So Thanksgiving? Also, a Poem · 4:05am Nov 28th, 2014
I didn't actually realize that it was thanksgiving. Don't celebrate it, here in the Philippines.
... That's all I have to say about Thanksgiving. So...
So! A few days ago - on a Monday - I wrote this:
I don’t remember yesterday’s sermon.
It was profound; it must have been
or the lady beside me would not have sobbed
and the many would not have said together, ‘Amen’.I remember having the wine and bread
or was it bread? A white circle
not even half my palm’s size, yet all around
people held the tasteless things like expensive china.Was the wine even wine? Or was it juice?
It tasted tangy, not holy
but the priest spoke of blood, Christ and communion
and the congregation said in synchrony, ‘Amen’.I don’t remember yesterday’s sermon.
It was profound; a girl found love
More deep than any person could give her -
God’s love. Redeemed, she checked into a rehab today.I don’t remember yesterday’s sermon.
I can’t bring myself to care, though.
One day, maybe, I’ll find His Truth
But today he’s absent. I content myself with life.Amen, I suppose.
What do you guys - well, Reese, I suppose - think?
I wrote this because I'm in a very much Catholic country (Philippines), in a very much Catholic University where my teachers pray before and after lessons, and I go to church every Sunday because of my catholic family, and I just don't get it.
"well, Reese, I suppose"
...I guess I am your primary replier, aren't I?
As for my thoughts, well, firstly, I'm not much of a one for poetry; while I can say that this one is straightforward enough to not be bothersome to me, I'm afraid that about all I can think of to say about the format is "Yes, this does indeed appear to be something of a poemish nature". Sorry.
Regarding the content, though, well, firstly, sorry about all of that (I don't care much for Christianity, so it sounds quite unpleasant to be so surrounded by it; even the area I'm currently living isn't that bad). Secondly, I curious about just what aspect or aspects you don't get. The poem seems to say something about that, I think, but I can't tell what.
2620669 Pretty much... Everything about it.
Why all of these rituals? Why all of this 'God is your only hope'? Why all of this illogical 'everyone is at fault' thing?
Why does it always seem to inspire so many people and change their lives or whatever?
Mind, I've got a very skewed perception - I'm in the Philippines, and I know only one atheist in my school besides myself. We had a drug talk and the speaker talked about how God changed his life after he took drugs. The philosophers and other staff, who appear at least somewhat intelligent (when we had a compulsory 'spirituality talk', they talked about always questioning God, and said 'what would you do if you knew that God did not exist?', before encouraging the questioning of God), are still really faithful about this stuff (the aforementioned questioning is meant to strengthen our faith).
I had a mini-debate with one of the speakers (had to stop three questions in because it was meant to be question time, not debate with bobbananville time), and what he said was that those who believe in God will find proof of God in everything; and those who don't will find proof of his nonexistence. So he's perfectly aware that there's no causal relationship between the existence of God and humanity's belief in him.
I just don't get anything of anything with religion (Catholicism mostly, but still religion). Why people believe it, the insane troll logic they use to support their beliefs, its prominence, pretty much everything.
And the weirdest part is how it inspires so many people - to stop taking Drugs, to find a home in their religious peers, to work together in apparent harmony. How it appears beneficial - not necessarily optimally beneficial, but I think (very much tentatively) that the world as it is would be better with religion than without it. And I don't understand why.
2620703
"Why all of these rituals?"
Group action binds people together, and ritualized action can bind them with people they've never even met before if the rituals are the same.
"Why all of this 'God is your only hope'?"
If the god of Abraham is the only good path, you'd better listen hard to and reward the guides on that path.
"Why all of this illogical 'everyone is at fault' thing?"
Universal applicability to humanity. If everyone is at fault, whether they know it or not, then the solution can be dispensed to everyone, even people who previously had no idea that they were "broken".
"Why does it always seem to inspire so many people and change their lives or whatever?"
Ah, now that one's a bit above my amateur psychology paygrade, I'm afraid. Sorry.
"Why people believe it, the insane troll logic they use to support their beliefs, its prominence, pretty much everything."
Some people genuinely find it comforting. Some people believe in the punishments for disobedience, and that outweighs any problems they may have with the rest. Some probably don't believe but are pretending to for social reasons. As for the logical justifications, if religion is part of your identity, it's often easier to shore up the support structure for that part a bit more than to rip it all out and completely rebuild the site.
"And I don't understand why."
Well, besides the aforementioned psychological group-binding… I'd say that it's because it's a worldview and way of binding people together that's intuitive for most people. It feels natural, which makes sense because it arose from our nature. If you're trying to keep you people together and at the same time understand a big, scary, dangerous world, you and they are probably going to be more comfortable with "a big man in the sky did it, he'll hit you if you're bad, and this is the Truth" than with "here's a mountain of textbooks on physics, here's one on psychology, social contract theory, and the philosophy of government, and all of these books are incomplete and almost certainly wrong in several places".
Is this helping at all?