Just as there are special and general theories of relativity, I think there are two types of revelation. Special revelation would be something like the Christian Bible, the Jewish Torah or the Quran of Islam. Such revelation speaks to a particular people at a particular time. So the first thing to notice about the Letter to the Romans is that it is to the Romans. We are overhearing a conversation addressed to someone else and must adjust the message accordingly. Such revelation is typically more personal and communal. It gives us a sense of identity and history. It is inappropriate to apply special revelation to those outside the context of our own group and version of history.
General revelation is the sense of being addressed by nature. It is a sense that we belong to the whole of things. General revelation is something almost everyone experiences at one time or another under a starry sky or on a desolate beach. General revelation yields no history or dogma, just a sense of that all things are tied together in one invisible web.
Special revelation is personal and therefore rather arbitrary. If we lost all the world’s scriptures and had to start from scratch, our reconstructed versions of special revelation would probably be very different. General revelation is intrinsic to nature and to our own human nature. If we lost every book on biology, geology and physics, we would eventually reconstitute the same truths.
Special revelation is what happens when we feel addressed by our favorite scripture, general revelation is what happens when we feel addressed by a leaf. Special revelation is gives us a songline in time, general revelation gives us our home in space.
How is it that the two politicians who speak most often about freedom in America (Rand Paul and Ted Cruz) both voted against protecting GLBT workers from discrimination in the work place? Why are they so passionate when it comes to protecting a man’s rights over his gun, and so hostile or lukewarm when it comes to protecting a woman’s rights over her own body? Why do they seek freedom for business owners to exploit their workers, but oppose the right of workers to collectively bargain for safe working conditions and fair pay? Why do they seek to weaken the ability of citizens to control their own lives through democratic processes, and lift up instead a dog-eat-dog form of capitalism as the ultimate arbiter of human affairs?
It is no mystery why white men in a sexist, racist, and homophobic culture should worship freedom. Freedom means one thing to the wolf and something very different to the lamb. Unless one’s idea of freedom includes a counterbalance of equality, what one is really seeking is the freedom to bully.
If there is any chance of reforming religion in our lifetime, we must realize that many of the things we hate about religion are hiding behind things religious people tend to love. Any attempt to build a healthy and helpful religion will require drastic surgery upon most Western forms of faith. To make religion healthy we must face some very hard facts:
It is not possible to worship a cruel image of God and maintain a kind heart.
It is not possible to believe in magical omens and also be rational about our universe.
It is not possible to read a text literally without losing the capacity to test one’s ideas for insanity.
It is not possible to maintain an image of God as king and also hold a democratic spirit.
It is not possible to love miracles without hating nature.
Those who wish to make religion vital and sane must have faith that we can purge religion of superstition and cruelty, and, afterward, still find a beating heart.
One modern method of propaganda is to cast political struggles as debates between extremists on the left and right. The underlying assumption is that both sides are lost in a partisan struggle with the truth being somewhere in the middle. So, if modern journalists were to cover a story about the Jewish Holocaust they might interview one Jew, one Nazi and let the reader decide what is “fair and balanced.” What would be missing from that analysis would be the discrepancy of power. That method of reporting would present both truth claims equally, but it would miss the primary reality that only one side was murdering the other.
When a topic like gay marriage is presented as a discussion on the news both sides can appear equally sane or crazy, but only one side in interfering in the life of the other. Only one side is saying the other shouldn’t be getting married. The two sides are not doing the same thing. When pro-choice and pro-life pundits speak on air, both sides can appear equally sane or crazy, but pro-choice people are not telling pro-life people that they have to get abortions. The two sides are not doing the same thing. When climate change scientists are presented equally with climate change deniers from the oil and gas industry, they are leaving out the fact that only one side of the struggle represents the scientific consensus.
Paul Krugman calls this form of propaganda “the cult of balance.”
“If one party declared that the earth was flat, the headlines would read ‘Views Differ on Shape of Planet.’”
Looking back at history it is all too clear that the struggle for human rights is not a debate between extremists on the left and right. The answer to “the slavery question” was not discovered by comfortable moderates, but by radical abolitionists. The answer to whether women should vote was not found by comfortable moderates but by radical suffragettes. It is the same with any struggle for justice, the answer is not found by utilitarian compromises but by discerning radical and universal principles of human rights.
