But, hmmm ... isn’t the fact that it’s sub-statistical a necessary condition for it being labelled miraculous?
As in, e.g., the appearance of stigmata. I’m not sure the idea of Francis’s stigmata being a miracle, and being an RNA transcription error, are really antithetical.
The transcription error was mine in my typo of psychosomatic. There is no comparison with the life of Christ and the impact of the Holy Ghost in and around that, downwind for a generation, being the ultimate and only statistical anomaly, and our mundane experience of the Spirit.
Reality now and for 99% of the time, all of human history, since Jesus' death does not include anything that can be rationally faithfully labelled miraculous. And the 1% was at the start. Nothing has happened since. Nothing ever happens under the auspices of the NHS. It always happens in rural Angola. The claim. Twice Westerners have made witness statements to me. I was appalled. The sense of loss I felt at the utter inadequacy of their accounts was acute. So disappointing. I wanted the claims to be true. Still do, irrationally. Another, deeply devout, pious, conservative, evangelical missionary doctor to Chad, at a dinner in her honour, was courageously honest to me personally. That moved me. She made no claims at all in describing her work terribly amusingly. With full eye contact she said to me, "Hopeless isn't it?". That's faith.
It's long past time to put away childish things. But we can't. Rational faith is an outlier and always will be. Lonely are the brave. Faith is stagnant, corrupted by cognitive bias: delusion.
Back in my tertiary Franciscan days I was interested to learn that Francis may have been suffering from leprosy, hence the ‘stigmata.’ He wasn’t a healthy chappie, so no doubt there could have been any number of other physical symptoms of disease contributing to his state, but which may have been interpreted by his companions as indicators of God’s grace.
Funnily enough, hearing this speculative information satisfied the rationalist in me, yet didn’t detract from my overall regard for the Saint.
Though bouts of cognitive dissonance will always be part of my journey.
There are two reasons to argue on the interwebs for something you don't approve of. One of them is trolling. The other one doesn't exist.
Why do you assume that just because I argue for or against something, that automatically indicates approval or disapproval?
ETA Did you mean me? Apology If not.
Since this thread began with a discussion of various reasons for disapproval of the Christian faith in the context of a change of heart, I think this technical point is not entirely tangential and is worth clearing up.
The dictionary definition of “disapprove” is to have or express an unfavourable opinion.
I will go back and look in a minute to see whether the word disapproval appeared in the OP.
Hmmmm, I've been out for a walk and spent the time thinking about this. I had not realised that the definitions were so closely entwined. As far as I'm concerned, there is quite a difference. Yes, I have an opinion about religious beliefs, but whether I like dislikeapprove, disapprove, value or not value them or any part of them is totaly irrelevant. Life happens; people behave in a million different ways; none of that needs any opinion of mine. The older I have become, the more I realise that we can all hope to do the best we can and try not to do too much damage on the way. I wonder if there is another dictionary where I would find a definition more compatible with what I think!
@SusanDoris it is verifiable (in the text of your posts) that you have expressed an unfavourable opinion of some things,
I think that here it would appear to be unfavourable in the eyes or opinions of those who follow the faiths and religions, but possibly not in the opinion of other atheists.
for example:
- Religious faith
- Spiritual direction
- Monastic life
- I definitely do not approve or disapprove of those. They are facts of life and those who take part have an absolute right so to do. I have opinions about them of course, but it is in the mind of others if they interpret my opinions as being particularly unfavourable. More importantly, it is having a place to write those opinions.
And although I have not conducted any content analysis, skimming would suggest that many of your comments, on topics like the present discussion, include the expression of an unfavourable opinion of things like these.
I repeat - I have opinions, but accept that the subjects of those opinions are part of life.
Perhaps if you do not actually have an unfavourable opinion on - for example - faith when you comment on it, you might indicate that you are taking a “devil’s advocate” position in order to advance the quality of argument? Otherwise on plain reading you are, by definition, usually indicating disapproval.
As far as the faith topic is concerned, I place it firmly on middle ground - not necessarily neutral, but being the middle part of an informal debate, without an opening motion or vote at the end. That is how I have always found SofF discussions so interesting.
I hope I have answered your points. Pleas say if not.
<snip>
Yes, I have an opinion about religious beliefs, but whether I <snip> disapprove, value or not value them or any part of them is totaly irrelevant.
I made no claims about the relevance or significance of your opinions, just the fact that you have opinions (that point is not in question) and that they showed you disapproved of certain subjects.
In relation to the term “disapprove”, you have now said:
I wonder if there is another dictionary where I would find a definition more compatible with what I think!
Yet when you started another thread on faith, you began with a dictionary definition. I used the same online dictionary. Shouldn’t we all abide by the same standard?
I repeat - I have opinions, but accept that the subjects of those opinions are part of life.
I did not suggest anywhere that you fail to accept that the subjects of your opinions are a part of life. I merely commented on the nature of your opinions, which have been expressed in a way that is unfavourable in relation to e.g. faith, monastic life and spiritual direction. That does not mean that those opinions should not be expressed, which you seem to be concerned about but I did not suggest at all.
