the foreshadow

Thoughts of a teenage Humanist on Life, the Universe, and Everything, and occasionally the sort of inane silliness uncharacteristic of blogs but very characteristic of Tumblr. The Foreshadow by Keith Favre is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be obtained at http://theforeshadow.tumblr.com/ask.

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Happy World Humanist Day!

It's June 21, the Summer Solstice and also World Humanist Day, by no coincidence: it's on the longest day of the year, the day the sunlight shines for the longest time, to symbolize the light of reason illuminating humanity in much the same way that the light of the sun illuminates the earth.

So, on this most auspicious of occasions, I hope you'll allow me to share a few thoughts on my own personal Humanism.

Atheism doesn't play a major role in my life all the time, but Humanism never stops.

I have my cycle of obsessions, and part of the reason that this blog hasn't really been updated is because the cycle has moved on. I'm definitely still interested in atheist and interfaith activism, but it's more of a passing interest at current, so atheism isn't really playing a huge role in my life right now. I know fighting for the rights of nonbelievers and helping others understand secularism and atheism is important work, but it's not occupying a lot of my time right now.

However, here's where I draw the distinction. Humanism isn't simply atheism with a fancy name or atheism plus morality. My atheism may have stopped playing a major role in my life, but my Humanism has never stopped. My Humanist beliefs color every interaction and friendship I have. I base my Humanism on a core optimism about human nature and faith in the ability of every human being to do good. It's profoundly affected the way I treat people and how I view people in general.

I consider myself a Christian atheist.

This may be news for some, but I've been doing a lot of thinking about religion as of late. Especially since Cardinal Bergoglio became Pope Francis, doing great work to fix the hypocrisy and vanity in the Church, I've been encouraging myself to own my Roman Catholic upbringing. There are many Church teachings I agree with, and for the ones I disagree with, I'm not alone: pro-choice Catholics created Catholics for Choice to promote freedom of conscience, and the coalition Equally Blessed promotes equal rights for LGBT individuals within the Church.

Obviously following Christianity without even believing in God isn't exactly mainstream, but it works for me. I draw inspiration from many religious traditions, but Christianity feels the most personal to me. The way I think of it is this: I'm inspired by the Bible but not bound by it. I consider Jesus an exemplary role model to follow. The Christian teaching that I think about most often is the seven deadly sins. I consider them the cause of all suffering: Pride, Greed, Lust, Envy, Gluttony, Wrath, and Sloth. When I find myself challenged by one of these, I call to mind the opposing seven heavenly virtues: Humility, Charity, Chastity, Kindness, Temperance, Patience, and Diligence. A pretty good guide to living, if you ask me.

While I don't believe in their supernatural propositions, I draw inspiration from many religious traditions.

Religion is a very interesting topic to me. It frustrates me when some atheists dismiss all religion out of hand, because there is definite wisdom to be found in the varied religious traditions of the world. Yes, most religions include supernatural aspects, but another aspect of the definition of religion is that they provide a code of ethics to live by, and there's a perhaps surprising (though, if you really think about it, not surprising at all) amount of overlap in the morals of the different religions. Yes, religion can be corrupted by dogmatism and tribalism to become a mockery of the ideals it promotes, but that doesn't diminish the value of those ideals. If anything, it demonstrates the need to remain diligent in promoting those ideals, because they can become corrupted so easily. Ideals to live by: sounds like Humanism to me.

So on this longest day of the year, take a moment to think about how Humanism influences your life. Not even necessarily the secular kind. Faith in humanity is Humanism. Working to promote the inherent dignity of every person is Humanism. If you work to improve the lives of people, you can call yourself a Humanist.

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Lessons from the Day of Silence: Thoughts of a Bisexual Humanist

I suppose this is my coming out. As I've known for a few months now, I'm bisexual. I've always been an advocate for LGBT rights, but this realization has made the issue take on an even more personal significance for me. Today I participated in the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network's Day of Silence. I spent basically all of today completely silent except when it was absolutely necessary for me to speak. Even for a hyper-introverted person like myself, it was torture. And much like it's never the fall that kills you, it's not the silence that drives you insane. It's the lack of communication. The feeling of not being able to get your point across. Basically, the whole point of having this Day of Silence. So, since I spent a day locked in a room with my uncontrollable internal monologue, unable to escape, I've done some thinking about some lessons that the Day of Silence can teach.

