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Did Christianity Cause the Crash? - The Atlantic (December 2009)
America’s mainstream religious denominations used to teach the faithful that they would be rewarded in the afterlife. But over the past generation, a different strain of Christian faith has proliferated—one that promises to make believers rich in the here and now. Known as the prosperity gospel, and claiming tens of millions of adherents, it fosters risk-taking and intense material optimism. It pumped air into the housing bubble. And one year into the worst downturn since the Depression, it’s still going strong.
slacktivist: Weak
Does Paul's specific advice here really mean that we ought to accept the permanent, dynastic rule of the least mature among us? Or are there limits to this accommodation?
What I'm getting at, in other words, is the dilemma that occurs when we give someone the benefit of the doubt and they abuse the favor, turning that benefit into a weapon against us.
slacktivist: TF: Bruce's Sermon, part 4
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Sweaty, rumpled earnestness, in the authors' minds, seems to be able to magically transform even this into a gripping, unforgettable sermon. What's that bit of nonsense about "no mention of an arrow"? And how on earth do you get from "a conqueror bent on conquest" to a mere diplomat? And doesn't Bruce notice that he has the crown before he rides out? And ...
None of that matters -- just look at how sincere and passionate Bruce is. See that exclamation point after the word "important"? That means it's important! Bruce is saying important(!) things and he's saying them passionately and sincerely.
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Clear as mud, that, but that's Daniel for you.
The first six chapters of Daniel are fairly straightforward stories of Israel in exile. The final six chapters are a hallucinogenic stew of visions, numerology and wrath. That description of the second half of Daniel might also work as a description of much of Revelation, so it's not altogether unreasonable for Bruce to decide that there's some connection between the two apocalyptic nightmares, but why here? Why jump to this passage in Daniel from that passage in Revelation? What's the justification or logic or excuse?
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slacktivist: Charity, conclusions and cake
Fred Clark continues to pursue the difference between religion obsessed with moral superiority and one that throws impromptu birthday parties for prostitutes.
"We can either take offense or we can give a party. It has to be one or the other, we can't do both."
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In discussing those I have been describing as members of the Cult of Offendedness and addicts of a counterfeit moral superiority, I do not want to presume that they are acting in bad faith.
They are acting in bad faith, but that's not my presumption, it's my conclusion. I am not attributing malice to them, but rather, having observed and studied their attributes, I am noting that those attributes include a vast reservoir of transparent, naked malice. Pretending not to see that wouldn't be charitable, it would merely be dishonest.
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I recently finished Frank Schaeffer's memoir Crazy for God which recounts, among many other things, his impression of the leaders of the religious right -- people who have chosen as their profession the taking of offense and the propagation of umbrage. Schaeffer describes such people as acting in bad faith, motivated by malice and a disingenuous desire for power. Here is a taste of his description of them:
There were three kinds of evangelical leaders. The dumb or idealistic ones who really believed. The out-and-out charlatans. And the smart ones who still believed -- sort of -- but knew that the evangelical world was shit, but who couldn't figure out any way to earn as good a living anywhere else. I was turning into one of those, having started out in the idealistic category.
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slacktivist: It must be Job's fault
So when levies break and a city floods and no one with the authority to help comes to the aid of those trapped by the rising waters, we can't bear the idea that something just like that could happen just as suddenly to us. We decide that they, like Job, must have done something to bring this on themselves. We make up stories about violent looting mobs -- opportunists who chose to stay behind and whose fearsome ruthlessness prevents the sending of aid.
Ah, Wall Street. Seeing the real you at last. » New Deal 2.0
Financial innovation was presented to us in a way that suggested that great things were happening for mankind. The presentations were usually vague. To understand them, we had only the power of our own imaginations, or perhaps, failing that, our awe in the face of this powerful expertise, confidently propelling us to a greater future....
