Church of the Churchless

Seeking the truth is better than finding it

This morning I came across an intriguing quotation in the final chapter of Christopher Hitchens' "God is Not Great." I've always thought how terrific it'd be to know the truth about life, the universe, God or unGod—in short, everything.

But Gotthold Lessing, an 18^th century German writer and philosopher, says that even if you could possess truth, you'd be better off perpetually seeking it.

The true value of a man is not determined by his possession, supposed or real, of Truth, but rather by his sincere exertion to get to the Truth. It is not possession of the Truth, but rather the pursuit of Truth by which he extends his powers and in which his ever-growing perfectibility is to be found. Possession makes one passive, indolent and proud.

If God were to hold all Truth concealed in his right hand, and in his left only the steady and diligent drive for Truth, albeit with the proviso that I would always and forever err in the process, and to offer me the choice, I would with all humility take the left hand.

Interesting. Surprising. And the more I pondered Lessing's preference, convincing.

I might well do the same. Though I'd prefer to negotiate out the "always and forever err" clause. I'd rather leave it as "not knowing whether I err in the process."

For if I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was on the wrong truth track, wouldn't this just be the flip side of possessing the truth? I'd be a certain non-possessor, which likely would make me equally passive and indolent (though not proud).

Religion is all about certainty. Science, uncertainty. You can never be sure that you've attained the ultimate answer, because there's always the possibility of more truth being revealed around the next inquisitive corner.

Lessing points us toward a quest that never stops questing. The search is what's being sought. So long as the seeking for truth continues, the seeker has found.

Could it be any other way, really? Even if God raised you or me to the highest heaven and poured into our consciousness complete knowledge of the cosmos, how could we be sure that what we experienced was the capital "T" Truth?

We could be part of The Matrix, taking as real what is an elaborate illusion. But again, how would we ever know for sure? How many reflections are possible in Alice's looking glass? What guarantee is there that this one, rather than that one, is to be trusted?

So while my first reading of Lessing produced a "no way, Jose!" in me, some further pondering of left hand vs. right hand made me feel much more comfortable with following in his thought-experiment footsteps. (Yet, again, with the proviso of not knowing for sure that I was erring).

I also felt better about my mother. She was an intense non-religious seeker of truth. A voracious reader and debater, she spent her life looking for answers to life's most important questions. And didn't find them.

She put so much intellectual and emotional energy into the search, since her death I've had frequent one-sided conversations with whoever I imagine is in charge of doling out Truth to the deserving.

"What the #&!*% went on with my mother??!!," I'll complain to the unseen, unheard, (and probably unreal) reason for my indignation. "She deserved more truth than she got. If she's enjoying an afterlife, you'd damn well better be treating her better than you did during her earthly existence."

Well, Lessing's quotation brought some peace. My mother got great satisfaction from her seeking.

Even if she had come to have an aha! moment before she died that made her believe she'd found the truth, this wouldn't have meant as much to her as the hugely more numerous what's it all about? moments.

She was born a seeker. She died a seeker. I'm pretty sure that we all do.

But not completely sure.

Invitation to write a churchless “sermon”

Over on the left sidebar you'll find a new "Posts Compendium" section.

I managed to take the assemblage of Church of the Churchless posts that I proudly called my blogistic compendium magisterium and transfer them from Google Page Creator to Typepad—my blog host.

Typepad now has the ability to create web pages in addition to posts, so it seemed preferable to keep the compendium as part of this blog rather than over on Google.

Browsing through my numerous posts, which date back to November 2004, I was reminded of how many words I've written. And also, of how much I enjoy reading other people's churchless thoughts.

It's always a pleasure to base a post on an email message that someone sent to me (after getting permission from him or her, naturally). I like taking a break from "sermonizing" once in a while. I also like to hear voices other than mine speaking on this blog.

So here's an offer (it's always been open, but not stated explicitly): if you've got something churchless to say, write it up and email me.

The possible subjects are as various as those in my compendium. Which cover just about any theme ("reality" is an inclusive rubric).

All I ask is that the writing be interesting, thoughtful, and non-dogmatic. It doesn't have to be a literary masterpiece. Just clear, honest, and straightforward.

[Update: For those would-be posters who are concerned about the visibility of their writing, I should point out a benefit of piggy-backing onto this blog.

By and large, Google is kind to me. My two blogs have been around for quite a few years and they're updated regularly—both Google positives. So at the moment Church of the Churchless posts are near the top of such search subjects as "Radha Soami Satsang Beas," "wu chi," and "best religion."

Of course, if you've lost your ego (unlike me), writing is its own reward, regardless of how many readers you have.]

I can't promise that I'll share everything sent to me as a post. But I can pretty much commit that if a writing isn't used as a post, it'll become a comment to an existing post. Thoughts are a terrible thing to waste.

Speaking of comments, a frequent blog visitor asked me if more comments could be shown in the "Recent Comments" section on the sidebar. Currently Typepad limits the number to ten.

I asked Typepad support if there was any way to show more comments. I pointed out that a single post may get quite a few comments, so it didn't make sense to limit the number of comments shown to ten when ten recent posts also are shown.

The support folks told me that I'd have to switch to a custom CSS layout if I wanted that change. Being HTML and CSS impaired, I don't want to give up the security blanket of the standard blog layout scheme.

But I've strongly urged Typepad to add an option that would allow standard layout users to display more comments. The help desk said my request will be considered.

I told them that feedback and interactivity is the hallmark of blogs. So comments need to be featured as prominently as possible.

I appreciate them a lot. Like I've said before, often they're the best part of a post.

Maybe the meaning of life is…life

Given how philosophical I've been for so many years, it's sort of surprising to me that I'm losing interest in pondering the meaning of life. More and more, living life is meaningful enough.

Adding something called meaning seems like decorating a cake that's already nicely frosted. It can be done, but what's the point? How many layers does life need?