Lesson One. Your allies are the people who speak for you when you have no voice.

The Day of Silence offers a nice opportunity to appreciate some of the issues faced by the LGBT community usually expressed in figurative terms by making them literal. Much like the straight allies who speak out to those who won't listen to the people themselves because of their identities, on the Day of Silence, your allies are the people who literally speak for you -- those who are willing to communicate ideas to others that you cannot.

Lesson Two. There are few things that are truly black and white. It's frustrating to be expected to pick between two choices when neither describes how you really feel.

Anyone who's participated in the Day of Silence can tell you that it's easy enough to work with yes or no questions -- the problem comes when your answer to a question can't be easily captured with a shake of the head or a simple hand gesture. Coincidentally, this too serves as an eloquent allegory for a LGBT issue. Especially for the oft-overlooked latter half of LGBT (i.e. bisexuals and trans* people, and the rest when extended to some of the more unwieldy abbreviations like LGBTQIA...), society often seems to expect people to "pick a side": gay or straight, male or female... you get the idea. Thing is, it's not really that simple. What's to be said when you're given two choices and you don't feel like either truly represents you?

And finally...

Lesson Three. There are many creative ways to communicate without talking.

This one doesn't really translate into any great epiphany about LGBT issues, but it's impossible to get through a Day of Silence without learning it. There may be debates on the extent to which it's cheating, but one way or another, be it through a notebook you carry around, sticky notes, or Charades: Hard Mode, if you're being silent for a day, you're gonna figure out a way to communicate. Oh wait. I guess that does translate into a good metaphor.

Lesson Four. We will never be silenced.

One of the great qualities of the human person is determination. We don't simply quietly acquiesce to oppression. There is such thing as right and wrong, it turns out, and what is right always wins. Maybe not at first, and never without cost, but in the end, driven by that very human determination, the right side prevails. Those who seek to reduce the dignity of the human person, who resist change out of fear of the unknown, will be forced either to change themselves or watch as they become increasingly irrelevant, because they will never, ever win.

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Les errances de l'esprit

I retained no other purpose but to ponder my own existence. I rudely took the Universe by her collar and demanded the answers I seeked. She sang electrical melodies — telegraphed her response across a cable of neurons. She breathed proteins and sighed silky strands of DNA. Her answers were at once exciting and frustrating — as all good things are. Her poetic prose echoed across the vastness, a series of electrical impulses stretching to eternity, wherever that may be.

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The Comedy of Six Million Murders

I originally posted this lengthy tirade as a status on Facebook, in response to a particularly heartless Holocaust joke. I promise I'm not usually this cynical, but this is a troubling trend I've been noticing with my generation and Internet culture.

TL;DR: Read it. Show that you're capable of processing more than 140 characters at a time.

I get it; I've been immersed in the Internet culture firsthand. I've laughed at the jokes. But I've changed my perspective a lot in the past couple of years. Now? I don't do offensive humor. Worst offender: Holocaust jokes. I might have laughed at them before. But now? At first glance, they're amusing puns or wordplay. I want to laugh. Maybe I almost smile for a fraction of a second. But I've been to Holocaust museums. I've read the stories the legions never survived to tell. I've studied the madness that was the Holocaust, undoubtedly one of the greatest crimes against humanity in all of history. I see a joke, I want to laugh... but then I remember what I saw, and I don't. SIX. MILLION. That's how many Jews died in the Holocaust. Six million people, brutally murdered by people who saw no wrong in doing so. It seemed as crazy at the time as it does now. Few believed that the Nazis would really go through with their plans, and six million Jews paid the ultimate price for it. If you feel comfortable trivializing the senseless murder of so many people, I think you need to examine your life, because you're seriously deficient in empathy. But that's not even what breaks my heart. What breaks my heart is that there are people who will see this and think nothing of it; label me a "moralfag", pat themselves on the back for being good trolls, and move on with their lives. That's the tragedy here. What have we done?

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NPS does Lent, 2013

This post is originally from NonProphet Status. The introduction is written by Vlad Chituc, and the section I contributed is the next-to-last one.

I’m an atheist, but a year ago I became a vegan for Lent. I was inspired by Alain de Botton’s book, “Religion for Atheists” and a general realization that bad habits and failures of will were the biggest barriers to getting where I wanted in life. I figured that Lent’s 40-day trial period was a nice religious practice that could be easily translated into secular life.

