Dear Yuyutsu,

I wouldn't say I was interested in discussing it rather that is where the conversation has led us.

Be that as it may nothing in your post negates nor challenges anything I have put. Particularly if, as I understand it, you are using the term 'we' and 'us' as referring to the personal, the royal 'we' so to speak, rather than universally.

I have absolutely no objection to you imposing the concept of sin within your personal relationship to your God. That is where it belongs. The stories about a sinful world deserving of destruction are yours to hold and inform your faith if that is what you desire.

Indeed I really don't have a problem either with people saying they are against gay marriage because that is the position of the God they follow. What they don't get to do is say it is unethical, or immoral or even unnatural because it is demonstrably not.

The problems only really start when they escape into the wider world and result in people being burnt at the stake or the modern equivalent.

The term "pursuit of happiness" is in the Declaration of Independence 1776, not the Constitution 1789.

Get it right!

When I read articles like this, I am always struck by the fact that it is symptoms which are talked about.
Symptoms discussed by themselves lack something.
So, let's drill right down to bedrock and causes.
The brain is a computer.
The body is its support system.
Like all computers, the brain has an operating system.
This runs the applications we call instincts.
We, the person, are the operating system which runs these 'apps'.
Our awareness is an internal 'colour monitor' attached to our computer.
What we see with our eyes is also displayed on this monitor.
Should the brain stop, the computer program which is us ceases to run.
After a very short time, the brain changes physically, and the system cannot be restarted.
We have ceased to exist.
Only the support system remains.
Its processes can continue for a short time, but soon they too will stop.
Everything which was the physical living person ceases to be.
Genetic code can live on in children.
Otherwise, a person exists only in the memory of others, and in what may be recorded about him?
There will never again be a physical person EXACTLY the same.
This response might seem to be a bit abstract, but we do need to relate what we read to basic truths?
For this is how we build accurate mental pictures?
I do this automatically when I am considering what others write.
I find the way I read an article is not always the way the writer intended.
But, in this case I do thank the writer for his interesting and thought provoking words.
I see 'the pursuit of happiness' as putting the cart before the horse.
When we live in a meaningful way, contentment usually results.
Especially when we stay 'in step' with those around us?
Happiness is a fortuitous and almost accidental result of these things?
The constitution of the US of A does deserve tribute for remaining neutral about religion though.
It will serve them well if they are able to apply it, and be guided by it?

In my younger days I enjoyed the happiness of pursuit. I have found happiness since at 95 I contemplate my beloved wife and wonderful descendants and no longer need to pursue it.

Dear Daffy,

I understand what you wrote, but without some preparation and explanation of the terminology, I doubt anyone else here would.

To step back, the article spoke (negatively) about the freedom to PURSUE happiness. I however, hold that each person should pursue happiness in their own way according to their best understanding at the time. Many baby steps and much trial and error are needed before one can even begin to fathom the Love you were speaking about.

This PURSUIT of happiness, everyone can understand, so this is where to start. Later as time goes by, as people search for happiness in all the wrong places, including material things and become disappointed, then they undergo the process of Neti-Neti.

The freedom to pursue one's happiness is even more important because it is the only way to guarantee the religious freedom of those of us who know better where to seek. Imagine yourself, God forbid, trying to write your last comment in China or North-Korea, where they equate happiness with the total surrender to and worship of their Leader. We must be thankful for and cherish the relative freedom we now have to pursue happiness, then trust in God's patience that everyone too will arrive Home eventually.

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Dear SteeleRedux,

Please do not confuse me with the author and try to read what I wrote with a fresh mind - I said nothing about "a sinful world deserving of destruction", nor about gay marriage. I support the freedom to pursue one's happiness even when it does not lead to happiness, even when in the immediate term it leads to misery (for oneself).

You were speaking of "your [=my] God" and "the position of the God they follow": there cannot be more than one God, thus it is not possible for different people to follow different Gods, even if they are so deluded that they think they do.

Concepts of sin can be different, certainly, but the fact/reality of either sinfulness or its absence, applies irrespective of one's concepts.

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Dear david f,

.

You wrote :

« In my younger days I enjoyed the happiness of pursuit. I have found happiness since at 95 I contemplate my beloved wife and wonderful descendants and no longer need to pursue it. »
.

I too can attest there can be happiness in the pursuit of happiness and that its pursuit can be fruitful. Like you, having found it, I no longer pursue it.

Like you, I cherish every minute of it, conscious that it is just a fleeting instant in my mortal existence, fragile, vulnerable, and irreplaceable.
.

Whereas Peter Sellick (Sells) wrote, quoting John Cheever :

« How lonely and unnatural man is and how deep and well-concealed are his confusions »
.

How sad.

.