I do keep reading about the meaning of life, though. This morning it was the final chapter in Nicholas Fearn's book about the latest answers to the oldest questions: "The Meaning of Life and Death." I liked this passage:

A student once asked the English linguistic philosopher J.L. Austin to explain what 'existing' was. Austin replied that it was 'like breathing, only quieter.' It is not surprising that the naked background of life, divested of any meaning-given activities should often be thought rather purposeless. We might wonder how such a featureless vessel possibly could have a purpose.

Fearn goes on to talk about how "the purpose, meaning, or value of any object is a relation it has to something outside itself." But my life being lived by me—taken as a whole—where's the outside of it?

Yes, I talk to myself frequently, setting up a division between my life and me. "Brian, are you really enjoying ___? Wouldn't ___ be more meaningful for you?"

Yet when I engage in these sorts of Me vs. Myself conversations, there's an absurdist quality to them. For I already know the answer. My life is the answer. I'm not a prisoner on a chain gang, forced to slave over a hot copier at Kinko's sending out the minutes of our neighborhood association—which I did this very afternoon.

Aside from involuntary and autonomic activities like breathing, digesting, eliminating, sleeping and such, what I do with my life is my own doing. At least, it feels that way. Whether free will or fate rules the daily activity roost, that's for wiser minds than mine to decipher.

Increasingly, questions such as "free will or fate?" fail to resonate with me like they used to. I'm folding pages in half, stapling them, sticking an address label on the front, placing a stamp in the upper right corner, opening the mail slot and dumping in the minutes. Tomorrow the postman will deliver the minutes to eighty-eight neighbors. A few will even read them.

That's sweet enough for me. I no longer feel the need to add an extra layer of "it's my karma," "selfless service reduces the ego," or another sort of pseudo-meaningful frosting.

Abstractions like those seem a whole lot less real than folding, stapling, sticking, placing, opening, and dumping. The meaning of my forty-five minutes at Kinko's was directly experienced by me, right then, right there. Now I'm on to something else: writing about it.

For $4 Google Answers offered up a response to someone's query, "What's the meaning of life?" That seems too much to pay, given that the question likely contains its own answer.

I prefer Julian Baggini's take on the question (which, naturally, I found via a Google search).

The only sense we can make of the idea that life has meaning is that there are some reasons to live rather than to die, and those reasons are to be found in the living of life itself.

I know that may not seem like enough, but if you expect a 10-course banquet, even the finest smorgasbord looks meagre in comparison. Trying to work out the meaning of life can be rather like trying to assemble Ikea furniture when you're convinced that you're missing a piece or haven't been given the proper instructions.

But the real problem is that you're trying to put together an elaborate Maråker cabinet when you have only got a standard three-shelf Billy bookcase. Something only seems to be missing because you're expecting much more.

“Body Worlds 3” helps death lose some of its sting

Yesterday afternoon I spent two hours looking at dead bodies. Plastinated ones, so skillfully presented and preserved the smallest nerves and tendons could be seen.

I got tickets to Body Worlds 3 at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) in Portland because it was my wife's birthday. Laurel wanted to see the exhibition. I wasn't as wild about the idea, given that I've got this decided preference for existing rather than not-existing.

I've also been known to ask our estate planning attorney, "Instead of saying When Brian dies…, could you substitute When Brian gerbils…? We'll know what you mean, and I won't get so anxious."

Well, maybe I'm making some progress in accepting death. For I had no problem spending quite a bit of time with dead bodies that let it all hang out.

Also, upside down.

The main thing I learned from the exhibition was this: we're meat. Strip away our skin and humans look an awful lot like what you see in a butcher shop. Which shouldn't be surprising, because we're animals.

Animals, however, who can think about death and dying.

All sorts of people, young and old, toured Body Worlds 3 along with us. I was perusing a display about hip degeneration when I noticed an older woman with a cane looking at the bones with more interest than me. Understandably.

Another woman reclined in a motorized wheelchair, accompanied by a friend. Her body wasn't working so well either. Each of us is going to join that club one day, no matter how healthy we are at the moment. Death is an efficient equalizer.

As I walked from display to display, looking at dead bodies in astoundingly creative poses, moving along with other mortals, each of whom eventually was going to end up in the lifeless state we were so fascinated by, I felt a bond with my fellow OMSI-goers.

Now and then I'd interact with a person next to me, asking a question or making a comment. It was easier to reach out to a stranger than it would be, say, at an art exhibit. We all had a lot in common: being alive, after which we'll be dead.

The creator of Body Worlds, Gunther von Hagen, wants this to be more than an anatomical learning experience. He says:

The human body is the last remaining nature in a man made environment. I hope for the exhibitions to be places of enlightenment and contemplation, even of philosophical and religious self recognition, and open to interpretation regardless of the background and philosophy of life of the viewer.

Scattered throughout the exhibit were quotations from great thinkers about death. I appreciated that, being a philosophical sort. I especially appreciated some quotes from Seneca and Epicurus.

Via a Google cache, I located the Body World Seneca passage.

Death is the release from all pain and complete cessation, beyond which our suffering will not extend. It will return us to that condition of tranquility, which we had enjoyed before we were born. Should anyone mourn the deceased, then he must also mourn the unborn. Death is neither good nor evil, for good or evil can only be something that actually exists. However, whatever is of itself nothing and which transforms everything else into nothing will not at all be able to put us at the mercy of Fate.

Makes sense. I don't fret over my state of nonexistence prior to my birth. Why, then, should I get hot and bothered over my not existing after I'm dead? I won't be around to be bothered then. As for now, I'm still alive.

This was pretty much the same argument in the Epicurus quote, which I wasn't able to locate verbatim online. Here's the chain of logic, though. (And here's a similar Epicurus sentiment).

(1) Death is annihilation.
(2) The living have not yet been annihilated (otherwise they wouldn't be alive).
(3) Death does not affect the living. (from 1 and 2)
(4) So, death is not bad for the living. (from 3)
(5) For something to be bad for somebody, that person has to exist, at least.
(6) The dead do not exist. (from 1)
(7) Therefore, death is not bad for the dead. (from 5 and 6)
(8) Therefore death is bad for neither the living nor the dead. (from 4 and 7)

OK. I'm convinced. But I'd still rather be alive than dead.

