, which I do not; but believe that all life is mortal, that death is an eternal extinction of life to the individual who possesses it, and that no individual life is, ever was, or ever will be eternal.

Abner Kneeland was an ordained Universalist minister whose religious doubts and evolving theology challenged his ministerial colleagues.

And his pursuit of a free and responsible search for truth places his ideas firmly within the Unitarian Universalism as we know it today.

Anti-Atheism Ad in UU World That Criticizes Bishop Spong

2009-09-12T12:24:00.014-05:00

Goodwolve on her Moxielife blog mentioned the recent Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) ad complaints directed at the UU World staff for their decision to run their ad (you can see a PDF copy of the ad here).

In her blog article, she briefly mentioned an ad on page 13 for John Gibson's book In Defense of Religion. According to the ad copy, Gibson's book:

... makes a new case for religion at its best. It attacks head-on and in detail recent anti-religion books by Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett, as well as the anti-faith theology of Bishop John Shelby Spong.

I'm pretty sure from reading two of the three "anti-religion" authors described above that they do have objections with religion as it is practiced by most persons. They may disagree with the Gibson's words but they wouldn't be too upset with the "anti-religion" label being applied to them by Gibson.

However, I'm surprised to see Bishop Spong labeled as an "anti-faith" theologian.

He's a very provocative theologian and many who are more traditional in their theology don't agree with his works. And I'm pretty sure that Dawkins, Hitchens, Dennett, et al would find his theology a pointless exercise.

However, I have personally found the liberal theological writings of Spong and others such as Crossan, Funk, Pagels, and Borg to give me better understanding of the faith tradition I was raised in, allow me to make peace with it, and to keep those parts of it that I find useful as a Unitarian Universalist who is a humanist and atheist today. Part of my journey can be found in a sermon I presented in 1997. And surprisingly enough, I tested as a "Bishop Spong Christian" in Beliefnet's "What Kind of Christian Are You?" quiz.

Spong's "12 Theses" or a "Call for a New Reformation" would make for an interesting starting point for a deeper Unitarian Universalist theological conversation grounded in our history from the Protestant Reformation:

1. Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.

2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.

3. The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.

4. The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.

5. The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.

6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.

7. Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.

8. The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.

9. There is no external, objective, revealed standard writ in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.

10. Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.

11. The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.

12. All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.

None of these statements are "we all agree, let's sit around the campfire and sing 'Kum-bah-yah' statements." It looks like Spong framed his statements to be intentionally provocative and to provoke discussion within Christianity.

I'm thinking it would be very interesting to use Spong's theses for a values-voting continuum activity in an adult religious education setting. With the theological diversity in found in Unitarian Universalist congregations, it would be an interesting discussion to have.

Of course, it's interesting that an ad perceived as "attacking religion" generates multiple complaints to the UU World staff while an ad promoting a book that attacks the ideas of non-theist philosophers and a leading liberal Christian theologian's work goes unnoticed by our readership (see here and here for links to criticisms of the FFRF ad).

Although we Unitarian Universalists are officially non-creedal and covenental (although the idea of what "covenant" actually means isn't the same for all of us), does the acceptance of the ad for Gibson's book in UU World imply that some non-theist theological and philosophical ideas are being pushed out the door in current-day Unitarian Universalism?

An alternative to the idea that a parent cannot use body part names when discussing sexuality with their children ...

2009-09-07T10:42:00.005-05:00

This link provided below is for a YouTube excerpt of Boston-area health/medical report Jeanne Blake's video Raising Healthy Kids: Families Talk About Sexual Health (I'm providing the link because the video cannot be embedded on this blog by request of the video owner):

Raising Healthy Kids: Families Talk About Sexual Health (YouTube)

If we as parents are teaching body part names like eye, nose, mouth, and ear, then we should also include penis, vulva, scrotum, and vagina.

In case you were wondering why Unitarian Universalists and the United Church of Christ provide sexuality education resources to help parents ...

2009-09-07T09:45:00.005-05:00

The Unitarian Universalist Association and the United Church of Christ jointly publish The Parent Guide to Our Whole Lives as part of their lifespan sexuality education series to assist parents with their role as the primary sexuality educator in their child's life. This book in many ways is the "Parent as Resident Sexuality Educator" book that accompanies "The Parent Trilogy" series (Being a UU Parent, Parents as Resident Theologians, Parents as Social Justice Educators)

The commercial from the US Government's Department of Health and Human Services shows just how much The Parent Guide to Our Whole Lives is needed. Apparently we are living in a country where many adults cannot use the scientific or medical names for body parts when talking with their children without embarrassment.

In Shreveport, we don't need Mr. Wolf ...

2009-08-08T22:18:00.004-05:00

JK Wedding Video Now Helping to Prevent Domestic Violence

2009-07-31T06:35:00.006-05:00

I'm sure many of you have seen the "JK Wedding Entrance Dance" viral video that is on YouTube (and recently discussed on Chalicechick's blog).

The song used in the video is by Chris Brown who is awaiting sentencing for domestic violence.

Jill Peterson and Kevin Heinz (the wedding couple) have created a web site with their wedding dance video that is asking for donations to support the Sheila Wellstone Institute, an organization dedicated to ending domestic violence in our communities.

This seems like a very generous and responsible way for this couple to use their "accidental fame."

Ministers and Professional Ethics

2009-07-10T06:14:00.012-05:00

I'm writing this as a layperson in response to the recent blog criticisms from some Unitarian Universalist ministers who have been critical of the new UUA President Rev. Peter Morales and/or recent ceremonies at General Assembly.

I'm not providing links to these critical blogs.

But I will highlight the following guidelines from the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association's "Code of Professional Practice":

I will stand in a supportive relation to my colleagues and keep for them an open mind and heart.

***

I will not speak scornfully or in derogation of any colleague in public. In any private conversation critical of a colleague, I will speak responsibly and temperately.

So ... even if you think that Peter Morales was the worst possible choice for UUA President and you're still grieving over the the loss of Laurel Hallman, should you be expressing your concerns in a public blog setting for all of us to read?

Is expressing the very deep hurt that some of you are feeling the best way to embody the values in your ministerial code of ethics?

And if you think that a recent ritual at General Assembly was totally wrong for polity or other reasons, is a public blog the best setting for expressing these thoughts?

Again, does this embody the values in the ministerial ethics that all of you affirm?

I'm not telling anyone what to say, think, or feel. I'm simply asking if a public blog conversation about these issues is appropriate.

Apparently the answer to "WWJD" is writing "The God Delusion"

2009-07-05T15:36:00.004-05:00

Here's a quote from British philosopher AC Grayling from an interview in the Guardian news web site:

I would imagine Jesus was a kind of Jewish reformer. If you were looking for an equivalent to the figure you dimly perceive through the gospels it would probably be a Richard Dawkins.

Why pareidolia doesn't mean a goddamned thing

2009-07-05T07:50:00.004-05:00

Good Samaritan

2009-07-05T07:27:00.004-05:00

One gets the feeling this is the response that Jesus would have received if he told the famous parable to a Unitarian Universalist crowd.

Richard Feynman on doubt, uncertainty, and religion

2009-07-03T09:34:00.005-05:00

As a religious tradition, Unitarian Universalism has been very comfortable embracing doubt and uncertainty (and they share this with other liberal religious traditions).

And this may be one reason that we seem to have growth issues -- it's not easy to market uncertainty (at least that's what I've read on the UU-Leaders email list from UU church consultant Mike Durall).

Science as a form of "faith"??

2009-05-23T14:28:00.010-05:00

About one month ago, a Unitarian Universalist theologian on a UUA-sponsored email list claimed that modern science is a form of "faith" and a form of theism -- here's the first part of this claim:

Modern science presupposes confidence (or faith) that the same physical laws always apply throughout the universe.

Actually, the "confidence" that scientists have regarding physical laws applying to places beyond our local surroundings isn't a "faith" issue.

It's a result of empirical observations coupled with parsimony (aka "Occam's Razor").

That leads us to a very reasonable working assumption of the same physical laws applying throughout the universe.

The same laws of physics developed by Galileo, Newton, Einstein, etc to explain the motion of objects on our Earth also appear to work very well in space for predicting the paths of artificial satellites and space probes, planets, and stars.

The same spectrographic pattern that indicate the presence of chemical elements observed on the Earth are also observed in planets and stars far away from us.

One simple explanation to explain the commonality in physical and chemical observations on the Earth and in the heavens is that the same physical laws apply in both places.

A more complex explanation would be that there are different physical laws on Earth and in the heavens that appear to produce the same results in terms of motion and spectroscopic analysis.

However, the more complex explanation runs into problems due to "Occam's Razor" - a very useful principle for evaluating competing scientific explanations for phenomena.

One short definition of "Occam's Razor" is the following:

" ... that the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory."

So ... the simplest explanation for the accumulated facts and observations that we have comparing chemistry and physics on Earth and the heavens is that the same physical laws apply both here and elsewhere. And so far, this assumption has worked very well for us.

Of course, this isn't written in stone and future exploration may change or modify the assumption of physical laws applying in all places.

Here's the rest of this theological claim about the sciences:

If scientific experiments produce contradictory evidence, scientists do not accept it, no matter, how many empirical tests may replicate it. The scientists' faith can be rightly called philosophical monotheism (even if they call themselves atheists).

The idea that scientists routinely reject evidence just because it contradicts existing theories is an astounding claim that borders on the outrageous. I would like some well-documented examples to back up this claim.

I'm not working as a scientist in my job today, but my college education was in the natural sciences (microbiology with a sprinkling of physics, chemistry, biochemistry, genetics, and applied mathematics). And my 1977-1981 education is a bit rusty.

Based on what I remember about the history and philosophy of the sciences, this is a very inaccurate depiction of how the sciences works.

It may be painfully slow to watch new results move from new and untested to established science but that's a safeguard to keep us from deceiving ourselves.

Remember that we are talking about a human-run enterprise and there are very human imperfections in how we do science.

A good example of the human imperfections affecting the work of science was difference in the acceptance of the results of the 1944 "Avery-MacLeod-McCarty" experiments and the 1952 "Hershey-Chase" experiments.

Both experiments were used to demonstrate that genetic information was contained in DNA and not proteins. The Avery-MacLeod-McCarty experiments were chemically much more "rigorous" than the Hershey-Chase experiments but the social climate among biologists in the 1940s was less accepting of the idea that DNA contained genetic information and was anything other than a dull and boring polymer.

Hershey and Chase built on Avery's work and their experiment was more "convincing" because the scientific audience was ready for the results. There was also the comfortable familiarity that the early molecular biologists had with the E. coli - T-2 bacteriophage virus experimental model that Alfred Hershey and Martha Chase used.

However, there are examples of rigorous experiments that changed how we view the world and how observations can change previously held ideas about creation:

Luria-Delbrück experiment (established that variation -- the raw material in natural selection -- arises through a random undirected process)
Michelson-Morley experiments ("the most famous failed experiment" -- this experiment helped disproved the theory that light required an invisible "luminiferous aether" to move across a vacuum and led to Einstein's theory of special relativity)
Evelyn Hooker's research (she establishing that homosexuals were as mentally healthy as heterosexuals -- her work led to changes in social attitudes and the eventual decision that homosexuality is not a mental illness)

There are safeguards built-in to ensure that we don't deceive ourselves when science is done properly:

Falsifiability -- Can a scientific claim tested and proven, in principle, false?
Reproducibility -- Can the results be verified independently? For historical sciences like paleontology and astronomy, are other researchers allowed access to the observations (e.g. fossils, raw astronomical data, etc)?

And many of the methods of science (double-blind experiments, statistical analysis, etc) are some of tools we do to keep from deceiving ourselves into "discovering" what we want to believe to be "true" when what we want to believe may not be an accurate description of creation.

Keep in mind that many of the "new atheist" writers like Daniel Dennett who are approaching religion with the same methodology that has been proven successful in the sciences are not trying to be jerks who want to piss off religious people.

