Thanks for an intelligent and articulate article that has given me much cause for reflection over this Easter season.

You don't get it one bit.

I don't think Jesus is one bit pleased with the piousness and religiosity of this opinion piece, and I say this as a devoted follower of Jesus reading the same Bible that you read.

How much of what you proclaim as "right" is Biblically prescribed?

Go ahead, dismiss me as a "literalist" but God only gave us his Word and in it prescribed a way of being his ekklesia, his kingdom-agents, in this world - and what you have prescribed in this article is far, far from it.

Let's embrace the lost in community, in our homes, into our lives - not seek to win the lost by piously going through a series of liturgical loops to a religious orgasm at the end.

Halle Loot Jar. The movie, with Ms Berry.

Given that Jesus didn't die on the cross, wasn't reborn at all and was later buried in one of many suggested sites as an older man it is quite right that the Easter Bunny should be taken seriously by the Church as a whole. All fantasies should be encouraged until people are intellectually mature enough to cope with facts.

I still am the Easter bunny, as I am Santa, once a yeat for both, aren't you?

Religion! Goodness sakes people, it's the 21st century and still no God or messiah seen. Time to wake up yet? Nope, just keep swallowing the pap and the biscuits.

"god" this man is so boringly one dimensional and also full of sentimental nostalgia---and so unconvincing!
The fact of the matter is that churches are realy no different to any other corporation in this day and age---they provide a consumer product. They provide some entertainment and perhaps a bit of consoling "meaning".Some "religious" hopefulness to fill up the emptiness of our normal everyday dreadful "sanity". TS Eliot's hollow every person.
Traditional catholic churches provide a multi-sensual theatrical performance which when well done could perhaps invoke something of the Divine Mystery. They were pleasure dome palaces--full of splendour and celebration.

"traditional" Protestant churches by contrast were/are cold and austere places--very grey in their tone. They were in effect court houses where one was "judged" by a stern and pleasureless vengeful "father" deity. No pleasure, no beauty or ecstasy allowed.

Sells talks about fear. Where there is fear there certainly is no possibility of love, or pleasure, or ecstasy, or celebration, or self transcendence---none whatsoever.

By contrast Real God is the God of ecstasy, of unbounded feeling, of rapturous chanting, of unbounded love, of Love-Bliss-Radiance.

True Religion is the esoteric science, or luminous sacred process of direct, and directly ego-transcending, investigation of, or enquiry into LIGHT itself. The method of True Religion is devotional surrender of the total body-mind of the "investigator" to and into LIGHT itself, and ultimately to the degree of oneness with the inherently Indivisible LIGHT itself.

All that arises in and as Consciousness is Beautiful!
Therefore, all of this arising and passing of conditional forms and beings Is Sacred!
All of This is Beautiful!
All of This is Self-Existing (As Consciousness) and Self-Radiant (As Primal Energy Itself, or Light Itself---Which IS Happiness Itself)!
All of This Is Sacred!
All of This Is Beautiful!
And So Be You!

Happiness is the now-and-forever Mystery that Is the Real Heart and the Only Real God of every one.

Happiness Is the Conscious Light of the world!

The author demonstrates why people have voted with their feet and now pack non liturgy churches as well as home churches. It is life that Christ came to bring not some liturgy which was introduced a long time after the resurrection of Christ.

I stopped attending church some years ago because of the "happy-clappy" nature that did not allow time for quiet reflection. I do not, and never have, gone along with the notion that Christianity is the only true religion. Religion is an accident of birth. I have no doubt that there was an historical figure who is the basis of the Christian faith but the idea that he was the result of a virgin birth or rose from the dead is more than I can personally handle.
That said I find that the Christian faith has produced some magnificient music, art and literature (not least parts of the King James version of the Bible) and many people with no beliefs at all have been able to enjoy those things.
The basic tenets of the Christian faith (and indeed of the Muslim and Bhuddhist faiths) that we should love and care for one another are what matters in the end.
"For him who has faith the last miracle will be greater than the first"(Dag Hammarskjold) and if that means that people learn to live in harmony then I will have seen the greatest miracle of all.

Sells,

Your notion that a Protestant priesthood should be preside over a laity confirms what Michael Polanyi states about Church worship being focused on experiential "indwelling" in crede, rather than the forensic invetsigation of scripture/theology. In terms of religionism it is merely a milder from of the Vicar of Christ concept and runs against the grain of why the Western Protestant churches became devoiced from the Latin church. For example, until recentl decades, the Angligan church would not allow the laity to handle the Eucharist, suggesting something "special" about the Minister, setting the Minister "apart" from the laity.

Moreover, you know as well as I do, the first century churches were either household or small group focused. The concept of a personal salvation was Hellenised (Paul) and Institutionalised (Constantine). This shift from cult to denominationalism is generic recognised in the sociology of the development religions.

Bias is also, problematic. One denomination will be biased over another. One religion will be biased over another. The better could be forensically, examine the varies means/claims to creation [religious/secular] based on objective knowledge.

Lastly, Western priesthood [post-Shamanism] has its roots in Sumer [as I pointed out to you in different thread.]. If Jesus is god, at least to some exent, a pre-existing institution has usurped Jesus' mission to ensure its own survival.

If a god called Jesus died for our sins, full stop. Why is there a need for a Church. Morality and community service and love, do not require belief in gods.

I am sure Jesus (were he not omniscient) would be shocked by the liturgy in Christian churches even a few centuries after his time, and the Christians of that era would be equally shocked by the liturgy in any church today. I think in any religion there is a necessary tension between the bones of fixed tradition and the flesh of living experience. Any tradition is liable to become ossified and in need of a shake-up -- a reformation, a revival, a great awakening, a back-to-basics movement. This is exactly what John the Baptist and Jesus represented to the Judaism of their time.

The difficulty, of course, is separating the genuine prophets and visionaries, like St. Francis of Assisi, from the charlatans and madmen -- the Jim Joneses, the Jimmy Swaggarts, the Jim Bakkers (maybe the name Jim is a tip-off). Also separating true reconnection and renewal from the lure of novelty and titillation.

All that Sells is saying here is simple Christian orthodoxy.

Imagine taking a poem.. written on a piece of paper... cutting it up into many pieces... losing some of the pieces and then sticking together the remaining pieces in any old order. The result would be similar to the travesty of pop-worship.

The liturgy bears some similarities to a play.
It has a sequence that makes sense... one thing leads to another in much the same way that events in a play progress by the logic of the plot.

Happy-Clappy liturgy completely dismembers the liturgy or, in many cases, ignores it to the point where the result cannot be called liturgy at all. It might still be 'worship' of some sort but its not liturgy and sometimes its not Christian.