You also state that some would agree and some disagree with you. I think that is true, but it does not make your opinions neutral; probably the reverse, if you think about it. In any case you specifically wrote in an earlier reply to @Boogie that your position is not neutral.
...it is in the mind of others if they interpret my opinions as being particularly unfavourable.
That implies a deficiency in either the clarity of your writing or my ability to understand it. I find both of those premises difficult to accept. Perhaps I flatter myself in relation to the latter point, but I do not believe so.
Overall, you now seem to be wishing that words meant different things than their accepted uses, and are contradicting yourself. I don’t really understand why; I was merely seeking to correct a technical error in your language use and you seem to be getting into contortions to try to argue against that.
Wouldn’t it be easier to simply say “oops” and move on? We all make mistakes.
Finally, I don’t want to derail the discussion with this trivial point so I will say no more on the matter.
True. I only realised that recently thanks to Eutychus. "I am whatever I am and you can never experience that. I am whatever I say I am and that is an infinitesimal, figurative subset of what I ineffably am".
I've come to the conclusion that cognitive dissonance is part and parcel of the whole thing. Learning to accept and acknowledge that is part of the process.
I attended the Orthodox pilgrimage to Holywell (Trefynnon) in North Wales yesterday and - as happens whenever I climb the candle - I get vertigo. Yet I enjoy the view.
Do I really believe the fella who told me that his spinal injury had been instantly and completely healed when he bathed in the Holy Well a few years ago? That his missing toenails had completely reappeared and grown back by the time he'd climbed out of the pool?
Does it matter?
Do I believe the story about St Winifride's beheading at the hands of Caradog ap Alauc, incensed that she would not yield to his advances as she was intending to become a nun? That St Beuno heard the commotion as he prepared to celebrate the Eucharist and left his cell, gathered up the headless corpse and the maiden's head, breathed into her nostrils and miraculously reattached it to her neck? That she got better and only had a thin white line to show where her head had been severed? That a spring of sweet water sprang out of the ground at the spot and that innumerable cures have been wrought there ever since, as attested by abandoned crutches and walking sticks in the small on-site museum?
No, I can't say I do. It's pious legend.
Consequently, when one of the priests made an impassioned plea that we continue to recognise the importance of the shrine as the only continuously used pilgrimage site from pre-Reformation days, I found myself wanting to applaud with one hand (one hand clapping?) and wanting to type up an application to join the local Humanist Society with the other ...
Are we perpetuating medieval superstition, defending the faith or living in cloud cuckoo land? I can deal with the paradoxes ... I think.
Would I die in a ditch over Holy Well? Or Lourdes? Or people praying extemporary evangelical prayers or taking the Bible fairly literally or whatever else?
There's a line in the Orthodox Liturgy that talks about 'rational worship', by which I suspect they mean that it's not ecstatic or orgiastic worship as in the Temple of Dionysius. Is it 'rational' to believe in miracles and Saints? The Incarnation and Resurrection?
Or is it supra-rational?
All I can do is say, 'Lord I believe, help thou mine unbelief ...'
(This is incidental, but I know someone for whom a verifiable, medical miracle did happen, within a bog-standard UK mainline-denomination context. I have no doubt of it. The apparently scandalous partiality of the whole thing - well who knows. It's outrageous, and perhaps that's an affront to our real faith.)
Yes. We have two miracles within our family, and they happened to the folks you'd think least worthy or appropriate. And people who were far more deserving spent decades in prison camps...
That's the cognitive bias of random survivor guilt in the case of the one. The other I don't recall.
So kind of you to dismiss it. AND us.
I'll not bother telling you the other one, since it will occasion more armchair diagnosis.
It's not kind. Or unkind. It's rational. Which means true. I couldn't possibly dismiss that. Not under any circumstances. And not in any prevaricating way in Purgatory.
I have no doubt of it. The apparently scandalous partiality of the whole thing - well who knows. It's outrageous, and perhaps that's an affront to our real faith.
I'm not sure what you mean about partiality; you mean, the fact that one is healed while others are not? That the affront is one of justice?
Yes, sorry (to you and Mousethief) that I wasn't clear. And by 'real faith' I am being snarky about my own, and others, infatuation with the rational. I'm taking the piss out of myself - I believe this someone was healed; at the same time he was (and so far as I know, is) an arse. How dare He?
Martin, your 'I am' precis sounds like a kind of Magisterial (capital on purpose) dogma which at the same time, you are arguing against. Or is it just our human pomposity in expressing it from the front of the church (or the loud bits of the forum) which gets you going? That's an honest question.
(Sorry LC, missed the edit window. Yes, the situation I am thinking of is similar to that which you mention - the undeserving case gets the miracle. All I can think is 'Were you there when I made the world? If you know so much, tell me about it.' (Job 38 v4)
mark. I admire your open, honest response. As you and all here know, my pomposity (and hypocrisy) knows no bounds. And none here are guilty of it. Apart from me. Not you or Lamb Chopped. No one. I don't find you pompous in the slightest. Courageous yes. Especially up against an implacable, uncompromising Roundhead zealot like me.
What gets me going is the impossibility of rationality being the predicate of faith. Even here. Especially here. And it will always be thus. Hulme was more right than even he knew.