It's just that the tools of science have been very useful for learning more about creation (and religions certainly are a part of creation).

And who would be against exploring the idea that religions are at least partially natural phenomena?

So Religious Bigotry and Stereotyping is OK if Atheists are the Target? (Response to Charlotte Allen)

2009-05-21T07:57:00.005-05:00

Here is my response to Charlotte Allen's recent column in the Los Angeles Times ("Atheists: No God, no reason, just whining," LA Times, 17 May 2009):

Dear Editors,

I was shocked to read Charlotte Allen's recent display of religious bigotry and stereotyping in your paper. Ms. Allen's essay is something that one would expect to find in the "Bible Belt" towns of Shreveport and Bossier City, Louisiana where I live.

But her bigotry wasn't something that I would expect in a major daily newspaper in California.

Instead of criticizing ideas connected to atheism, free-thinking, and naturalistic philosophy, Ms. Allen simply goes to the cheap stereotype ("crashing bores," "atheist victimology," etc).

Imagine if she had done this sort of stereotyping with any other group -- let's say Christians, Jews, Moslems, women, homosexuals, etc. Would the LA Times print unfounded smears about these groups like they did about atheists?

Atheists and other free-thinkers may sound angry but their anger is justified. Given the role that religion (as it is actually practiced and not as it's taught in seminary) has in promoting injustice, ignorance, hatred, war, and terrorism, we can't afford to be unquestioning about religious ideas anymore. Religion is too influential and has the power to hurt too many people to go unquestioned.

For example, Proposition 8 in your state was heavily supported by religious people -- the exit polling showed a strong correlation between church attendance and voting yes on 8. However, atheists and non-religious people didn't support treating some Californians as second-class citizens.

With Charlotte Allen's column in your paper and the recent Proposition 8 vote, it appears that California isn't really that different from a "Bible Belt" state like Louisiana, Texas, or Oklahoma.

You may have better museums, restaurant choices, and entertainment options than we do. But you also appear to have the same religious prejudices that we have in the "Bible Belt." Welcome to the club.

Sincerely,
Steve Caldwell
Bossier City, Louisiana

Children's religious education is tougher than it looks ...

2009-05-13T08:24:00.005-05:00

... and I'm sure that this sort of probing questioning has happened at least once to every minister or DRE during the worship moment for all ages.

Neil deGrasse Tyson on Astrology

2009-05-08T07:33:00.009-05:00

And here's an explanation from an interview with Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson (American astrophysicist and Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City) on the Scholastic News web site about the debunking described in the video:

People come in here [Hayden Planetarium] assuming that they'll get their horoscope. They don't know that astrology has been [disproven] for centuries, but it's a billion-dollar industry, so it's not going away soon.

I did this experiment in a college class. I found some widely read horoscope column, and I said, "Pick one at random, and put it on the wall. Is this your horoscope, or not? Type yes, no, or maybe." Eighty percent of the people thought it was their horoscope!

Some sleepless, creative person 5,000 years ago invented the constellations. If we were to make constellations today, there'd be no serpents. There'd be a cell phone and an SUV and a microwave oven and a baseball field. There would be things that are in our modern culture, expressed in the legends of the sky.

"Weathering the Storm" (A Response to the National Organization for Marriage)

2009-04-23T06:09:00.007-05:00

This comes from "Love, not Laws" -- a grassroots group dedicated to marriage and other equal rights issues for gay and lesbian folks.

Hat tip to Rev. Candace Chellew-Hodge for forwarding this video to me. Candace is a UCC minister and Associate Pastor at Garden of Grace UCC - Columbia SC, editor of whosoever.org (an online magazine for BGLT Christians), and author of Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians.

Ubuntu Linux gets a comic book ...

2009-04-22T08:30:00.003-05:00

Some pop-culture recognition for Ubuntu Linux ...

Open-Mindedness Explained ...

2009-04-12T08:55:00.003-05:00

The universe took 13.7 billion years to create this blog ...

2009-04-03T23:33:00.004-05:00

The following jacket blurb is used for promoting Michael Dowd's book Thank God for Evolution:

"The universe took 13.7 billion years to produce this amazing book. I heartily recommend it. I am often asked how science and religion can co-exist. This is a wonderful answer." — John Mather (NASA Senior Astrophysicist - 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics)

The funny thing about this book blurb is that it took the universe 13.7 billion years to create everything that we see and experience around us today -- Facebook, reality TV, Adam Sandler's movies, gonzo porn, the Grand Theft Auto video games -- even my blog.

I suppose realizing this cuts down on the "wow" or "woo" factor behind the 13.7 billion year book blurb.

"Understanding Science: How Science Really Works" Web Site

2009-03-22T23:37:00.005-05:00

A new web site explains the real non-linear, non-sequential, and cooperative process that we call science. You can find this web site here.

Shakers and Unitarian Universalists -- Can We Adapt to Change?

2009-03-05T17:12:00.006-06:00

This post is based on a reply that I posted on Chalicechick's Chaliceblog about her explanation for her decision about who she would support in the 2009 UUA President Election.

In a reply to her original blog post, Chalicechick wrote the following in response to Rev. Peter Morales' use of the Shaker historical example as a cautionary tale for Unitarian Universalism.

"who actually thinks that 'no fucking' was a bigger problem for the shakers than lack of diversity. But again, my impression is that Morales isn't one for complexities."

And this is my expanded response based on my original comment.

The lack of biological reproduction wasn't a problem for the Shakers for many years.

Before state-run orphanages and adoption agencies were available, religious groups like Shaker communities were the "social safety net" for orphans and others who were destitute and needy.

As long as there were a ready supply of orphans and other needy persons, Shaker communities were able to survive.

The philosopher Daniel Dennett mentioned this during his TED ("Technology, Entertainment, Design) talk in 2002 -- the Shaker tradition was a religious meme that caused sterility in its human hosts but was able to survive for many years due to the ready supply of orphans, widows, and other new hosts for the Shaker meme in the environment:

Remember the Shakers? "Gift to Be Simple?" Simple furniture? And of course they're basically extinct now. And one of the reasons is that, among the creed of Shakerdom is that one should be celibate. Not just the priests -- everybody.

Well, it's not so surprising that they've gone extinct. But in fact that's not why they went extinct. They survived as long as they did at a time when the social safety nets weren't there and there were lots of widows and orphans, people like that, who needed a foster home. And so they had a ready supply of converts. And they could keep it going. And, in principle, it could've gone on forever. With perfect celibacy on the part of the hosts. The idea being passed on through proselytizing, instead of through the gene line.

So the ideas can live on in spite of the fact that they're not being passed on genetically. A meme can flourish in spite of having a negative impact on genetic fitness. After all, the meme for Shakerdom was essentially a sterilizing parasite.

There are other parasites which do this -- which render the host sterile. It's part of their plan. They don't have to have minds to have a plan.

Wikipedia has some information on why the Shaker movement died off:

Membership in the Shakers dwindled in the late 1800s for several reasons. People were attracted to cities and away from the farms. Shaker products could not compete with mass-produced products that became available at a much lower cost. Shakers could not have children, so adoption was a major source of new members. This continued until the states gained control of adoption homes.

I suspect the best parallel that one could draw from the Shakers is the need to be agile in response to changing demographic, economic, and cultural trends.

As Unitarian Universalists, our post-World War II trend has been one of using suburban congregations as a major focus of our growth strategy -- both Rev. Hallman's church (in the Park Cities suburbs of Dallas TX) and Rev. Morales' church (in the Denver suburb of Golden CO) fit the suburban church growth strategy. The failed "Pathways" experiment in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area also involved a suburban focus. Will this suburban growth strategy continue to work for us?

Unlike the Shakers, we do plenty of fucking but our reproductive fucking may not lead to growth. If our churches are good at attracting adult seekers but repel adult who were our former children, that could be one very big reason that we have growth concerns.

Finally, our current growth strategy has one similarity to the Shaker's "orphan" strategy. There is no guarantee that we will always have a ready supply of adult seekers looking for a religious community. Christianity as a demographic group is shrinking the US and most of our adult coverts come from a Christian background. The "atheist - agnostic - unchurched" demographic has doubled over the past decade so they are around 15% of the population. And this appears to be a demographic group that has very little interest for what Unitarian Universalism offers (in part because we're perceived as being "too religious" by some non-theists).

Our traditional recruiting pool for adult converts is shrinking.

We reproduce but drive off many of our offspring who were raised in our churches.

And we may be currently ineffective at attracting growing demographic groups.

Like the Shakers, we may be facing demographic, economic, and cultural changes.

Are we agile enough to adapt and change in response to these changes?

Biological Origins of the Soul Pushed Back to 30 Million Years Ago ...

2009-02-16T20:01:00.003-06:00

The molecular biologist Francis Collins has suggested that the human soul with its capacity for ethical decision-making is evidence for the existence of God:

Ultimately, Collins offered his own way to reconcile faith and science: Theistic Evolution. In this vein, God created the universe 13.7 billion years ago with its “parameters tuned to allow the development of complexity over time,” meaning that God planned to include evolution, including the evolution of human beings. After evolution had “prepared a sufficiently advanced ‘house’” in the human being (the human brain), God gifted humanity with the knowledge of free will, good and evil, and a soul. God used DNA as an information molecule; thus DNA is the language of God. (as quoted from The Stanford Review)

A recent paper presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science convention documents the appearance of ethical behavior in chimps and monkeys.

Chimps and humans last common ancestor was approximately 5 to 7 million years ago. The last common ancestor for chimps, monkeys, and humans was approximately 35 million years ago.

These non-human primates are demonstrating a wide range of ethical behaviors:

Here's an excerpt from the news coverage on this research in the Irish Times:

A session of the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s annual meeting debated the evolutionary origins of morality yesterday, the closing day of the event. While many held that morality was invented by human society, it was far more likely that it emerged as a result of natural selection, Prof Frans de Waal, professor of primate behaviour at Emory University, Atlanta said.

Altruism had long been assumed to exist only amongst humans, but many apes, monkeys and even birds displayed what could be taken to be altruism. This suggested that there was a natural selection pressure towards the behaviour that today we view as moral.

Prof de Waal has done extensive work with primates. “We have evidence for empathy, we have evidence for reciprocity, we have evidence for pro-social tendencies and we have evidence for fairness principals,” he said.

He described a range of studies involving chimps and monkeys that demonstrated these tendencies. One of two monkeys was offered the option of receiving a treat for itself or a treat that could be shared with the second, with sharing almost always the option chosen.

“They actually have a preference for choosing the pro-social option that rewards both,” he said, although there was no immediate benefit to the monkey that chooses to be generous.

In a trial that demonstrates a sense of fairness, two chimps are taught a task and rewarded with pieces of cucumber which they readily accept. The task is repeated, but the reward for one chimp is upgraded to grapes. This chimp continues to perform the task, but the second, receiving only cucumber will throw away its reward and stop performing the task, Prof de Waal said.

“I can equate it to the bonuses being given on Wall Street,” and the strong negative public response to them, he quipped.

If the human soul (the source of free will and knowing the difference between good and evil) has biological roots extending back up to 35 million years ago among our primate cousins, perhaps we should entertain the possibility that what we call ethics, morality, and free will all have their roots in natural selection.

As reported in The Times:

Some researchers believe we could owe our consciences to climate change and, in particular, to a period of intense global warming between 50,000 and 800,000 years ago. The proto-humans living in the forests had to adapt to living on hostile open plains, where they would have been easy prey for formidable predators such as big cats.
This would have forced them to devise rules for hunting in groups and sharing food.
Christopher Boehm, director of the Jane Goodall Research Center, part of the University of Southern California’s anthropology department, believes such humans devised codes to stop bigger, stronger males hogging all the food.
“To ensure fair meat distribution, hunting bands had to gang up physically against alpha males,” he said. This theory has been borne out by studies of contemporary hunter-gatherer tribes.
In research released at the AAAS he argued that under such a system those who broke the rules would have been killed, their “amoral” genes lost to posterity. By contrast, those who abided by the rules would have had many more children.