We’re continuing and expanding that tradition this year at NonProphet Status. I asked our contributors, as well as some of our favorite people, to share what they were giving up for Lent.

Vlad Chituc I had a few accidental dietary transgressions last year, and I quickly learned how easy it can be to ignore what’s in what we’re eating. For the most part, though, I solidified a lot of the eating habits I have today. Though I’m not entirely vegan (yet), I’ve been gradually replacing eggs and dairy in my diet. I maintain a vegan diet for most meals in any given week, so I’m going to give veganism another try this year, hopefully for good.

It’s boring, though, to do the same thing two years in a row. So I’ll follow through with some sage advice from this Twitter feed: I’ll be reading no internet comments for the next 40 days, comments here notwithstanding. I’ve wasted way too many hours arguing with strangers on the internet for no discernible reason, and there’s no sense in wasting my time and harming my mental health on something so petty. I’m convinced that very little, if any good, has ever come from the average comment thread in any website. I have never heard anyone say “Wow, I’m really happy I read that insightful comment section,” so I think this is for the best.

Chris Stedman I haven’t observed Lent since I was a Christian, so this is something new. But I like trying new things, so here goes. Instead of giving something up for my first atheist Lent, I’m going to add a practice: every day, I will make an effort to tell at least one person in my life at least one of the reasons that I am glad to know them. Often times, in the busyness of life, these kinds of feelings go unexpressed. We just assume that people already know that we love them, or that we demonstrate our gratitude sufficiently through our actions, or that we’ll get around to verbalizing it later. This Lent, I’m going to try to be a bit more intentional about expressing my gratitude for the many ways other people enrich my life.

Chelsea Link I really like the idea of Lent – like Vlad said, giving yourself a set amount of time to try breaking a bad habit (or forming a new good one, like Chris is working on) seems like a really healthy practice. The combination of a predetermined end-date that you can always look forward to as a willpower booster and the solidarity of lots of other people taking on similar challenges at the same time makes Lent a smart tradition for anyone to adopt, Christian or otherwise. This year, in an effort to both take better care of my body and be more financially prudent, I’m giving up alcohol for the next 40 days. I’m making an exception for the bottle of champagne I’ve been saving to celebrate my boyfriend’s last day of work this weekend, because rituals and traditions should be flexible, not dogmatic. But I feel like I’m somewhat making up for that rule-bending in a few weeks since I’ll be keeping kosher for Passover during the last week of Lent. Borrowing from two religions at once has got to count for something, right? Thank goodness Ramadan is still a few months away.

Adam Garner My phone is for all intents and purposes an extension of my body. If I’m not obsessively checking Twitter or refreshing my Facebook news feed, I’m getting into internet fights on Reddit. It’s bad enough that when I go out to dinner with my girlfriend I have to surrender my phone as soon as we sit down. So for the next 40 days I’m going to make a potentially futile attempt to wean myself off of neurotically checking my phone every 3 minutes. That’s not to say that I’m going to give it up completely. I’m about 98% sure that would break me. But I really like the idea that for the next couple of weeks I’m going to make a conscious effort to only check it once every…hour. Yeah. I think I can do that.

On top of trying to wrangle in an obnoxious addiction, this is going to be a weird experience for me. Being that I was raised Mormon and am now a godless heathen, I’ve never observed Lent. Actually, up until about 2 hours ago I never even considered it a possibility. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. There’s something powerful about millions of people over the same 40 days trying their best to conquer bad habits and collectively distance themselves from those things that we trick ourselves into thinking we need.

Keith Favre A few months ago, I would have dismissed the term “cultural Catholic.” But I’ve since developed a near obsession-level interest in religion, and that’s taught me to appreciate the positive aspects of the tradition I was raised in. It seems natural to capture the spirit of Lent in my own secular practices, just as it does with Christmas and other religious rituals. Following this logic and some inspiration from Vlad’s piece “Lent for Atheists,” I decided to give adopt a vegetarian diet for Lent this year. I would try veganism, but one step at a time.