The Church, particularly the UCA, is entirely to blame for this problem. They dont educate their own people to understand the liturgy and they persist in ordaining ministers who have failed to comprehend its form. The mess that Sells describes is the result and we now have churches full of people who think Christianity is all about getting themselves to heaven. Where that is the case it is difficult to argue that the church is actually Christian.

Sells... if only you could explain this in plain English, rather than in the theologically conventional way that you have, then you might do some good

Interesting piece, Mr Selleck.

(But first, find yourself a new editor: "Unlike Roman Catholic’s", "an invisible clergy in civies", "the UC service I sttended" - not a good look.)

Not being particularly religious myself, it always fascinates me when those who are, argue amongst themselves about who is the more acceptable in the sight of their God.

It is not, of course, an argument confined to Christians. Jews of my acquaintance tend to be of the lightly orthodox persuasion, in that they only occasionally indulge in bacon and eggs for breakfast. But there are other grades of commitment, all the way up to the guys in black wearing hats and sporting beards and ringlets. The streets of London's Hampstead on Sabbath are filled with those who still insist on walking to synagogue, being overtaken by those of a more relaxed devotional disposition, in their Bentleys.

Mr Selleck is clearly on the reactionary side of the Christian equation. He is far too polite to say so, but he probably despises the happy clappies of Hillsong - I wonder if he even considers them to be of the same faith as himself? The Hillsong people themselves probably see Mr Selleck as being a little too earnest - hey, like Jesus was a man, you know, as well as the Son of God.

What it boils down to, is fashion.

In religious fashion terms, Mr Selleck is a suit-and-tie guy - probably complete with stiff collar, a waistcoat, fob watch and a hat. Hillsong is, obviously, the jeans-and-tee-shirt set. Through the ages, pious sobersides who dislike frippery have coexisted with those who believe in the soul-baring properties of music.

Hillsong is simply the 21st century version of Thomas Tallis - who, incidentally, wrote for Catholic rites under Henry VIII, English vernacular services under Edward VI, the reinstated Latin liturgy under Mary and both English and Latin works for Elizabeth I.

It is easy for me, as an outsider, to propose that none of them is, in fact, "right".

I suggest it would be a more difficult task to persuade Mr Selleck of this.

The article’s content may upset some people but I am grateful To Mr Sellick for putting into words what so many of us find to be true.

I too stopped attending church when it dawned on me that the noise and commotion generated by the nauseatingly sentimental ‘happy clappies’ made me feel I had been through a blender?

Instead of the ‘Peace that passeth all understanding’ it became a weekly event that had me asking that I be passed the paracetamol.

Peri

I suppose, being an outsider, you care little about liturgy or the word proclaimed through it.
But Im guessing you appreciate fine music. Perhaps you are an 'insider' to the fine music scene. If that is the case then you might appreciate that there is a vast difference between the experience of hearing a virtuoso perform a Bach Partita and listening to a five year old struggling to get through twinkle twinkle (without Mozarts variations, of course).

They are vastly different experiences and each can be special in its own way. Hillsong is more like the 5 year old than the the virtuoso. Dont expect to plumb the depths of human experience through the music of the five year old. Likewise, dont expect too much from the Hillsong attempt at 'liturgy/worship'.

Done well, liturgy is far more than the mere repeating of familiar words in a rigid structure. Consider the difference between Macbeth performed well and merely read. The play can be the vehicle for a profound experience but that is not achieved merely by reading the script. Nor is it achieved by butchering the script at random.

Sells and Christian religionists,

Trust you find psychological comfort based on what you believe over the Easter Period.

O.

The writer does not understand the word liturgy. All churches have liturgy. Liturgy is simply the format of worship. What perhaps he meant to say was that some churches have very formal and others more informal liturgies.

The Bible records many styles of worship: personal and private worship, family worship, small group worship, Corinthian church worship, Tabernacle worship, Temple worship, Davidic worship, and heavenly worship are only a few examples. In each case, the style of liturgy was different, varying from the very formal to the very informal.

To insist upon something that neither Jesus nor his Apostles insisted upon is to create a legalism or wowserism. That is when tradition becomes a yardstick for judgmentalism and division. I am not interested in the Christianity of men, but the Christianity of Christ, its founder. The only liturgy that he insisted upon was to worship God in spirit and in truth, period.

"This is Christian worship captive to pastoral care; the needs of the people take centre stage rather than the worship of God. The result is oozingly sentimental."

I agree with you that this is a bad aim. But I do not believe that formal liturigcal worship will guard against this. Man looks on the outward appearance; God looks at the heart.

I have no problem with the way the men who run your church have decided to hold mass/church services over the years. I do have a problem that you believe this is the ONLY God-ordained way of worship. I see this as akin to the people who believe that the KJV is the ONLY English translation of the Bible which is the Word of God, without accepting the limitations that 16th century men ordered to translate a Bible under a secular king may have faced.

In the OT David disrobed (to the level of underwear or naked?) in his spontaneous love/adoration of God. At Pentecost, people started speaking in strange tongues, in ways other theists were not yet used to. Later in Acts, God revealed Himself to the "uncircumcised" and told His people to "eat" with these Gentiles. Far from the expected religious order of the day, I'm sure.

It is not fair for you to try and put worship of God into a box. To worship God is to adore Him. I believe that, yes God is a God of order. But I also believe that worship is something that comes from both the head and the HEART. Trying to take the heart out of it, by smothering it in convention and tradition purely for tradition's sake, makes it inseparable from the kind of “piety” the Pharisees thought they had in Jesus' day. Remember its the street people, tax collectors, fisherman and prostitutes who understood God's grace better than the religious elite, those who had memorised and taught from the Scriptures for so many years.

The opposite extreme is making it all about the heart, or becoming self-centred pop psychology. Christian worship should never be about self, however, in blessing God we ourselves do become blessed with the increased intimacy we have with Him. The Bible instructs men to love their wives as Christ loved the Church- is it such a stretch of the imagination that the Church must love God with the same intimacy, intelligence and emotion with which a man might love a woman?

I am opposed to both legalism and lasciviousnesss (worldliness) within the church. It is the Fear of God and the Love of God which keeps us from either of those ditches. Neither of these can be measured merely by structure and format of a church service.

Gawd - reminds me a bit of the Sunnis and the Shias.

From outside the theocratic fishbowl, they all look like different variations of goldfish. Catholic/Protestant::Shia/Sunni.

Big deal. Who cares about whether the spiritually deficient need an interlocutor between themselves and their imaginary friend?

It never ceases to amaze me how much time human beings spend talking, thinking and writing about things that do not exist. I suppose that's why we do it, because reality is too boring and drab to accept as our lot.

