Hi Suze,

Maybe you're onto something - maybe there are only two ways of viewing anything, one way OR the other. So if not a male sky-based God, appropriated by Western, modern, technologically sophisticated capitalism, then obviously the ONLY alternative is a female, earth-based goddess, to be appropriated by all good anti-capitalists, environmentalists, Indigenous people and women - and equally clearly, technology is one of their enemies.

So let's advise other people - who are on a journey that we cannot take, we're so modern - to return to the caves, the simple life, hunting, gathering, digging your garden (or at least get the wife to do it), and stay un-modern. Oh, how terrible it is that we can't live like this ourselves and oh how lucky, say, Indigenous people are to be able to stay out of modern society, living their simple lives, living off the land, at one with nature, caring for country, happy-nappy around the camp-fire, living off berries and lizards, listening raptly to their elders, treading lightly on the land.

Would that we could live in such simple, happy harmony with nature - but we have our rat-race, urban commitments, our houses to pay off, our investments to make and keep track of, our children to send to private schools. Oh, woe is us !

Pretty obvious, really ;)

Joe

You're probably right Loudmouth, it is way too late to switch allegiance now :)

So, maybe it would be better for our suffering world to have NO allegiance to ANY religion or God... male or female?

Let's just follow our own good sense, and see where that approach takes us...

Cheers,
Suze.

Oooo, Suze, you're in dangerous territory ! Are you suggesting that there are more than two ways to view any issue ? Good heavens, you're at risk of approaching reality.

Of course, on almost any issue, there are more than two, or three, or four or more alternatives, and all of them may be wrong. We don't have to choose just between (a) or (b). On some issues, there are almost infinite possibilities. We have to be able to critique every side to a (multi-sided) discussion, and it may turn out that none of the alternatives are worth a sparrow's fart of consideration.

In fact, every alternative would have weaknesses or defects, but some are far more glaring than those of other alternatives. It seems to me that choosing between one religious alternative or another religious alternative is a false dilemma - both are probably crap.

And what passes for an accepted, scientific rationale for some phenomenon may have its own weaknesses and I'm sur that Karl Popper would agree. No big deal. We keep searching, testing, modifying our hypotheses, testing again - these are methods of investigation that no religion can withstand.

So it is with the Earth Mother/Mother Earth superstition: a nice, sweet, seemingly harmless and pro-Indigenous and pro-woman superstition. Test it ? It's bullsh!t. Move on. Re-join the world.

Joe

Mmmmm...Suze, Poirot and Loudmouth
The thought of a nurturing loving Mother Earth does sound comforting, like being wrapped in a warm blanket. Earth worshipping has a lot going for it, at least there are not false idols rather a connection with nature. Makes a lot of sense from an evolutionary POV.

What is truth? (I've just finished watching The Oxford Murders and thought of this topic).

The fact is there are few absolutes. Truth is nebulous. Two quotes from the film's character Professor Arthur Seldom -

"There is no way of finding a single absolute truth, an irrefutable argument to help answer the questions of mankind. Philosophy therefore is dead. Because whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must be silent."

"Since man is incapable of reconciling mind and matter, he tends to confer some sort of entity on ideas because he cannot bear the notion that the purely abstract only exists in our brain."

Interesting film that concentrates on mathematical purity, truth and philosophy.

I am not sure people are really interested in truth, people make decisions and then selectively associate with ideas that serve to support those decisions in an eternal self-fulfilling cycle.

People are not interested in truth only in what they think works best even if the premise is fantastical, unbelievable and unprovable. Religion works on that premise and maybe it has to otherwise it's truth will be exposed and that works against the fundamental idea of an out-of-human moral framework.

Since truth cannot always be known, truth is too scary a prospect we basically make stuff up to fill the void.

Pelican,

I agree that the article is a bit gobbledygook. As for the UN, what most likely happened was that the members were impressed by the politically-correct and photogenic proposal, failed to see the pitfalls, probably didn't even understand the English properly nor even cared to understand it and thus voted for it in order to look good. It's a mindless and toothless organization anyway.

Once (not "if") the Earth no longer survives, greed and avarice will also cease to be manifest, but so long as the Earth does survive, there is some order and function, including that religion should stick to its spiritual role and is not meant to be responsible for survival, for example, or for "fixing" the world. Survival and organism-centered well-being are best left to secular modalities such as science. Those in history who attempted to control the world in the name of religion only created a mess and gave religion a bad name (which is indeed reflected in many of the responses here).

Religion's sole purpose is to draw closer to God and ultimately unite with Him. As there are obstacles on this path, such as greed and avarice, religion therefore often includes techniques to overcome those obstacles. One of those techniques is to care for the environment, as caring for anything outside one's little "self" helps one to purge their selfishness. The environment is indeed quite likely to improve as a result, but that's not the aim of a true religion, that would only be a side-effect.

Yuyutsu
You make an excellent point about the positive spin off effects in combatting greed and avarice.

"The environment is indeed quite likely to improve as a result, but that's not the aim of a true religion, that would only be a side-effect."

Agreed, I am not seriously proposing that religion be about environmentalism only that it is often forgotten, and worse, mocked by some avid Christians (and others) who don't perceive God's creation as worthy of protection.

The UN is indeed a mindless and toothless organisation - a bit like a chicken dressed up in wolve's clothing.