That’s not the only thing I’m giving up for Lent, though. As it turns out, a lot of those lessons from Sunday school many years ago have stuck in my head. Every year we would have the Lent discussion; everyone wants to give up things like chocolate or soda, but that’s missing the point. Thinking theologically, what you give up should be some vice that’s distancing you from God. From a secular perspective, then, it should be something that’s distancing you from being a better person. In this way, it seems to me that the purpose of the Lent tradition is self-improvement. My sacrifice of meat-eating will be my 40-day experiment, as Vlad put it. The vice that I’ll be giving up, though, is procrastination. It’s a popular subject for jokes on the internet, but it’s also something that has started to become a serious problem for me. I’ll hopefully end these forty days with less stress from work and more awareness of the challenges I’ll face with my inevitable full transition to a vegetarian diet. Let the games begin.

Walker Bristol I’ll give up tweeting raisin puns for Lent.

“Joseph Raisinger”, “Singin in the Raisin’’, “If emotion without raisin is blind, then raisin without emotion is impotent”, “Raisin Rally”…

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An Atheist Does Lent

I've dismissed the term cultural Catholic in the past, but I'm growing to think that it might apply to me. Just about an hour remains until Ash Wednesday, the first day of the Catholic season of Lent. As with some other holidays, I really like the idea of Lent. During Lent, Fridays are days of fasting and abstinence, which means that food should not be eaten outside of meals and meat should not be eaten at all, though for some reason there's an exception for fish meat. The most significant ritual of the Lenten season, however, is the giving up of a vice. Every year, Catholics are supposed to choose something to give up for Lent. Of course those not very invested in their faith (but nonetheless feeling an obligation) choose things like chocolate or soda, complain the whole way through, and emerge on the other side unchanged. But, as any Sunday school teacher will tell you, that's not the point. The thing you give up doesn't even have to be a thing. The point of giving up something during Lent is to try to make a positive change in your life. This year, I plan to celebrate Lent, even though I'm an atheist. Self-improvement is always good, and looks like it's in season now. My vice (oh, my terrible, terrible vice) is procrastination. That's what I'll be giving up, hopefully. Additionally, and somewhat inspired by Vlad Chituc's piece entitled "Lent for Atheists", I'll be trying out vegetarianism during Lent. So here's hoping that what I give up during Lent will stay given up. Let the games begin.

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Do you actually check this?

Interesting. The self-answering question.

Anyway, yes. I do. And for when I don't, I get emails.

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God is Dead, They Said

In every age there are those who proclaim the imminent death of religion. They seem to be to religious apocalyptic doomsayers what bigoted New Atheists are to religious fundamentalists, seemingly a mirror image. Like the various spectacular non-apocalypses we've experienced, the continued persistence of religion should serve to show that perhaps their reasoning is a bit off. A recent example of this is Valerie Tarico in her Salon article "Religion May Not Survive the Internet". There are a couple of reasons why her titular claim is a little far-fetched. Shall we?

First off, religion has survived for many thousands of years. That's gotta mean something. That something is that religion is not a monolith. The fundamental flaw in the "God is dead"-sayers' reasoning is, time and time again, their conception of religion. They see religion as this outdated, slowly decaying bit of craziness that will lie down and quietly fade into irrelevance any day now. But the fact is that religion has only survived so long because it can change. Nothing that is incapable of change will survive for very long in a changing world. A particular example of religion changing can be found in the Roman Catholic Church's posthumous overturning of its ruling on Galileo. It obviously wasn't for his benefit; at the time, Galileo was long dead. It was symbolic. The reversal of the ruling that put a man to death for seeking scientific truth was the symbolic rejection of the type of strict, literal interpretation of scripture that had formerly characterized the Church. I'm not saying that there aren't still problems with religion -- they are legion, certainly. I'm just saying that religion won't just shrivel up and die. It's only the negative aspects that are likely to do that. (And good riddance!) At its heart, a religious community is a group of human beings, and if they change, so too will the religion.

A point that's rather unique to modern doomsayers (and that Tarico makes significant use of in her article) is the observation of the growing ease of access to and acceptance of alternatives to religion. To say that that could bring about religion's demise is making a pretty big leap. Once again, the problem is with the view of religion (religious people, specifically, in this instance). The only way that easier access to alternatives to religion could bring about religion's demise is if every religious believer only remains in their particular religious community out of a sense of obligation. Now, this is certainly the case for some closet atheists, but it's hardly an accurate picture of the average believer. Put simply, most religious people aren't looking for an alternative to religion. It should go without saying that many people live happy, fulfilling religious lives.