Ah, Sells poor lad - seems to have never had the pleasure of a session or two in one of the halls of the Orthodox -- Greek, Russian, -- churches.
Never sat (or stood) as part of the over-generous attendance in one, and let the cadence of proceedings rise and fall as it washes over you?
Never had the music of it all absorb you, while appreciating the intricate artwork all around, and the demonstrated sincerity of those who brought it all together? Or known that such a temple of worship might have been made possible largely due to the voluntary contributions of an athiest - demonstrating that commitments might be more to the values of community tradition than to the narrow concerns of liturgy?
Let the benefits of community spirit prosper in peaceful diversity. Throw away the unhealthy corsets applicable to some long-since-deflowered dame of exclusive dogma.

DIVERSITY is good... when it comes to the Church. While I prattle away against multiculturalism, and those who claim 'diversity' enriches our society, I don't take the same position when it comes to 'The Church'.
The Body of Christ consists of the people, and there is no set method of worship. The concept of worship and fellowship are that we are one IN Christ. That does not mean we will all act exactly the same in worship or fellowship, but it does mean that we honour Christ and flee from sin. We don't have to flee from our social sub culture unless it infringes on the holiness of God.

Liturgical worship is indeed symbolism rich, but at times it can be fellowship poor. If no attempt is made to emphasise the spiritual reality in the daily life and experience of the believers then the liturgical experience will degenerate into something done as an end in itself, with the participants thinking they will benefit spiritually and before God simply by 'doing' the liturgy irrespective of how they conduct their lives outside that liturgical framework.

"I ALSO STOPPED GOING TO CHURCH" I hear some posters saying....so I ask you..did you ever have a relationship with Christ ? Was your church attendance an expression of love for Jesus ? I simply don't 'get' this "I stopped attending church" because the church started to annoy me thing. Well..I do get it, but it raises many questions in the mind.

FEAR.. is a good thing. Fear of consequences for doing wrong.. how can this be bad ? Fear of God is not a cringing fear, but a healthy one. If I drive up to Sydney and pass 3 signs in a row saying "Speed camera ahead" and I deliberately speed.... who can I blame for the fine ? We know the commandments, that they are for our good, should we not be scared to go against them deLIBerately ? The 'fear' of the Christian is not fear of imperfection, but of deliberate sin.

We Christians do not need to apologize for our faith. It is amazing that forensic science today can pinpoint who, when and how of a crime, but the forensic evidence for God, which is everywhere, is somehow described as idiotic. The Bible calls those fools who in their hearts claim that there is no God.

We Christians also do not need to apologize to each other for the wonderful cultural diversity contained in our various liturgies. There is no rule created by either Jesus or the Apostles as to what liturgical format to use. To make any such rules as mandatory and condemn those who prefer a less formal liturgy is more like religion of the Pharisees than that of Christ.

waterboy, I think you may be confusing means with end.

>>being an outsider, you care little about liturgy or the word proclaimed through it<<

You can take that to the bank. But I am vitally interested in people, what moves them and motivates them. And in that, Christians make fascinating subjects.

>>Im guessing you appreciate fine music<<

I do appreciate music. As to what "fine" means in this context, I assume you mean "traditional", in the same way that Sells views traditional liturgies as "fine".

But I have to point out that in order to get to a Bach Partita, the five year-old has to negotiate "Twinkle Twinkle" first. Listening to it may be hard for us, but we also know that it is an essential rite of passage, so we endure it.

Music has always had a profound, almost mystical impact on humans, which is one of the reasons that it has always formed such an influential part of religious occasions. It also appears to be the glue that binds the Hillsongers together. Theirs may be simpler, more juvenile and often quite silly, but it is still music.

It may have been "grander" to hear a cathedral choir singing a Palestrina Kyrie than Hillsong delivering "All Praises To The King", but I question whether it is all that different in its intent.

The dilemma for traditionalist Christians such as Sells is that they dislike it in the same way as my late father disliked the music of the Beatles - it simply did not fit into his world view of "music", in precisely the same way that Hillsong's liturgy does not fit into Sells concept of what it a liturgy should be.

The aim, surely, of a church is to find a way through the mass of distractions available to people in order to introduce them to religion. A far harder task today than it was before radio, television and the internet appeared.

Where once it was fashionable to present mystique and complex ceremonial, it is now fashionable to be informal and accessible.

Fashions change, that's all.

Now come on Peter, you can't be serious. What % of the population
bother with going to churches? 8-10% perhaps?

Religion was great when people were uneducated, uninformed
and gullible. Times have changed.

Yup, some need that imaginary friend, no problem, if it
keeps them happy. Just don't expect the rest of us to
take it any more seriously then Santa, the tooth fairy
or the hobbgobblins in your garden.

Fear and tremble for all you like Peter, just don't expect
the rest of us to join you. Fact is that heaven is here and
now, the worms will chew you up, like everyone else, when
you fall of the heavenly perch, as we all do.

BD will be chewed up no different to anyone else :)

"Christian worship is serious holy play that reveals the world as it really is rather than what it thinks it is. ..We should attend Church in fear and trembling not knowing where we will be led each Sunday."

I think this is an interesting conclusion that doesn’t exactly follow from the rest of the article. It seems that Sellick will go to non-liturgical worship with more fear and trembling. Most of us going to a liturgical worship know only too well where we will be led each Sunday and find the place boringly familiar. Surely set orders need to be peppered by the unconventional and free worship set into some kind of structure. Is the whole thing as either/or as Sellick suggests?

Oh Yabby, a crustacean after my own heart.

We are drowning in endless mind-numbing religion, will this ignorance ever end?

What an amazing world it would be without it.
Religion won’t be leaving us any time soon . . . . . we can only dream about that time in the future when fear and ignorance makes way for love and happiness.

RigPig

Peri

Im not confusing means and ends atall. The child certainly gives us hope for the future but the virtuoso plumbs the depths of human experience and shares that with us. Liturgy,done well,points usto fuller and richer ways of being human together.

Liturgy,to a great extent, is determined by theology. To dismiss the differences as simply due to fashion is to miss the point entirely. There is far more to these liturgical differences than mere fashion. The differences reflect profoundly different theologies and very different motivations of the participants and leaders. Some people seek a personal experience and value the emotional highs associated with certain sorts of worship. Others value the communal nature of worship and see it as binding and identifying. Some find in worship the discipline of listening to the whole word of God even the bits they dont really like or understand.

You say that you are interested in how people are motivated but your oversimpilified 'analysis' that these are just fashion differences is obscuring to you the fascinatingly different motivations that determine the types of liturgy that the various churches practise.

To confess my own bias...I have little time for pop-worship as I find it shallow, unedifying and self-serving. Its focus is usually on personal experience and personal salvation which I regard as a corruption of Christ's teaching. Atthe same time I recognise a real danger in the traditional liturgy that there isa tendency to try to 'preserve' it asa kind of museum piece. There is no reason why the liturgy should not have variations, change & evolve but unless the changes make sense the result will be fractured, truncated and inadequate. The inevitable consequence of inadequate theology and inadequate liturgy is that intelligent people, quite rightly, walk away. The church becomes irrelevant and 'cultish' where it should be universal and prohpetic.