And the biologist PZ Myers makes the following observation about these findings:

It's a little glib and speculative, but it's enough to shut down the claim that morality couldn't have evolved.

And now we can say that being ethical is an all-natural additive-free organic behavior that we share with some animals.

Rejection of Evolutionary Biology in a Unitarian Universalist Congregation?

2009-02-15T18:46:00.008-06:00

During the brief post-DVD discussion today, one of our congregation's leaders said that she had wished that people from both ends of the evolutionary biology debate spectrum had been at today's Thank God for Evolution DVD screening.

I asked if the folks who were rejecting evolution were members of our congregation or members of the wider community (we had a brief announcement about the DVD screening in the local paper).

I learned that we have some members of our congregation who reject evolution.

I was surprised. I would not be surprised that some members of our community outside All Souls would reject evolution - conservative religion is prevalent in our town.

But I was surprised that members of my congregation would reject evolution.

I know that we are a non-creedal faith tradition - but seriously?

A free and responsible search for truth doesn't mean one can believe anything one wants to believe. Responsibility would suggest that one should not reject settled scientific matters like the theory of evolution, the germ theory of disease, or the heliocentric theory of the solar system.

It's possible that some ideas may be nonsensical.

In a 1973 essay that criticized creationism and espousing theistic evolution, evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky wrote:

Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution.

The entire essay can be read here.

Perhaps we can need an adult religious education class using the book Your Inner Fish? There's a catchy and fun music video associated with this book.

Thoughts After Viewing "Thank God for Evolution" DVD at Church

2009-02-15T16:55:00.010-06:00

On Sunday afternoon after our morning worship and religious education class time, our church screened a portion of the companion DVD for Rev. Michael Dowd's book Thank God for Evolution. A description of the DVD can be found here.

You can download a free excerpt of Dowd's book using this web page.

After seeing part of the DVD today, it still seems like a very cleaver way to reframe religion so it's compatible with modern-day evolutionary biology - an example of memetic religious adaptation happening right before our eyes.

However, I was puzzled by something that Michael said in on the DVD.

Here's a quote in his book that is identical or nearly identical to an idea that he presented in his DVD:

Religious believers can hardly be expected to embrace evolution if the only version they've been exposed to portrays the processes at work as merely competitive and pointless, even cruel, and thus godless. Is it any wonder that many on the conservative side of the theological spectrum find such a view repulsive, and that many on the liberal side accept evolution begrudgingly?
[Source - Thank God for Evolution, page 7]

The troubling thing about this idea is that it justifies a rejection of a scientific theory if it appears to contradict one's religious beliefs.

First, some very basic evolutionary biology before we explore the theological issues with Dowd's suggestion.

One of Darwin's contributions to evolutionary biology was natural selection.

Natural selection operates through a simple algorithmic mechanism that follows from the following facts:

Heritable variation exists within populations of organisms.
Organisms produce more offspring than can survive.
These offspring vary in their ability to survive and reproduce.

Given enough time and this simple process, one ends up with both great beauty and great cruelty in the natural world. The three steps are mindless but they have produced both mindfulness and awareness in our world - perhaps the ultimate demonstration of evolutionary biologist Leslie Orgel's "Second Rule" that he coined in response to anti-evolutionary appeals to irreducible complexity:

"Evolution is cleverer than you are."

Natural selection was not advanced as a theory because biologists wanted to promote a "competitive, pointless, cruel, and godless" theory like natural selection.

As a theory, it was proposed because it:

Fit known facts
Provided opportunities for making future predictions (testing and falsifiability) along with further refinement through discovery of new facts (which has done extensively since 1859)
Was an excellent example of parsimony (parsimony in science is the "preference for the least complex explanation for an observation")

I find it puzzling that one would entertain the suggestion to reject a theory that simply because it appears to be "pointless" or "godless" from a human perspective.

Although we have removed ourselves from the center of universe in 1543, many of us still need to accept or reject scientific theories not on the basis of evidence but rather on the basis of how well they serve human aesthetic or psychological needs.

Perhaps we need to face the possibility that creation may be indifferent to our aesthetic or psychological needs?

On the DVD, Dowd talks extensively about the evolutionary trend towards greater cooperation and he suggests that evolution is a directional process.

Unfortunately, there is nothing in the simple evolutionary algorithmic process that requires cooperation in all instances.

Cooperation is an adaptive response in some circumstances and that is why we see examples of it in nature.

However, there are instances where competition is very successful biologically.

However, that doesn't make ruthless self-interested competition the most ethical choice for us today. Given the cultural tools that we have, we can predict the future negative outcomes that come from individual self-interest.

As humans with culture and communication, we can explore cooperative options through the cultural adaptation options available to us.

Shreveport Area Darwin Day Events

2009-02-14T09:15:00.001-06:00

Update - Rev. Michael Dowd (author of Thank God for Evolution) will be at All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church in Shreveport on 26 February 2009. See the updated information below for details.

Here's information on four upcoming events for this year's celebration of "Darwin Day" in the Shreveport-Bossier City area:

Tuesday, 10 February 2009, 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM -- Re-broadcast of Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial on KLTS (local PBS affiliate) -- This documentary is about the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District trial that ruled against the teaching of intelligent design in public schools due to church-state separation issues. This documentary features excellent interviews including Dr. Barbara Forrest who spoke at Darwin Day in Shreveport in 2008.

Saturday, 14 February 2009 from 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM -- Darwin Day Bicentennial at LSU-Shreveport Science Lecture Auditorium -- Thanks to Dr. Cran Lucas and the LSU-Shreveport Biology Department, the following program is being offered in our community:

1:00-1:10 PM -- Introduction by Dr. Stephen Banks, Professor of Biological Sciences, LSU-Shreveport.

1:10-2:00 PM -- "Why Intelligent Design Is a Protestant Theory of Creation" By Dr. Holly Wilson, Professor of Philosophy, University of Louisiana - Monroe.

2:00-2:50 PM -- “The Influence of Charles Darwin on British and American Literature” by Dr. Helen Taylor and Dr. Stephen Brennan, Professors of English, LSU-Shreveport.

2:50-3:40 PM -- “The Evolution of Charles Darwin: A Brief Biography” by Dr. Cran Lucas, Professor of Biological Sciences, LSU-Shreveport.

3:40-4:00 PM -- Birthday cake and refreshments.

Sunday, 15 February 2009, 11:00 AM - 12:15 PM - At All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church, Chaplain Barbara Jarrell is in the pulpit for our celebration of Evolution Sunday.

Sunday, 15 February 2009, 12:30 PM - 2:30 PM - At All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church, we will be showing the DVD Thank God for Evolution: How the Marriage of Science and Religion Will Transform Your Life and Our World. This book is by Rev. Reverend Michael Dowd, a United Church of Christ minister. After watching the DVD, we will have a brief discussion about the movie and the ideas presented in it.

Thursday, 26 February 2009, 6:30 PM - 9:00 PM - Rev. Michael Dowd (Author of Thank God for Evolution) -- All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church is proud to present the Rev. Michael Dowd, who will be here with us to share his live presentation based on his book.

Known as "America's Evolutionary Evangelists," Michael Dowd and his wife Connie Barlow live on the road sharing the "Good News" of the 14-billion -year epic of cosmic, biological and human experience. Michael's' book has been endorsed by Nobel Prize winning scientists and religious leaders across the spectrum as a work that builds bridges, provides guidance and offers realistic hope for people of any religion or belief system. This event is free and open to the public. Please bring your friends and help us spread the word. An offering will be collected, and books and DVD's will be available for sale.

Ken Starr wants 18,000 divorces to happen

2009-02-07T09:07:00.004-06:00

[Hat tip to Lara Campell (Director of Religious Education - Community Unitarian Church, White Plains NY) for pointing this video out.]

Free Ubuntu Pocket Guide

2009-02-01T23:08:00.004-06:00

In case you need a free "how to" book on Ubuntu Linux for use in your congregation or other non-profit organization. Here's the description from the book's web site:

The ultimate Ubuntu book!
Written by award-winning author Keir Thomas, Ubuntu Pocket Guide and Reference is a totally unique and concise guide for everyday Ubuntu use. It's the world's most popular Ubuntu book, with over 150,000 people already having read it!
Focuses on core competencies and background knowledge needed to be an expert Ubuntu user;
Readable, accessible, and easy to understand—even if you've never used Linux before;
100% new and original! Written from the ground-up to cover Ubuntu 8.04 and 8.10.

You can download the book as an Adobe Acrobat PDF document using this link here.

"Thank God for Evolution" - An Example of Memetic Evolution

2009-02-01T00:09:00.007-06:00

I'm still waiting for Susan to lend me her copy of Thank God for Evolution by Rev. Michael Dowd.

While I'm waiting, I downloaded the sample free chapter from the authors' web site today. The excert covers the first 44 pages of the book (plus some promotional "book blurb" info for the book).

The first thing that struck me here was that Rev. Dowd's message is an example of memetic evolution in action -- an attempt to reframe both religious views about evolutionary biology and evolutionary biology itself in such a way that religion and evolutionary biology are not viewed as incompatible.

Here's a short description of memetics from Wikipedia:

Memetics is an approach to evolutionary models of cultural information transfer based on the concept of the meme. Starting from a metaphor used in the writings of Richard Dawkins, it has since turned into a new area of study, one that looks at the self-replicating units of culture. It has been proposed that just as memes are analogous to genes, memetics is analogous to genetics.

In the preface of the book, Rev. Dowd is reaching out to the following groups of readers:

To those of you who have rejected evolution . . .
I promise that the secular version of evolution you have rejected is not the version of evolution presented in these pages. Indeed, if the understanding of our collective past and the vision of our common destiny outlined here do not inspire you to be more faithful in all your relationships, to find new ways to bless others and the world, and to awaken eagerly each morning to a life filled with meaning and purpose, then please continue to reject evolution!

To those who accept evolution begrudgingly (like death and taxes) . . .
I promise that this book will provide you with an experience of science, and evolution specifically, that will fire your imagination, touch your heart, and lead you to a place of deep gratitude, awe, and reverence. You will also find here effective ways to talk about evolution to any friends, family, co-workers, and neighbors who are biblical literalists or young earth creationists.

To devoutly committed Christians . . .
Whether you are Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, Evangelical, Anabaptist, or New Thought, and whether you consider yourself conservative, moderate, or liberal, my promise to you is that the sacred evolutionary perspective offered here will enrich your faith and inspire you in ways that believers in the past could only dream of.

To Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, and other non-Christians . . .
I promise that it will be easy to apply most of what you find here to your own life and faith. I also promise that if you explore the meaning of your tradition’s insights within an evolutionary context, as I attempt to do with Christian doctrine, you will provide an invaluable service to your religion and our world.

To agnostics, humanists, atheists, and freethinkers . . .
I promise that you will find nothing here that you cannot wholeheartedly embrace as being grounded in a rationally sound, mainstream scientific understanding of the Universe. I also promise that the vision of “evolutionary spirituality” presented here will benefit you and your loved ones without your needing to believe in anything otherworldly.

To those who embrace an eclectic spirituality . . .
I promise that this perspective will enrich your appreciation of the traditions and practices that nourish you most deeply, while helping you find new excitement in each. It will also help you communicate and relate to others who hold very different religious or philosophical worldviews.

Making evolutionary biology more appealing to the traditionally religious is an idea full of good intentions. On the surface, greater acceptance of evolutionary biology will help evolutionary biology gain greater acceptance in North America if the popular perception is that evolution is compatible with religion.

However, a change in popular perception may also benefit those religions that are perceived as being pro-evolution and pro-science. By retooling religion, we may be seeing an adaptive change in religion.

None of this reframing of evolutionary biology and religion has anything to do with the truthfulness or usefulness of evolutionary biology theory. The truthfulness and utility of a theory are determined through scientific methods.

However, the reframing of religion so it's perceived as being compatible with science may be useful for the long-term survival of religion.

