You and JP? Oh yes! Taking this in FULLY and will re-read again this weekend to savor the blending of humor and genius. We'd damn well better acknowledge the powerful yearnings/cravings of the "god shaped hole in our hearts" before it's too late...I'm a pragmatic optimist AND our species IS on the edge. THANK you Jamie for sharing your brilliant poly-theoretical mind...with us.
Thousands of years spent “debating” which belief system is true, which belief works the best for a human wanting to win at life, or win at spirituality, so little time, if any, spent asking “is this belief system compatible with life on earth, with how earth works, and with the rest of life on earth?”
Seems most religions and modern spirituality, including the new age and personal development industry, are coming only from, or mostly from, the human centered or human supremacist paradigm. Shaping all of life on earth to coincide with these beliefs. That’s a problem, or maybe even the root of our collective predicament. Make all of earth in the image of a god that man made.
Also kinda seems like most religions helped craft neoliberal economic theory, and it seems like most of the new age, as well as the mega church industry, is just neoliberal economic theory. So these strange bedfellows of new age people, or personal developers, signing up as born-again fundie Christian’s, isn’t strange at all, at root it’s the same exact paradigm. Throw in some confusingly muddled concepts extracted from the greater context of non-dualist philosophies, and it’s a sociopathic nightmare (i.e. I AM GOD therefore can manifest whatever I want, being Source of all!)
Beliefs are certainly important to have for sure, but what if those beliefs aren’t compatible with the rest of our family of life? Beliefs never just stay inside our heads. That’s catastrophe in the making when it’s billions of people believing foggy things and then creating and enforcing those ideas on all the rest of life.
As for spiritual experiences that accompany these beliefs, personally I see them as real, but those beliefs and identities are powerful filters that translate those experiences of Spirit and nature into more of the same human supremacy.
Wish this was openly discussed way way more than it is, so thanks for cracking it open so frequently, Jamie.
Also, does JP ever mention bonobos? Honestly don’t know. Seems he’s got a thing for basing his lifestyle system or philosophy on male adolescent chimps, not just lobsters. Does he ever hang out with Dr Jane Goodall for some “outside the echo chamber” time? Or would he consider a source like, the Max Planck Institute, for example, as anything other than liberal or ungodly propaganda (good ongoing research there about our OTHER closest relative, bonobos, who sure do like to get sexy but that’s still only part of their story, too)
As for the inaccurate stories our popular culture spreads about nature, about how nature is, making the *whole story* about nature, and therefore humans, just about male hierarchy, dominance, and predation, it would be fun for some influencers to spend a few years in the bush working with guides and trackers and indigenous people. Some funny stories from safari guide James Hendry about tourists complaining over how boring the wildlife turned out to be, how little killing and sex actually was going on out there in the wild. Not to mention that it’s the herbivores, matriarchal in their hierarchy, too! that are the most dangerous on-foot but also in-vehicle (ellies and buffaloes)
Pop culture or even “dominant culture” beliefs about nature are inaccurate at best, and yet the entire world has been forced and controlled to try and resemble those overly reductionist, human centered stories.
for sure hyper-indvidualistic McSpirituality, including neutered versions of Asian contemplative traditions, all get rolled up/co-opted really easily by neoliberal market forces. The "inward turn" and "change comes from within" often deny social responsibility and political agency
Hi Jamie, happy Caturday. Thanks for this space that offers little moments of catharsis, I’m sure you know it’s rare.