Elsewhere in this thread someone described the liturgy as 'a form of entertainment' and that IS what it has become,unfortunately. When it remains true to its form as the universal and prophetic proclamation of Christ then itis not entertainment at all but serious business.

Yabby, companionable crustacean as Rig Pig says, there is a hell!
You’ve got to believe it – because the Pope said so only a week or so back. What more evidence do you want than the constraints imposed on the congregations that Sells would lead?
Hell doesn’t dwell in the gentle halls of the Taoists, or the Buddhists, the Uniting Church--. But, perhaps it also resides in the halls of some of those Presbyterians who would spurn Robbie Burns.
It is far removed from the sunday sunrise over the ocean, the predawn birdcalls in some part of undisturbed bush, or the ripple of a clear mountain stream – where I prefer to be.
No hell there, away from the crowd maddened by being told what to think – or rather, nor to think – for themselves. Being lectured by some individual destroying the joy of living in the present; someone permitting no enhancement of the wisdom of the father by the wisdom of the sons (and daughters) to continue accumulating over ensuing generations

Yabby, RigPig,

You are absolutely right in your observation that the church in ignorance and with no little touch of superstition portrays God as your 'imaginary friend'. I too yearn for a day when religion of this sort has been relegated to the pages of history books.

I do not, however, believe that ALL religion is necessarily of that sort. Perhaps God is the idea that this world could be better, that heaven is something that could be realised here and now and that all living creatures might enjoy this life to the full for as long as it lasts. No religions of personal salvation can achieve this because they appeal to the individually selfish side of humanity and defer 'reality' to the 'imaginary' world-hereafter. Something different is needed. If a religion, or philosophy, or whatever you might want to call it, heightened people's awareness that conciousness, self-awareness, the ability to love, fear and be angry are somehow special and gives us the opportunity to 'self-create' a better way of being in which all can share then couldnt we call that a spirituality and wouldnt it be worth pursuing. If you follow through this sort of logic then I think you arrive at the conclusion that 'salvation' of the individual is impossible without 'universal' salvation.

Here is a starting point.... "The fullest enjoyment of life is only achieved when it is achieved at once for all living creatures." If you dont believe this then try enjoying a one-person party!

Perhaps even Jesus had an idea something like this when He said "Whoever seeks to gain his own life will lose it."

We are not as far apart on this as you think, waterboy

>>There is far more to these liturgical differences than mere fashion. The differences reflect profoundly different theologies and very different motivations of the participants and leaders<<

Fashions in music can also reflect profoundly different concepts and structures. Twentieth century composers who leaned towards the atonal were convinced that the classical genre was boring and stultifying. Others such as Samuel Barber and Ralph Vaughan Williams remained primarily romantic, while other fashions such as Philip Glass' minimalism also wax and wane.

What these folk have in common is music. Where they differ is in their interpretation - their theologies - and this is reflected in the fashions in music that come and go.

In the mid-sixties, "free jazz" appeared, a movement led by musicians such as Albert Ayler and Archie Shepp. Those who were brought up on a diet of Miles Davis, Gerry Mulligan and Charlie Parker considered it little more than "noise", but it had its adherents who firmly believed that it was a highly evolved form of music.

So they too saw their worship of music to "reflect profoundly different theologies and very different motivations of the participants and leaders", but in the end it turned out to be just another phase.

I am a little surprised that you don't have a more charitable view of Hillsong. I happen to know quite a few of that congregation, they are predominantly young, and they are very much Christians.

I am sure there will be other fashions in liturgy that come and go, and some that will stay. But I cannot understand why in some corners of the Christian world there are people like Sells who become agitated when others of their faith choose a more approachable service to attend.

After all, as Sells himself points out:

>>Christian worship is serious holy play that reveals the world as it really is rather than what it thinks it is<<

Guess what. In the world as it really is, there are many ways to skin a cat.

Tasmanian Tiger please tell us about "the forensic evidence for God, which is everywhere". I think you'll find it is not so much described as "idiotic" as non-existant. And of course "the Bible calls those fools who in their hearts claim that there is no God" - because instuments of propaganda invariably belittle their detractors.

I had the full christian up-bringing - Sunday school, weekly church, church school, and it all left me totally unmoved by the notion of god, although I love the old services, hymns and the language of the King James bible. On the odd occasion I find myself in church I find the modern language and the happy-clappies quite repulsive, but the pleasure in the old services was derived from the beauty of the language, the sense of occasion and the time to be quiet in a lovely setting. As for god - well for me god is a real as any other character from great fiction, and a really nasty piece of work. Who could like a character who had the power to do anything, make people believe anything, and chose to kill his own child as the best way to make a point? Sick.

Candice sounds like the best advert going aroung for the Hillsong type churches. She writes of her church upbringing "and it all left me totally unmoved by the notion of god" and then goes on to say 'Although I love the old services, hymns and the language of the King James bible'
It seems that a lot of people (not all) in churches that practice liturgy have a great deal of followers that choose not to believe or follow the teachings of Christ.

If you are totally unmoved by the notion of God' it is obvious that you do not know Him. I am sure though like every other person on the planet that if you don't know Him you would of replaced Him with something else.

Waterboy,
I have been following your posts with some satisfaction that someone understands what I am on about. However your last exposes an unexpected atheism. The church is not based on any of our ideas for a better world. It and its liturgy is based on the truth of God. Otherwise we are left with Pericles’ psychological payoff that hangs in mid air. Liturgy is not something that supports our dream of a better world but points to a reality hidden below the surface of the world. That is why it must be handled with care, it is enacted theology as you yourself have pointed out.

Peter Sellick

You completely miss the point, Runner - there was nothing spititual at church to move me despite the beauty of the language, which can still send a tingle up my spine. The thought of people jumping up and down like human pogo-sticks, as at Hillsong, just strikes me as incredibly funny, and their music does absolutely nothing for me. The thing is, all the religious exposure of my youth totally failed to provide me with any sense or evidence of a god or any inclination to believe in an entity that has never seemed more than a human construct. And if you look at god in the bible, he is a really unpleasant character - playing favourites, killing people, demanding his followers kill people, dumping on his chosen people, its all there. I appreciate that some people can't get through the day without the support of this figment of their imagination, but I'm not one of them.

I'd still like to see Tasmanian Tigers 'forensic evidence' of the existence of god - who knows, I may be convinced. I'm quite open to rational argument, its just the irrational stuff that I don't get.