When we speak of saints, sages, mahatmas and peacemakers, we are usually referring to the great friends of humankind- the citizens of the whole. But to be such is not easy, nor is it popular. To be citizens of the whole means to place our patriotism within the context of universal human rights, our idea of personal happiness within the context of the common good, and our religion (or lack thereof) in the context of universal compassion and reverence.
“A US-led trade deal is currently being negotiated that could increase the price of prescription drugs, weaken financial regulations and even allow partner countries to challenge American laws. But few know its substance. The pact, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), is deliberately shrouded in secrecy, a trade deal powerful people, including President Obama, don’t want you to know about. More than 130 members of Congress have asked the White House for greater transparency about the negotiations and were essentially told to go fly a kite. While most of us are in the dark about the contents of the deal, which Obama aims to seal by year end, corporate lobbyists are in the know about what it contains.
…”Instead, says Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, “This really is a deal that’s being negotiated by corporations for corporations and any benefit it provides to the bulk of the population of this country will be purely incidental.” Yves Smith, an investment banking expert who runs the Naked Capitalism blog adds: “There would be no reason to keep it so secret if it was in the interest of the public.”
http://truth-out.org/news/item/19830-bill-moyers-yves-smith-and-dean-baker-on-secrets-in-trade
Last week $5 billion was cut from federal food stamp programs. Republican law makers are proposing an additional $40 billion be cut. To get a sense of perspective consider the following:
According to Thom Hartmann, last year the average American making $50,000 paid $36 in taxes to provide food stamps and an additional $6 for other safety net programs.
At the same time the same family would pay:
$870 in taxes to provide corporate tax subsidies.
$696 for Business Incentives at the State, County, and City Levels
$722 for Interest Rate Subsidies for Banks
$1,231 for Revenue Losses from Corporate Tax Havens
“Overall, American families are paying an annual $6,000 subsidy to corporations that have doubled their profits and cut their taxes in half in ten years while cutting 2.9 million jobs in the U.S. and adding almost as many jobs overseas.” -Paul Buchheit
If you want to see where Buchheit gets his numbers, follow the links:
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/09/23
Thom Hartmann is not quite as clear:
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/19844-food-stamps-are-affordable-corporate-welfare-is-not
I learned from Buddha that religion is about awareness, not belief.
I learned from Lao Tzu that religion is about the ordinary not the miraculous.
I learned from Isaiah that religion is about justice not personal righteousness.
I learned from Jesus that religion is about forgiveness not morality.
I learned from Austin Atheist Madelyn Murray O’Hare that love for humankind does not require theological justification.
I learned from Freud that plumbing the depths of our being requires symbols.
I learned from Helen Keller that love means radical politics.
I learned from Einstein that intelligence is written into what seems empty space.
I learned from Van Gogh that ritual cannot replace creativity.
I learned from St. Paul that rules can never replace responsibility.
In other words, I have derived my heresies from the best of sources.
When the symbols of religion work properly, we do not form friendships with invisible beings in the sky, and we do not fight about truth claims no one can prove. When the symbols work properly, we poetically understand ourselves to be expressions of the very ground of being, and recognize the same ultimate and intimate value in every other being as well.
In reality based religion there is one miracle, and it is life. To speak from my own tradition, the resurrection is not a story about resusitated cadavars, but a revelation about the life process. The “truth” of a symbol like the resurrection is found in a certain quality of living and loving. In other words, the resurrection has not happened for me if I cannot not see the “Christ” in you.
It is the same, I suspect with burning bushes and bodhi trees.
Jim Wright is a former Speaker of the House for the US Congress. In a scene that is sure to be played out for seniors across the state, he was turned down for a voter identification card because he no longer drives. I do not understand the Republican strategy of insulting women, the elderly and people of color and then trusting that gerrymandering and voter suppression will keep them in power. Are there enough selfish rich white guys to make this strategy work?
full story here:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/03/jim-wright-voter-id_n_4210225.html