But wait. I am! Cool.

And Oregon State just won the College World Series. Again. It's a great time to be alive.

Of course, any time is.

“Wall of Separation” looks like an American history con job

It's a plain and evident fact that the United States' founding fathers were deeply concerned about this country becoming a religious theocracy. That's why we have a godless constitution—the title of a book I'm reading.

So given what I know about how strongly George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and other leaders of their era felt about keeping religion out of government, my ears perked up when I heard mention of a PBS pseudo-documentary, "Wall of Separation," that suggests the wall may really have been an open door.

The PBS web site says:

But is this conventional wisdom of "secularized" government exactly what our Founding Fathers intended when they established our nation and wrote the Constitution and Bill of Rights? Some scholars think so. Other scholars claim that a contextualization of Colonial American culture and politics reveals a radically different definition of religious establishment and church/state relations than we have today. Some even claim it is the exact opposite of what the Founders intended. This is an ongoing debate that has continued to polarize Americans to this day.

This is the same sort of B.S. attitude that allows for the claim that "some say" evolution is true while "others say" intelligent design is how the world came to be, conveniently ignoring the fact that "some" includes the consensus of the scientific community, while "others" is limited to a few religious true believers.

Similarly, I strongly suspect that "Wall of Separation" isn't going to accurately reflect the views of most historians. As Barry Lynn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State points out, the program has its roots in the religious right.

And likely is tied into Christian Reconstructionism. This is a thoroughly creepy attempt to have American society dominated by Christian beliefs, legally and otherwise. I'm not sure why "reconstruct" is in their name. Probably they're trying to reconstruct the Middle Ages in the United States, when the Church controlled almost every aspect of life.

If he were alive today, Thomas Jefferson would be urging us to resist this theocratic movement with every bit of our secular muscle. Here's some Jefferson quotes from "The Godless Constitution."

"Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity," Jefferson wrote, "have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned." What, he asked, has been the effect of this slaughter? "To make one half of the world fools, and the other half hypocrites," he answered, "to support roguery and error all over the earth."

…"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with solemn reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and state."

…All priests, Jefferson claimed, "dread the advancement of science as witches do the approach of daylight." They preach "bigotry and fanaticism" at the expense of human reason. "The mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus" spread "impenetrable darkness…and there they will skulk." A "band of dupes and impostors," they sponsor "ignorance, absurdity, untruth, charlatanism and falsifications."

What is reality?

That's a great title: "What is Reality?"

It gets right down to the nitty-gritty of what life is all about. Being real. Whether we live only once, or have an opportunity to live another physical or metaphysical existence, making the most of these precious human moments means really living them.

So I leapt to open an issue of New Scientist magazine that had "The Big Questions" emblazoned on the cover. "What is Reality?" is the biggest of the big in my opinion. And seemingly that of the magazine's editors also, since they featured Roger Penrose's essay on this subject in the numero uno position.

I've read a couple of Penrose's books. Can't say that I understood them even halfway completely, but the guy is an Emeritus Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford. And I struggled with high school trig.

Nonetheless, I enjoy Penrose's ability to meld his profound scientific and mathematical knowledge with deep philosophical musings. Here's his entire article, which is eminently readable.
Download what_is_reality_by_roger_penrose.doc

On this blog my posts and visitor comments often touch on the question of what's really real. I lean toward the objective reality side; others tilt toward subjectivity, seemingly arguing that whatever reality is, it can't be separated from the consciousness that's aware of it.

Penrose sets up a straw man sort of argument at the beginning of his piece. Like many politicians he utilizes a "Some say" approach that is one of the few things in his essay I don't agree with. I've never heard anyone say the following, just as I've never heard anyone support the "Some say we shouldn't fight the terrorists who hit us on 9/11" phrase so beloved by Bush and Cheney.

Some might even feel driven to the view that one's own particular conscious experience is to be regarded as primary, and that the experiences of others are themselves merely things to be abstracted, ultimately, from one's own sense data.

He correctly rejects this solipsistic position — which is pretty much held only by the seriously mentally ill. But he also rejects a much more common belief, one probably shared by some who are reading these words.

Even if such a solipsistic basis is not adopted, so that the totality of all conscious experience is taken as the primary reality, I still have great difficulty. This would seem to demand that "external reality" is merely something that emerges from some sort of majority-wins voting amongst the individual conscious experiences of all of us taken together.

I'm with Penrose. There's just too much evidence of an astonishing regularity underlying the universe. Of course, it isn't so astonishing when we consider that if reality was unpredictably chaotic, life as we know it couldn't exist. (This basically is the Anthropic Principle, which points out the obvious: if the universe wasn't suitable for life, we wouldn't be here wondering why the universe is suitable for life).

Among the basic laws of physics that we know – and we do not yet know all of them – some are precise to an extraordinary degree, far beyond the precision of our direct sense experiences, or of the combined calculational powers of all conscious individuals within the ken of mankind.

…It would be a mistake to think of the role of mathematics in basic physical theory as being simply organisational, where the entities that constitute the world just behave in one way or another, and our theories represent merely our attempts – sometimes very successful – to make some kind of sense of what is going on around us.

…To me, such a description again falls far short of explaining the extraordinary precision in the agreement between the most remarkable of the physical theories that we have come across and the behaviour of our material universe at its most fundamental levels.

This is the point where a lot of spiritually-inclined people part company with science. But not me. Mathematics is able to describe and predict how many, if not most, physical systems behave (in theory, at least). I've got no problem accepting that the same likely is true of you, and me (in theory, at least).

It's natural to think of ourselves as special, somehow outside the laws that govern material reality. The structure of space and time, gravity, moving bodies, electromagnetism, quantum mechanics, fluid dynamics, nuclear forces—these phenomena and so much more can be modeled with remarkable precision by scientific theories which are primarily mathematical.