Latest Revision to UUA "Principles and Purposes" Document Now Available

2009-01-28T21:00:00.000-06:00

Update: There is no provision for absenstee voting on the proposed Article II revision. Here's the info that UUA Pacific Southwest District Trustee Tom Loughrey sent to me:

Well, after some research by the UUA Secretary, Paul Rickter, he has determined that there is no provision in the by-laws for an absentee vote on Article II. Everyone seems to acknowledge that the logic of an unamendable by-law would allow it but it is not the case and would itself take a by-law amendment.

Note: I have added the changed text from the January 2008 UUA Board of Trustees Meeting to the latest draft of Article II.

The changed text can be found in Section C-2.2 and is written in blue bold italic text to distinguish it from the Commission on Appraisal's December 2008 draft.

According to Tom Loughrey (Pacific Southwest District UUA Board Representative), the type of motion from the UUA Board to put this on the 2009 General Assembly Agenda is a motion that doesn't allow for General Assembly delegates to amend the Article II text. All they can do is vote for or against it.

This seems reasonable to me given that their process allowed individuals and groups from across the nation to provide their inputs to the Commission on Appraisal and the UUA Board.

The UUA Commission on Appraisal has released their latest proposed revision to the UUA "Principles and Purposes" section of the UUA Bylaws.

Below is the text of the latest revision (copied from the COA's 15 page report to the UUA Board and pasted into this blog post for easy reading):

Proposed Revision of Article II
ARTICLE II: Covenant
Section C-2.1 Purposes.
This association of free yet interdependent congregations devotes its resources to and exercises its corporate powers for religious, educational, and humanitarian purposes. It supports the creation, vitality, and growth of congregations that aspire to live out the Unitarian Universalist Principles. Through public witness and advocacy, it advances the Principles in the world.

Section C 2.2. Sources.
Unitarian Universalism is rooted in two religious heritages. Both are grounded on thousands of years of Jewish and Christian teachings, traditions, and experiences. The Unitarian heritage has affirmed that we need not think alike to love alike and that God is one. The Universalist heritage has preached not hell but hope and courage, and the kindness and love of God. Contemporary Unitarian Universalists have reaped the benefits of a legacy of prophetic words and deeds.

Unitarian Universalism is not contained in any single book or creed. Its religious authority lies in the individual, nurtured and tested in the congregation and the wider world. As an evolving religion, it draws from the teachings, practices, and wisdom of the world’s religions. Humanism, earth-centered spiritual traditions, and Eastern religions have served as vital sources. Unitarian Universalism has been influenced by mysticism, theism, skepticism, naturalism, and process thought as well as feminist and liberation theologies. It is informed by direct experiences of mystery and wonder, beauty and joy. It is enriched by the creative power of the arts, the guidance of reason, and the lessons of the sciences.

Grateful for the traditions that have strengthened our own, we seek to engage cultural and religious practices in ways that call us into right relationship with all.

Section C-2.3 Principles.
Grateful for the gift of life, we commit ourselves as member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association to embody together the transforming power of love as we covenant to honor and uphold:
The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
Justice, equity, and compassion in human relations;
Acceptance of one another and encouragement of spiritual growth;
A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
The right of conscience and the use of democratic processes;
The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
Reverence for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.
As free yet interdependent congregations, we enter into this covenant, pledging to one another our mutual trust and support. Capable of both good and evil, at times we are in need of forgiveness and reconciliation. When we fall short of living up to this covenant, we will begin again in love, repair the relationship, and recommit to the promises we have made.

Section C-2.4 Inclusion.
Systems of power, privilege, and oppression have traditionally created barriers for persons and groups with particular identities, ages, abilities, and histories. We pledge to do all we can to replace such barriers with ever-widening circles of solidarity and mutual respect. We strive to be an association of congregations that truly welcome all persons and commit to structuring congregational and associational life in ways that empower and enhance everyone’s participation.

Section C-2.5 Freedom of Belief.
Congregational freedom is central to the Unitarian Universalist heritage.

Congregations may establish statements of purpose, covenants, and bonds of union so long as they do not require a statement of belief as a creedal test for membership; nor may the Association employ such a test for congregational affiliation.

Source document for this draft revision:
January 2009 Report From the UUA Commission on Appraisal to the UUA Board

The UUA Board met on 14-19 January 2009 and made one minor change to the COA's draft.

The full report provides background information on the decisions made by the COA in gathering and using inputs from Unitarian Universalist across the country.

How Can Atheists Be Good Allies?

2009-01-02T00:15:00.006-06:00

Greta Christina asks on her blog "How can atheists be good allies?"

Here's a brief quote from her blog explaining why this is important:

I think it behooves the atheist movement to make alliances with other groups that we have affinities with: groups that aren't atheist- specific and that are made up of both believers and non-believers, but that have goals we support ... and in some cases, progressive ecumenical religious groups who recognize the validity of atheism.

I think it behooves us for a number of reasons. Partly because our movement is too small and too stigmatized right now to accomplish what we want on our own: we'll get more visibility and more work done if we have other people speaking for us and working with us. Partly because it shows the world that we don't just care about how we want to be treated and what we think we deserve: we care about what we have to offer and how we want to participate in the world.

And partly because it's, you know, the right thing to do. Because we're not just atheists, but people, citizens of our communities and our countries and our world. Because we do care about what we have to offer and how we want to participate in the world.

So how can we be good allies? I've already written about what atheists are asking for from people who want to support us. What should we be doing to be good allies with people we want to support?

A brief outline of her suggestions is listed below:

Treat other groups the way you want to be treated.
Don't assume that religious believers are stupid -- and don't talk to them or treat them as if they're stupid.
Don't be quick to assume malice or willful ignorance.
If you're going to talk about religion, tread carefully.
Be careful about making analogies.
Remember that it's not always about us.
Support other atheists whose methods are different from yours.

The expanded explanation of Greta's suggestions can be found online here.

Not only are these suggestions useful for atheists -- they would also be useful for Unitarian Universalists (of all theological stripes) as well when working with others.

The end of Hillary's campaign and "PUMA" meet "Godwin's Law"

2009-01-01T12:51:00.002-06:00

Playing with Wubi and Improved Broadcom Wireless Support in Ubuntu Linux

2009-01-01T10:22:00.009-06:00

Since I had didn't have to work for most of New Year's Eve, I got a chance to install Ubuntu Linux using Wubi on my April 2004-vintage Dell Windows XP desktop PC (which is now a dual-boot system with Windows XP and Ubuntu 8.10 on it).

Wubi comes with Ubuntu Linux as a built-in feature on the Live CD installation disk since Ubuntu 8.04 and is useful for anyone who wants to try out Ubuntu Linux while also using Windows for the following reasons:

Current Windows setup remains unchanged (Wubi only adds an extra option to boot into Ubuntu during system startup and Windows remains the default operating system).
Wubi does not require you to modify the partitions of your PC or to use a different bootloader. It does not install special drivers.
Wubi installs from the Ubunti "Live CD" disk just like any other Windows-based application.
Wubi is spyware and malware free, and being open source, anyone can verify that.
Wubi keeps most of the files in one folder (doesn't clutter the hard drive with software "debris") and can be easily uninstalled like any other Windows-based application.

This means that Wubi is a very easy way for a Windows user to experiment with Ubuntu Linux with very little risk. All one needs to do is log into Windows, insert the Ubuntu Live CD, and following the on-screen instructions for installing Wubi and Ubuntu Linux.

All you need is to run Ubuntu with Wubi is 256 megs of RAM, 5 gigabytes of available hard drive space, and a computer currently running Windows (Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Vista supported). Additionally, you have total access to your Windows-created documents -- the rest of the "C" hard drive is available in the "/host" directory for browsing. User documents are available in the "/host/Documents and Settings" folder.

If you don't like using Ubuntu Linux through Wubi, just reboot into Windows and uninstall Wubi. Everything is back to normal.

Here's a brief description of what Wubi is from Wikipedia:

Wubi (Windows-based Ubuntu Installer) is an official Windows-based free software installer for Ubuntu.
---
The goal of the project is to assist a Windows user unacquainted with Linux in trying Ubuntu without risking any loss of information due to disk formatting or partitioning. Wubi can also uninstall Ubuntu from within Windows.

Since my wireless card was an Linksys 802.11b/g card (Linksys WMP 54G PCI card) with a Broadcom chip set, I knew that the wireless internet on this computer would not work initially and I would need to connect this PC to the internet using a wired connection to get the Ubuntu side of this PC on the internet.

Broadcom has been reluctant to assist the open-source community with hardware drivers and this can make setting up wireless internet a real chore on a Linux PC. This has changed with the recent release of linux drivers for Broadcom wireless chipsets.

Borrowing 50 feet of 10/100Base-T ethernet cable from work (left in my office from a co-worker's project), I was able to install Ubuntu Linux through Wubi, patch my system with the latest updates, and (most importantly) install the restricted drivers for using my wireless card with very little effort. Getting wireless working was easier than installing multimedia drivers during this installation.

Given the large number of laptop and desktop PCs using Broadcom wireless chipsets, this improved Broadcom wireless support is very useful. This means that churches and other non-profits will be able to better use older computer hardware donated to them - the old laptop that was donated may now be usable for a staff person or volunteer who needs a laptop for word processing, email, web surfing, etc using wi-fi.

The only hardware hiccup that I had to deal with was the Dell OEM Soundblaster Live audio card. I couldn't get this sound card to work using Ubuntu Linux but I can get sound out of the integrated audio on the computer motherboard which is good enough sound for my purposes.

Update: After rebooting into Windows XP, I discovered that I was getting no sound in Windows. To fix this, I downloaded the integrated audio hardware driver from Dell's web site, installed this software, removed the Soundblaster software, and disabled the Dell OEM Soundblaster hardware.

Since the integrated audio hardware works for both Ubuntu Linux and Windows XP, I will use the integrated audio hardware instead of the Soundblaster hardware.

So what's so wrong with a "WYSIWYG" world?

2008-12-29T19:51:00.016-06:00

On a recent post on my blog ("Humanist Parents Recreating Religious Community"), some of the reader comments touched on a variety of questions:

Are words like "bright" that some use to describe people with a naturalistic worldview useful?
Are words like "super" used to describe people with a supernatural worldview useful?
Are "bright" and "super" worldviews are mutually exclusive (this is the assumption voiced by The Brights organization)?
Do the assumptions behind the words "bright" and "super" impose a literalism that allows no room figurative understanding?

Here is Fausto's comment on this because it provides an excellent summary of these concerns:

The positions they [the terms "bright" and "super"] attempt to describe are not either-or, but fall within a varying range. There are "supers" who find truth primarily through empirical means, there are "brights" who do not deny the possible value to others of mystical experience even if they themselves have not found it helpful, there are "supers" who do deny the value of mysticism, there are naturalistic mystics who deny supernaturalism, and so on. Moreover, it sounds as though both "bright" and "super" as defined may allow only for literal understanding and exclude the validity of figurative expression.

Personally, I disagree with the assumption that a naturalistic "bright" worldview is somehow incompatible with valuing figurative expression.

Humans are a part of the interdependent web -- the fingerprints of our biological roots that we share with the rest of creation are all over us. For example, the Hox genes in humans show our biological connection with jellyfish and fruit flies -- not to mention all bilaterally symmetrical animals.

If we are a part of the web of creation, then I consider it reasonable to view our behavior and the things we create as natural phenomena (the same way we view the dancing of bees and bee honeycombs as "natural phenomena").

I think the amazing creation that we live is a "WYSIWYG" place - "what you see is what you get." I think that this physical plane of existence is all that we can really can know is and it's wonderful.

Given the amazingness of the natural world, do we need to "gild the lily" by adding a supernatural layer to this world we live in?

The stories and religions that we create are valuable not because they contain "literal truths" or even "figurative truths."

These human-created figurative expressions are natural phenomena and they are valuable because they tell us something about what it means to be human and perhaps lead us to a better understanding of ourselves.

At least Barack Obama didn't ask this religious leader to speak at the Inauguration ...

