Bono: I often wonder.

Distributed on Facebook by a group called Unfundamentalist Christians.

Bono. 

As an afterthought it occurs to me that I need to comment on this here. This journal is intended as a personal exploration of ideas, in a format I can access from anywhere I happen to be, a format that combines ideas and images, a format I can build on over time. I recognize it as a social platform, but am not using it as such. I don't much care if others see it, but it isn't aimed at anyone except myself. In the unlikely event that someone stumbles on my ramblings and evolving thoughts--Google specializes in unlikely events--it's important that this posting be seen in its context.

I'm exploring the entire and complex range of relationships between Religion, Belief and whatever we mean when we say Spirituality. I understand Bono's observation here, and understand further that many people have been hurt, devastated, by their encounters with religious life and religious people.

Yet looking at the widest possible picture I can conjure about the role of religion in our lives, I can't say I often wonder about its misuse. I simply see those abuses as a reality, a matter of human history.

Like everything on earth, religion can be misused and used for abuse.

No one doubts the importance of water for life. Do we condemn it because it can do unfathomable damage in a flood or tornado, or is used as a coercive instrument in waterboarding?

The forces of nature are powerful beyond imagination. Vast social forces can push the limits of human control. The human genius for horror knows no bounds.

I share Bono's sympathies here in order to recognize the history of abuse of religion. As time goes along I'll continue to share like thoughts. It's an ugly reality.

Sustaining Belief: Confirmation Bias.

Now we move into a bit of technical area, with a good description of the way science is studying how belief systems are maintained. At first glimpse it seems science is adding only labels to the conversation, but on deeper thought what these labels signify is that there is a body of careful study going on in the field. From that it's probably fair to say that over the years there's been some good understanding developed of the dynamics and the parameters involved.

Michael Eades is a physician whose writings I have followed for 15 years or more, an earlier adopter and advocate of the notion that carbohydrates are problematic in human nutrition. "Early adopter" in a field like this is a polite way of saying Rebel and Damned Proud of It, and I felt fortunate to find his carefully reasoned, well-documented and human-friendly writing when I did. I continue to subscribe to his blog, where he writes about Nutritional science and anything else that strikes my fancy. I am not, by the way, happy to see that he has followed the medical model of hawking supplements over the internet. Talk about cheesy.

The term researchers have come to use for selective attention and validation in maintaining belief systems is Confirmation Bias. Dr Eades:

To show how the confirmation bias is built brick by brick, let us turn to politics.
[Let's] Assume we come to politics a tabula rasa, starting at zero.
Imagine yourself at the very top of the pyramid of knowledge and belief. Right at the apex, there is no knowledge or belief. You are a political newborn, so to speak.
At the base of the pyramid, the knowledge level is deep and wide. On the right side of the base is where all the conservative ideals, knowledge, and insights lie. On the left side live the liberal ones.
When you start at the top, you get tipped down one side or another. Maybe it’s a column you read, or a talking head on TV, or a parent, teacher, or friend. Doesn’t really matter, but somehow you get tipped to one side or the other and start rolling down that side of the pyramid, gathering ideology as you go.

You establish your rudimentary political views, and, as you start rolling down, you read more, you engage in discussion, you watch cable channels that mirror your views, and you, in general, become more entrenched in your ideology. All the way down you continue to confirm your ever-growing bias. Once you have reached the bottom, you have marinated so long in your particular political sauce that you can’t possibly understand how anyone could not believe the same way you do. In fact, you are certain that anyone who doesn’t is a completely misguided idiot.
It never occurs to you that others may have tipped and rolled down the other side of the pyramid. They, too, have reached their side of the bottom and are completely infused with the righteousness of their own beliefs and cannot imagine how someone could be so stupid as to believe any differently.
What is even worse is that many of us who have rolled down our own side of the pyramid refuse to even read anything written by one who has rolled down the other side. You don’t want to learn anything that might throw you into cognitive dissonance, so you renounce it as trash, unworthy of your reading, and move on. We’ve all done this at some time or other.
We work hard never to let opposing views penetrate our consciousness in an effort to avoid the unpleasant sensation of cognitive dissonance. The confirmation bias is the tool we use.