I've only got myself to blame: it can't be valid, Martin's saying it.
(This is incidental, but I know someone for whom a verifiable, medical miracle did happen, within a bog-standard UK mainline-denomination context. I have no doubt of it. The apparently scandalous partiality of the whole thing - well who knows. It's outrageous, and perhaps that's an affront to our real faith.)
Yes. We have two miracles within our family, and they happened to the folks you'd think least worthy or appropriate. And people who were far more deserving spent decades in prison camps...
That's the cognitive bias of random survivor guilt in the case of the one. The other I don't recall.
So kind of you to dismiss it. AND us.
I'll not bother telling you the other one, since it will occasion more armchair diagnosis.
Engage or get off the passive aggressive pot. This is Purgatory. You dismiss yourself and me. I dismiss your irrational claim. No diagnosis was made. Just minimal rationalization.
What gets me going is the impossibility of rationality being the predicate of faith. Even here. Especially here. And it will always be thus. Hulme was more right than even he knew.
OK, I've got no philosophy outside web comics so I'll have to leave your Hulme point. But how do you mean about the 'gets you going'. That the apparent orthogonality (that's engineering ) of faith and rationality makes you mad because you can't see why He made it so hard, and you're pulled towards abandoning all but the rational? Or that when someone denies that orthogonality (and perhaps tries a 'God is x because science says y') , it makes you mad (it does me too, FWIW). Or am I making a mess of the embarrassingly (for me) unfamiliar word 'predicate'?
(I really got off on Job - it's ages since I read that. Chap 40 vs 7-14 are really good too.)
I have no doubt of it. The apparently scandalous partiality of the whole thing - well who knows. It's outrageous, and perhaps that's an affront to our real faith.
I'm not sure what you mean about partiality; you mean, the fact that one is healed while others are not? That the affront is one of justice?
Yes, sorry (to you and Mousethief) that I wasn't clear.
I'm confused as to why you are apologizing to me, as I wasn't part of this subtopic. Did you mean Martin54?
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people. An old shipmate, IngoB, used to do that, and it made a lot of people very angry. Just to stir things up? That's trolling. I'd like to hear why you are doing this.
What gets me going is the impossibility of rationality being the predicate of faith. Even here. Especially here. And it will always be thus. Hulme was more right than even he knew.
OK, I've got no philosophy outside web comics so I'll have to leave your Hulme point. But how do you mean about the 'gets you going'. That the apparent orthogonality (that's engineering ) of faith and rationality makes you mad because you can't see why He made it so hard, and you're pulled towards abandoning all but the rational? Or that when someone denies that orthogonality (and perhaps tries a 'God is x because science says y') , it makes you mad (it does me too, FWIW). Or am I making a mess of the embarrassingly (for me) unfamiliar word 'predicate'?
(I really got off on Job - it's ages since I read that. Chap 40 vs 7-14 are really good too.)
He didn't make it hard. He made it rational. As He must. And again, sorry, you just aren't guilty, I'm afraid, of being either irrationally orthogonal (metaphoric that)… no 'ang on a minute, you are. But everyone but me is. All the nicer, younger, better, smarter. And aren't I the one denying orthogonality saying 'God is x because science says y'? I am responsible for all mess here. Please leave me that shred of dignity.
God is rational because science. Therefore He does not intervene in any detectable way. All grains of wheat in the blizzard of chaff are random: Good shit happens too. It's in His provision of existence that exists as if He didn't provide it. Lamb Chopped's husband's 'miracle' of survival is perfectly rationally a random grain of wheat. I'm glad for them that it's an unquestionable real miracle until beyond their last breaths. I used to have them. Your medical healing is too. A grain. No suspension of the laws of physics - that are completely independent of God - necessary. A grain in the blizzard. The best I ever heard was of an alcoholic landlord friend of a friend who one day kneeling down to replenish a drinks cabinet prayed for the only time in his life and challenged the God he didn't believe in to stop Him drinking. He's been dry ever since. Allegedly. And never prayed again or got religion. Allegedly. I believe everything and nothing everybody tells me, but that rings true enough. The mind is awesome. In God's provision.
Hulme said that reason is and should be the slave of the passions. Nothing said on this thread, or anywhere else ever, including my demand that rationality come before faith, does anything but prove him passionately right.
(This is incidental, but I know someone for whom a verifiable, medical miracle did happen, within a bog-standard UK mainline-denomination context. I have no doubt of it. The apparently scandalous partiality of the whole thing - well who knows. It's outrageous, and perhaps that's an affront to our real faith.)
Yes. We have two miracles within our family, and they happened to the folks you'd think least worthy or appropriate. And people who were far more deserving spent decades in prison camps...
That's the cognitive bias of random survivor guilt in the case of the one. The other I don't recall.
So kind of you to dismiss it. AND us.
I'll not bother telling you the other one, since it will occasion more armchair diagnosis.
Engage or get off the passive aggressive pot. This is Purgatory. You dismiss yourself and me. I dismiss your irrational claim. No diagnosis was made. Just minimal rationalization.