2008-12-23T22:19:00.004-06:00

With all the blog commentary about Rick Warren being selected give the invocation at President-Elect Obama's Inauguration, it's a good thing that he didn't ask for Pope Benedict XVI to speak.

Check out the recent news story from England with the Benedict's comments on how we need to "save the world" from homosexuality:

"Pope: Saving world from homosexuality like saving rainforests"
In comments at the Vatican that are likely to provoke a furious reaction from homosexual groups, Benedict also warned that blurring the distinction between male and female could lead to the "self-destruction" of the human race.

In his address to the Curia, the Vatican's central administration, he described behaviour beyond traditional heterosexual relations as "a destruction of God's work" and said that the Roman Catholic Church had a duty to "protect man from the destruction of himself".

It is not "outmoded metaphysics" to urge respect for the "nature of the human being as man and woman," he added.

"The tropical forests do deserve our protection. But man, as a creature, does not deserve any less."

The Catholic Church teaches that while homosexuality is not sinful, homosexual acts are. It opposes gay marriage and, in October, a leading Vatican official described homosexuality as "a deviation, an irregularity, a wound".

The Pope said humanity needed to "listen to the language of creation" to understand the intended roles of man and woman.

He also defended the Church's right to "speak of human nature as man and woman, and ask that this order of creation be respected".

Humanist Parents Recreating Religious Community

2008-12-21T22:53:00.013-06:00

I saw a link to this Washington Post news story on Hemant Mehta's "Friendly Atheist" blog -- "Humanist Parents Seek Communion Outside Church."

It reminds me of the Time magazine article about "Atheist Sunday Schools" that I blogged on back in November 2007.

Here's the introductory part of the recent Washington Post story:

They are not religious, so they don't go to church. But they are searching for values and rituals with which to raise their children, as well as a community of like-minded people to offer support.

Dozens of parents came together on a recent Saturday to participate in a seminar on humanist parenting and to meet others interested in organizing a kind of nonreligious congregation, complete with regular family activities and ceremonies for births and deaths.

The news story gives the following background on humanism:

Humanism is both a formal movement and an informal identification of people who promote values of reason, compassion and human dignity. Although most humanists are atheists, atheism is defined by what is absent -- belief in God -- and humanists emphasize a positive philosophy of ethical living for the human good.

And here's the rationale behind this conference:

The seminar's organizers wanted to reach out to people like the Proctors -- first-time parents scrambling for guidance as they improvise how to raise their daughter without the religion of their childhood.

"I'm often told that when people have kids, they go back to religion," said John Figdor, a humanist master's of divinity student who helped organize the seminar. "Are we really not tending our own people?"

Regarding the idea of re-creating a church environment (community, values, ritual) without traditional religion, the interesting thing on Hemant's blog was that two readers recommended Unitarian Universalism instead of "reinventing the wheel" for humanist parents (blog comments found here and here).

In fact, one reader described Unitarian Universalism as "community without the religiousness."

The news story describes this conference happening in Boston at Harvard University. Boston is the home of the Unitarian Universalist Association and Harvard University has ties to Unitarian Universalism.

I wonder if these humanist families don't know about our congregations (as unlikely as that would be in New England) or if our congregations are not meeting their family needs.

Even if these families do not want to join Unitarian Universalist congregations, I wonder if we can find ways to collaborate with humanist groups with programs like the Our Whole Lives lifespan sexuality education programs and other family support ministries that could be used by these families.

Supporting Atheists As Anti-Oppression Work

2008-12-17T03:33:00.008-06:00

Greta Christina has recently posted on her blog a list with nine suggestions for traditionally religious folks who want to be supportive allies for atheists and other non-believers.

Greta has more details on her blog about this but I have copied the main points from her blog for your consideration:

1. Familiarize yourself with the common myths and misconceptions about atheists -- and don't perpetuate them.

2. Familiarize yourself with what it's like to be an atheist, both in the U.S. and in the rest of the world.

3. Find common ground.

4. Speak out against anti-atheist bigotry and other forms of religious intolerance.

5. Be inclusive of atheists.

6. Don't divide and conquer, and don't try to take away our anger.

7. If you're going to accuse an atheist or an atheist group of being intolerant -- be careful, and make sure that's really what they're being.

8. Do not -- repeat, DO NOT -- talk about "fundamentalist atheists."

9. Be aware of how religious belief gives you a place of mainstream and privilege.

You can read Greta's detailed exploration of each suggestion for allies on her blog here.

Greta's suggestions are related to the past suggestions that I have made on my blog about supporting non-Christian Unitarian Universalists in our congregations:

Note: by late Sunday night (21 December 2008), this blog post has 106 comments on it. The conversation has gone into a non-productive rut and I'm closing off comments on this thread.

Strangely enough, a similar thing happened on Greta's blog. She has closed off comments on the original post and has created a new post to comment on her list here. Greta does say that any attempts to use this thread to revive the original shut-down comment thread will result in being banned from her blog.

I'm ready to move on to a new subject like the recent news coverage on humanist and atheist Sunday Schools.

"Tiktaalik (Your Inner Fish)" Music Video

2008-12-13T08:23:00.008-06:00

The music video at the beginning of this clip describes the fossil discovery that Dr. Neil Shubin is most famous for -- Tiktaalik. The video is from the 2008 Penn Reading Project at the University of Pennsylvania.

Tiktaalik is a transitional fossil illustrating the evolutionary development between lobe-finned fishes and tetrapods (four-legged animals like us who are really just a highly specialized form of lobe-finned fish).

Dr. Neil Shubin is a paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, popular science writer, and the author of Your Inner Fish: A Journey Into the 3.5 Billion-Year History of the Human Body.

This book is a fascinating read and it explains many of the oddities in human anatomy are due to our several million year transition from fish to land-dwelling warm-blooded tetrapod.

For example, the convoluted path that the vas deferens takes in the human body makes sense when one realizes that the path of the vas deferens made sense in our fishy ancestors (their testes were inside the abdominal cavity and not in an external scrotum that is now required in warm-blooded mammals for sperm production at slightly cooler than body temperature).

I'm guessing that museums gift shops would profit from selling Tiktaalik plush toys -- they certainly are very cute looking.

And here is a video clip describing how artists create 3-D reconstructions for museums based on fossil evidence and artistic guess-work from observing living creatures:

Free Video Resource on Critical Thinking

2008-12-08T21:34:00.008-06:00

Here's a free video resource on critical thinking that one can watch online or download for free non-commercial use through a Creative Commons license. In addition to YouTube and Google Video format, you can download the movie in various video formats and in .iso image files for burning your own DVDs.

Here's the description from the movie's web site:

Here Be Dragons is a free 40 minute video introduction to critical thinking. It is suitable for general audiences and is licensed for free distribution and public display.

Most people fully accept paranormal and pseudoscientific claims without critique as they are promoted by the mass media. Here Be Dragons offers a toolbox for recognizing and understanding the dangers of pseudoscience, and appreciation for the reality-based benefits offered by real science.

Here Be Dragons is written and presented by Brian Dunning, host and producer of the Skeptoid podcast, author of Skeptoid: Critical Analysis of Pop Phenomena, and Executive Producer of The Skeptologists.

National Republican Congressional Committee Does a "Willie Horton" Mail Ad

2008-12-03T21:22:00.007-06:00

The National Republican Congressional Committee sent a postcard attack ad to my house today complaining that Paul Carmouche (the Democratic candidate for Louisiana House District Four is soft on crime and just "too liberal."

They have more attack ad stuff on their web site and the special web site they set up for these attack ads intended to influence the vote in the runoff election happening this Saturday.

Given that the recent Republican history of using racially charged imagery in political ads, it's no surprise that the postcard ad has a mug shot of a black criminal defendant -- it's just a repeat of the racially charged "Willie Horton" ads that the Republicans used in 1988.

Why Atheist Advertising is Important

2008-12-03T19:29:00.004-06:00

Hemant Mehta (author of the Friendly Atheist blog) received an email from a Washington DC area high school student giving her positive response to the American Humanist Association's bus ads. Here's a short quote from her email:

The American Humanist Association mentioned that one of the reasons they wanted to do this ad campaign was because some atheists feel alone over the holidays. Well, this morning when I had to listen to a Creationist try to convert everyone in earshot while I was heading to a Catholic school where I am one of only a handful of atheists, I felt alone. That ad on the bus reminded me that even when I feel like I am the only one standing up for truth, there are others out there who are doing the same thing.

You can read the rest of her response with Hemant's comments here.

Part II -- When Did Expressing Doubt About God Become a "Negative" Attack Message?

2008-11-30T22:04:00.009-06:00

I saw a blog post tonight on Hemant Mehta's "Friendly Atheist" blog titled "Questioning God is Apparently Hate Speech." Hemant is the author of I Sold My Soul on eBay (a book that describes his visits to a variety of Christian churches. These visits initially occurred as a result of an eBay auction and the media reaction was the Mehta "sold his soul on eBay").

His blog post is related to my recent blog post on recent American Humanist Association bus ads (When Did Expressing Doubt About God Become a "Negative" Attack Message?).

Apparently, the atheist billboard ad is at the top of this blog post is considered offensive "hate speech" but other billboards in Colorado expressing religious views like the one below are OK:

Here's the news coverage from the Rocky Mountain News about this billboard dispute:

The message is but eight words divided into two short sentences set against puffy white clouds on a blue and black background.

One of the men behind the billboard message says his life has been threatened because of it, which seems an odd thing since those doing the threatening all profess to be Christians.

Just eight words:

"Don't believe in God?" the upper left of the billboard reads. "You are not alone," the lower right says.

---

The sole purpose of the ads, the group maintains, is what it says: to let other freethinkers, atheists and humanists know there is a group out there for them.

Two of the 11 signs were supposed to go up in Fort Collins and Greeley, the group said. This was so until the moment the media company that owns the two billboards read the message.

The hate mail and nasty, threatening phone messages began almost immediately.

Much of it has been directed at Joel Guttormson, who mostly has been serving as a spokesman for COCORE, as they call it.

Twenty-two and a Metro State junior majoring in theoretical mathematics, Guttormson also is president of the Metro State Atheists, one of the 11 groups that make up COCORE.

"It's been kind of wild, kind of outrageous," he says of days since the billboards went up.

"It has been mostly Christians who've been calling and e-mailing," Joel Guttormson said, "which is strange since the message is not directed at Christians or anyone from any religion.

"You know, if you see an ad for migraine medicine and you don't have a migraine, why would you care?"

Almost all of the feedback, he said, has been from people who say the billboards denigrate Christians. He says he still has no idea how that is possible.

"We are not out to anger people," Joel Guttormson said. "I don't know why people think that. So much of it says we are evil and that we hate everybody.

"Have you seen the billboard? Tell me where any of them mentions evil or hate. Why is everyone so mad?"

---

There is some good news out of this -- Joel Guttormson reports:

"The cool thing is we've even had some Christians step up and defend us. They know our message is no more offensive than one that reads:

"Believe in God? You're not alone."

It's Amazing Where Religion Leads Some Folks ...

2008-11-29T11:28:00.003-06:00

It's amazing to find where religion leads some folks.

Imagine a British woman of Sub-Saharan African descent who became a "born-again Christian" and is now defending the institution of slavery because "slavery is not wrong."

Apparently if it were wrong, God would have condemned it in the Jewish and Christian Scriptures - here's the money quote from this blogger:

The bible does not condemn slavery. So Christians try to act like Job's friends and try to defend God in a rather foolish way by condemning slavery, as if God forgot to do it Himself in the bible. I think this is a very unwise thing for a Christian to do because if slavery was wrong, God would have said so himself. But He doesn't say its wrong. As John MacArthur says in his study bible, " The New Testament nowhere directly attacks slavery; had it done so, the resulting slave insurrections would have been brutally suppressed and the message of the gospel hopelessly confused with that of social reform.

Of course another possibility is that the authors of the slavery-supporting Bible verses are simply wrong for defending slavery.