I realize these things aren’t going to get better, overall. I’d like to reach a point where I’m genuinely no longer angry about the spiritual industry’s fuckery. But then I see yet another thoughtfluencer, making millions and possibly influencing billions, with zero eco-literacy, toss out more sexy ideas about “evolution”, with seemingly no awareness of what adaptation even is on earth. And then it seems almost no one wants to learn anything about ecology, or, if they’re ultra “science” allergic, commit to lifelong learning (and unlearning!) within earth-centered wisdom traditions in their fullest context (not just skimming the sage and drumming off the top)
Sigh. Enjoy this first day of autumn. We gotta be with our beloveds 🌎
Can confirm, this article does a great job. I was raised in the fundie born again church (big part of why I’m passionate about shitty spirituality being at the root of our predicament) and literally- it was an actual *recovery* from that brainwashing, an actual restoration and reclaiming of being a human animal here and now, on Earth. I chose to attend private Christian high school, mostly to escape bullying and threats of sexual violence in public school, but also I was genuinely devoted to spirit and end times prophecy, above all. Then attended a private Christian college for a year before beginning the slow awakening to what a hyprocritical, delusional, misogynistic etc etc racket it all was, and how very little it had to do with the teachings of Yeshua. One class was about examining original Aramaic texts of Jesus’ teachings and I was comparing that with what was sold in the Jumbotron churches and it was mind blowing. Also began to see that dominionists had no sense of actual stewardship, just a lot of lip service during sermons or spoken over a meal (perhaps of venison- Christian hunters are some of the most hypocritical people on the planet)
Not to mention actual spiritual abuse. The list of sordid nastiness goes on. These people, or many of them, are mentally ill and downright malignant, period. There is no difference between church dynamics and those of abusive relationships. I see personality disorders on proud display, not praise for creator’s creation (and by what logic would creator be utterly divorced from creation such that it’s now gross sinful and deserving of destruction? Zero logic there, all laughable and toxic delusion)
If there was a Yeshua Ben Joseph, or a few people like that, or no one at all- those teachings are simple, common sense wisdom, and they are earthy ASFFFFF. Dude lived a life pretty much identical to a traditional healer (sometimes called a ‘shaman’ but not remotely resembling the Instagram shitshow “shaman”)
This is definitely what collapse looks like, people heading towards authoritarian certainty and a promise of escaping the consequences of the mess THEY caused.
Glad to see some of these young evangelicals come out of the cult fog and try to rejoin the family of life.
Ps- for anyone reading this, Rex Wyler, one of the OG founders of Greenpeace, wrote a book about the teachings of Yeshua, it’s a good palate and soul cleanser for anyone wanting to reclaim those teachings apart from the machine of utter annihilation they’ve been co-opted for.
“Because what we’re really experiencing is a collapse in shared meaning itself.”
In the final pages of his book, The Mass Psychology of Fascism, Wilhelm Reich offered, “in the final analysis, the German people knew they were in league with the devil, but Hitler provided them with a sense of shared identity and purpose, which proved preferable to an otherwise meaningless existence.”
Jamie: two things. 1. May I recommend “The Phantom God: What Neuroscience Reveals about the Compulsion to Believe” by John C. Wathey? It goes a long way in suggesting how our neo-natal physiology pre-disposes us to the construction of belief in “larger” forces or beings. 2. While I understand the point that Jonathan Haidt is attempting to make, I would suggest that the human propensity to “believing in gods and worshipping” is not necessarily the same thing as “having a sense of the sacred”. I attribute the conflation of these two things to the influence of a particular construct, a specific cultural narrative that has infected/influenced much of human theology throughout the last several millennia. From the viewpoint of this vertical hierarchy, gods, worship and the sacred are one, indistinguishable from and inevitable to each other. Therefore, to abandon one predicates the inescapable loss of the other. I am not certain this is true. I suggest that the popular headlong rush back into the arms of the Church Fathers (compassionate and tolerant bunch that they are) is generated at least in part by the belief that you can only be in relationship with the sacred if you are serving “gods” and appropriately worshipping them. And for the record, this is equally true about the burgeoning cult of the Divine Feminine.
Excellent, especially your point that there doesn't seem to be any alternatives that can get any traction (previous comment ), including the Metamodern project.
While I can appreciate your framing, you leave us with no solutions. I pointed out, on one of your previous posts, the model of Sarvodaya Shramadana, a 65 year old project from Sri Lanka that IS an on the ground solution - and has inspired me in the West.
Not to be a broken record, but I reached out before to dialogue about that with you. I have worked for more than 40 years on practical applications of what could be called a Trans-Religious on-the-ground community network that I call Symbiotic Culture.
The religious, spiritual but not religious, and secular folks all agree upon the importance of universal Virtues like sharing, generosity, service, compassion, etc. as part of building community. Combining shared virtues and common community needs such as local food, water, energy, environment, arts and culture is the basis for building popular, local community movements. It has worked and it is working. It is just time to make it real.