If I were writing this I'd eliminate the implication that somehow this is a problem process. He writes this way because he's had an unpleasant encounter with a correspondent who exhibited arrogant confirmation bias.

He is also an important contributor in a field that has been simply overrun with what appears to be an abuse of a belief system for political and financial gain, the field of human nutrition.

But I hasten to add that belief systems represent an invaluable process that enables us to maintain our sense of balance and direction in a chaotic world.

Our beliefs are the operating system of the psychic and spiritual gyroscope. They keep us going even in the face of challenges.


I'll finish this posting with a quote that takes us back to Religion. Belief. Cosmos.

Ralph Waldo Emerson: From Religion to Spirit.

Gracie Binoya has captured the spirit of the Pasque Flower, the mountain harbinger of Spring.

As I watch my family, my friends, my neighbors in this community bask in the glory of springtime in the Rocky Mountains, I know there is a true awakening happening on this Easter day.

In our little Presbyterian Community Church we spent Saturday evening preparing for a pancake feed and potluck for the morning. Anticipating one of the two largest days of attendance of the year--Christmas is the leading contender--we know that at some level, even the most cynical mountain resident recognizes the symbolic, archetypal power of this unique Christian holiday (Holy Day).





Absorbing the pull of the cycles of Nature, I find my thoughts turning--with no conscious will from me--to the spiritual gravity of these earth forces. Last year I found a jewel of a book, illustrated with watercolor paintings, at the Yellowstone Association bookstore in Jackson Hole. The Laws of Nature: Excerpts from the Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson, edited by Walt MacLaughlin.

Imagine my surprise to see the opening paragraphs. 

          Emerson studied divinity at Harvard College. In 1829, he became pastor of the Second Church in Boston. He married the young, beautiful Ellen Tucker a few months later, and lived for two years what appeared to be a perfectly normal life. Then Ellen died of tuberculosis. That tragic event sparked a spiritual crisis in Emerson. An ember that had been smoldering within him since his college days suddenly burst into flame. And before another year passed, Emerson was rethinking his vocation, his beliefs, everything.
          In the summer of 1832...he retreated into the White Mountains of New Hampshire to collect his thoughts. When he returned to Boston, he resigned his ministry.

We know of course that Ralph Waldo Emerson went on to become a Naturalist, a philosopher, a leading voice in the understanding of the transcendental potential of encounters with the natural world.





I stop and I pause, in seeing these words so clearly and simply spoken. He left his vocation in the ministry to pursue a spiritual awakening.

Is there a more potent example of the distance between the two worlds?

Repeating a Theme: Beauty as Theology.

March 2013.

The nature of blog writing is episodic.

The theme of this particular blog is spelled out in the name. Religion. Belief. Cosmos. Within the limits of that broad theme, I write following no preconceived outline. Yet what emerges does have something of a flow, following whatever it is that has struck a resonant chord within me these days.

My thoughts weave around the various aisles of thought in these general areas, sometimes influenced by a particular reading I've encountered, sometimes by a dream or a personal encounter or a vision that smacks me in the head.

Leaving Estes Park.

Despite the wandering, my deepest feeling these days is that the notion I'm exploring is the experience of Beauty as a source of spiritual nurturance and nourishment.

Within that context I've been looking generally at the differences between the Roman Catholic and the Protestant Christian religions, pondering whether the Catholic traditions don't aim more at the sublime, at least in intention, than the Protestant, which are explicitly and aggressively bounded by the cognitive and intellectual.

Glenfinnan Viaduct, Scotland.

More specifically, in recent writings I'm returning to the profound and preverbal connection I've long felt for well-designed physical spaces--landscapes, engineered structures, buildings. And that building form that captures the essence of all spirituality, the Cathedral.

Most closely identified with the Catholic tradition, the Cathedral finds its home in those Protestant religions most closely associated with liturgical practice: the Church of England, or as it is known in the United States, the Episcopal Church, and the Lutheran Church.

Ferrell Jenkins tells the story of the Church at Wittenburg.