To me, that's beautiful. It reflects the unity and order of the cosmos. And I'm a part of it. Yes, I see the world subjectively, as do we all. But underlying the vagaries of individual consciousness is a whole other order of being that Penrose points us toward.

It isn't really physical, because materiality fades away once one reaches the foundational quantum world.

Whether we look at the universe at the quantum scale or across the vast distances over which the effects of general relativity become clear, then, the common-sense reality of chairs, tables and other material things would seem to dissolve away, to be replaced by a deeper reality inhabiting the world of mathematics.

You could look upon this as the mind of God. But I'd rather not. It is what it is. Which we don't know, because there's debate over whether mathematics simply describes how the stuff of physical reality operates, or whether there's another plane of reality that the mathematical laws of nature emanate from.

I'm attracted to the second option. Like most mathematicians, so is Penrose.

Might mathematical entities inhabit their own world, the abstract Platonic world of mathematical forms? It is an idea that many mathematicians are comfortable with. In this scheme, the truths that mathematicians seek are, in a clear sense, already "there", and mathematical research can be compared with archaeology; the mathematician's job is to seek out those truths as a task of discovery rather than one of invention.

To a mathematical Platonist, it is not so absurd to seek an ultimate home for physical reality within Plato's world.

And that is decidedly "spiritual," though it's difficult to discern much difference between mathematicality and spirituality if one accepts Penrose's basic premise: that reality is mysteriously both objective and tied to the conscious subjectivity of those who experience it.

We do not properly understand why it is that physical behaviour is mirrored so precisely within the Platonic world, nor do we have much understanding of how conscious mentality seems to arise when physical material, such as that found in wakeful healthy human brains, is organised in just the right way.

Nor do we really understand how it is that consciousness, when directed towards the understanding of mathematical problems, is capable of divining mathematical truth. What does this tell us about the nature of physical reality? It tells us that we cannot properly address the question of that reality without understanding its connection with the other two realities: conscious mentality and the wonderful world of mathematics.

Spinoza’s God is Einstein’s God. And, mine.

I'm a long ways – a very long ways – from sharing Albert Einstein's understanding of the universe. But when it comes to Einstein's religious bent, we're almost soul brothers. Just as, I suspect, many other churchless people are.

As described in a TIME article, "Einstein and Faith," in 1930 Einstein wrote a credo called "What I Believe." It ended with this oft-quoted passage about what he meant when he called himself religious.

The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead, a snuffed-out candle. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is something that our minds cannot grasp, whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly: this is religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I am a devoutly religious man.

However, many people still wanted a simple answer to the question of whether he believed in God. Rabbi Goldstein, an Orthodox Jewish leader, sent a telegram to Einstein: "Do you believe in God? Stop. Answer paid. 50 words." Einstein used about half of his allotment.

I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals himself in the lawful harmony of all that exists, but not in a God who concerns himself with the fate and the doings of mankind.

So what is Spinoza's God? Basically, nature. Spinoza, a seventeenth century heretical Jewish philosopher, didn't want anything to do with a transcendent God who sits up in the heavens and guides the goings-on down here on Earth. His God is immanent in everything that exists.

I'm reading Matthew Stewart's "The Courtier and the Heretic: Leibniz, Spinoza, and the Fate of God in the Modern World." Stewart says:

In Spinoza's view, to put it simply, God and Nature are not and never will be in conflict for the simple reason that God is Nature…The "Nature" in question here is not of the blooming and buzzing kind (though it would include that, too). It is closer to the "nature" in "the nature of light" or "the nature of man" —that is, the "nature" that is the subject of rational inquiry.

However, it's easier to point to what Spinoza's God isn't, than to what it is, because the philosopher leaves us guessing about some of God's subtler qualities. However, Stewart says, this much is clear:

Spinoza's God is not the God of Sunday school and Bible readings. It is not the kind of supernatural being who wakes up one morning, decides to create a world, and then stands back at the end of the week to admire his achievement. In fact, God has no "personality" at all: it isn't male or female; it has no hair, likes or dislikes, is not right- or left- handed; it does not sleep, dream, love, hate, decide, or judge; it has no "will" or "intellect" in the way we understand those terms.

Well, if God is Nature, where's the need to add something abstract called "God" to the concrete reality of the natural world? I find myself asking this question quite often, generally to myself. For I'm fond of using "God" to mean the totality of everything in existence.

When I type out or speak that word, "God," increasingly it seems unnecessary to me. Why don't I simply say "reality," "existence," or "cosmos"? It's as if I've broken up with someone once dear to me and I can't bring myself to take her photo off of the bedside table.

If we no longer have a relationship, why am I still relating?

Once in a while I also find myself talking to the guru who I used to believe was part and parcel of my innermost being. Now I don't. Yet out of habit I sometimes have a (one-sided) conversation with him.

Of course, now and then I do that with my mother, who also is dead, and I have almost zero confidence that she's capable of hearing me.

So I'm having to face some contradictions in myself. Which is a good thing. More and more I catch myself when I start to fall back into old anthropomorphic religious habits, such as looking upon really real reality as being something transcendent and apart, rather than right here and now.

Stewart asks:

According to Spinoza, God or Nature causes the things of the world in the same way that the nature of a coffee, for example, causes it to be black. But we do not usually say that the nature of coffee is divine, so why should we say that Nature is God?

In the Ethics [Spinoza's main writing], as a matter of fact, one can substitute the word "Nature" (or "Substance," or even simply an X) for God throughout, and the logic of the argument changes little, if at all. So why use the term "God" at all?

Looking over Einstein's thoughts about God, religion, and theology, I strongly suspect that he too mostly used the word out of habit and respect for social convention. "God" is a flimsy abstract conception that pales in comparison to the power and glory of nature. Which, naturally, includes us and indeed is us.

Einstein:

I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.

… A human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.