Here are two recent posts:
The De-Platforming of God (okay, that's provocative)
What strikes me about the lurching toward an external structure for transcendence and grounding is that the keyword is "external". It IS possible for an individual to establish a relationship--a richly rewarding way to fill that God-shaped hole--to something greater than themself. But it's not easy. It takes focus, and practice, and a significant effort to figure things out, more or less alone (though it's possible albeit not easy to find like-minded others to navigate those waters with). What you're highlighting is the appeal of that outside structure, that source of defining narrative, and a prepackaged collection of fellow travelers; being told what to do, in other words.
I live in Reno Tahoe. If any reader is interested, here's my company: www.RegenesisReno.com/aboutus. I'm a Burner, yet we believe strongly massive change is possible through an alliance combining our evangelical/born-again neighbors and our Spiritual, But Not Religious (SBNRs). We believe in cocreating new communities in Reno Tahoe as the Exponential Twenties unfold. If any readers are interested, please DM me.
Your headline grabbed my attention and I couldn't resist reading this piece even though I'm deep in packing my home into boxes to move next week. I have an ongoing obsession with understanding religion and religiosity. Several of Karen Armstrong's books are in said boxes waiting for their new home along with a copy of Jeff Sharlet's 2008 book The Family. In the run up to the 2016 election, I had an intution bsed on my mom's weird beliefs and behavior that there was a dark link between American Fundamentalism and right wing American Catholicism, so I dug around and learned enough to scare myself. It was more than I imagined. I was raised Catholic, spent 11 years in Catholic school and my mother and step-father (now deceased) were members of both the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre and the Order of Malta, not Opus Dei, but not that far off. When they were pre-school age, my daughter and neice found klan resembling robes in a closet at their house and even at their age, they knew there was something weird about them and showed them to my sister and me.
I'm a believer... not affiliated with a religion now, but I have a spiritual community and love ritual and prayer. In any case, the reason for my comment is that it seems to me that the conversion trend is about looking for community with something deep and meaningful at the heart. One of the problems however is that this seems for many to quickly become a kind of fervent zealotry which reveals only a lack of faith and an ancient need for power and control - and then, in brief, we end up with a bunch of nutjobs on the Supreme Court. (I can't read the NY Mag piece due to paywall). If people didn't just join the church, but did so with a humble intent to find a God they could surrender to rather than something "right" that they could then stand on and preach about, it would be different, but that seems to be the rare human.
When you add quantum entanglement to the disparate attempts to understand "spiritual" phenomena it seems there are unlimited depths that have yet to be explored and explained. Humans on the other hand have only the natural evolutionary psychology that evolved 200,000 years ago. There is a pushback against hypermodernism the result of culture evolving faster than biology, too fast for many to appreciate or comprehend. If there is a god like cosmic consciousness it is encouraging preparation for the collapse of neo-liberal modernist conservative mindset.
Haha, I thought you might say that! I LOVE the book and recommend it to everyone I know. It's literally my 'about you' on my FB profile :) I've loaned it to a friend and she loves it.
We've been trying to build a community, called the Unchurch, but it's not growing. They're all Burners. So they've been doing drugs and being creative for years, but they have no idea how to build community, create rituals or do any of the real work.
I might try to restart Sunday Assembly in my city. They at least were coming from a Church background and have a great formula.
But I think it's too late for all of that anyway. We need a Revolution. Inequality is growing and governments have no plans to change that.
It's that frame that Schmachtenberger uses, from Marvin Harris- Infrastructure, Social Structure, Superstructure. We have to have a Superstructure. Left Hemispheric Rationalism is imporant, but has limits- we hunger for the Transcendent.