" [1] Christian worship is serious holy play that reveals the world as it really is rather than what it thinks it is. [2] It is as shocking as the scandal of the Gospel and a danger to our constructions of the world. [3] We should attend Church in fear and trembling not knowing where we will be led each Sunday. " - Sells

Peter,

[1., above] We agree on what I have been saying for six months worship is indewlling [Polanyi] in crede, not exchanging information. The latter does not require a priesthood and brick and mortar building. Books and CDs will suffice.

[2.] Ditto for the Trinity of Serapis. That Mystery cult was backed but substianial scriptural works [Wells]. Its godheadhead is similar to Christian godhead. Stucturally {not the person], the Litergy of the Church of Serapis might have more in common with the Anglicans, than between the RCC and the Anglicans.

[3.] Fear and trembling in the absence of secular danger, the neuroscientists put down to the Neocortex being suppressed by the Limbic [survival] survival system. moreover, indulging in worship is likely to be reinforcing [Skinner] causing neurons to tree branches [Grenfield].

In between the cracks of 1, 2, 3, is the consistant interaction between Egypt and Roman. Theocrasic transference about the "afterlife" into the Late-Greco and Latin world of 300 circa BCE too 200 CE occurred. IT REALLY DID. In the first century CE, there were chariot loads itinerate Messiahs and Holy-Sayers making a living during the SAME period. The Jews seem to have revolted against the history of being under the Greek and Eyptian thumb, midst the power of the near apex of Roman power under Augustus

Thanks for your clarification Candice

'And if you look at god in the bible, he is a really unpleasant character - playing favourites, killing people, demanding his followers kill people, dumping on his chosen people, its all there.'

You obviously perceive a different 'god of the bible' to the followers of Jesus. History shows that those who did their best to live consistently with His teachings were the ones that violence was inflicted upon.

Its funny that out of the thousands of Christians I have met none of them have been into killing people. I have meant a number of non believers that are comfortable with murdereing their unborn.

PigRig, If we are truly just mindless cosmic accidents, then there is no reason why anyone ought to condemn terrorism and mass murder. After all, such a horrible person would be just recycling collections of purposeless material in a purposeless universe.

Like it or not, it is Christianity that discusses love and happiness. Jesus' beatitudes are revolutionary, contradicting popular thinking about what makes us happy, and his basic rule is love.

Ignorance and fear come when you live in a purposeless existence that ignores the obvious mind behind everything, leading to a life that is going nowhere except to be recycled in a supposedly purposeless universe. What a waste!

People, who know history, can explain history directs politics, movements and theocrasia; just as an astronomer can can explain why inner planets trend towards non-geaseous and the larger outer planets are gaseous. Absolute knowledge isn't there with hyper-complex systems, but, there fundamentals are, yes, are, known.

[aside: Personally, I think Claudius is underrated, then again, I admire Jimmy Carter.]

The reason why you don't engage real history, suggests, seep down, the God you fear is, THE GORGON IN THE MIRROR, the truth.

My bottom line is, I have never seen the Forum debates being between theism and atheism, but, instead, between [open] knowledge and [contrived] ignorance. The churches have a big stake in the latter, via in worship, catechisms and articles of faith."

Runner,

CHRISTIANS

Ever heard of Adolf Hitler? Ever heard of Slavery, Ever heard of Hiroshima? Ever heard of the Inquisitions? Ever heard of the Crusades? Every heard of the Klu Klux Klan?

AND OF CHRISTIAN GOD;

Ever heard of Smitting, plagues, floods and droughts?

Candide, great posts! I share a similar experience to you,
although I'm not into the religious singing stuff, there is
much better music around then that :)

Tassie Tiger, why would life not have meaning without
praying to some imaginary God? Sheesh, you have not
lived yet! Life is full of meaning and purpose, but
its up to you to decide what you want it to be.

Once the worms have chewed you up, what will continue
is your dna, through your kids. So naturally most people
focus on their kids, grandkids etc. Not only in humans,
in other species too.

Other then that, I know amazingly happy people who have
determined their own passions and purposes which fill
their lives. If Edison had not been so passionate about
inventing new things, you could well be sitting
in the dark :) The list is endless.

Its amazing how Xtians talk of the Jesus love story,
but ignore the old testament, where the old boy was clearly
a violent, mean thing.

Runner, the leaders of the Xtian church, ie the popes,
used to have heretics like us burnt at the stake. Oops,
clearly the Jesus loves you story is not so correct.
Allah loves you too, until you do the wrong thing by
his church.

Fact is, as a social species, the basics of our morality
is part of our evolution. Species that help each other,
share, don't kill each other etc, have better prospects
then species who kill each other, which soon go extinct.
Read up some primatology, such as De Waal's "Good Natured"
the origins of right and wrong in humans and other animals.
You'll find that other primates are far more like us
then you would have ever dreamed

"There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in your philosophy" William Shakespeare.

I tend to agree with old Willie on this one and in so doing I do not dismiss the idea of there being a God. However I have trouble in accepting religious doctrines and have many intellectuaL discourses with my devout baptist daughter who reads to me passages from biblical books.

I have attended both the solemn services in my youth and the modern services with my daughter and I much prefer the modern services.

Maybe the service that the author attended wasnt particularly well run. I have noticed that all ministries are not equal and some are just so much better than others. Why does a true man of God need robes to prove it. That special something will be obvious to all who come into his church or presence. Jesus needed no special adornment. If a man isnt truly holy clothes will make no difference except to act as a masquerade.

Sells,

I found 'Truth of God' and 'Hidden Reality' type theology attenuated,closed and deeply dissatisfying and have long since moved on from there.

The reality of God is not 'hidden' or displaced to some other place beyond human experience but it is beyond the limits of language to express it. Hence God is approached in metaphor,image,parable and sacrament not asan unknowable mystery butasan inexpressible dimension of common human being. my Theology is bound bythe principle that it must operate within the horizon of ordinary human experience and be consequential. I know itis theological foolishness to 'seek a better world' but itis the point at which I choose tobe a fool for it seems to me worthy foolishness.

The raison-detre of Theology must pertain to realities that you and I and Peri can experience. If it does not have any effect in human experiencable reality then it is inconsequential. Be clear by this I do not imply any instrumentality in the liturgy. We do not control it in that sense, cannot manipulate it in terms of outcomes. That is why Liturgy isso dangerous and such serious play and why God-manipulating pop-worship is so desolate.

Phrases like 'Truth of God' and 'Hidden reality' fall short of being language worthy of Theology or Liturgy. They lack metaphorical power and therefore cannot be revelatory of the divine. They are closed,too certain,too specific and too concrete. Their time passed with the demise of TheologicalSystems. As life proceeds without certainty so too Theology proceeds without certainty and without closure. The Liturgy is not closed but proceeds from call to commission and returns us to our ordinary lives without answers or certainties. It can be likened to passing through a gate. The gate is open and on either side we are inthis world but passing through the gate can change our perspective,transpose us from being in the street to being in the garden. Certainty and closure are characteristics of death,not of life,so Theology (or Liturgy) that leaves us anywhere BUT hanging in mid-air is life-denying.