Finding our energetic groove

The past few days haven't been real cheerful for me, save-the-world (or 137 acres, at least) wise. My wife and I have been leading a fight against a proposed subdivision on groundwater limited farmland adjacent to our neighborhood.

Wednesday we got screwed by a purely political decision by our county Board of Commissioners. They ignored an independent hydrogeologic assessment and their own Planning Commission. That night I had trouble getting to sleep, as travesty of justice visions kept running through my brain.

Thursday I got to vent to a television news reporter. That made me feel a bit better, even though just a few seconds of my sage observations got on the air.

So what do you do when you're confused, discouraged, and out of sorts? I was bummed out by a material world disappointment. But I've had the same feelings when my spiritual aspirations were dashed by cold, hard, unfeeling reality.

For about a day and a half I struggled to regain some sort of balance. I alternated between Screw social activism because it all comes down to bullshit politics and Those ignoramus county commissioners have to be stopped before they kill (the environment) again.

It was interesting to observe how I reacted to my own thoughts and intentions. Whenever I envisioned continuing to fight the subdivision to the bitter end, no matter what it took, I'd feel a burst of positive energy. Giving up, or engaging in a half-hearted attempt to stop the development, left me listless.

There's a few things I like about "The Secret." Just a few. One is that your emotions are signposts pointing to the Way for you. When you're doing what you should, it feels good. Not necessarily pleasant (climbing a steep mountain, for example), but right.

Hard to put into words – "right" isn't quite right as a descriptor – but you know it when you feel it.

Which I did sometime Friday afternoon. I stopped conducting mental cost-benefit analyses, the odds of winning an appeal vs. how much we and our neighbors would have to raise to pay the attorney fees. I realized that what mattered to me wasn't what might happen in the end; it was what I felt driven to do now.

And that was to battle on. If the rolling hills I drive by every day eventually are covered by homes, it'll bother me a lot less if I feel like I left everything on the field rather than throwing in the towel (sports metaphors come easily after watching the College World Series a little while ago. Go Beavers!).

I'm reading a book about Spinoza, an appealingly heretical seventeenth-century philosopher. Here's what I came across this morning:

Happiness is freedom, says Spinoza. It follows when we act in accordance with our own deepest nature – when we "realize ourselves," as it were. Unfortunately, we humans rarely have the privilege of acting according to our deepest nature, for in our ignorance of ourselves and of the world we submit ourselves to the guidance of forces beyond our control.

…Most people most of the time, concludes Spinoza, are passive. But the point of life is to be active.

…The conatus is a drive or desire – in essence, the desire to persist in one's own being. Every person – and indeed every rock, tree, and thing in the world – has a conatus to act, live, preserve itself, and realize itself by pursuing its own interest (or "advantage").

"Pleasure" is the state that results from anything that contributes to the project of this conatus, that is, anything that increases a thing's power or level of "perfection": and "pain" is the state that results from anything that does the opposite, that diminishes the power of a thing.

Well, I didn't need a philosopher to tell me this. It was nice to read an explanation of what I'd been going through the past few days, though. I could tell when I was in, or close to, my conatus' energetic groove. Also, when I was out of it.

Relating this to being churched or churchless, faithful or faithless, devoted or doubtful, something in each of us yells Oh, yeah, this is SO right! to ourselves when we're really grooving to the beat of our inner drummer.

Our dance might not be visible to other people (or, it might). But (shifting metaphors) we know when our conatus is firing on all twelve-cylinders and smoke is pouring from our racing slicks as we shoot down our Way fueled by high-octane confidence.

Confidence that we're doing what we should, even if we're the only ones on that road, because there's nothing else we can do. The engine's warmed up, the gas tank's full, the windshield is clean, and we've got some traveling to do.

Life is good, even when it isn't, so long as we keep moving. Staying still isn't an option unless we're dead. As I remember Davy Crockett saying in a Disney movie from my childhood, "Be sure you're right, then go ahead."

Spinoza would agree.

What’s the favorite “religion” of the religion-less?

I showed you mine a few days ago. Now you show me yours.

Your favorite "religion." Which, because I put quotation marks around the word, could be:

An honest-to-god (or godless) religion; a philosophy of life; a metaphysical system; a spiritual path; or something describable that's along these lines. What I believe is just a touch vague.

If golf, NASCAR, romance novels, raising gerbils, or watching "24" reruns is your religion, that's nice. But I'd just as soon that you didn't extol it in a comment to this post.

Because I'm sincerely – maybe even seriously – interested in finding out what turns on the religion-less when it comes to "religion."

I guess you could call this a quest to learn the best of the worst—given that I've got a pretty dim opinion of most organized attempts to fathom the unfathomable.

The question also could be phrased as, "Which religion sucks the least?" (suck being a derogatory term, for those blog visitors unfamiliar with American English).

As for me, I said:

Taoism is my favorite non-religious religion. I like it for a lot of reasons, not least of which is that it's the only philosophy I know of that comes with a built-in self defense and health promoting exercise system: Tai Chi. When a philosophy can be expressed physically, that shows a pleasing rootedness in reality.

I could have gone on with what I like about Taoism. And if you choose to leave a comment in which you share your favorite, I hope you'll give some reasons for your choice. "Why" is as important as "what," though a book-length comment isn't necessary.

I've been wanting to ask this question of Church of the Churchless visitors for some time. Comments from the regulars leave me with an impression of where they're coming from, but I'd enjoy learning more specifics.

Of course, leaving no comment at all also is an answer in itself. "None" is an entirely acceptable response.

Taoism’s “Mysterious Pass.” You’re in it, now!

Taoism is my favorite non-religious religion. I like it for a lot of reasons, not least of which is that it's the only philosophy I know of that comes with a built-in self defense and health promoting exercise system: Tai Chi.

When a philosophy can be expressed physically, that shows a pleasing rootedness in reality. I adore abstractions also, but like they say (or at least, I do) "Three bucks and a whole bunch of metaphysical concepts gets you a grande latte at Starbucks."