Two important words: “culture” and emerging “zeitgeist”. I would propose that it is not a religious problem but rather a cultural problem as I would also propose that religion is in service to culture. Different worldviews, perspectives, grand narratives, et voila. And it all emerges within co-creation. JBP no longer makes the sense that he did when bounding into fame, as he and his base have co-created and emerged to become a new fringe establishment to culture war with the establishment they rile against. I would propose that meaning is created, it is not fundamental or absolute. Yet meaning is lost in self-absorption and self-service. Define your sacred and recognized that which is greater than the little self and then sacrifice being in service. That is what is to be deciphered. Peace Bro. And I vibe with your perspective, mind and turn of phrase! 🤜
I grew up in "Weird Christianity." A group of boomers got dissatisfied with the Campus Crusade evangelical experience, formed the Evangelical Orthodox Church and eventually became part of the Antiochian Orthodox Church. They turned into monasticism, long and daily liturgical worship, icons, incense, veils and untrimmed beards, mysticism, hierarchical obedience, Byzantium, onion dome buildings, vestments and cassocks, prayer ropes, Fr. Seraphim Rose and the St. Herman Brotherhood (if you know, you know), and on and on and on. All those things that people came up with and developed were taught to my generation as revelations from God which he offered us to separate ourselves from the world and unite us to him. Pretending that beliefs and practices from older traditions are divine gifts didn't stand up to the most basic questions and doubts from me and many of my peers. Making Christendom Great Again is a false hope, a false God.
Those boomers- and whatever you want to call the following generations- should stay off Highway 61 and take Van Morrison's song Don't Look Back for a spin on their turntables: "Don't look back to the days of yesteryear, You cannot live on in the past, Don't look back." And keep Jordan Petersen off that playlist. As far as I can tell, he doesn't practice or believe any traditional religion but believes that other people should, so that the world will be organized in a way that satisfies him. To use the lobster analogy, he's fine with the rest of us being in the pot while the water comes to a boil, meanwhile he gets to swim in the vastness of the ocean and explore all life has to offer.
Joe Rogan, Russell Brand, and Alex Jones? That's an unholy Trinity whose core teaching seems to be: "I'm gonna say and do whatever the fuck I want and people must like it because they are giving me attention and money." Makes Hillsong- with its celebrities and scandals- and megachurches- with their money and plastic Joel Osteen positivity- seem like bastions of good Christian normality.
Let's drop the false binary: there's more to life than Priests or Prozac. Life isn't a choice between Dogma and Despair. How about wonder and fellowship? I know I experienced the sense of awe watching the sunlight glimmer on the Napa River yesterday. I communed with my fellow bike racers as we pushed each other physically in a Cyclocross race and shared the joy of effort afterwards. All that yesterday without having to get my mind spun up with spiritual warfare or would down with Klonopin. Religion or bust? Come on, we can find meaning without having to impose false certainty.
Do you see any potential for a science/information theory based teleology, as described by thinkers like Bobby Azarian, to fill the ‘god shaped hole’? (Or a cosmo erotic humanist narrative of first values for that matter?)
I suppose they both lack the community and ritual that give these traditions sticking power
Outstanding essay and analysis. I graduated from a United Methodist divinity school in 2001. How the world has changed. My feeling is that religion and spirituality are a natural response to the randomness of human life. What you are seeing in these religious “movements “ is a deep rooted discomfort and a yearning for meaning. Are some weird? Of course. Are some potentially dangerous. They could be.
However, their possible influence is really minor due to the dominance of traditional conservative evangelical Christianity in the culture and politics of the United States. You can have “ a thousand points of light”, but the monolith remains. And it is dangerous to a rational and peaceful civic life.
And then there are these beautiful humans who rise asking for a free Palestine, free Congo, free Sudan (ie the students encampments) and opening their eyes to the maliciousness of this corrupted system - the real God most Americans are worshipping.
You and JP? Oh yes! Taking this in FULLY and will re-read again this weekend to savor the blending of humor and genius. We'd damn well better acknowledge the powerful yearnings/cravings of the "god shaped hole in our hearts" before it's too late...I'm a pragmatic optimist AND our species IS on the edge. THANK you Jamie for sharing your brilliant poly-theoretical mind...with us.
Thousands of years spent “debating” which belief system is true, which belief works the best for a human wanting to win at life, or win at spirituality, so little time, if any, spent asking “is this belief system compatible with life on earth, with how earth works, and with the rest of life on earth?”
Seems most religions and modern spirituality, including the new age and personal development industry, are coming only from, or mostly from, the human centered or human supremacist paradigm. Shaping all of life on earth to coincide with these beliefs. That’s a problem, or maybe even the root of our collective predicament. Make all of earth in the image of a god that man made.
