Daily Archives: April 1, 2012

Great Work, Humanities, World History

Old Flames

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Spring                                                  Bee Hiving Moon

Masters of the Planet.  Started reading this book by Ian Tattersall, a paleoanthropologist.  A popular narrative about the evolution of the human species, Tattersall covers ground I learned well over 40 years ago when I majored in anthropology.   Trouble is, the ground has shifted a lot since I learned about australopithecus and paranthropus robustus and all the other hominids.

(Logo Institute of Human Origins)

When I finished my study,  the time line of human evolution ended about 3 million years ago.  Now it stretches to more like 7 million.  I learned bipedalism was a way to hunt for game and watch out for predators in the grasslands of the open savannah.  Hmmm.  Problem with that theory is that more recent finds show the first bipedalists hung out at the edge of forests and often went back into the forests.  Lots of experiences like that for me.

The book did relight those old flames, the reason I added anthropology to my already in place philosophy major.  Something about the human story, that long arc of time when we differentiated from the ancestor we held in common with the great apes.  How it happened.  What it means for us, now.  All the different disciplines necessary to be a good anthropologist:  ethnology, linguistics, archaeology, physical anthropology.  It was just so much fun.

I’d recommend this book, but I think calling it a popularization is misleading.  Tattersall is a good writer, clean prose, very logical, that’s all good, but the subject matter often veers into the apparently esoteric.  If this stuff fascinates you, it’s a good way to catch up the last 40 years or so.  And they have been amazing years in the project of learning our story.

Commentary on Religion, Faith and Spirituality, Great Wheel, Great Work, Humanities, Myth and Story, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

Religion Collapse Disorder

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Spring                                                           Bee Hiving Moon

Had a chance to speak to Groveland UU this morning, a regular event each year for me for over 20 years now.  Some years more, some years less, always congenial.

The Reimagining Faith piece (see Current Work at the top of this page) resonated in a way a bit different than I had intended.  The conversation was not so much about reimagining faith as it was about the falling away of religious life and what that might mean.  That’s where the discussion led.

The Reimagining Faith project needs to deliver a fuller account of what I call religion collapse disorder.  Better documentation of this accelerating trend in the US and more on its implications for individual and group spirituality will be important.  I had sort of skipped over that and gone directly to the challenge facing deinstitutionalized Americans.

Between now and the Summer Solstice I’m going to start investigating possible Asian resources.  I’ll look especially at Taoism, Shinto, and the ukiyo-e artist Hokusai who belonged to a Buddhist sect that worshiped the north star.

There is also more work to be done on tactics, or methods, of constructing a new faith and I think the constructive theology exercise lined out below will be fun and a good step in this direction.

Realized, with a bit of surprise, that I’ve spent a lot of my life putting myself in front of people:  preaching, organizing, acting, touring, writing.  Never thought of it all like that before and it made me wonder what drives it.  Don’t know.

Commentary on Religion, Faith and Spirituality

What Is Your Core Religious Conviction?

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Spring                                                              Bee Hiving Moon

Challenge to a seminary class in constructive theology.  Sounds fun.  Think I’ll do it.  Not right now because I have to go give my presentation on Reimagining Faith.

“In 3500 words or less, please answer the following questions: What is your core religio-moral conviction, and how does it inform or give shape to your understanding of the theological norms of your society? What is your organizing theological framework? What do you mean when you speak of God? Please include an account of God’s power, creative act, presence and providence, and the question of evil. Or, if you are non-theistic, how do you take account of the beginning of life, the creative power that sustains us all, the web of relations, and the question of suffering? Who and where are human beings in the scheme of things: in relation to the holy, to other humans, to other creatures, to the earth? How do you see the human predicament and the notion of sin? Finally, how shall we dwell together?”