The conclusion that Tarico reaches in her article is simply wrong, because it is based on a stereotype of religion as a monolithic, unchanging entity whose adherents participate only out of a sense of obligation. There are certainly instances where that's the case, but it's those bits that stand to fade into irrelevance, not religion as a whole. Our religions reflect ourselves, conferring on them that very human resilience that will likely keep us seeing religion in some form or another for ages to come.

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How the Internet Helped Me Find My Faith

This was originally written as a response to a post in /r/religion asking "How has ubiquitous access to the sum of human knowledge (aka the Internet) affected your faith (or lack thereof)?"

I wouldn't say that the Internet caused me to lose my faith. More that it helped me discover that I didn't really have it in the first place. Reading and learning from the Internet for many years led me to a point where I was an "agnostic Catholic" (though many object to equating "agnostic" to "weak", it was pretty much true then). I then discovered deism, which defines God as only the Supreme Architect, the non-intervening creator of the universe. Reading the definition made me recall sitting in church one afternoon and trying to figure out how I could make the Big Bang theory and God work together at a young age. For that reason, I embraced deism readily. The Internet also encouraged me later to realize that I was only a deist because I didn't want to let go of God, even if my "God" would be more recognizable to Epicurus or Spinoza than Aquinas. I decided I was an atheist and later started reading a lot about Humanism. My readings on Humanism, at first mostly on the Internet but later in a couple of physical books as well, has profoundly influenced the way I view the world and humanity; to steal a phrase from Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe, and Everything. So though my faith in God was never strong (and when it was, only because I was convinced by a scientific apologetic book), my faith in humanity as a Humanist is stronger than ever, and I have the Internet to thank for it.

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The Christmas Post of Myth and Legend

Seeing news of the Freedom From Religion Foundation's (in)famous 'Let Reason Prevail' sign a few weeks ago, I was reminded of hearing about the same sign back in my deist days.

Figure 1. Let tactlessness prevail.

Naturally, I was disgusted back then, but my perspective was also a bit different. A deist is little more than an atheist with a god, and as a deist, I liked to imagine myself as above all the petty squabbling between atheists and the religious. I was convinced that neither side was giving the other enough credit, and while I still think that's true to a certain extent, I failed to realize at the time that a person who thinks about such matters as often as I do can never be above the continuum of belief and doubt. I could never be an apatheist, and my foundation for deism was far from sturdy. But recognizing that I'm now equipped with 20/20 hindsight, how do I feel about this sign now that I consider myself an atheist and a Humanist?

CNN's Dan Merica noted a few days ago that "Christmas exposes [the] atheist divide on dealing with religion." So where do I place myself on this divide? Merica's article uses American Atheists' David Silverman and Harvard Humanist Chaplain Greg Epstein as the exemplars of the opposing sides of the divide. I place myself squarely on Epstein's side. As I've noted before, trivializing people's beliefs is not a very effective "strategy". Atheists are already at a disadvantage in American society, and calling other people's deeply held beliefs "myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds" isn't likely to help our cause terribly. I'd imagine that some of these atheist activists all too eager to trivialize others' beliefs wouldn't appreciate the same being done to them.

Figure 2. Doesn't feel good, does it?

Naturally, I can't end my Christmas post without talking about the real meaning of Christmas (cue groans from the audience), as I did with Thanksgiving earlier this year. Pointing out that Christmas and friends originated from pagan winter solstice celebrations, besides failing entirely to change the minds of the "War on Christmas" folks (who are a little less than receptive to such sentiments), completely misses the point. Why are there so many celebrations around the winter solstice? No matter how you choose to celebrate it, winter is a time to celebrate humanity, to show that no matter how cold things get, the warmth of the human spirit will always prevail. (This was the idea I had in mind when I wrote "The Defeat of General Winter, or The Vernal Equinox Funeral Mass".) Christmas and Thanksgiving are a couple of my favorite holidays because they are, at the core, celebrations of the inherent goodness of humanity (as the American Humanist Association would say, "Sounds Like Humanism!"). With the associated mythology (which, I should add, is not necessarily a bad thing), Thanksgiving is a celebration of gratitude and Christmas is a celebration of generosity. I'd imagine that, much as rejection of their god, which, for the most part, they view as an embodiment of humanity's positive potential, puzzles the religious, rejection of this celebration makes little sense. Whether or not it's literally true that a jolly man with a magical sleigh and flying reindeer delivers presents to all the world's children in one night is moot when the point is to celebrate generosity and the unity of humanity.