The irony doesn't escape me that the church named after the instigator of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther, is one of the churches most closely aligned with religious practices most similar to those of Catholicism. Nor is it incidental that the doors on which Fr Luther chose to post his 95 Theses were magnificent. (Beauty is not always simple and inexpensive.)

This blog entry occurred to me as a helpful reminder to myself and to any prospective reader who might wander this way: there are themes afoot here.

The Church Cemetery.

We seem to understand instinctively that there is some connection between church and the milestones of life, from birth to christening to marriage to death.

Even a cursory knowledge of the records available to the genealogist reveals an awareness of the availability and the reliability of church records for family historians.

Which is to say, the church is one of the important human institutions that ties us to our past, links our generations, tells our family stories. At least it has been, until recent times. What is replacing it?

More than that, the cumulative effect is that at least in the West the church tells the story of our human family.

The Mission, a film of Beauty and Theology.

This is an epic film, unsurpassed cinematography, archetypal musical themes, powerfully charismatic people, in a slice of life telling of the exploration, exploitation and settling of the Americas by the Europeans.
















I never stopped to think that in this film, the Mission undertaken in the middle of the wildest of South American forests was the building of a cathedral. With the resources and the immense complexity of such an undertaking amidst a native population, clearly this was seen as the essential task of missionary work.



This was the pattern for the Catholic Church throughout much of its history, as I understand it. Preaching the gospel as they understood it took place within the context of the building of a cathedral. The cathedral was all-important. Historic maps of Italy in the Vatican Museum show scattered hilltop villages, each with its own cathedral at its center.

In Protestantism the place of worship may be an abandoned warehouse, a neighbor's house, a storefront. Simplicity and humility are the order of the day. My little mountain church is typical, Nederland Community Presbyterian Church.



In the world of the Catholic Church the place of worship is the very center of the community life, grand and eloquent in its statement, built for the ages as a tribute to a powerful God. In even the simplest of small-town church buildings, architectural and aesthetic beauty are primary.

In the world of Protestantism, the worship space is incidental. Is it correct to say that in the world of Catholicism the cathedral is of prime importance?


With changing membership and attendance patterns in Protestantism, I've been present in conversations, serious considerations, about the advisability of maintaining large (read: expensive) church facilities. Something important is being omitted in these conversations.

Tiny beauty.

Here's yet another example of a Truth hiding in plain sight.

Until being introduced to the concept of Beauty as Theology, I never stopped to think about the differences between Catholic and Protestant places of worship.

Especially evident in Italy, where even the smallest towns are centered around cathedrals, in America the earliest settlements by missionary priests were marked by the building of community jewels.

Those precious architectural masterpieces continue to inspire. And unlike most American architecture that disintegrates with age, these Places remain as inspiring today as the day the were built. The loving craftsmanship of construction has carried over to deep dedication across generations to careful and passionate caretaking.

In recent travels through southern Colorado, my son and his family stopped to enjoy the splendor of this tiny Catholic Church in Pagosa Springs.

Ego Knows.

Belief: Holding steady in a storm.

A belief system serves an essential purpose, supporting our efforts at going in a purposeful direction in the midst of life's storms. It's designed to withstand buffeting, and we can thank God for that. Every system has its gyroscope. In the human psychic system, that is the set of interlocking, interacting beliefs.

A belief is a working hypothesis, a conclusion based on experience to this point in time. We can adopt an As If attitude to use as a guide for planning and anticipating, yet still stay open to new learning as experiences continue to come in. In which case we adopt new beliefs to use in navigation.

Because the terrain we are navigating is ever-emerging, our belief system requires calibration, maintenance and systematic recalibration. It becomes useless and dangerous when it is outmoded, incomplete, improperly set.

There may be one True North, but a useful navigation system includes a growing and evolving map of the local terrain as well as of the far destinations.

Let your Light so shine.

The Supreme, impersonal and transcendental Self shines through the particular, personal, individual self in a beautiful and unique way. It is like the sun shining through a particular piece of stained glass. Each one glows and transmits the light of the sun like no other can possibly ever do.

Francis Bennett

April 2014