Also kinda seems like most religions helped craft neoliberal economic theory, and it seems like most of the new age, as well as the mega church industry, is just neoliberal economic theory. So these strange bedfellows of new age people, or personal developers, signing up as born-again fundie Christian’s, isn’t strange at all, at root it’s the same exact paradigm. Throw in some confusingly muddled concepts extracted from the greater context of non-dualist philosophies, and it’s a sociopathic nightmare (i.e. I AM GOD therefore can manifest whatever I want, being Source of all!)
Beliefs are certainly important to have for sure, but what if those beliefs aren’t compatible with the rest of our family of life? Beliefs never just stay inside our heads. That’s catastrophe in the making when it’s billions of people believing foggy things and then creating and enforcing those ideas on all the rest of life.
As for spiritual experiences that accompany these beliefs, personally I see them as real, but those beliefs and identities are powerful filters that translate those experiences of Spirit and nature into more of the same human supremacy.
Wish this was openly discussed way way more than it is, so thanks for cracking it open so frequently, Jamie.
Also, does JP ever mention bonobos? Honestly don’t know. Seems he’s got a thing for basing his lifestyle system or philosophy on male adolescent chimps, not just lobsters. Does he ever hang out with Dr Jane Goodall for some “outside the echo chamber” time? Or would he consider a source like, the Max Planck Institute, for example, as anything other than liberal or ungodly propaganda (good ongoing research there about our OTHER closest relative, bonobos, who sure do like to get sexy but that’s still only part of their story, too)
As for the inaccurate stories our popular culture spreads about nature, about how nature is, making the *whole story* about nature, and therefore humans, just about male hierarchy, dominance, and predation, it would be fun for some influencers to spend a few years in the bush working with guides and trackers and indigenous people. Some funny stories from safari guide James Hendry about tourists complaining over how boring the wildlife turned out to be, how little killing and sex actually was going on out there in the wild. Not to mention that it’s the herbivores, matriarchal in their hierarchy, too! that are the most dangerous on-foot but also in-vehicle (ellies and buffaloes)
Pop culture or even “dominant culture” beliefs about nature are inaccurate at best, and yet the entire world has been forced and controlled to try and resemble those overly reductionist, human centered stories.
for sure hyper-indvidualistic McSpirituality, including neutered versions of Asian contemplative traditions, all get rolled up/co-opted really easily by neoliberal market forces. The "inward turn" and "change comes from within" often deny social responsibility and political agency
Hi Jamie, happy Caturday. Thanks for this space that offers little moments of catharsis, I’m sure you know it’s rare.
I realize these things aren’t going to get better, overall. I’d like to reach a point where I’m genuinely no longer angry about the spiritual industry’s fuckery. But then I see yet another thoughtfluencer, making millions and possibly influencing billions, with zero eco-literacy, toss out more sexy ideas about “evolution”, with seemingly no awareness of what adaptation even is on earth. And then it seems almost no one wants to learn anything about ecology, or, if they’re ultra “science” allergic, commit to lifelong learning (and unlearning!) within earth-centered wisdom traditions in their fullest context (not just skimming the sage and drumming off the top)
Sigh. Enjoy this first day of autumn. We gotta be with our beloveds 🌎
check this article on young evangelicals getting environmentalism. teases apart just how whacked the US current God,Guns, Guts, (plus Drill Baby Drill) axis is, and how little it has to do with Christian notions of stewardship https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/young-evangelical-climate-change-activists-1144370/
Can confirm, this article does a great job. I was raised in the fundie born again church (big part of why I’m passionate about shitty spirituality being at the root of our predicament) and literally- it was an actual *recovery* from that brainwashing, an actual restoration and reclaiming of being a human animal here and now, on Earth. I chose to attend private Christian high school, mostly to escape bullying and threats of sexual violence in public school, but also I was genuinely devoted to spirit and end times prophecy, above all. Then attended a private Christian college for a year before beginning the slow awakening to what a hyprocritical, delusional, misogynistic etc etc racket it all was, and how very little it had to do with the teachings of Yeshua. One class was about examining original Aramaic texts of Jesus’ teachings and I was comparing that with what was sold in the Jumbotron churches and it was mind blowing. Also began to see that dominionists had no sense of actual stewardship, just a lot of lip service during sermons or spoken over a meal (perhaps of venison- Christian hunters are some of the most hypocritical people on the planet)
Not to mention actual spiritual abuse. The list of sordid nastiness goes on. These people, or many of them, are mentally ill and downright malignant, period. There is no difference between church dynamics and those of abusive relationships. I see personality disorders on proud display, not praise for creator’s creation (and by what logic would creator be utterly divorced from creation such that it’s now gross sinful and deserving of destruction? Zero logic there, all laughable and toxic delusion)
If there was a Yeshua Ben Joseph, or a few people like that, or no one at all- those teachings are simple, common sense wisdom, and they are earthy ASFFFFF. Dude lived a life pretty much identical to a traditional healer (sometimes called a ‘shaman’ but not remotely resembling the Instagram shitshow “shaman”)
This is definitely what collapse looks like, people heading towards authoritarian certainty and a promise of escaping the consequences of the mess THEY caused.