The funny thing is that I've heard folks speak against the Welcoming Congregation Program and other Unitarian Universalist social justice programs using a similar logic -- they should be discouraged because they interfere with spreading our Unitarian Universalist "gospel" in our congregations and our communities.

[Hat tip to Evolved and Rat/i/onal (Religion exploits unpatched vulnerabilities in the human mind) and Pharyngula (PZ Myers' blog) for finding this unusual perspective on slavery and the Bible for us.]

When Are Your "Privately Held Religious Beliefs" Not So Private Anymore?

2008-11-28T00:34:00.005-06:00

Here is Dan Savage's answer to the question proposed in the title of this blog post and in Dan's original online article:

When you donate $1500 to a political campaign to strip other people -- people who are not your co-religionists -- of their civil rights. Richard Raddon is, or was, the director of the Los Angeles Film Festival. All hell broke loose after it emerged that Raddon, who is Mormon, had donated $1500 to the "Yes on 8" campaign.

Dan writes about how making a large donation to a political campaign isn't a private expression of religion any more:

Bill Condon, the gay guy who directed of Dreamgirls, attempted to get Raddon's back: "Someone has lost his job and possibly his livelihood because of privately held religious beliefs."

No. No. No. Raddon lost his job due to criticism of his public political actions, not his private religious beliefs, and his public political actions were a part of the public record. If Raddon wanted to go to church and pray his little heart out against same-sex marriage, or proselytize on street corners against gay marriage, or counsel gay men to leave their husbands and marry nice Mormon girls instead, that could be viewed as an expression of his "privately held religious beliefs." Instead he helped fund a political campaign to strip a vulnerable minority group of its civil rights.

"Millions of Californians definitely lost their civil rights," says John Aravosis. "But I'm not hearing a lot of concern about any of those victims, only sympathy for their attacker. When you use the power of the state to rip away my civil rights, and force me to live by your 'values,' you are no longer practicing your religion. You're practicing politics."

In the wake of Prop 8 millions of gays and lesbians all over the country have decided that we're no longer going to play by the old rules. We're not going to let people kick our teeth down our throats and then run and hide behind "Nothing personal—just my private religious beliefs!" That game's over.

When Did Expressing Doubt About God Become a "Negative" Attack Message?

2008-11-26T19:18:00.009-06:00

This blog post is in response to another blogger's article on the American Humanist Association's recent ad campaign.

For the life of me, I cannot see why an ad campaign that suggests there is no need to believe in god or gods is somehow a negative attack message.

When did an honest expression of doubt and skepticism become an expression of religious intolerance in the eyes of some believers?

This ad is critical of traditional religious belief. But we should not live in a society where we engage in religious "idolatry" where honest questioning is discouraged.

Any idea (religious or non-religious) must be able to withstand criticism.

Any idea that cannot withstand critical analysis should be rejected or modified.

Unitarian Universalism as a "Safe Place" for Atheist "Deconverting"?

2008-11-13T09:10:00.003-06:00

Greta Christina - a favorite blogger of mine who writes on "sex, atheism, politics, dreams, and whatever" - writes in her blog today about "How can we make people who are questioning their faith feel that atheism is okay?"

She mentions Unitarian Universalism as a place for "people who have left religion but still miss its ritual and community" and a "non-denominational religion without the need for all that pesky God stuff."

You can read the rest of her article here.

I guessing that the changing social norms surrounding church attendance and changes in religious demographics may affect how "atheist-friendly" our Unitarian Universalist congregations are to those who are "deconverting" in the future.

The social expectation that one must attend church is no longer enforced in the United States - in my "Bible Belt" town, most of my neighbors do not attend church regularly (based on the numbers of folks observed doing yard work and other stuff on Sunday mornings).

Christianity is currently the majority religion but it's shrinking. The "atheist/agnostic/unchurched "demographic is growing. Check out the "American Religious Identification Survey" findings for more details about these demographic changes.

Both of these demographic trends and the non-mandatory nature of church in our society will affect our future demographics and future growth. I suspect that our atheist, agnostic, and unchurched neighbors will stop joining us and create their own institutions for supporting their families like the "Atheist Sunday School" mentioned on my blog and in Time Magazine.

Easy Web Site Tool -- Google Sites

2008-11-08T16:05:00.002-06:00

If your congregation or other community organization needs to set up a low-cost web site, I would check out the Google Sites web site building tools.

Our community's PFLAG (Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays) chapter web site's domain name registration had expired and it was taken by poachers.

To create a temporary web site while we decide where we want to do next on the web for our group, I used Google Sites -- here's the new Shreveport PFLAG web site.

With tools that are this easy to use, there is no excuse for a church not having a web site today.

Two Campaign-Related Videos

2008-10-24T19:32:00.003-05:00

Hat tip to Andrew Sullivan.

A "Morning After Pill" for Political Mistakes?

2008-10-10T18:29:00.002-05:00

Dan Dennett Video Clip -- A Proposal to Teach All Religions in All Schools

2008-10-01T07:20:00.005-05:00

At 4:20 after the start of the video, he advocates for teaching a fact-based curriculum on all religions.

Dennett's suggestion is very similar to the one that Joel made on his blog.

Maybe Disney will make a movie about this year's election season?

2008-09-28T18:26:00.007-05:00

[Hat tip to Andrew Sullivan for posting this video clip on his blog.]

Video Resource on Cultural Misappropriation

2008-09-28T09:16:00.003-05:00

Here are two clips from White Shamans and Plastic Medicine Men, a one-half hour documentary dealing with the popularization and commercialization of Native American spiritual traditions by Non-Indians.

White Shamans and Plastic Medicine Men, Part 1 of 3

White Shamans and Plastic Medicine Men, Part 2 of 3

I found a study guide for this documentary that asks the following questions:

1. What are the motivations for many non-Indians who take use Indian religious practices?

2. Do you think any of them are aware of the problems caused by what they do?

3. Do you think any of them consider the possible dangers related to their appropriation of Indian religion?

4. Which of the non-Indian people interviewed might be the most aware of the fact that they are exploiting Indian religion and people?

5. What are some of the recognizable names discussed in the video?

6. When non-Indians appropriate elements of Indian religions, what does it say about their view of the complexity of Indian cultural practices?

7. Why do they think it is okay to do use Indian religious practices?

I saw this video several years ago when I attended a Young Religious Unitarian Universalist "Spirituality Development Conference" as an adult advisor.

This documentary with a follow-up discussion would make a very useful adult or youth religious education class on appropriate and inappropriate borrowing from other cultures in Unitarian Universalism.

Planned Parenthood Response to McCain's Attack on Abuse Prevention

2008-09-12T21:19:00.005-05:00

[Hat tip to Andrew Sullivan for making this resource known to me through his blog.]

McCain speaks out against child abuse prevention

2008-09-09T21:49:00.008-05:00

I bet my headline has caught your attention.

Some may think it's unfair to make this charge against Senator McCain.

But it's really no more unfair the recent McCain campaign criticism of Senator Obama's support of age-appropriate sexuality education during his time in the Illinois State Legislature ("McCain criticizes Obama vote on sex ed legislation")

Senator Obama's support of age-appropriate sexuality education is endorsed by public health and sexuality education experts like Rev. Debra Haffner:

Educating Children for Prevention
A high quality sexuality education program, such as Our Whole Lives (OWL), is one of the best methods for sexual abuse prevention. Children who learn that their bodies are good, that their sexuality is a gift, how to make good decisions, and the language to communicate accurately and effectively about sexuality are also being prepared to respond appropriately when faced with abusive behaviors, to assert their right to control their own bodies, and to tell an adult if such behaviors occur.

So ... Senator McCain's criticism of Senator Obama's support of " ... one of the best methods for sexual abuse prevention" tells me that Senator McCain is either intentionally or accidentally speaking out against effective child abuse prevention.

Many Unitarian Universalist and United Church of Christ congregations offer this type of age-appropriate sexuality education in our congregations for children in kindergarten and first grade. And the excellent resources used in these congregations can also be used in other religious and secular settings as well.

Now -- I don't seriously believe that Senator McCain is really in favor of child abuse.

But I do believe he is in favor of putting his honor and integrity into a blind trust so he can be elected President.

The Religious Gap Between "Theory" and "Practice" ...

2008-09-08T20:56:00.004-05:00

Greta Christina (a blogging favorite of mine who writes on "Sex, atheism, politics, dreams, and whatever") recent wrote a post on atheist bloggers.

Greta made an observation about the gap between religious "theory" (religion as taught in seminary and the academic world) and religious "practice" (religion as it is actually lived in congregations and communities):

Truth to tell, though? I honestly don't care all that much about advanced modern theology. If you have an argument to make, I'll certainly read it. But for the most part, I'm just not all that interested in religion as it's believed and practiced by a handful of theological scholars. I am primarily interested in religion as it overwhelmingly plays out in the real world.

Greta's comment got me to wondering about Unitarian Universalism. Do we have a gap between academic "theory" and day-to-day "practice" in the Unitarian Universalist tradition?

Can we call it sexism if it's done by her supporters?

2008-09-06T13:13:00.005-05:00

Several days ago, I asked a question on my blog about Alaska's Govenor Palin's selection as the Republican Vice-President pick with a t-shirt that referenced her perceived attractiveness:

"I wonder if this is the intended message of Senator McCain's VP pick?"

A few Unitarian Universalist bloggers criticized me for asking this question.

However, it's interesting to view some of the campaign buttons worn by Gov. Palin's supporters:

I'm relieved to see that her selection as the Republican VP candidate was a measured and well-reasoned decision based on her public service experience as a PTA parent/community organizer and politician.

It would be a shame if her appearance was a major factor in Senator McCain's decision-making process.

The 2008 election is more important than a high school election,

However, our elections seem to resemble high school elections in terms of framing of the candidates. And because of this, the outcome is worse for our nation.

Instead of voting for the "smart" candidate, we end up voting for the more popular kid or more attractive kid.

This is how we ended up with the "class clown" president instead of the Nobel Peace Prize winner president in the White House.

And we can't afford another four years of "class clown" government.

Debating the Wisdom of Abstinence-Only Sexuality Education

2008-09-01T14:25:00.011-05:00

It may be time for us as a nation to examine the public health outcomes and public policy impact of our nation's decision to federally funded "abstinence-only" sexuality education to the exclusion of other types of sexuality education in our schools and our wider society.

There are two recent news stories that I saw on Google News that are related to our public policy decision on this.

One story is concerned with the personal life of Gov. Palin's oldest daughter:

Gov. Palin Says Her Unmarried 17-Year-Old Daughter Is Pregnant
"We have been blessed with five wonderful children who we love with all our heart and mean everything to us," reads the statement from Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and her husband Todd.

"Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned," they continued, referring to their 17-year-old daughter. "As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support.

"The Palins said that "Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family.

The second story deals with the public policy position that Gov. Palin has taken regarding "abstinence-only" sexuality education:

Palin backed abstinence education
(CNN) – Sarah Palin, who announced on Monday that her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant, indicated during her run for Alaska governor that she was a firm supporter of abstinence-only education in schools.

In a 2006 Eagle Forum questionnaire, Palin indicated that she supported funding abstinence-until-marriage education programs instead of teaching sex-education programs.

"Explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support," Palin wrote in the conservative group’s questionnaire.

However, we do know that the comprehensive sexuality education programs used in Western Europe do have a better public health and public policy outcomes in comparison with the United States. However, this isn't the type of sexuality education that Gov. Palin or Sen. McCain supports.

Here are a few graphs from the Advocates for Youth "Adolescent Sexual Health in Europe and the U.S.—Why the Difference?" fact sheet:

If the teen pregnancy, teen abortion, and teen sexually-transmitted infection rates in the US were the same as the Netherlands, we would have 657,000 fewer teen pregnancies, 441,000 fewer teen births, and 215,000 fewer teen abortions. It would also save the taxpayers $921 million each year (in 1997 dollars).

Unplanned pregnancy is a something that can be prevented. It's not something that "just happens" and it doesn't take "rocket science" to prevent it.