This morning I was reading Thomas Cleary's translation of "The Book of Balance and Harmony: A Taoist Handbook." It's about the Complete Reality School of Taoism, a great name.

Complete Reality. Bring it on! So long as it's nice to me, naturally. And includes my favorite TV shows, like Reno 911, Survivor, and The Colbert Report.

I came across mention of "The Opening of the Mysterious Pass." Also a way cool term. Images of Taoist sages treading solitarily through misty mountains seeking the Way ran through my head.

Actually, I was doing the treading at that very moment. As are you, right now.

"The opening of the mysterious pass is the most abstruse and most essential mechanism. It is not, as various practitioners of yoga say, in the forehead, or the navel, or the bladder, or the genitals, or between the kidneys and navel, or between the kidneys and genitals.

From head to heels, any spot on the body you may focus on is not it. Yet it is not to be sought externally, apart from the body.

Therefore sages just used the word "center" to point out the opening of the mysterious pass. This "center" is it. Let me give you a convenient simile.

When a puppet moves its hands and feet and gesticulates in a hundred ways, it is not that the puppet can move—it is moved by pulling strings. And though it is a strong device, it is the person controlling the puppet who pulls the strings.

Do you know this person who controls the puppet? The puppet is like the body, the strings are like the mysterious pass; the person controlling the puppet is like the innermost self. The movements of the body are not done by the body; it is the mysterious pass that makes it move.

But though it is the action of the mysterious pass, still it is the innermost self that activates the mysterious pass. If you can recognize this activating mechanism, without a doubt you can become a wizard."

I seek and find a "mysterious pass" image through Google. Who did that? How did the Who accomplish it? Where did the intention behind the Who's How come from?

Researchers stick subjects in brain scanning machines. They ask them to think of "running dog." Part of the brain lights up. A scientific paper about the neurological correlate of that sort of thought is written.

I wonder, But what other part of the brain told that part of the brain to activate itself? When I think to myself, "think about a running dog," what or who is doing the thinking about my thinking? Me? But then, what or who is behind all that? How many levels do I have? Where do I begin and end?

Science hasn't reached the other side of the Mysterious Pass. Neither have I, that's for sure.

During my morning meditation I've pretty much given up on trying to fathom the mysteries of the cosmos. I'd just like to understand where one thought of mine comes from.

Like, "Wu." A single syllable. It could be any other word, of any length, with any meaning or non-meaning.

Say it to yourself in your head. Your mind. Your mysterious pass. Whatever you want to call the place where we listen to ourselves speaking to ourselves.

Where does the silent sound come from? Where does it go to?

We can see the puppet moving. We can catch a glimpse of the strings being pulled. But the puppet master is hidden. Science is clueless. So is religion, notwithstanding empty claims to the contrary. So am I.

The Complete Reality School says that the mystery occurs at the meeting place of yin and yang, where stillness stirs into action. I'd say, "See you there." But we're already there.

Lao-tzu says, "Effecting utter emptiness, keeping complete silence, as myriad things act in concert, I thereby watch the return."

The I Ching says, "Return means seeing the heart of heaven and earth." The I Ching hexagram RETURN consists of one yang arising under five yins: yin is quietude, yang is movement; when quietude reaches its consummation, it gives rise to movement. It is this point of movement that is the mysterious pass.

Just apply your attention to the point where you rouse the mind and activate thought, concentrating on this constantly – then the mysterious pass will spontaneously appear.

Some Radhasoami UK Facebook excerpts

There have been some interesting recent comments from Osho Robbins, plus equally interesting comments on his comments.

One of which was mine, where I put up some links to a UK Facebook group that Osho Robbins posts on frequently. (See my June 9 comment on this post.)

I just realized that you have to sign up for Facebook before you can browse around the Radhasoami group. Since that is a bit of a pain, and some won't be willing to do it, I'll copy in one of Osho Robbins' posts (see continuation below) on "The Nature of God--Oneness or Nothingness."

I agree that whatever "God" or ultimate reality is, this supremely supreme whatever seemingly is beyond each and every concept about it.

However, I can't help but wonder whether those concepts include the content of Osho Robbin's post, what I'm writing now, and everything else we can say about what can't be said.

That said, I agree with some of Osho Robbins' take on enlightenment that I found on his web site.

But can you learn the secret of true happiness and living a fulfilled life from Osho Robbins via an intensive two-day workshop? Well, if you go let me know.

True culture of life has to be godless

Religious types—Christians, mostly—like to talk about a "culture of life." This is shorthand for being against abortion, death with dignity, stem cell research, and other supposedly anti-life policies supported by godless secularists like me.

I see things just the opposite. Religiosity is what's destructive of living life fully, devotedly, appreciatively, reverently. Here's why.

Virtually every religion holds that earthly existence is just a prelude to something better: heaven, paradise, nirvana, god-realization. The life we're living now is to be looked upon as a springboard that hopefully will bounce us in the direction of divinity after death.

Back in my science fiction reading days I enjoyed Philip Jose Farmer's "Riverworld" series. The main character's goal was to reach the headwaters of a huge river. It was tough going. Eventually he discovered that when he was killed, he was instantly reborn along the river.

As I recall, sometimes upstream, sometimes downstream. Regardless, the man didn't fear death anymore. He'd give up his life willingly to have a chance of fulfilling his quest.

Just like Islamic suicide bombers. And Crusaders. And every other religious fanatic who considers physical life to be of little value compared to the non-bodily state that awaits the faithful after they take their last breath.

They are the extremists. But even religious moderates comfort themselves with thoughts like, "No matter how bad things are now, they're going to be better when _____ [Jesus /God/ Buddha-nature/ Krishna/ Guru/ Jehovah/ Allah/ otherwise fill in the blank] embraces me in the next life."

With one eye on the afterlife, how is it possible to give this one the respect it deserves?