Glad to see some of these young evangelicals come out of the cult fog and try to rejoin the family of life.
Bless your buttons J!
Ps- for anyone reading this, Rex Wyler, one of the OG founders of Greenpeace, wrote a book about the teachings of Yeshua, it’s a good palate and soul cleanser for anyone wanting to reclaim those teachings apart from the machine of utter annihilation they’ve been co-opted for.
Oh! And Carolyn Baker, a Grand Dame of doomer acceptance, wrote a book about the rise of christo-fascism in this time of collapse. Yay! 🙌
Damn Jamie. This is a mic drop. 🎤
“Because what we’re really experiencing is a collapse in shared meaning itself.”
In the final pages of his book, The Mass Psychology of Fascism, Wilhelm Reich offered, “in the final analysis, the German people knew they were in league with the devil, but Hitler provided them with a sense of shared identity and purpose, which proved preferable to an otherwise meaningless existence.”
Jamie: two things. 1. May I recommend “The Phantom God: What Neuroscience Reveals about the Compulsion to Believe” by John C. Wathey? It goes a long way in suggesting how our neo-natal physiology pre-disposes us to the construction of belief in “larger” forces or beings. 2. While I understand the point that Jonathan Haidt is attempting to make, I would suggest that the human propensity to “believing in gods and worshipping” is not necessarily the same thing as “having a sense of the sacred”. I attribute the conflation of these two things to the influence of a particular construct, a specific cultural narrative that has infected/influenced much of human theology throughout the last several millennia. From the viewpoint of this vertical hierarchy, gods, worship and the sacred are one, indistinguishable from and inevitable to each other. Therefore, to abandon one predicates the inescapable loss of the other. I am not certain this is true. I suggest that the popular headlong rush back into the arms of the Church Fathers (compassionate and tolerant bunch that they are) is generated at least in part by the belief that you can only be in relationship with the sacred if you are serving “gods” and appropriately worshipping them. And for the record, this is equally true about the burgeoning cult of the Divine Feminine.
Nice points Thx for writing!
Excellent, especially your point that there doesn't seem to be any alternatives that can get any traction (previous comment ), including the Metamodern project.
While I can appreciate your framing, you leave us with no solutions. I pointed out, on one of your previous posts, the model of Sarvodaya Shramadana, a 65 year old project from Sri Lanka that IS an on the ground solution - and has inspired me in the West.
Not to be a broken record, but I reached out before to dialogue about that with you. I have worked for more than 40 years on practical applications of what could be called a Trans-Religious on-the-ground community network that I call Symbiotic Culture.
The religious, spiritual but not religious, and secular folks all agree upon the importance of universal Virtues like sharing, generosity, service, compassion, etc. as part of building community. Combining shared virtues and common community needs such as local food, water, energy, environment, arts and culture is the basis for building popular, local community movements. It has worked and it is working. It is just time to make it real.
Here are two recent posts:
The De-Platforming of God (okay, that's provocative)
https://richardflyer.substack.com/p/seeking-the-holy-grail-of-community-b84
Symbiotic Circles as a "Cultural Recovery" group - this is the Trans religious framing Is spoke about
https://richardflyer.substack.com/p/seeking-the-holy-grail-of-community-4c2
Have a great day!