I hope Andrew Tripp of Considered Exclamations doesn't mind if I steal the concluding paragraph from his post that inspired me to write all of this:

With their incredibly out of touch priorities, American Atheists and the Freedom From Religion Foundation are not helping to advance secularism or civil rights for atheists with their Christmastime actions. What they are doing is sophomoric and more fit for name-calling in a high school cafeteria than it is for high profile activist organizations. Especially when lined up side by side with the Harvard Humanists, they are an embarrassment. And while I still have my differences with some of the Humanists there, their activism is actually helping people, and they should be applauded for it. On the other hand, AA and the FFRF need to take a strong look at themselves, and think about whether they actually want to change the world for the better or just continue to try to one-up religious people. If it's the latter, they do not deserve our community's support.

So from one human being to another, Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

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[ cloud overview ] [ get your own cloud ] This is a Tumblr Cloud I generated from my blog posts between Sep 2012 and Dec 2012 containing my top 20 used words.

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The Class That Changed My Life: A Letter to My Speech Teacher

Subject: Out of the night that covers me, black as the Pit from pole to pole...

...I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul.

The opening lines of "Invictus", the poem that I had never heard before taking your class, a poem that I've had almost memorized since then, until I made efforts to memorize the parts I had missing a few weeks ago. Yesterday I decided to look at the manilla folder sitting on a shelf on my desk; as I suspected, it was the folder from my summer Speech class. Luckily, I hadn't lost it. It would be tragic to lose the contents of that folder. At some point, I decided to think more seriously about an impulsive idea I'd had a couple of months ago, to send you an email, at the time settling with copying "Invictus" into a Facebook status and tagging the people I had bonded with the most over those few weeks. Perhaps I'm a bit late, emailing you at a school address just as we've been released for mid-winter break, but better late than never, right? I owe a lot to your class. Perhaps the most memorable happening of those few weeks in the summer was the interestingly arranged pseudo-debate between Christian and myself, our persuasive presentations taking opposing stances on more or less the same issue. That presentation was a large part of the impetus to become more active in my Humanism. Though I still tend to awkwardly stumble through a carefully worded definition of Humanism when asked, trying desperately to skirt around the 'no God' part, I'm largely "out", much more confident than I was when announcing the words I'm an atheist to the room during the very interesting Q&A session following my presentation led to a catch in my throat. I've led the effort to start a chapter of the Secular Student Alliance, a national organization that advocates for the rights of young non-believers like myself and helps provide a supportive community for them, at West Brook. An article about the club was published in the school newspaper today and we're having the first public meeting on the first week after we return from the break. Inspired in part by my relatively recent discovery of my role model and occasional Twitter conversation partner, atheist interfaith activist Chris Stedman (who recently wrote a book, Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious), I'm helping a Muslim friend, Eraj, who from my understanding has also had you, start an interfaith club called Coexist. It doesn't have the outpouring of support that the SSA has (Eraj, the sponsor, and myself are pretty much the only people working on it), nor the Secular Student Alliance's extensive library of resources, so it hasn't quite materialized yet. But it will. So to conclude this veritable wall of text, thank you for giving me the opportunity to discover my voice and use it to promote causes I believe in. Your class was extremely helpful; you could even say it changed my life.

Keith Favre

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The Triad

With my recent discovery of the existence of Desiderata, the texts that I use for inspiration works out into a triad. For anyone interested, here are the texts.

The Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebhur

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.

"Invictus" by William Ernest Henley

Into the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance, I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance, My head is bloody but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the Horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishments the scroll. I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.

Desiderata by Max Ehrmann

Go placidly amidst the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time. Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy. 

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My First Cause

When I first read the description of an "unprogrammed" Quaker service, it struck me as a little strange. Creepy, I thought. The service consists mostly of a collective silence, with anyone in the congregation free at any time to walk to the front and speak if, as the page I was reading phrased it, they feel "inspired by God." I was significantly less favorable to religion at that point, so my focus was more on how to work the "inspired by God" bit into a funny joke than on any similarities to my experience. But on consideration, much of my church experience has been unprogrammed. Perhaps I thought it seemed creepy because I imagined an awkward, forced silence, a quiet wish to soon be free of the unnatural stillness and on with whatever else the day could bring. But in reality, it's probably more the way I would always fill silences: with pondering on matters of Life, the Universe, and Everything, to steal a favorite phrase from The Hithchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Thinking about the origins of my unbelief, I invariably return to the same memory. A small one, but one that would come to define a turning point in my life.