No. I was a damn fool to respond to you at all. I'll not be making that mistake again unless it's in Hell. And you can take your damnable rudeness to Hell, where it belongs--both the outright contradiction without explanation/discussion/or anything but bare assertion, AND your naming of me as "passive aggressive" and my claim as "irrational." Take it to fucking Hell. It doesn't belong here.
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people. An old shipmate, IngoB, used to do that, and it made a lot of people very angry. Just to stir things up? That's trolling. I'd like to hear why you are doing this.
I have no ulterior motives; I am very restricted in the activities I cantake part in; the discovery of forums on the internet gave me an interest which waxes and wanes but never stops; the religious beliefs aspects of life have always interested me and really this is the place where the most interesting discussions are, as far as I know, available to read and take part in; since I am grateful for a place to discuss points of view on the basis that posters are here on anequal basis, the last thing I would do is to to deliberately try to annoy; I hope that answers your question.
I've come to the conclusion that cognitive dissonance is part and parcel of the whole thing. Learning to accept and acknowledge that is part of the process.
I attended the Orthodox pilgrimage to Holywell (Trefynnon) in North Wales yesterday and - as happens whenever I climb the candle - I get vertigo. Yet I enjoy the view.
Do I really believe the fella who told me that his spinal injury had been instantly and completely healed when he bathed in the Holy Well a few years ago? That his missing toenails had completely reappeared and grown back by the time he'd climbed out of the pool?
Does it matter?
Do I believe the story about St Winifride's beheading at the hands of Caradog ap Alauc, incensed that she would not yield to his advances as she was intending to become a nun? That St Beuno heard the commotion as he prepared to celebrate the Eucharist and left his cell, gathered up the headless corpse and the maiden's head, breathed into her nostrils and miraculously reattached it to her neck? That she got better and only had a thin white line to show where her head had been severed? That a spring of sweet water sprang out of the ground at the spot and that innumerable cures have been wrought there ever since, as attested by abandoned crutches and walking sticks in the small on-site museum?
No, I can't say I do. It's pious legend.
Consequently, when one of the priests made an impassioned plea that we continue to recognise the importance of the shrine as the only continuously used pilgrimage site from pre-Reformation days, I found myself wanting to applaud with one hand (one hand clapping?) and wanting to type up an application to join the local Humanist Society with the other ...
All I can do is say, 'Lord I believe, help thou mine unbelief ...'
I’m working on it...
Though extempore evangelical prayers....ouch!
The retrieval of St Beuno’s sermon from the raging depths by a passing seagull- now that’s truly a miracle!
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people. An old shipmate, IngoB, used to do that, and it made a lot of people very angry. Just to stir things up? That's trolling. I'd like to hear why you are doing this.
I have no ulterior motives; I am very restricted in the activities I cantake part in; the discovery of forums on the internet gave me an interest which waxes and wanes but never stops; the religious beliefs aspects of life have always interested me and really this is the place where the most interesting discussions are, as far as I know, available to read and take part in; since I am grateful for a place to discuss points of view on the basis that posters are here on anequal basis, the last thing I would do is to to deliberately try to annoy; I hope that answers your question.
No, it does not. I asked you, why would you argue for a position you do not hold? You did not answer that question.
I guess it's easy for me to not fall in love with science and the 'rational', since they once paid the mortgage around here. The science world moves by the vanity of its chief proponents just like anything else human, unless one seeks out (who, me? ) lowly test-and-measurement roles where the concrete beam either cracks, or it doesn't. But the priest laid on hands, prayed, and for that time only - only, and he does it week in, week out, faithfully and liturgically and with no big show - the man didn't die, and as far as we no, still hasn't. And my loved ones did, and do, and so do those we know and love here.
The gospel yesterday reminds us that if we had faith as big as a mustard seed we could plant mulberry trees - no, mulberry trees could plant themselves, in the sea. Tune here, words here.
(If you were thinking this evangelical approach was a little...anachronistic...well hey!)
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people.
Playmates, not playthings.
And I suspect your "believe in" is too binary. There are positions in between being convinced of the truth or falsity of a position.
Some of us are prone to "perhapsing around". Perceiving some truth in an idea and wondering how far they can push it before it's unsustainable. Playing devil's advocate for the sake of understanding the issue better from the resulting discussion.
I don't read SusanDoris as expressing that kind of playfulness with ideas. She comes across to me as someone who knows what she believes and doesn't see how it could be false, but is open to possibility and doesn't want to be dogmatic. But I could be wrong.
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people.
Playmates, not playthings.
And I suspect your "believe in" is too binary. There are positions in between being convinced of the truth or falsity of a position.
Some of us are prone to "perhapsing around". Perceiving some truth in an idea and wondering how far they can push it before it's unsustainable. Playing devil's advocate for the sake of understanding the issue better from the resulting discussion.
I don't read SusanDoris as expressing that kind of playfulness with ideas. She comes across to me as someone who knows what she believes and doesn't see how it could be false, but is open to possibility and doesn't want to be dogmatic. But I could be wrong.
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people. An old shipmate, IngoB, used to do that, and it made a lot of people very angry. Just to stir things up? That's trolling. I'd like to hear why you are doing this.