Our Western European cousins have an excellent track record with promoting healthy sexual decision-making in their teens. This is something that we could do in the US if we want to.

As Unitarian Universalists working in partnership with the United Church of Christ, our gift to the wider world is our excellent "Our Whole Lives" lifespan series of comprehensive sexuality education curricula.

It's amazing what one finds on CafePress ...

2008-08-30T10:58:00.003-05:00

I wonder if this is the intended message of Senator McCain's VP pick?

"Postchristianity" and the Future of Unitarian Universalism in North America (Part II)

2008-08-16T13:19:00.004-05:00

I understand that folks are upset by the recent use of the "p-word" by a Unitarian Universalist Association spokesperson after the recent Knoxville shooting. I've got several comments about this in my last blog article ("'Postchristianity' and the Future of Unitarian Universalism in North America").

But I'm going to post this question to see if we can get folks to focus on the long-term demographic trends in North America that point towards a postchristian society:

If we end up with a postchristian society similar to Western European societies where religion fulfills at most a cultural, symbolic, and ceremonial role, what is our future as a Unitarian Universalist movement in this postchristian society?

I would like to focus on this question and how it might affect future Unitarian Universalist growth and survival.

Any thoughts?

"Postchristianity" and the Future of Unitarian Universalism in North America

2008-08-16T08:09:00.009-05:00

Postchristianity has been talked about on the Unitarian Universalist blogosphere for the past few weeks -- you can read these discussions here, here, here, here, and here.

However, I think we're overlooking the very real "postchristian" demographic trend in North America and its impact on our congregations.

Here's a brief quote from Wikipedia to help us with what the term "postchristian" might mean:

Postchristianity, postchristendom or postchristianism are variants of a term used to describe a contemporary cultural attitude strictly linked to postmodernism. It may include personal world views, ideologies, religious movements or societies that are no longer rooted in the language and assumptions of Christianity, though it had previously been in an environment of ubiquitous Christianity (i.e., Christendom). Neopaganism and its cultural backgrounds, are the most notable examples of this kind of postchristian new religious movements.

Thus defined, a post-Christian world is one where Christianity is no longer the dominant civil religion, but one that has, gradually over extended periods of time, assumed values, culture, and worldviews that are not necessarily Christian (and further may not necessarily reflect any world religion's standpoint). This situation applies to much of Europe, in particular in Central and Northern Europe, where no more than half of the residents in those lands profess belief in a transcendent, personal and monotheistically-conceived deity.

Or in simpler terms, postchristian describes a culture where Christianity had been the dominant civil religion in the past, is still present today, but is not the dominant religion today.

In other words, religious life in our culture is moving from Christianity as the majority religion to simply being one of many religious views in North America. The suggestion that Christianity is present but not dominant visually depicted by this Universalist lapel pin where the cross is present but not central (image provided by UniUniques):

If the term "postchristian" is insulting, I suppose this lapel pin is insulting as well. Go figure.

In a postchristian world, we can't assume that our potential members will understand the Protestant Christian assumptions that influence our Unitarian Universalist congregations in the past and today.

We will see this demographic shift happen in Canada first based on the extrapolation of current demographics provided by the Ontario Consultants for Religious Tolerance:

"The percentage of Canadians who identify themselves as Christian has been dropping by about 0.9 percentage points per year. This is very close to the rate of decline in the U.S. If this trend continues, then by about the year 2023, non-Christians will outnumber Christians in Canada."

And here is their prediction for the United States:

[In 2001,] 76.5% (159 million) of Americans identify themselves as Christian. This is a major slide from 86.2% in 1990. Identification with Christianity has suffered a loss of 9.7 percentage points in 11 years -- about 0.9 percentage points per year. This decline is identical to that observed in Canada between 1981 and 2001. If this trend has continued, then:
At the present time (2007-MAY), only 71% of American adults consider themselves Christians
The percentage will dip below 70% in 2008
By about the year 2042, non-Christians will outnumber the Christians in the U.S.

In the past, we have recruited many of our members from those who have left Christianity to become Unitarian Universalist as adults. Close to 90% of our adult membership are adult converts who were not raised as Unitarian Universalist.

However, this group of potential Unitarian Universalists is shrinking.

What impact will this have on our future growth and long-term survivability as a religious movement?

While we discuss the suggestion that "postchristian" is an insulting or loaded term, this demographic issue remains untouched even though it could and probably will impact us within the next 10 to 30 years.

If McCain compares Obama to Britney ...

2008-07-31T08:50:00.005-05:00

... then this "viral video" response is probably the funniest response to McCain's ad:

Candace Chellew-Hodge's Open Letter to Sean Hannity

2008-07-29T23:34:00.008-05:00

Rev. Candace Chellew-Hodge has written a response to the right-wing pundit incitement to violence connected to the recent Knoxville Unitarian Universalist church shooting.

Candace is the founder/editor of Whosoever: An Online Magazine for GLBT Christians and currently serves as associate pastor at Garden of Grace United Church of Christ in Columbia, S.C.

Here's a short quote from her open letter to Sean Hannity (who used to be a former co-worker when she worked in the news media business before entering the ministry):

Sean, you occupy a position of power. All words have power, but some words are more powerful than others simply because they are amplified from a larger stage. With power comes responsibility. If there is any of that old Sean left—the one before the big office, the popular TV and radio show and best selling books—I appeal to that man. Understand the power of your words. I know that words of division are profit-making words for you. We human beings apparently love to see a good fight, or feel our views justified by a good argument. But I hope this incident will give you pause and help you begin to choose your words more wisely. I hope, in choosing future words, you’ll consider not what’s best for the Hannity bank account, but what’s best for humanity.

I long for the day when profitable words are words that uplift, encourage, and inspire people. The strength of this nation has always been our unity in diversity and our unity in the face of adversity. By using your words to create a world of “us” and “them” you only perpetuate violence and discord in our society. I am asking you, Sean, to examine yourself and your words. You don’t have to agree with liberals and their views, but you can oppose liberal ideas without painting those who hold those beliefs as enemies who need to be stopped or defeated. If conservative ideas are truly superior, then a compelling case can be made for them without resorting to the politics of personal destruction.

Sean, your words have the power to heal and the power to destroy. The choice is yours.

The rest of the letter can be read here.

Her new book, Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians, will be published in September 2008 by Jossey-Bass.

Dan Dennett: Ants, terrorism, and the awesome power of memes (TED Talk Video Clip)

2008-07-13T18:18:00.002-05:00

Bloggingheads Video Clip -- "Science Saturday: The Young and the Restless"

2008-07-12T21:38:00.005-05:00

Check out the Blogginghead online conversation between Abigail Smith (University of Oklahoma grad student and blog author of erv) and PZ Myers (University of Minnesota - Morris professor and blog author of Pharyngula).

An excellent explanation of the importance of Richard Lenski's research on evolutionary biology of bacteria during this discussion can be found here.

The portion of this discussion related to recent Bill Donohue-PZ Myers dispute can be found here.

Background info on the Donohue-Myers dispute can be found here and here.

More Outrage and Death Threats Over "Religious Insult" - Round Two

2008-07-10T22:42:00.005-05:00

After the initial "cracker kidnapping" incident, the Minnesota biology professor PZ Myers has commented on the over-reaction on the Pharyngula science blog:

IT'S A FRACKIN’ CRACKER!

PZ Myers blog was noticed by Bill Donohue and the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights:

MINNESOTA PROF PLEDGES TO DESECRATE EUCHARIST

Bill Donohue has asked his followers to harass Myers and the University of Minnesota President. Myers' reaction to this harassment can be found here:

Now I've got Bill Donohue's attention

Earlier today, Myers reported the following response to his criticism of the religious over-reaction from Donohue and the Catholic League:

Fight back against Bill Donohue!

Instead of "turning the other cheek," Myers blog commentary on the "cracker" incident has earned the following reaction:

So far today, I have received 39 pieces of personal hate mail of varying degrees of literacy, all because I was rude to a cracker. Four of them have included death threats, a personal one day record. Thirty-four of them have demanded that I be fired. Twenty-five of them have told me to desecrate a copy of the Koran, instead, or in some similar way offend Muslims, because — in a multiplicity of ironic cluelessness — apparently only some religious icons must be protected, and I would only offend Catholics because they are all so nice that none of them would wish me harm. I even have one email that says I should be fired, that the author would like to kill me, and that I only criticize because Catholics are so gentle and kind.

Myers has also received death threats in the comments on his blog:

If God doesn't get you, I will

You're a fucking giant sized scumbag. I hope you die slowly and painfully. Cunt.

And it's starting to get noticed outside the blogosphere and in the mainstream media:

Communion wafer held 'hostage' raises holy heck

And we're still waiting for the moderate religious voices to condemn threats of violence and economic harm over a cracker that wasn't eaten and the subsequent commentary about this uneaten cracker.

Death Threats Over "Religious Insult" in the US??

2008-07-09T08:15:00.003-05:00

Remember the Danish Muhammad cartoon controversy where a perceived religious insult led to death threats for those doing the insulting?

Apparently something very similar happened in Florida on a college campus after a student "kidnapped" the "body of Christ":

So far, I have seen no press coverage of moderate or liberal Christian voices speaking out against this religious extremism happening within Christianity.

This is no different from the relative lack of moderate or liberal Islamic voices speaking out against religious extremism happening within Islam.

Apparently, the safety of a human is less important to some Christians than the safety of a cracker.

Does this describe a "typical" Unitarian Universalist?

2008-07-05T09:56:00.003-05:00

I ran across this web site after reading an interview with the author.

Much of this list describes a very common demographic group in Unitarian Universalist congregations. Much of this list would describe (in biting satirical accuracy) a "stereotypical" Unitarian Universalist.

Check out the complete list here.

Given the population demographic trends presented in Rev. Peter Morales' opening speech at the 2008 General Assembly candidates forum, this is an area for future work.

Congregations, Ministers, and the New "Incompetence" Rule

2008-06-30T07:47:00.010-05:00

There has been some concern in the Unitarian Universalist blogosphere over the new rule concerning ministerial incompetence that was approved at the 2008 UUA General Assembly. You can read about it here, here, and here.

See the UU World online article titled "Ministers can be terminated for incompetence" for more details. Here's a summary of the new rule change:

"The fellowship of a minister may be terminated by the Ministerial Fellowship Committee for unbecoming conduct, incompetence, or other specified cause."

First, it seems funny to me that any professionals should be this concerned about protecting colleagues who are incompetent in their profession.

A minister who demonstrates serial incompetence through several congregational postings does impact the public perception of ministry throughout the UUA. This requirement to be professionally competent is just as "vague" as the requirement to not engage in "unbecoming conduct."

This is especially important in light of the fact that our denomination considers ordained clergy to be an option for congregational formation and sustainment within the UUA. Ordained clergy are not a requirement for a congregation to be in the UUA and many congregations exist and even thrive without ordained clergy.

However, payment of pro-rated fair share contribution to the UUA Annual Program Fund and 30 members at the time of application are requirements to be a UUA member congregation -- check out Article III and Rule III in the UUA Bylaws for what it takes to create a new UUA member congregation.

If we want to see lay-led congregations grow to the size where professional leadership is needed for further growth, then these lay-led congregations should be satisfied that ministry as a profession is generally competent. A few negative examples will be enough to convince these smaller congregations to forgo hiring a minister.

Second, in spite of the language we use to describe ministers as "called," what we're really doing is "hiring" a religious professional through a formal congregational vote. I'm not a big fan of high-falutin' language. Ministers are employed by congregations (even if they are treated as "self-employed" for IRS purposes).

Third, Scott Wells is right that the UUA does very little to require competency in the various local "franchises" that carry out the local business of this association of congregations.

For example, my local congregation did a horrendous job with the Welcoming Congregation program a few years ago -- you can read about my congregation's "incompetence" here.