One of the perhaps appealing aspects of Roman Catholicism is the uniformity of the mass. From week to week in any given church, the experience is largely the same. Naturally, there are many parts of a Roman Catholic mass that involve the congregation, but there are also a couple of periods of silence and the Liturgy of the Eucharist, recounting the story of the Last Supper as the bread and wine is, at least according to Roman Catholic doctrine, transformed to literally become the body and blood of Christ, respectively. (Interestingly enough, I don't think I ever actually believed that, even during my religious phase[s].) Though the priest speaks in the Liturgy of the Eucharist, the repetition of a thousand masses made the sound as silence to my ears. Tending as I always have to get lost in thought, while zoned out, I would think about God.

Though my life before about age ten is largely a blur to me, I date this memory to somewhere around that time. Sitting in the pews of the small church with the Vietnamese pastor reputed for its "quick mass" one Saturday afternoon, I thought about the beginning. Of everything. I thought about the Big Bang. As I had learned, the Big Bang theory stated that the entire universe was in the beginning condensed to a single point, then born in flames as a massive explosion scattered those cloistered particles of matter across the cosmos, creating the universe as we know it today. As have many others, I wondered where the particles came from in the first place. How did they get there? (I didn't seriously consider the idea that they could have always been there until much later, closer to now than then, but I digress.) That, I supposed, was how God fit in. I was pretty pleased with myself for having solved the religion and science problem. God made particles and then the Big Bang happened, and that was that.

The interesting thing to me is that I didn't consider changing the Big Bang theory. That was a fact to me. But God was mutable. I knew, intuitively, that God was just a concept in my mind that I could change to suit my purposes. (Neil deGrasse Tyson's definition of God as "an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance" comes to mind.) From a very young age, I didn't find anything strange about questioning my religious beliefs. Years later, the recall of this memory would inspire me to shed my "agnostic Catholic" beliefs and become a deist, setting in motion the series of events that would eventually lead me to Humanism. So, in a way, my childhood articulation of the first cause argument was my first cause, creating my Humanism as I know it today.

[theforeshadow]

Do you believe that consciousness and brain are one and the same?

I do. Consciousness is a property produced by the interactions between nerve cells. Apart from a body, consciousness makes no sense. Defects in the organs responsible for collecting sensory data and translating it into electrical impulses predictably degrade the perception of said data, and electrical activity in different parts of the brain correlate with the use of associated cognitive functions. As far as I'm concerned, there's no reason to believe that consciousness can exist outside of the interactions between nerve cells, so when we die, that's it. Make use of evolution's masterpiece of electrical engineering while you still can. You won't get another one.

[theforeshadow]

"God is..."

A common "tactic" of the New Atheists we all know and love is to attempt to convey how ridiculous supernatural beliefs seem to them by phrasing them in the most ridiculous-sounding way possible (think "Jewish zombie" for the resurrection of Christ). Naturally, like many of their "confrontationalist" tactics, it's notoriously ineffective (I don't think I would take well to someone trivializing my beliefs, either). One such example I'm interested in, though, is describing God as a "magic sky daddy", "invisible sky wizard", et cetera, ad nauseam. This is interesting to me because, though the religious people I talk to do believe in God as a supreme being and creator of the universe, there often comes a point in the conversation when they feel the need to redefine God as a certain principle, or with an example. God is love, they say, or God is the beauty of the sunset. God is a kind act toward a stranger. In V for Vendetta, one of my favorite movies, "God is in the rain." Indeed, holy books have much to say to this effect; to take a few examples:

He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. 1 John 4:8

Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. Matthew 5:9

لَّهُ ثَوَابَ الدُّنْيَا وَحُسْنَ ثَوَابِ الْآخِرَةِ ۗ وَاللَّهُ يُحِبُّ الْمُحْسِنِينَ So Allah gave them the reward of the world and the good reward of the Hereafter. Allah loveth those whose deeds are good. 'Āli `Imrān 3:148

إِنَّ الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ سَيَجْعَلُ لَهُمُ الرَّحْمَٰنُ وُدًّا Lo! those who believe and do good works, the Beneficent will appoint for them love. Maryam 19:96