I have no ulterior motives; I am very restricted in the activities I cantake part in; the discovery of forums on the internet gave me an interest which waxes and wanes but never stops; the religious beliefs aspects of life have always interested me and really this is the place where the most interesting discussions are, as far as I know, available to read and take part in; since I am grateful for a place to discuss points of view on the basis that posters are here on anequal basis, the last thing I would do is to to deliberately try to annoy; I hope that answers your question.
No, it does not. I asked you, why would you argue for a position you do not hold? You did not answer that question.
An example of where you think I have argued for a position I do not hold would help, otherwise I cannot see when I have done this.
@SusanDoris why would you argue for a position you don't hold? Just for fun? Just to test your rhetorical skills? That would be treating us as playthings and not as people.
Playmates, not playthings.
Quod scripsi, scripsi. I know what I mean. You do not.
(This is incidental, but I know someone for whom a verifiable, medical miracle did happen, within a bog-standard UK mainline-denomination context. I have no doubt of it. The apparently scandalous partiality of the whole thing - well who knows. It's outrageous, and perhaps that's an affront to our real faith.)
Yes. We have two miracles within our family, and they happened to the folks you'd think least worthy or appropriate. And people who were far more deserving spent decades in prison camps...
That's the cognitive bias of random survivor guilt in the case of the one. The other I don't recall.
So kind of you to dismiss it. AND us.
I'll not bother telling you the other one, since it will occasion more armchair diagnosis.
Engage or get off the passive aggressive pot. This is Purgatory. You dismiss yourself and me. I dismiss your irrational claim. No diagnosis was made. Just minimal rationalization.
No. I was a damn fool to respond to you at all. I'll not be making that mistake again unless it's in Hell. And you can take your damnable rudeness to Hell, where it belongs--both the outright contradiction without explanation/discussion/or anything but bare assertion, AND your naming of me as "passive aggressive" and my claim as "irrational." Take it to fucking Hell. It doesn't belong here.
The assertion stands. As does your projected and not damnable brittle rudeness. And your mere assertion of a miracle where none is warranted. And you are a courageous fool if you are a fool at all. I see no contradiction at all. Where do you? If you want to discuss why your publically proclaimed miracle is real when no such miraculous explanation is necessary for a random, statistically insignificant life story, do it here. What's to discuss in Hell? Justify your claim and the vast majority edifice that goes with it. Please. Address the actual content, the meat, not the form. Please. Have that courage. Please. If you can only do that in Hell, OK. But that's all I will pursue.
I asked you, why would you argue for a position you do not hold? You did not answer that question.
An example of where you think I have argued for a position I do not hold would help, otherwise I cannot see when I have done this.
You said you did. I was trusting you to be telling the truth.
I'm sorry, but I cannot go back to try to find exacgtly what I said when, so this is where this exchange of posts will have to end, unless you choose to find it yourself.
I read your point of view with interest. My point remains, though, that I join in the discussions because it is an interesting thing to do, and just because I argue for or against something does not indicate approval or disapproval. I think there is an enormous difference between presenting a point of view, however strongly, in a discussion and whether one approves or disapproves of the attitude etc being discussed.
Can you think of anything I have written which directly indicates approval or disapproval?
I read your point of view with interest. My point remains, though, that I join in the discussions because it is an interesting thing to do, and just because I argue for or against something does not indicate approval or disapproval. I think there is an enormous difference between presenting a point of view, however strongly, in a discussion and whether one approves or disapproves of the attitude etc being discussed.
Can you think of anything I have written which directly indicates approval or disapproval?
Thank you for looking for and finding the quote. Why do you think that it indicates that I will argue for a position I do not hold? The paragraph you quote is a general comment, it is not about a particular subject.
And I certainly do not recall ever having argued for something I do not believe or a position I do not hold!
I'm sure I've argued for things I don't believe. I mean sometimes it is easier to write down what I don't believe in order to organise in my mind the things I do.
To me the problem is when someone makes it sound like something is really important (@SusanDoris said something and claimed that she'd continue arguing for it until she died) and then when I asked more about it claimed that she was unbothered. I concluded it was a rhetorical flourish.
But, you know, if people really are unbothered and generally sanguine about specific things, maybe you could at least write in a disinterested way and measured way about it.
Because if you sound like something is of critical importance, it isn't really surprising when people believe you.
It's not about denying that one enjoys contributing to a discussion in general, it is about the enthusiasm and importance one naturally takes from your words. Which is confusing when you later say that you are not really very interested anyway.
@SusanDoris my suggestion is this - If you find a discussion really interesting but you don’t particularly hold a position on it then ask questions. It keeps you in the loop without having to argue a point you don’t want to.
I guess it's easy for me to not fall in love with science and the 'rational', since they once paid the mortgage around here. The science world moves by the vanity of its chief proponents just like anything else human, unless one seeks out (who, me? ) lowly test-and-measurement roles where the concrete beam either cracks, or it doesn't. But the priest laid on hands, prayed, and for that time only - only, and he does it week in, week out, faithfully and liturgically and with no big show - the man didn't die, and as far as we no, still hasn't. And my loved ones did, and do, and so do those we know and love here.
The gospel yesterday reminds us that if we had faith as big as a mustard seed we could plant mulberry trees - no, mulberry trees could plant themselves, in the sea. Tune here, words here.