What strikes me about the lurching toward an external structure for transcendence and grounding is that the keyword is "external". It IS possible for an individual to establish a relationship--a richly rewarding way to fill that God-shaped hole--to something greater than themself. But it's not easy. It takes focus, and practice, and a significant effort to figure things out, more or less alone (though it's possible albeit not easy to find like-minded others to navigate those waters with). What you're highlighting is the appeal of that outside structure, that source of defining narrative, and a prepackaged collection of fellow travelers; being told what to do, in other words.
I live in Reno Tahoe. If any reader is interested, here's my company: www.RegenesisReno.com/aboutus. I'm a Burner, yet we believe strongly massive change is possible through an alliance combining our evangelical/born-again neighbors and our Spiritual, But Not Religious (SBNRs). We believe in cocreating new communities in Reno Tahoe as the Exponential Twenties unfold. If any readers are interested, please DM me.
Gordon, it is great to see you here! Let's schedule that call we discussed.
Your headline grabbed my attention and I couldn't resist reading this piece even though I'm deep in packing my home into boxes to move next week. I have an ongoing obsession with understanding religion and religiosity. Several of Karen Armstrong's books are in said boxes waiting for their new home along with a copy of Jeff Sharlet's 2008 book The Family. In the run up to the 2016 election, I had an intution bsed on my mom's weird beliefs and behavior that there was a dark link between American Fundamentalism and right wing American Catholicism, so I dug around and learned enough to scare myself. It was more than I imagined. I was raised Catholic, spent 11 years in Catholic school and my mother and step-father (now deceased) were members of both the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre and the Order of Malta, not Opus Dei, but not that far off. When they were pre-school age, my daughter and neice found klan resembling robes in a closet at their house and even at their age, they knew there was something weird about them and showed them to my sister and me.
I'm a believer... not affiliated with a religion now, but I have a spiritual community and love ritual and prayer. In any case, the reason for my comment is that it seems to me that the conversion trend is about looking for community with something deep and meaningful at the heart. One of the problems however is that this seems for many to quickly become a kind of fervent zealotry which reveals only a lack of faith and an ancient need for power and control - and then, in brief, we end up with a bunch of nutjobs on the Supreme Court. (I can't read the NY Mag piece due to paywall). If people didn't just join the church, but did so with a humble intent to find a God they could surrender to rather than something "right" that they could then stand on and preach about, it would be different, but that seems to be the rare human.
Mud Wrestling with Shamans
I found Michael Winkelman (https://youtu.be/RpEc0L7RG3E?si=wwGq_WdKljUofejc) a while back and his take on the stoned ape hypothesis was enchanting.
Rupert Sheldrake (https://www.sheldrake.org/essays/fields-of-being-on-morphic-resonance) described consciousness as a morphic field in which familiarity bound sentient individuals in a psychic network.
I only recently found and read James McClenon (https://www.academia.edu/58479817/Shamanic_healing_human_evolution_and_the_origin_of_religion).
When you add quantum entanglement to the disparate attempts to understand "spiritual" phenomena it seems there are unlimited depths that have yet to be explored and explained. Humans on the other hand have only the natural evolutionary psychology that evolved 200,000 years ago. There is a pushback against hypermodernism the result of culture evolving faster than biology, too fast for many to appreciate or comprehend. If there is a god like cosmic consciousness it is encouraging preparation for the collapse of neo-liberal modernist conservative mindset.
Quick Question: NOW WHAT!?!??!?
wrote a book about that ; Recapture the Rapture is an open source tool kit for a bunch of on the ground experimentation
Haha, I thought you might say that! I LOVE the book and recommend it to everyone I know. It's literally my 'about you' on my FB profile :) I've loaned it to a friend and she loves it.
We've been trying to build a community, called the Unchurch, but it's not growing. They're all Burners. So they've been doing drugs and being creative for years, but they have no idea how to build community, create rituals or do any of the real work.
I might try to restart Sunday Assembly in my city. They at least were coming from a Church background and have a great formula.
But I think it's too late for all of that anyway. We need a Revolution. Inequality is growing and governments have no plans to change that.
What do you think needs to be done?