Finally,I forgive you for calling me an atheist. Peace be with you

Lovely post waterboy, typos aside :)

Notwithstanding my somewhat flippant comment above, my spiritual leanings aren't too far from you, Pericles and many of the more rational posters in this thread.

Sells' articles are often interesting, but almost always solely because they provide an insight into a particular kind of Christian worldview. Of course, this is the very same reason why some of us enjoy Boazy's prolific contributions about more prosaic topics :)

My eternally agnostic perspective is always enriched by engaging with religious types here, even if I'm occasionally a little more caustic than civil debate warrants.

Of course, these sentiments reflect a mellow mood occasioned in part by the consumption of chocolate and good red wine on a distinctly chilly day. Happy Babylonian fertility festival all!

Praise Ishtar :P

Oliver

You write'Ever heard of Adolf Hitler? Ever heard of Slavery, Ever heard of Hiroshima? Ever heard of the Inquisitions? Ever heard of the Crusades? Every heard of the Klu Klux Klan?

AND OF CHRISTIAN GOD;

Ever heard of Smitting, plagues, floods and droughts

You either show a great ignorance to Jesus and His teachings or for some reason along with the above mentioned names you deliberately mis represent Him.

Runner,

Thanks for your reply.

Primarily, I was referring to the Christian Church and the Cannanite God(s) of the Old Testament. Christians and the Hebrew henotheist diety act/acted nothing like Jesus [the odd temper trip aside] and his teachings [which incidently are known to societies too].

I'm currently writing from Rome and have seen the huge pilgrimage of devotees at the Vatican. It's a lot like Mecca must be during the Muslim holy festivals but with an abundance of tacky souvenirs and commercial exploitation.

It's pretty much business as usual here today (Monday)and Good Friday was not a Public Holiday.

I can't get over the fact that this is the time of year we commemorate the resurrection of the Saviour of a large part of the world's population by the eager over-consumption of little chocolate eggs, distributed by a magical invisible rabbit.

Says a lot really.

Runner,

1. As previously mentioned, I was referring mainly to the actions of Christians. Any tally of tens of millions of deaths of the twentieth century would have Christians matching the Maoists, Stalinists or flue epidemics. The separation you see between Christians and killing is not there.

2. If we discount the miracles... There have been some highly self-actualised individuals in history, many teachers, many humanists and many martyrs. Considering Jesus' secular existence, why do you see him not merely special, but, special to the point of being extraodinary?

Even the establishment of a denominational church [from the Jesus cults] had more to do with Paul [inclusion of gentiles and Hellenisation], Hadrian [exiling Jew from the Holy Lands], and Constantine [Nicaea]. [Marketing has given us Paris Hilton and big oil, George W.]

If one could video a day in the Life of Jesus, especially, before his alleged arrest; what would be so special?

Prophets and massiahs were thick on the ground in the first century Middle East[for religo-political reasons].

3. The drive to believe is strong amongst religionists [I let the self-reference stand.] : Just look at the RCC first-tracking JP II's sainthood. Before his body was cold, one could have forecast the his miraculous intercession with God. Rot.

Relatedly, on the the Liturgy of Extreme Unction. Why does a dead Pope require nine absolutions, when one is okay for normal folk? The ceremony of the death of Kings, Presidents or Popes is most temporal, indeed. Even in liturgy, in life, and, in death, there are church-consented rank distinctions, I suspect [the]Jesus [characterisation] [if he ever existed] would not approve.

Sells,

Come on Sells, my friend, you really don't believe the intercession of a dead Pope [Archbishop, in your case?] can occasion the remission of a disease.[Not saying some to bio-neurological agent, opposite to pointing the bone was not at work.]

Woobles,

Thanks for the funny post it has tickled my funny bone and given me a good laugh.

Truth really is stranger than fiction isnt it.

Sells,
That was a very interesting piece to read, especially for someone old enough to understand and share your sentiments. I am just wondering, whether you counted on the number of naive, or irrelevant (or both) comments by "liturgical outsiders". It might be interesting to hear comments on the music of, say, Missa solemnis, written by a musical connoisseur, bur hardly if written by a musically illiterate or even deaf person. Similarly, comments on the religious and/or psychological value of traditional liturgy vs. "happy-clappy" liturgy are interesting when written by somebody who can experience it at least on the psychological level but not if written by people "liturgically illiterate". I would not comment on the aesthetic or grammatical merits of this or that essay written in Turkish since I do not understand that language.

Good God, to coin a phrase. Why can't some of you at least spend your time contemplating your navel or someone else's for that matter. This constant bickering about something that has never existed is ridiculous and wastes your time and everybody else's.

If you must believe this stuff, keep it private as it's supposed to be.

This sort of display shows one thing. Ignorance. Neanderthal thinking. I'm afraid of the dark, I'll wait for something to save me, hope it knows what it's doing.

George.
What we are faced with is a massive loss of culture to the extent that most people do not have any basis for a discussion about theology or church practice. It reminds me of the parable that Alistair Macintyre writes in the beginning of After Virtue in which he describes a culture that has undergone a catastrophe in which scientific language is destroyed. What is left is fragments of language that do not make sense and do not connect to the real world. But what can you expect when our educational institutions at all levels are virtually banned from teaching any serious theology, church history or biblical studies. While we mourn the loss of indigenous culture we miss that we have lost the most part of ours except for the technical

Sells,

What religion reminds me of is the TV adaption of William Golding's, "Lord of the Flies". As children the cult sing a hotch-potch song of a national anthem and hyms. The have no remember of what really happned when they where infants, so the confabulate from unrelated parts.

You have a habit of starting with Church and Jesus as god as a given. The assumption is too broad. A god may exist independent of human invention.

We appreciate your article writing efforts, but, you are the least likely contributor to this debate. You compliment the like minded and ignore contrary inteprenations of history. If everybody else was like you we still be in the Dark Ages.

George,

Greetings.

We have agreed to differ, so need for a reply. However, I know some whom knew JPII personally. There was discussed about children sitting around the priest during the service. John Paul said it was okay for Australia but would not operate in Italy: That reply, recognises culture, not liturgy in religion.

So what i get from this article is that the liturgy of the Church is kind of like a recipe for a cake. If you stick to the prescribed ingredients and the instructions you would expect to have a really good cake at the end of it, if you go altering the ingredients or changing the instructions or removing or replacing any component who knows what you'll end up baking? Not that i really know that the metaphorical cake symbolises, some sort of awakening perhaps?

