Hi there
So I haven't figured out how to respond on my blog . Your point about trhe holocaust is well taken in that any attempt to use the word, for say , Rwanda, is deemed inappropriate.
The event itself is what lies at the end of many discussions in Israel about State action and legitimacy.
Thanks for your thoughts.
My show 'My Israel' will be on Vision TV May 5,6,7.
be well
Ralph B

Thanks, Ralph, I look forward to seeing it! Always enjoy your work... and love the Jazz!

SW

Dear SunWarrior,

Golly, Christianity is so evil, so misguided, so monolithic. I wonder what I am in the midst of my spiritual journey, though, if I am not part of the monolithic Christian enterprise you seem to be describing? The faith about which you write resembles little what I feel, but I do recognize much of what you write in bits and portions of stuff that mistakenly gets labelled as Christianity.

I think that Gordie read that wrong.

Actually, I think that modern society may be called a reaction to a Perception of the hegemony of Christianity, and this perception has outlasted the true influence of Christianity by decades. I am fascinated by the reflexive anti-Christianity reaction I see around me in people who have never attended church (nor have their parents and in some cases, grandparents), and couldn't tell a single Christian theological point if it had two legs and walked up to introduce itself.

As Hal Niedzviecki points out in Hello, I'm Special: How Individuality Became the New Conformity, what we have generally is a societal "rebellion" pose that has long since lost and certainly outlived what it is rebelling against. The knee-jerk anti-Christianity reaction is but one facet of a Perception (my caps) that has no basis in reality.

Equally interestingly, despite the worst intentions of many of its leaders historically and presently, Christianity has never been a monolith--its history (as is that of Judaism and Islam ) is rife with disagreement and fratricidal conflict over theological points, liturgy, Christology, language, dress, the status of women--you name it.

I think your notion of "business-science" as replacing Christianity's apparent hegemony with an alternate (and dangerously narrow) world view is a valid one, although more than one scientist has expressed alarm at how science is being misused in this way.

Gordie-boy,

To paraphrase Kipling, 'what do we know of civilization and Christianity, if all we've ever known is civilization and Christianity?'

Christianity did what it was supposed to do, but unaware it was doing it. It is the effect that, if you're in the middle of the forest, you can't see the continent you're on. It is no fault of anyone. You were born into it, and was given no choice in how your mind was trained to think. Within that reality, you do your best with what you were given, and how you understand it.

It is a simple observation. It is a question of civilization, living from knowledge instead of wisdom, moving away from Nature and into an artificial reality. How did that happen. Follow the dots, outside of the faith, and you see a different picture, not evil per se, just on autopilot. And a monolith that no one can really put their finger on.

It doesn't matter anymore. Business-science has defeated religion's role in society, in designing humans, and Christianity is now adjusting. It is hard to imagine that you're contributing to clear cutting a forest when you need to buy a carton of milk to feed your baby. That's just Christian love. You stuck in the logic of the system, trying to survive by their rules. They control the reality we are in. It used to be the Church that defined reality for us. Now its an add-on.

why4eye,

The general reaction is against percieved abusive dominance that business-science represents as freeing humans from with their abundance, medicine and technology.

Business-science has replaced the cultural role religion used to play in establishing and supporting values and the survival system, creating people's ideas about what reality is.

Business-science has used so many of the Christian ideals, but shown that it can deliver the ideals far better than Christianity ever could to the masses. It is not about theology, but culture and politics. A civilized problem, not a cosmological one. Historically, Christianity was just a reaction against the pagan cosmology, a swing of the pendulum from one side to the other. Christians take it for granted, and this is the 'world' they live in, though there is much more outside of it that the religion resists.

Socially, yes, society changed significantly in the 1960's, and business-science used the social and technological change more effectively than Christianity, which got lumped in the popular mind with historic abusive dominance prevalent throughout history. People found they could act against the Christian cultural taboos without repercussions, and that reaction has fed into the business ascendancy.

I agree, that the reaction is fading in memory, and just the emotion remains in the cult of individualism and freedom against anything that smacks as dominance. But the ideals that we take for granted are based on the Christian ideals that business-science made 'real' better than the Church ever could, feeding the poor and healing the sick.

Christianity has been an intellectual monolith for 500 years. All the debate within the religion is merely centered around the same Christian principles, nothing fundamentally off-base, just fringe theological points. Jesus remains the center, reality remains God, humans and inert matter, and the spiritual cosmology remains God, Jesus, souls and the devil. Everything else is minutiae supporting, even in debate, the fundamentals of the core.

Thanks,
SW