(If you were thinking this evangelical approach was a little...anachronistic...well hey!)
@mark_in_manchester, 99.9..9% yes. Fully creedal of course. Happy with theist ritual, hymns and other people's formal prayers. And would never gainsay informal ones. I give my own complementary take where appropriate. The 0.0..1% theist in me is with regard to the incarnation. And is more than enough. Well it would be if the rational conversation about it could be had.
The fact that a priest rightly laid on hands and prayed and a guy happened to survive is to be rejoiced over, God be praised, but they can have nothing to do with one another causally. If the priest hadn't been there, in all probability the outcome would have been the same but for the psychosomatic power of hope.
I see no mulberry trees taking themselves off to the sea side, let alone mountains. Not even metaphorically. Except by time and chance. God in His provision be praised.
Martin, the scandal of the healing I have been hinting at is too much for me to spell out here in public. It insults those here, and those who people here knew, and know, for whom no such healing was, or so far as we know is, forthcoming. I'm PM you for what it's worth, just so I don't feel like I've left you half in the dark. I don't understand the why, and for whom, and all that; not for one moment. But - it happened, and I must be among those who can't let it go when someone is wrong on the internet.
I read your point of view with interest. My point remains, though, that I join in the discussions because it is an interesting thing to do, and just because I argue for or against something does not indicate approval or disapproval. I think there is an enormous difference between presenting a point of view, however strongly, in a discussion and whether one approves or disapproves of the attitude etc being discussed.
Can you think of anything I have written which directly indicates approval or disapproval?
Thank you for looking for and finding the quote. Why do you think that it indicates that I will argue for a position I do not hold? The paragraph you quote is a general comment, it is not about a particular subject.
And I certainly do not recall ever having argued for something I do not believe or a position I do not hold!
You state you are arguing for things you neither approve nor disapprove of. I have to assume if you don't approve or disapprove of a position, you wouldn't hold that position. Otherwise why hold it?
Comments
The transcription error was mine in my typo of psychosomatic. There is no comparison with the life of Christ and the impact of the Holy Ghost in and around that, downwind for a generation, being the ultimate and only statistical anomaly, and our mundane experience of the Spirit.
Reality now and for 99% of the time, all of human history, since Jesus' death does not include anything that can be rationally faithfully labelled miraculous. And the 1% was at the start. Nothing has happened since. Nothing ever happens under the auspices of the NHS. It always happens in rural Angola. The claim. Twice Westerners have made witness statements to me. I was appalled. The sense of loss I felt at the utter inadequacy of their accounts was acute. So disappointing. I wanted the claims to be true. Still do, irrationally. Another, deeply devout, pious, conservative, evangelical missionary doctor to Chad, at a dinner in her honour, was courageously honest to me personally. That moved me. She made no claims at all in describing her work terribly amusingly. With full eye contact she said to me, "Hopeless isn't it?". That's faith.
It's long past time to put away childish things. But we can't. Rational faith is an outlier and always will be. Lonely are the brave. Faith is stagnant, corrupted by cognitive bias: delusion.
Funnily enough, hearing this speculative information satisfied the rationalist in me, yet didn’t detract from my overall regard for the Saint.
Though bouts of cognitive dissonance will always be part of my journey.
There is a Jewish Passover prayer which remembers the interventions that God made for the Israelites known as Dayenu: 'It would have been enough.'
If He had brought us out of Egypt, it would have been enough.
If He had divided the Sea for us, it would have been enough.
If He had given us Shabbat, it would have been enough.
If He had led us to Mount Sinai, it would have been enough.
If He had given us the Torah, it would have been enough.
A Christian NT version would include the incarnation, crucifixion, Resurrection, Ascension and Pentecost.
Perhaps for you the incarnation is enough.
Hmmmm, I've been out for a walk and spent the time thinking about this. I had not realised that the definitions were so closely entwined. As far as I'm concerned, there is quite a difference. Yes, I have an opinion about religious beliefs, but whether I like dislikeapprove, disapprove, value or not value them or any part of them is totaly irrelevant. Life happens; people behave in a million different ways; none of that needs any opinion of mine. The older I have become, the more I realise that we can all hope to do the best we can and try not to do too much damage on the way. I wonder if there is another dictionary where I would find a definition more compatible with what I think! I think that here it would appear to be unfavourable in the eyes or opinions of those who follow the faiths and religions, but possibly not in the opinion of other atheists. - I definitely do not approve or disapprove of those. They are facts of life and those who take part have an absolute right so to do. I have opinions about them of course, but it is in the mind of others if they interpret my opinions as being particularly unfavourable. More importantly, it is having a place to write those opinions. I repeat - I have opinions, but accept that the subjects of those opinions are part of life. As far as the faith topic is concerned, I place it firmly on middle ground - not necessarily neutral, but being the middle part of an informal debate, without an opening motion or vote at the end. That is how I have always found SofF discussions so interesting.
I hope I have answered your points. Pleas say if not.
I made no claims about the relevance or significance of your opinions, just the fact that you have opinions (that point is not in question) and that they showed you disapproved of certain subjects.