RobbyH, i find it strange that you would take the time to read and post to this thread just to then say you think its a waste of time and should be kept private.
Sells articles usually elicit quite a bit of discussion and debate from a range of perspectives. His pieces always have a high post count and frequently appear in the most popular and most discussed article sections. Why would you want to silence this sort of talk when it's clear a majority of people are interested in it?

Oliver,
We agreed to disagree, but I do not think we disagree on the point you make. Of course, liturgy is culturally determined worship, and you are right, it does not make sense to those who do not recognise the Addressee of that worship (a point well illustrated also by RobbyH and Donnie). And it makes only limited sense to those who do not understand the culture it is built on. Like music does not make sense to those who are deaf, and e.g. classical music makes only limited sense to those who have not been educated to appreciate it.

Liturgy has an important psychological stimulant dependent on the cultural background of the worshippers. For instance, only Catholics of European/Western tradition regretted the demise of the Tridentine mass — albeit only a minority of them. One spoke of liturgical vandalism, not of liturgical heresy. And whatever bone of contention still exists between Rome and Constantinople (or Moscow), it is not the different liturgies. There were Catholics of Byzantine rite even in the pre-Vatican II Church.

George,

Thanks. Those of the Western tradition probably appreciate pews and the the right cum rite to sit. [Was it St. Augustine or earlier, wherein, one should stand during a service? I need to check.]

Cheers and best wishes,

O.

I'm sure that organised religion has its merits, no matter the denomination.
Having gone through the anglican experience as a child/young adult, I was fortunate enough to meet a number of people whose carriage and demeanour was a satisfying reflection of their personal relationship with their creator. Having said that, it occured to me over time that their, and my own, relationship with the creator was not dependant upon ritualistic discipline, no matter how grand the architecture nor how splendid the rituals, but moreso one of gratitude for the opportunity to be and experience. The evidence of God's wonder surrounds us daily.
Some may disagree, but there is no harm in the repetitive nature of the rituals. They are a desired constant reminder to some, much like, and please excuse the analogy, repetitive public service announcements or advertising, through various media. Also, some people are not inclined to study of the various scriptures and prefer a weekly dose of readings and explanations.
Formal or informal, if you believe that worship can only occur in one spot and/or you enjoy the social interaction of being with like minded people and can willingly combine your talents for the greater good of the community, then that's a good thing surely?
I'm not sure that I can reconcile the concept of icons with the teachings pertaining to graven images but I understand that is a reflection of a time when the general population had a higher degree of illiteracy and needed to see statues/images to help understand the concept. It's relevance now may be up for question.
Right now, I thank God for my ability to read, reason, engage in abstract thought, type, breath, see, etc.

tRAKKA,

Do you not see a problem with leaving interpretation to a third party? Some say that Church is more about "indwelling" in worship, rather than the exchange of information. One is not encouraged to critique the Minister, Priest or Pastor, as would be the case in other forms of teacher-learner relationships.

Priesthood is an occupation and an religion an industry, which preceded the Christ era by four thousand years, establishing several[then] New World Religions. Moreover, even then the content and rite was formulaic; creation story, divine visitations, priests, sacrafices and altars. Christianity is not differentiated in many, many areas: Hence, would it not a good idea to indepedently appraise Christian claims, against the "broader" non-theistic historical record one's self

Yeah its confusing. When one goes into any place of religious worship what they are after is as important to them as the knowledge of god the place imparts...extremes of range
i.joining a worship because of its large and influential and organized congregation for self benefit
ii.congregation where its society formed by its members is as important as its help to spiritual development
iii.one walks in because they have a sense of gods existence and their connection but want education to develop this spiritual relationship ie the highest of drive a human can have...

I think we all know of examples of each of the above and where we belong...

Problem for religious groups is that they got involved in politics, ie control of society, which is nothing about god but power and authority which reflected in their method of practice...hence now lot of them are being rejected leaving a lot of lost souls...keep searching and one day all the pieces will fall into place and you will see...then existing day to day will change to becoming a part of the whole which is god and where each of us belong in this harmonious body...

Sam

tRAKKA,
Thank you for that post and Oliver and sam said - they are all interesting and in some ways complementary of the same view. My jury is out on the issue of a universal intellect or diety but I agree with all of your views on organised religion.

Its the blatant manipulation of religious belief for political or idealogical adavantage that disturbs me. It is a pheneomena of our times and it is making inroads on our political system by challenging the seperation of church and state. When I hear our leaders applying deterministic concepts of good and evil in international realtionships; taking the christian moral highground on complex issues of human rights etc - where will it stop? Then I hear, the christian lobby attacking the Muslim community for wanting the same political power with our politicians playing both off againts each other for political expediency.

I think its time to send them all back to their pastoral fields with firm parameters requiring them to leave their religious baggage at the door, if they wish to get involved in secular governance.

Netab,
" its time to send them all back ... requiring them to leave their religious baggage at the door, if they wish to get involved in secular governance".

Equally, one should leave irrelevant political agitation at the door if one wishes to enter a discussion on a paper concerned solely with the merits or not of traditional vs. post-modern Christian liturgy. The Christian lobby is certainly not the only political lobby that tries to influence "secular governance", and you have every right to criticise any one of them. But what has this got to do with the topic of Sells' paper?

George,

"Liturgy has an important psychological stimulant dependent on the cultural background of the worshippers."

True. It has a very positive side for worshippers requiring community and affirmation.

Liturgy [the theology behind it] has also been mixed-in with power politics, the Great Schicism, for instance.

Only recently, I read that for catechumen waiting two to three years before Baptism, that the Bread was not the Body:

There were baptised Christians and a special group of catechumen apprentices. At the meal [c.250] the catechumen "was supppossed to receive 'bread of exorism', which is distinct from the baptised Christian's bread. There was "no place [for catechuman] at the Lord's table when baptised Christians met and prayed mindfully for their host" [Robin Lane Fox]. If accurately reported, over the centuries, it seems an entire sacrament has been dropped. Also, if caught sinning, becoming a mere "hearer" of instruction, as a catechumen regarded, as a demotion.

In the first and second centuries, liturgy seemingly was neither upper class, slave or underclass. Peachers went to small property owners not to slave mines or to palaces. The early target market tended to literate but having limited social mobility. Not sure, if this is how the churches and Hollywood portray the situation

George,
I'll post where ever I like thank you - if you don't like it, then you can go pray about it somewhere! Not that I need to answer to you but I would have thought that the first line of the post identified who I was directing the post to and in what context- not clear enough for you? This is not your chapel sunshine and I'll certainly take an interest in this thread in future and whenever I feel like it. Don't forget to pray for my soul!