The local congregation's decisions have impacted our growth and outreach efforts to folks in the bisexual, gay, lesbian, and transgender communities. Our decisions have also affected outreach to allies (e.g. families who have BGLT relatives). We have lost members over our Welcoming Congregation decisions and many in the BGLT communities perceive us as unwelcoming.

The really strange thing about the Welcoming Congregation issue for our congregation is that one of our board members sent an email out to our minister and 31 of his closest friends where he wrote that our minister was "incompetent" for speaking in favor of the Welcoming Congregation program in our pulpit back in the fall of 2007 (we all know that email is always the best way to communicate in a congregation where there is a disagreement).

The sermon podcast audio where our minister spoke in favor of the Welcoming Congregation can be listened to here ... judge for yourself if this is "ministerial incompetence" or simply a sermon that made one board member uncomfortable.

Ubuntu "Hardy Heron" -- Observations After Upgrading

2008-06-23T21:34:00.016-05:00

Yes -- I know that Ubuntu Linux 8.04 ("Hardy Heron") has been available for free downloading since 21 April 2008.

I just don't like being an "early adopter" for a new operating system because this role can morph into being a "beta tester."

As much as I enjoy trouble-shooting computer software and hardware problems, my laptop is something that I want to "just work" and not be an experimental project most of the time.

Last night work life, church life, and home life all allowed me to upgrade my laptop to the latest Ubuntu release.

I have been using Ubuntu Linux on my laptop full-time since June 2007 -- having gone from version 7.04 ("Feisty Fawn) to 7.10 ("Gutsy Gibbon") to 8.04 ("Hardy Heron").

Ubuntu's philosophy is to provide a totally free and open-source computer when installed with the default selections.

However, there are multimedia resources (sound and video) and data file formats that many computer users outside the open-source community use daily. Philosophical purity may conflict with real-world interoperability.

For these practical considerations, one needs to be able to use the wide range of multimedia data available online even if it involves proprietary software.

The "Ubuntu restricted extras" package will allow you to play most common multimedia formats, including MP3, DVD, Flash, Quicktime, WMA and WMV, including both standalone files and multimedia content embedded in web pages.

Any other multimedia content requirements can be satisfied through the Medibuntu Project web site. The "how-to" instructions on this page will walk you through the steps needed to play commercial encrypted DVDs on your Ubuntu Linux computer. I've also installed the VLC video player for use with DVDs. I watched a few minutes of Battlestar Galactica Razor DVD last night to confirm commercial encrypted DVD operation.

These multimedia resources take care of nearly every multimedia requirement that was formerly provided to me through Automatix -- Automatix and EasyUbuntu were automated install tools for these multimedia options for earlier versions of Ubuntu Linux.

Both Automatix and EasyUbuntu are now unsupported orphan software or "abandonware" at this time. However, their ease-of-use multimedia features have now been replaced by the incorporation of the restricted extras and Medibuntu resources available to all Ubuntu users.

To ensure that I can open any Microsoft Office 2007 documents sent to me, I installed the "odf-converter-integrator" package -- this allows me to open any Microsoft Office 2007 file (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) using OpenOffice. Instructions for installing these Office 2007 converters can be found here.

For those who are not familiar with Ubuntu Linux, here's a brief description adapted from the Wikipedia article text on Ubuntu Linux:

Ubuntu is a computer operating system. It has consistently been rated among the most popular of the many Linux distributions. Ubuntu's goals include providing an up-to-date yet stable Linux distribution for the average user and having a strong focus on usability and ease of installation. Ubuntu is a derivative of Debian, another free operating system.

Ubuntu also emphasizes accessibility and internationalization, to reach as many people as possible.

The most recent version of Ubuntu comes installed with a wide range of software including: the OpenOffice.org productivity suite, the internet browser Firefox, the instant messenger Pidgin, and the raster graphics editor GIMP.

The amazing thing about Ubuntu Linux is that one can take an older computer that would be considered "obsolete" for Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office use and keep it useful through more efficient and leaner software. This is an advantage for churches and other non-profit organizations that depend on cash and used property donations to meet their needs.

When a church member or community non-profit supporter gets a new computer, he/she should consider asking if the church or non-profit can use the older hardware as a potential Ubuntu Linux workstation.

The gift of an "old computer" may mean the difference between a volunteer or staff person having or not having a computer in some cash-strapped churches or non-profits.

Ubuntu Linux provides the same functionality that Microsoft Windows XP and Microsoft Office provides (web surfing, email, word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, etc) on older hardware that would not support or would poorly support Windows XP or Microsoft Office (not to mention the resource hogs Microsoft Windows Vista or Microsoft Office 2007).

Ubuntu Linux is available for PC, 64-Bit and Mac architectures. The alternate installation CDs require at least 256 MB of RAM (the standard installation CD requires 384MB of RAM). Install requires at least 3 GB of disk space.

For example, my son's homework/web surfing computer is a used Compaq Pentium III (800 Mhz) with just 256 megabytes of RAM and 20 gigabytes of hard drive storage. It provides enough power for light word processing and web surfing. All of this is done with a "free" operating system that isn't susceptable to the many computer virus and spyware threats that plague Microsoft Windows.

Tonight, I updated my congregation's web site to reflect next Sunday's worship service info and I also prepared last Sunday's sermon podcast audio using Audacity and the LAME mp3 encoder on my laptop's new "Hardy Heron" setup -- so far everything is working as advertised.

My next two "Hardy Heron" installs will happen in the next few weeks -- updating the sermon podcast digital recorder computer and a spare loaner Pentium III computer that we provide to congregation members or staff who need a computer for home use (this loaner computer is identical to my son's computer).

Then I'll update my congregation's part-time chaplain's computer (yet another Pentium III identical to my son's computer).

Trailer for "Suspended: No Astrology Allowed"

2008-06-22T08:37:00.001-05:00

A Question For Rev. Dr. Laurel Hallman

2008-06-19T08:07:00.006-05:00

Rev. Dr. Laurel Hallman made the following comment on her UUA Presidential Candidate web site in answering a question:

"Thanks for the website of the Freedom of Religion Foundation. If you had said Freedom from Religion I would have been concerned."

The person with the question had typed "Freedom of Religion Foundation" but provided the URL for the "Freedom from Religion Foundation" in her question.

The Freedom from Religion Foundation is a non-profit group dedicated to promoting church-state separation and educating the public on matters related to non-theism. This group's social justice work sounds like something that many Unitarian Universalists would support and affirm.

Are you suggesting that Unitarian Universalists should reverse their past social justice positions affirming church-state separation?

Are you suggesting that we should not support non-theism education when we know that non-theists are marginalized in our culture?

A 2006 University of Minnesota study reported that atheists are perceived as a group worthy of marginalization and exclusion by many Americans. They are viewed as the least-trustworthy group according to this survey.

I know the disputes within Unitarian Universalism over "language of reverence" and theological diversity can and often do get heated.

However, we do need to remember that our churches have a duty to "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable" -- part of this duty may include finding a way to be welcoming to all and not excluding the non-theists in our congregations in order to improve our "marketability" in the religious marketplace.

Not just "better living through chemistry" ...

2008-06-16T01:00:00.003-05:00

... all living happened through chemistry and time:

There may be very little need for the supernatural in creating life on Earth.

Pale Blue Dot

2008-05-31T16:15:00.001-05:00

A video on the folly of expecting an external source for our salvation:

"Fundamentalist Atheists," Godwin's Law, and Blake's Law

2008-05-03T20:07:00.004-05:00

Godwin's Law (or Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies) is a descriptive adage first proposed by Mike Godwin in 1990:

"As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."

Now that Usenet newsgroup discussions have been superseded by blogs, wiki talk pages, and other discussion areas, this would probably be updated:

"As an internet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."

Godwin's Law is often invoked in online discussions to caution us against the use of exaggerated comparisons and is often conflated with fallacious arguments of the "reductio ad Hitlerum" type.

Some would suggest that anyone who invokes a Nazi analogy has "lost" the online debate.

For discussions involving atheism and skepticism, a similar adage is Blake's Law:

"In any discussion of atheism (skepticism, etc.), the probability that someone will compare a vocal atheist to religious fundamentalists increases to one."

Or in simple terms, most comparisons to Nazis or fundamentalists are not true attempts at dialog but rather rhetorical devices intended to shut down discussion through name-calling.

And once a person has invoked a "fundamentalist = atheist" comparison, it's pretty apparent that an honest discussion is over.

We're lucky that YouTube and the Internet were not around in 1968 ...

2008-05-03T06:44:00.005-05:00

The following quote is from a Newsweek special feature on Martin Luther King's legacy.

It mentions the title of his final (and undelivered) sermon:

On Thursday, April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. had retreated to room 306 of the Lorraine Motel, worrying about a sanitation strike in Memphis and working on his sermon for Sunday. Its title: "Why America May Go to Hell."

This sermon title was for the sermon he would have preached if he had not been assassinated.

In case anyone is curious, the first ARPAnet network (the grandparent of the modern internet) didn't come online until November 1969.

Theology vs. Politics in Response to Rev. Wright

2008-04-28T19:40:00.010-05:00

Joan Walsh and many other political pundits are on-target for the political impact of Rev. Jeremiah Wright's public comments on Senator Obama's Presidential campaign.

But the political analysis of Rev. Wright's comments show a gaping hole in religious literacy when it comes to liberation theology and its roots within the teachings of Jesus.

Most folks have heard the beatitude "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God" in Luke 6:20 so long that they don't see the harsh politically-tinged social justice message in this Bible verse.

John Dominic Crossan (the former Catholic priest and co-founder of the Jesus Seminar) writes about this in his book Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography. Crossan's exegesis of this verse takes us to a very uncomfortable place. The following quote is from Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography, page 62:

Now what on earth does that mean, especially if one does not spiritualize it away, as Matthew immediately did, into "poor in spirit" -- that is, spiritually humble or religiously obediant? Did Jesus really think that bums and beggers were actually blessed by God, as if all destitute were nice people and all the aristocrats were correspondingly evil?
...

If, however, we think not just of personal or individual evil but of social, structural, or systemic injustice -- that is, of precisely the imperial situation in which Jesus and his fellow peasants found themselves -- then the saying becomes literally, terribly, and permanently true. In any situation of oppression, especially in those oblique, indirect, and systemic ones where injustice wears a mask of normalcy or even of necessity, the only ones who are innocent or blessed are those squeezed out deliberately as human junk from the system's own evil operation. A contemporary equivalent: only the homeless are innocent. That is a terrifying aphorism against society because, like the aphorisms against the family, it focuses on not just on personal or individual abuse of power but on such abuse in its systemic or structural possibilities -- and there, in contrast to the former level, none of our hands are innocent or our consciences are particularly clear.

Now in terms of a modern-day preacher saying "God damn America" like Rev. Wright did, it does not make sense from a personal or individual point of view.

But it does make sense when viewed an anti-oppressive liberation theology lens when applied to the very real and very ordinary systemic injustices our country has committed and continues to commit today.

It's probably fortunate for John McCain, Hillary Clinton, or Barack Obama that Jesus isn't alive today to be a personal friend.

Otherwise, they would have to explain their connection to this crazy preacher who is so anti-American in his sermons.

Bill Moyers Interviews Rev. Jeremiah Wright

2008-04-26T09:49:00.004-05:00

Here's an hour-long interview of Rev. Jeremiah Wright by Bill Moyers -- worth checking out to understand the context of the YouTube soundbites from his sermons (and the web broadcast on one's computer doesn't interfere with Battlestar Galactica on Friday nights).

"Brick Testament" -- Bible Stories Told Through Legos

2008-04-26T09:24:00.004-05:00

2 Samuel 11:2 -- "And from the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful."

The Brick Testament is worth checking out -- here's a brief explanation from the web site:

The Brick Testament is the largest, most comprehensive illustrated Bible in the world with over 3,600 illustrations that retell more than 300 stories from The Bible.

Launched first as a website in 2001, then as a published book series in 2003, The Brick Testament project is an ongoing one-man labor of love, constructed and photographed entirely by The Rev. Brendan Powell Smith.