In relation to the term “disapprove”, you have now said:
Yet when you started another thread on faith, you began with a dictionary definition. I used the same online dictionary. Shouldn’t we all abide by the same standard?
Going back to your opinions:
I did not suggest anywhere that you fail to accept that the subjects of your opinions are a part of life. I merely commented on the nature of your opinions, which have been expressed in a way that is unfavourable in relation to e.g. faith, monastic life and spiritual direction. That does not mean that those opinions should not be expressed, which you seem to be concerned about but I did not suggest at all.
You also state that some would agree and some disagree with you. I think that is true, but it does not make your opinions neutral; probably the reverse, if you think about it. In any case you specifically wrote in an earlier reply to @Boogie that your position is not neutral.
Despite that, you also say that:
That implies a deficiency in either the clarity of your writing or my ability to understand it. I find both of those premises difficult to accept. Perhaps I flatter myself in relation to the latter point, but I do not believe so.
Overall, you now seem to be wishing that words meant different things than their accepted uses, and are contradicting yourself. I don’t really understand why; I was merely seeking to correct a technical error in your language use and you seem to be getting into contortions to try to argue against that.
Wouldn’t it be easier to simply say “oops” and move on? We all make mistakes.
Finally, I don’t want to derail the discussion with this trivial point so I will say no more on the matter.
thank you - and yes, I agree: Whoops! and move on!!
Yes but only if it can be considered, admitted rationally, honestly, without absurd, demeaning, magisterial dogma.
'The Tao that can be described
Is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be spoken
Is not the eternal name.'
Lao Tzu.
I attended the Orthodox pilgrimage to Holywell (Trefynnon) in North Wales yesterday and - as happens whenever I climb the candle - I get vertigo. Yet I enjoy the view.
Do I really believe the fella who told me that his spinal injury had been instantly and completely healed when he bathed in the Holy Well a few years ago? That his missing toenails had completely reappeared and grown back by the time he'd climbed out of the pool?
Does it matter?
Do I believe the story about St Winifride's beheading at the hands of Caradog ap Alauc, incensed that she would not yield to his advances as she was intending to become a nun? That St Beuno heard the commotion as he prepared to celebrate the Eucharist and left his cell, gathered up the headless corpse and the maiden's head, breathed into her nostrils and miraculously reattached it to her neck? That she got better and only had a thin white line to show where her head had been severed? That a spring of sweet water sprang out of the ground at the spot and that innumerable cures have been wrought there ever since, as attested by abandoned crutches and walking sticks in the small on-site museum?
No, I can't say I do. It's pious legend.
Consequently, when one of the priests made an impassioned plea that we continue to recognise the importance of the shrine as the only continuously used pilgrimage site from pre-Reformation days, I found myself wanting to applaud with one hand (one hand clapping?) and wanting to type up an application to join the local Humanist Society with the other ...
Are we perpetuating medieval superstition, defending the faith or living in cloud cuckoo land? I can deal with the paradoxes ... I think.
Would I die in a ditch over Holy Well? Or Lourdes? Or people praying extemporary evangelical prayers or taking the Bible fairly literally or whatever else?
There's a line in the Orthodox Liturgy that talks about 'rational worship', by which I suspect they mean that it's not ecstatic or orgiastic worship as in the Temple of Dionysius. Is it 'rational' to believe in miracles and Saints? The Incarnation and Resurrection?
Or is it supra-rational?
All I can do is say, 'Lord I believe, help thou mine unbelief ...'
So kind of you to dismiss it. AND us.
I'll not bother telling you the other one, since it will occasion more armchair diagnosis.
It'll have to be.
Yes, sorry (to you and Mousethief) that I wasn't clear. And by 'real faith' I am being snarky about my own, and others, infatuation with the rational. I'm taking the piss out of myself - I believe this someone was healed; at the same time he was (and so far as I know, is) an arse. How dare He?
Martin, your 'I am' precis sounds like a kind of Magisterial (capital on purpose) dogma which at the same time, you are arguing against. Or is it just our human pomposity in expressing it from the front of the church (or the loud bits of the forum) which gets you going? That's an honest question.
What gets me going is the impossibility of rationality being the predicate of faith. Even here. Especially here. And it will always be thus. Hulme was more right than even he knew.
I've only got myself to blame: it can't be valid, Martin's saying it.
Engage or get off the passive aggressive pot. This is Purgatory. You dismiss yourself and me. I dismiss your irrational claim. No diagnosis was made. Just minimal rationalization.
OK, I've got no philosophy outside web comics so I'll have to leave your Hulme point. But how do you mean about the 'gets you going'. That the apparent orthogonality (that's engineering
(I really got off on Job - it's ages since I read that. Chap 40 vs 7-14 are really good too.)
I'm confused as to why you are apologizing to me, as I wasn't part of this subtopic. Did you mean Martin54?
(MT, I thought this was for me - it turned up after a post of mine - hence my mention of your name. If it was a x-post, that's fine, my mistake).
He didn't make it hard. He made it rational. As He must. And again, sorry, you just aren't guilty, I'm afraid, of being either irrationally orthogonal (metaphoric that)… no 'ang on a minute, you are. But everyone but me is. All the nicer, younger, better, smarter. And aren't I the one denying orthogonality saying 'God is x because science says y'? I am responsible for all mess here. Please leave me that shred of dignity.