It's that frame that Schmachtenberger uses, from Marvin Harris- Infrastructure, Social Structure, Superstructure. We have to have a Superstructure. Left Hemispheric Rationalism is imporant, but has limits- we hunger for the Transcendent.
Two important words: “culture” and emerging “zeitgeist”. I would propose that it is not a religious problem but rather a cultural problem as I would also propose that religion is in service to culture. Different worldviews, perspectives, grand narratives, et voila. And it all emerges within co-creation. JBP no longer makes the sense that he did when bounding into fame, as he and his base have co-created and emerged to become a new fringe establishment to culture war with the establishment they rile against. I would propose that meaning is created, it is not fundamental or absolute. Yet meaning is lost in self-absorption and self-service. Define your sacred and recognized that which is greater than the little self and then sacrifice being in service. That is what is to be deciphered. Peace Bro. And I vibe with your perspective, mind and turn of phrase! 🤜
I grew up in "Weird Christianity." A group of boomers got dissatisfied with the Campus Crusade evangelical experience, formed the Evangelical Orthodox Church and eventually became part of the Antiochian Orthodox Church. They turned into monasticism, long and daily liturgical worship, icons, incense, veils and untrimmed beards, mysticism, hierarchical obedience, Byzantium, onion dome buildings, vestments and cassocks, prayer ropes, Fr. Seraphim Rose and the St. Herman Brotherhood (if you know, you know), and on and on and on. All those things that people came up with and developed were taught to my generation as revelations from God which he offered us to separate ourselves from the world and unite us to him. Pretending that beliefs and practices from older traditions are divine gifts didn't stand up to the most basic questions and doubts from me and many of my peers. Making Christendom Great Again is a false hope, a false God.
Those boomers- and whatever you want to call the following generations- should stay off Highway 61 and take Van Morrison's song Don't Look Back for a spin on their turntables: "Don't look back to the days of yesteryear, You cannot live on in the past, Don't look back." And keep Jordan Petersen off that playlist. As far as I can tell, he doesn't practice or believe any traditional religion but believes that other people should, so that the world will be organized in a way that satisfies him. To use the lobster analogy, he's fine with the rest of us being in the pot while the water comes to a boil, meanwhile he gets to swim in the vastness of the ocean and explore all life has to offer.
Joe Rogan, Russell Brand, and Alex Jones? That's an unholy Trinity whose core teaching seems to be: "I'm gonna say and do whatever the fuck I want and people must like it because they are giving me attention and money." Makes Hillsong- with its celebrities and scandals- and megachurches- with their money and plastic Joel Osteen positivity- seem like bastions of good Christian normality.
Let's drop the false binary: there's more to life than Priests or Prozac. Life isn't a choice between Dogma and Despair. How about wonder and fellowship? I know I experienced the sense of awe watching the sunlight glimmer on the Napa River yesterday. I communed with my fellow bike racers as we pushed each other physically in a Cyclocross race and shared the joy of effort afterwards. All that yesterday without having to get my mind spun up with spiritual warfare or would down with Klonopin. Religion or bust? Come on, we can find meaning without having to impose false certainty.
Do you see any potential for a science/information theory based teleology, as described by thinkers like Bobby Azarian, to fill the ‘god shaped hole’? (Or a cosmo erotic humanist narrative of first values for that matter?)
I suppose they both lack the community and ritual that give these traditions sticking power
Outstanding essay and analysis. I graduated from a United Methodist divinity school in 2001. How the world has changed. My feeling is that religion and spirituality are a natural response to the randomness of human life. What you are seeing in these religious “movements “ is a deep rooted discomfort and a yearning for meaning. Are some weird? Of course. Are some potentially dangerous. They could be.
However, their possible influence is really minor due to the dominance of traditional conservative evangelical Christianity in the culture and politics of the United States. You can have “ a thousand points of light”, but the monolith remains. And it is dangerous to a rational and peaceful civic life.
Fred Haddad
Greensboro NC
thanks fred! always appreciate folks from within the faith!
And then there are these beautiful humans who rise asking for a free Palestine, free Congo, free Sudan (ie the students encampments) and opening their eyes to the maliciousness of this corrupted system - the real God most Americans are worshipping.