We're up to 3,500 deaths of American soldiers in Iraq. Tens or even hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died. This is just one of many "killing fields" around the world. Darfur, Afghanistan, North Korea, AIDS stricken Africa—what makes it so easy to read about people needlessly dying here, there, everywhere without slamming the newspaper on the table and crying This is fucking insane!

I'd say because in most of us there's a lurking (or up front) notion that when a person dies it's not really the end for him or her. It's a bad call, but the game still is going into extra innings.

Well, what if it isn't? What if each of us gets only one chance to experience life? What if every hour, minute, or second subtracted from a life span is gone forever? What if this moment, right here and right now, is so unbelievably precious — because another one can't be purchased for any price — it's impossible to place a high enough value on it?

This is where a godless outlook leads: toward a genuine culture of life. This life. Not the next one. What could very well be (and probably is) the only one. For me, for you, for everybody.

From this perspective a potential life doesn't have nearly as much value as an actual life. A nascent embryo isn't a conscious living being; someone paralyzed by a spinal cord injury is. So embryonic stem cell research is part of my culture of life.

As is allowing people to decide for themselves how they want to die. Death with dignity and doctor-assisted suicide when death is imminent (blessedly legal in my great state of Oregon) also support a culture of life. Religious superstitions shouldn't play a part in social policies, neither in end-of-life care nor anywhere else.

Abortion is a bit more problematic. I've got no problem with early-term abortions. When a developed nervous system is lacking, so is the consciousness necessary for human existence.

Here also a balance must be struck between respecting a fully-formed life and a nascent life. A pregnant woman knows what her life is all about; a several-week old fetus doesn't. The woman's personal ethical choice trumps anyone else's, because she is living her life directly.

Again: this is a culture of life.

No one who believes in an afterlife can maximally reverence presentlife. Divided loyalties preclude a whole-hearted commitment to the reality of is, because could be drains energy, commitment, and attention.

A culture of life thrives in godlessness and is deadened by religiosity. Choose your philosophy of life accordingly.

David James Duncan’s “In Praise of No Guide”

It's about fly-fishing. And life. And spiritual practice. And just about anything and everything.

Like I wrote about yesterday on my other blog, David James Duncan's marvelous three page essay, "In Praise of No Guide," hooked me on buying his entire book: My Story As Told By Water.

Reading Duncan makes me want to believe in reincarnation so I can come back and be able to write like him. He's got, well, a way with words. Not to mention fishing.

He was born in Portland and grew up here in Oregon. There are lots of other fly fishing maniacs in the state, one of whom is in my Tai Chi class. I'm not one of them, even a catch and release kind, which I gather is the usual fly-fishing modus operandi. But I've spent many hours walking along the banks of the Metolius River, a fly fisherperson's Mecca, and appreciate the lure of this activity.

Which usually is a solitary pursuit. Mostly I see a man (or woman, occasionally) standing in the water by himself, in waders, intently casting. Sometimes I wave to them. Rarely do they wave back. Too focused on their art, seemingly.

Duncan doesn't see much reason to rely on a guide. Nor do I, not now. I used to. But like Duncan, I've come to appreciate that a spiritual guru can be as distracting as a fly-fishing guru when it comes to communing with whatever is communable. He writes:

My reservations about the average fly-fishing guide are a lot like my reservations about the average spiritual guru. Both can be highly entertaining. Both can also be any of several types of idiot. Both usually charge for their services in either case. Why risk rewarding idiocy in hope of a little guidance?

…The average guide mediates so relentlessly between you and your fishing that it feels as if you and the river are divorcing and trying to split up the property. The average guide plants an invisible ego-flag on every fish you catch, as if he were a mountaineer, the fish were the summit, and your stupidity were Mount Everest.

…Fly-fishing guides accept payment in order to help clients circumvent their ignorance. But ignorance is one of the most crucial pieces of equipment any fly fisher will ever own. Ignorance is a fertile but unplanted interior field. Solitary fly fishing isolates us in this field, and leaves no choice but to try to cultivate and plant and grow things in it.

A guide, on the other hand, is like a hired farmer who, for a price, drives his tractor into your interior and plants your field for you. When the two of you are finished, he may know what's growing inside you. But you sure as hell won't. Fly-fishing guides turn clients into the absentee landlords of their own interiors.

You can read more of Duncan's oh-so-fine prose on my other post. Last year I also wrote about his latest book, "God Laughs and Plays."

I like Duncan's style. Irreverent and sacred at the same time. It's just that he'd rather worship in a river rather than a church.

Yes, I realize there's something a bit incongruous about looking upon Duncan as a guide to guidelessness. But there's a large difference between guides who advise "You don't need me, or anyone else, to show you what to do and where to go," and guides who want you to latch on to them with their promise of Great Things.

These are remote possibilities. Far, far less remote is the possibility that at day's end you'll be handing your guide three hundred bucks, shaking his hand, and biting your tongue as you fight the urge to say, "Thanks that the insects you said wouldn't bit did, while the fish you said would, didn't.

Wu t-shirt leads to philosophical conversations

Usually I just wear my Wu t-shirt to Tai Chi class or the athletic club. Yesterday was pretty grey in central Oregon, so I decided to brighten it up with my yellow Wu attire.

Good decision. After a pleasant walk along the Metolius river, where this photo was taken, I had a couple of pleasant philosophical discussions stimulated by a "What does that mean?"

When I started my Wu Project some fifteen months ago, I knew that what I needed most of all, and first of all, was a Wu t-shirt. What's a project without a t-shirt?

I'm pretty sure that what I've got on my chest doesn't say Kick me or This dumb shit thinks this means Wu. The Wikipedia entry for "Mu/Wu" now shows the character in cursive script, but the small non-cursive icon looks like my t-shirt. Still, whenever someone Chinese walks by while I'm wearing it I prepare myself for hilarious laughter.

The cursive version is cool. Check out this animation that shows the calligraphy stroke order. Beautiful.

Like Wu. And conversations about Wu. My first was in the charming Camp Sherman store. One of the owners pointed at my chest and said, "Explain."