God is rational because science. Therefore He does not intervene in any detectable way. All grains of wheat in the blizzard of chaff are random: Good shit happens too. It's in His provision of existence that exists as if He didn't provide it. Lamb Chopped's husband's 'miracle' of survival is perfectly rationally a random grain of wheat. I'm glad for them that it's an unquestionable real miracle until beyond their last breaths. I used to have them. Your medical healing is too. A grain. No suspension of the laws of physics - that are completely independent of God - necessary. A grain in the blizzard. The best I ever heard was of an alcoholic landlord friend of a friend who one day kneeling down to replenish a drinks cabinet prayed for the only time in his life and challenged the God he didn't believe in to stop Him drinking. He's been dry ever since. Allegedly. And never prayed again or got religion. Allegedly. I believe everything and nothing everybody tells me, but that rings true enough. The mind is awesome. In God's provision.
Hulme said that reason is and should be the slave of the passions. Nothing said on this thread, or anywhere else ever, including my demand that rationality come before faith, does anything but prove him passionately right.
And yeah, Job says it all.
No. I was a damn fool to respond to you at all. I'll not be making that mistake again unless it's in Hell. And you can take your damnable rudeness to Hell, where it belongs--both the outright contradiction without explanation/discussion/or anything but bare assertion, AND your naming of me as "passive aggressive" and my claim as "irrational." Take it to fucking Hell. It doesn't belong here.
I'm sorry; I should have given more context. No, it wasn't you.
I’m working on it...
Though extempore evangelical prayers....ouch!
The retrieval of St Beuno’s sermon from the raging depths by a passing seagull- now that’s truly a miracle!
No, it does not. I asked you, why would you argue for a position you do not hold? You did not answer that question.
I guess it's easy for me to not fall in love with science and the 'rational', since they once paid the mortgage around here. The science world moves by the vanity of its chief proponents just like anything else human, unless one seeks out (who, me?
The gospel yesterday reminds us that if we had faith as big as a mustard seed we could plant mulberry trees - no, mulberry trees could plant themselves, in the sea. Tune here, words here.
(If you were thinking this evangelical approach was a little...anachronistic...well hey!)
Playmates, not playthings.
And I suspect your "believe in" is too binary. There are positions in between being convinced of the truth or falsity of a position.
Some of us are prone to "perhapsing around". Perceiving some truth in an idea and wondering how far they can push it before it's unsustainable. Playing devil's advocate for the sake of understanding the issue better from the resulting discussion.
I don't read SusanDoris as expressing that kind of playfulness with ideas. She comes across to me as someone who knows what she believes and doesn't see how it could be false, but is open to possibility and doesn't want to be dogmatic. But I could be wrong.
Quod scripsi, scripsi. I know what I mean. You do not.
You said you did. I was trusting you to be telling the truth.
The assertion stands. As does your projected and not damnable brittle rudeness. And your mere assertion of a miracle where none is warranted. And you are a courageous fool if you are a fool at all. I see no contradiction at all. Where do you? If you want to discuss why your publically proclaimed miracle is real when no such miraculous explanation is necessary for a random, statistically insignificant life story, do it here. What's to discuss in Hell? Justify your claim and the vast majority edifice that goes with it. Please. Address the actual content, the meat, not the form. Please. Have that courage. Please. If you can only do that in Hell, OK. But that's all I will pursue.
Here you go.
And I certainly do not recall ever having argued for something I do not believe or a position I do not hold!
To me the problem is when someone makes it sound like something is really important (@SusanDoris said something and claimed that she'd continue arguing for it until she died) and then when I asked more about it claimed that she was unbothered. I concluded it was a rhetorical flourish.
But, you know, if people really are unbothered and generally sanguine about specific things, maybe you could at least write in a disinterested way and measured way about it.
Because if you sound like something is of critical importance, it isn't really surprising when people believe you.
It's not about denying that one enjoys contributing to a discussion in general, it is about the enthusiasm and importance one naturally takes from your words. Which is confusing when you later say that you are not really very interested anyway.
@SusanDoris my suggestion is this - If you find a discussion really interesting but you don’t particularly hold a position on it then ask questions. It keeps you in the loop without having to argue a point you don’t want to.
@mark_in_manchester, 99.9..9% yes. Fully creedal of course. Happy with theist ritual, hymns and other people's formal prayers. And would never gainsay informal ones. I give my own complementary take where appropriate. The 0.0..1% theist in me is with regard to the incarnation. And is more than enough. Well it would be if the rational conversation about it could be had.
The fact that a priest rightly laid on hands and prayed and a guy happened to survive is to be rejoiced over, God be praised, but they can have nothing to do with one another causally. If the priest hadn't been there, in all probability the outcome would have been the same but for the psychosomatic power of hope.
I see no mulberry trees taking themselves off to the sea side, let alone mountains. Not even metaphorically. Except by time and chance. God in His provision be praised.
You state you are arguing for things you neither approve nor disapprove of. I have to assume if you don't approve or disapprove of a position, you wouldn't hold that position. Otherwise why hold it?