This is one of the many failures of the New Atheists in their criticisms of religion. Focused too much on the concept of God as a deity, they neglect to consider the way believers see their gods. Recently, explaining my Humanist values to a Christian teacher, I was told that by being compassionate and helping others, I am glorifying God. An atheist doing God's work! A lofty concept for some, sure; in the Qu'ran, nonbeliever and ungrateful are practically synonymous (Al-Baqarah 2:276). Perhaps a New Atheist would take offense at this, but I recognized it for its true meaning. To the religious, whose concepts of God and morality are so deeply intertwined, to serve God and to do good are one and the same. And it's part of the reason I think it's important for atheists to participate in interfaith work: if you believe that doing good works are glorifying God, then the assumption that nonbelievers do no good works logically follows. Atheists can show that it's still possible to do good works (glorifying God, by the religious interpretation) without believing in any sort of god themselves. Supernatural implications aside, if God is love and compassion for my fellow human beings, then amen, I do believe.

[theforeshadow]

Why Interfaith Needs Atheists

"Good news for the interfaith people!" JT Eberhard trumpets sarcastically in a post about an interfaith conference recently held in Washington, D.C. The focus of Eberhard's post is the understandably alarming sentiment expressed at the "Generations of Faith" conference, sponsored by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, on November 10 and heralded in the National Catholic Register yesterday:

Participants at a recent interfaith conference in the nation's capital discussed how interreligious dialogue can play an important role in establishing peace and fighting secularization in America.

"Oh how I hope more atheist groups get on board with interfaith, as though we should be eager to slide ourselves under the banner of 'faith'," Eberhard quips with obvious sarcasm, but as it turns out, his sarcastic suggestion is actually what needs to happen.

As David Niose argues in his book Nonbeliever Nation, the Religious Right doesn't marginalize Secular Americans by disproving their claims, but by marking them as the enemy and keeping them out of the conversation entirely. The double standard is painfully apparent in a statement made by Father John Crossin, executive director of the Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs at the USCCB:

[Dialogue] requires a willingness to be silent and truly listen to what others are saying rather than simply responding with our own views.

Apparently Secular Americans are excluded from this principle, as Auxiliary Bishop Barry Knestout of the Archdiocese of Washington responds to the "problem" of secularism with his own views:

The secular response to religious diversity is to push all religious beliefs out of public life, Bishop Knestout warned. But while this approach has become prominent in the modern era, it is dangerous to all religious beliefs and fails to respect "the reality of the spiritual dimension of life."

Eberhard rightly condemns this hypocrisy, saying:

They're big about talking up respecting others as a prime virtue, but seem to have no problem painting secularism as the villain and saying that atheists can't listen.  I guess only people from incompatible faiths, most of which believe each other will be roasting in hell for all eternity, merit their respect.  Incidentally, when people who believe each other are damned for all time unite against a common enemy, in this case secularism, that should reveal just how little they think of atheists.

He also anticipates the response from "Chris Stedman and his ilk":

Some atheists will trip over each other trying to align themselves with interfaith groups like this, presumably to tell them how wrong they are from within.  Seems to me we can do that just fine without lending them the endorsement of our presence.  Personally, I can't say "fuck these people" loud enough.  They are not allies to secularism or to atheists, though they'll happily accept our help undermining both.

As I say of many things, just because a system can be abused doesn't mean that it should be thrown out. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater, in other words. The sentiments of these bishops decrying the "evils" of secularism demonstrate quite effectively why interfaith needs atheists. If anything, secularism should be the goal of interfaith, because in a secular world, everyone has freedom of and from religion; the freedom to practice or not practice any religion they want, so long as doing so does not harm anyone else. Both the atheists and the religious win in a secular world. Without atheists to speak for the secular non-"faith tradition", attempts at interfaith dialogue run the risk of turning out like this, locking sights on secularism as a common enemy. The ultimate goal of interfaith dialogue should be to promote understanding among people of all faiths and no faith, and without atheist voices, that can't happen. Quite simply, if interfaith dialogue is promoting prejudices instead of challenging them, they're doing it wrong. Just as more liberal religious people should not be presumed to condone religiously-justified hate by fundamentalists who claim the same tradition, atheists in interfaith should not be presumed to condone behavior like this in the name of interfaith.