This is a sub-thread of the well-read thread, which my son, Turner, started, at www.scienceagogo.com --February 2007. The thread is on Philosophy of Religions ... It is now on its way to having six million hits. Feel free to join in.
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The idea for this sub-thread about FACTS, FICTION, FAITH & FANCY--true, false, useful and whatever, which make us who we are--came to me a few days ago during a period of what I now call META-tation.
 

...just a few, quiet reflections.

1. there will never be a Palestinian nation. There isn't enough land even for the people who live there. And there are millions more who have been living in camps for sixty years. Look at a map that shows how small it is. Israel has annexed so much land, stolen so much, and made so much of it unusable that a Palestine cannot survive.

genties & ladlemen,

my mother has been given 3 to 12 months to live; her cancer has progressed to that point.  she says she is ready to go, has everything set up, but, of course, i can tell she doesn't want to go.  thank g_odness she lives in a place and time where she gets to choose -- she's tried various chemo (but not all of them) and, I think, is choosing quality of life over quantity

i ask for blessings for her from those who can and healing for her from those who can, sendings of positive energy and good wishes her way

When I was fourteen, I adored travel books by a Brit named HVMorton. He was a very popular travel writer of the 20s and 30s who had a knack of seeing a living past around him everywhere he went - and he could bring that life to the reader. I read his In Search of England, In search of Scotland, etc. I suspect it was the first step in me deciding to become an historian.

The latest frpm the world of science:

We are learning more and more that we know less and less.

Time and space are being puzzeled about.

Things connect when they shouldn't - and cause instantanious action with no connection over extreme distances,

Most of the universe is made up of stuff we know nothing about.

Every thing it seems, according to the quantum mechicanlcal genius, the Buddah, Everything is connected. Every atom, string...

When I look in the mirror, I see something I call me, but it isn't what everyone else sees, they see me reversed, the other way around, the right way around, I see myself back to front. Then there's  different photos of me, some so different you wouldn't know it was the same person, so which one is me? Then there's different ages, then there's the self we project. Is it the same as what is received about us? Am I what you think I am, or what I think I am? Is one more real than the other? Am I a spirit in cyberspace?

We live in a world in which extremist think tanks have enormous influence ever governments and the news media. There "studies" invariable recommend less for us and more for the corporations and wealthy individuals. Their profits will then be used to benefit everyong. (Right. Tell that to Haiti, Iraq, and Guatemala.  Tell that to unemployed Americans who live in a country without with one of the largest gaps between right an poor in the world.  Their moral basis, often enough stated publicy enough, is greed is good.

Talking about spiritual attainment is hard because we lack a proper of definition of the word "spiritual".

Nowadays a lot of practices are put under the umbrella of spirituality ranging from self deprivation to taking drugs.

However in this short post we should hope to clear the word "attainment".

As human beings and we are always operating on faith since we never know what the future has in store for us.
 
When we pressed the elevator button we wait because we have faith it will come. Based on this statement we should make a distinction between three kinds of faith: below reason, within reason and above reason.
 
The usual connotation of the word refers to the first kind of faith: below reason, meaning that we’ve been told something and we believe it without verifying it. This is the religious approach to faith.
 

Just came across these 2 fascinating videos about Science and Buddhism.  Enjoy!