Malarky. This is all code for defer to the wishes of those who make money from these techniques.
slacktivist: TF: Bruce's sermon, part 2
And if God has to kill you to get your attention, then he'll kill you until you listen. If he has to kill everyone on earth until they all accept that he is not willing that any should perish, then that is what God will do. Because he's all about the love. And Bruce urges you to appreciate that love -- or else.
OnTheCommons.org » Art, God and Copyright
Two examples of copyright and religion in conflict: Indonesian batik designers, and sermon sharing sites.
slacktivist: TF: Bruce's sermon, part 1
Other stories in other books persuade readers to go along through the willing suspension of disbelief. Tribulation Force insists on the willing suspension of the reader's humanity. It requires the reader not just to accept but to participate in the monstrous absence of empathy displayed by the characters and authors alike. The word empathy has recently become something of a partisan football, so it's worth reminding ourselves here of what the opposite of empathy is: sociopathy.
There's a monster at the end of this book. And if the authors succeed at what they've set out to do, that monster is you.
Pope Criticizes World Economic System, Calls for Social Responsibility - washingtonpost.com
Pope Benedict XVI criticized the international economic system yesterday and called for a new global structure based on social responsibility, concern for the dignity of the worker and a respect for ethics.
"Caritas in veritate" - Encyclical Letter of His Holiness Benedict XVI
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7. Another important consideration is the common good. To love someone is to
desire that person's good and to take effective steps to secure it. Besides the
good of the individual, there is a good that is linked to living in society: the
common good. It is the good of “all of us”, made up of individuals, families and
intermediate groups who together constitute society[4]. It is a good
that is sought not for its own sake, but for the people who belong to the social
community and who can only really and effectively pursue their good within it.
To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of
justice and charity. To take a stand for the common good is on the one hand
to be solicitous for, and on the other hand to avail oneself of, that complex of
institutions that give structure to the life of society, juridically, civilly,
politically and culturally, making it the pólis, or “city”. The more we
strive to secure a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours,
the more effectively we love them. Every Christian is called to practise this
charity, in a manner corresponding to his vocation and according to the degree
of influence he wields in the pólis. This is the institutional path — we
might also call it the political path — of charity, no less excellent and
effective than the kind of charity which encounters the neighbour directly,
outside the institutional mediation of the pólis.
TPM: The Philosophers’ Magazine | The politics of scepticism
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It is my contention that scepticism should be more of a factor in public life. Unquestioning belief is currently pervading global culture, and unless we set about countering its advance there’s a very real danger of drifting into an age of dogma where belief-systems dictate what we should think and how we should live. Doubt is a positive phenomenon, because applying a criterion such as reasonable doubt to our beliefs, particularly our religious beliefs, rarely generates absolute certainty.
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The theory of agonistic pluralism put forward by the post-Marxist theorist Chantal Mouffe, building on the work of the American political scientist William E. Connnolly, provides some interesting ideas in this context. The major objection that Mouffe has to democratic politics as usually practised in the West is that it lacks real oppositional content, being based instead on a system of collusion between the main parties involved in any given country (usually two, with the UK and the US as prime examples of that model). These parties are seen to have more in common than not, and the result is a politics based on compromise and consensus.
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Less Wrong: Atheism = Untheism + Antitheism
Hunter-gatherer superstition isn't much like what we think of as "religion". Early Westerners often derided it as not really being religion at all, and they were right, in my opinion. In the hunter-gatherer stage the supernatural agents aren't particularly moral, or charged with enforcing any rules; they may be placated with ceremonies, but not worshipped. But above all - they haven't yet split their epistemology. Hunter-gatherer cultures don't have special rules for reasoning about "supernatural" entities, or indeed an explicit distinction between supernatural entities and natural ones; the thunder spirits are just out there in the world, as evidenced by lightning, and the rain dance is supposed to manipulate them - it may not be perfect but it's the best rain dance developed so far, there was that famous time when it worked...
Figgleton v. Ditchens « Easily Distracted
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