As if I could. But anyone who wears anything but a plain t-shirt should be willing to answer questions about the message they're broadcasting to the world.

"It's Chinese," I replied. "It means Wu. That's a negative—negation, nothingness. But it doesn't have, well, the negative sense we Westerners put on nothing. It's more like the universal that remains when everything particular is negated."

"Infinity," the owner said. "Exactly," I told her. Though exactly isn't exactly a word that fits with Wu, she seemed to hit the word-nail right on the head.

Anyway, it beat talking about the weather. Conversations like the one we had, even brief ones, are so much more satisfying than the usual "How's it going? … Fine" variety. It'd be nice if everybody had a t-shirt that succinctly expressed their philosophy of life (and they were amenable to talking about it).

My other t-shirt inspired conversation came near the end of the Metolius river trail, where you approach the headwaters and are stopped by a fence on private land.

The family pet and I had been following a woman and her yellow lab. Serena and I were faster walkers than they were. We caught up with them near the turning point. She was in her 70s. Her dog, about the same in dog years. The woman had the look of an elderly flower child.

Flowing smock. Brightly colored hearing aids, not disguised at all but prominently displayed in her ears like jewelry. Our dogs sniffed each other. Then she did the human equivalent.

She asked "What's that?" I started to go through my usual explanation, but she politely cut me off. "Yes, Wu. Like Wu-wei." Once again I said, "Exactly."

It turned out that she was a massage therapist who did Qigong. I told her that I practiced Tai Chi and had some experience with Qigong. I demonstrated the "wu chi" (readiness) posture and showed how "tai chi" makes an appearance as soon as Wu differentiates into one thing or another—yin or yang.

Listening to myself talk, I liked what I heard. Not because I was saying it. Because it made sense, in spite of the speaker's Wu ignorance.

"There's got to be something beyond everything that we can ever know or understand," I said. "Out there on the other side of beyond, that's Wu." She smiled.

She and her husband had just moved to Camp Sherman, a quirky community of 200 or so full-time residents. She'll fit right in. Folks around here resonate with Wu as the Metolius River wordlessly speaks it.

A message from an agnostic satsangi

Here's a mildly-edited email message that I got from a self-described Radha Soami Satsang Beas "agnostic." Like me, this person had started meditating many years ago with high expectations.

The experiment of meditation was performed just as instructed. Only problem was, the predicted results weren't forthcoming. Yes, as the message starts off by saying, we're on a parallel journey.

I especially enjoyed some lines near the end: "I still have a lot of respect and admiration for Charan Singh and Gurinder Singh [past and present RSSB gurus]. They may not be who we thought they were, but they are damn good at pretending to be who we thought they were."

Nicely said. Here's the message:

I have been reading your blogs now for several years and have been on a parallel journey on and off the path. I often need to read your blog to hear verbalized what I am thinking/feeling. Thanks for doing that and I appreciate your faithfulness in chronicling your journey.

I had a spiritual crisis about three years ago which caused me to doubt the legitimacy of the path and the divineness or lack of divineness of the Masters. I struggled with it for a year or so trying to give the path a second chance but finally decided that I just don't know what is true. Now I don't think about it much except to read your blog, like I said, to find out what I am currently thinking.

The major sticking point for me is like you said in a recent post—that this was supposed to be a science and if you do the experiment you are supposed to get the results. I would have settled for a few flashes of light or anything tangible that I was on the right track. I am always willing to concede that the fault lies with me and I am doing something wrong.

But if this was a true science then you would think that there would be some sort of feedback and correction mechanism to put one back on the right track. I suppose when Charan Singh was still alive we could have written and gotten an answer, but the reality now, with so many disciples, is that written communications are out of the question.

Come to think of it, I did write a few letters and got responses but they were pretty general and didn't really address what I specifically needed to do to make progress.

There is also a lot of stress on the need for a living teacher to guide you and that makes sense when there are only a few hundred disciples. But when you have a few million disciples and there is still only time to interact on a personal basis with a few thousand at most, it means all of the others aren't really getting any tangible benefit from that living Master.

It is amazing that once you stop having 100% belief in the program, how all the little inconsistencies that you were willing to overlook before make you wonder how you ever believed any of this stuff. Of course the reason was we wanted to believe it because we wanted it all to be true.

I still want it to be true. I think that is why I am still following the vows for the most part and meditating some – I am still hoping that Master will finally realize that he overlooked me someday and drag me inside.

Anyways, I have no regrets about the last 35 years and feel that I am better off for being on the Path.

When I think back to the beginning I have to admit it was the inner region travel that was the big draw along with the science part. I thought that when I was initiated that I would be going inside or at least be seeing some light or hearing some sound. So I was a bit bummed out when nothing happened.

Then later when I went to Dera [RSSB headquarters in India] I thought for sure when I saw the Master for the first time I would see or feel something.

Disappointment again, and again I rationalized the fault was mine. As time went on and life went on the expectation of something happening kind of faded and I went into kind of a routine. I was very consistent in doing my meditation every day for some period of time, but that time would vary.

I remember hearing Master saying once that if a disciple were to sit in meditation for two and a half hours every day for six months he would see some progress. During that time in my life it seemed like an unreachable goal. Then I retired and had no excuse.

So for eight years I meditated for two and a half hours or more every day. Still no visible inner signs of progress. Then I had that crisis where doubt finally was able to wedge itself firmly in my consciousness and I am now firmly in the agnostic satsangi group.

I still go to Satsang [meetings] occasionally hoping to be inspired, but am mostly just bored. I still have a lot of respect and admiration for Charan Singh and Gurinder Singh. They may not be who we thought they were, but they are damn good at pretending to be who we thought they were. Of course they have never claimed any powers for themselves. They have left that for our imaginations to fill in.

Sorry for this disjointed rambling but that is how my mind works these days. Thanks again for providing a forum for the not-so-bitter doubting satsangis. That ex-satsangi message board is a real downer.