Oliver,
Again, I have to agree and thank you for the info about early catechumens. Yes, it is important to keep in mind the original Christian liturgical practice. However, I think that one also has to keep in mind, that -- at least in Europe -- people's aesthetic tastes and psychological dispositions have evolved over the centuries; including a "propensity" to tradition inherited from recent generations of worshipers, that could not have existed in the first centuries A.D. For instance, besides "classical" (pre-20th century), music, there is decent modern music and decadent music, though it is not easy, if at all possible, to give objective criteria for which is which. Perhaps something similar can be said about the aesthetic, pastoral and psychological values of new liturgies.

Oliver,
I prefer not to leave interpretation to a third party. That is my conscious decision. The role of the minister/priest ,historically, was to explain to the unlearned an interpretation of holy teachings as proscribed, depending on the religious persuasion. The challenge today lies, I believe, not so much with the third party but more so on reliance upon the third party interpreting scripture as was meant. If a person decides to accept another's interpretation without question, even with the benefit of self-education, that is their own business.
Christianity owes a lot to "pagan" rituals, I agree. The Assyrians gave us the epic of Gilgamesh, the Easter celebration is drawn from the Babylonian worship of Ishtar, typically early to mid-march, as a time of renewal. Worship on sundays was instigated because the Christians couldn't get a crowd on saturdays but the temples for Baal and crew were filled on sundays. If you can't beat'em...
I'm not sure if any benefit can be drawn from telling someone their form of worship is not correct. It remains a personal decision in the end. The gift of choice allows us all to worship as we feel fit.

tRAKKA,

Thank you. I liked your reply. It was balanced and recognised many historical realities some devout might choice not to recognise.

Often, I tell my undergrad. business studies students that a textbook is just a handy approximation of the real world reality. It is sensibly contrived but for the real world falls short. In a larger picture a discipline will have community of practice with a peer-group [topic educated reference group] whom defend a position(s)[Lakatos]. Other disciplines, rough researchers and better PhD students will attack it. That is how progress is how we progress.

In religious practice, to me, congregations seem too passive and the Churches don't really acknowledge cultural anthropology, history and comparative theocrasia to there flock. They too defend their positions, but to quash, rather meld positions. It is like watching TV [inactive] rather than reading a paper [active]. The priest/minister is given far to significant a role and is virtually unchallengable. Historically, the Jews lost battles to Hadrian because the former would not fight on the Sabboth, the General/Empire knew this. Even Jesus said that the Sabboth has been made by Man [?].

Polanyi as I mentioned saw performance artistic and religious as an act of "indwelling" in that performance. It really is learning.

My critique of Sells on many topics is his is an "inside" world and religion [any religion] is not subjected to objective forsenic scunity by denominationists in the same way as in the 1950s/60s,Solid State cosmologists had recognise that that 2.7K degrees background radiation supported the Big Bang

To ensure that I don't invoke the sanction of the hammer of god, I'll stay well within thread. I think the authors statement is correct because in the past, adherents to the 'holy play' had a liturgical sensory environment that both created a psychological atmosphere and directed the participants sensory input to the medium of the third party; who acted as the guide through the psychological forest of our fears and expectations to the shimmering grail in a far off clearing. The great playwrights of the Greek tragedy's developed the liturgical techniques that would be used by christianity in later ages.

The problem now is that essential to both the Greek and later Christian liturgical rights is the 'holy guide'. The fact that christianity has only relatively recently moved from Latin to indigenous language has essentially changed the liturgical environment from mystery to dogma and diminished the role of the 'holy guide'.

Christians in the past, participating in these rights at least knew that they were undertaking a spiritual jorney; now they have no idea and are vulnerable to manipulation.

Netab,
Thank you, that is a very interesting insight into the psychological function of Christian liturgy; the fact that you are apparently an "outsider" is here quite irrelevant.

Netab,

The Holy Guide metaphor for the role of the Divine in Christian Liturgy is quite misleading. This seems to me a clear misunderstanding of the liturgy. If Holy Guide is the role of God in Greek Tragedy then that would be a major point of difference between Greek Drama and Christian Liturgy and evidence that the two are not as closely related as you suggest.
As for manipulation through the liturgy, it has always been there and was certainly no less the case when the liturgy was conducted in Latin.
Personally I would prefer the liturgy to be conducted in Latin and that the congregation have sufficient grasp of Latin to understand it. The reason, however, is that we might then access the vast body of liturgical texts and sacred music that have been either lost or diminished by translation into the vernacular.
While a psychological analysis of the liturgy may be quite valid, I believe yours is quite wide of the mark.

As a student I remember being interested in the psychological aspects of Christian worship but I soon came to understand that this could never be the central focus. Our problem in this is the great turn to the self initiated by Descartes that places the self at the centre of everything we do. What happens in liturgy is a turn away from the self towards God, the self takes second place. Since James published “The varieties of religious experience” religion has been about subjectivity hence the psychologising trend. It is after all only about us and that reveals how deep our atheism goes. We attend liturgy in the hope that we will be addressed from outside of our subjectivity which in our time has become a locked cage. You do not have to be a supernatualist to expect this kind of address but you do need humility.

I see no harm in letting the psychologists loose on the liturgy.
It is like looking at a beetle through a magnifying glass, you will not discover the essence of the beetle but you will learn something.
Perhaps it would expose some of the problems with pop-worship, which is an intensely individualistic and psychological affair.

waterboy,
Thanks for your comments. I may not have been as clear as I should but by 'holy guide' I referred to the priestly or leadership function. In the Greek Tragedy's this function was found in the chorus or narrator. I don't agree with your comments re Latin; Latin is a very evocative language for those that understand it and for those that didn't, it heightened the sense of the mystery unfolding in the rites.
Sells,
Thanks also. I take your point about the promotion of egoism in spiritual matters but lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater. The attendance at liturgy is a holistic sensory experience that leads us away from ourselves / ego to the point of a fundamental understanding of our identity in the experience of the renewal in the mystery of the God / Man figure of the risen Christ. But the road away from the ego to the body and blood of Christ, is a road of psychological preperation

Why Latin? Jesus would jave used [Attic] Greek and Arimaic? Jesus' Cheraei are Greek and more educated than the Koine Greek of the Theological Schools. Personally, those you do believe should do so in their mother tongue. Higher specialised scholarship should be available but not necessarily of the Bible School variety.

Latin is a precise language but it is lesser choice than Attic Greek for philosophical topics.

Latin and languages not understood by the broad congregation is okay for communion of the devout and fellowship: But, having the word of any supposed God should be an open system, like UNIX.

"Our problem in this is the great turn to the self initiated by Descartes that places the self at the centre of everything we do." - Sells

Peter, Descartes was a Philosopher. Humanist Psychology is concerned with the good health of the individual and holding all people "in unconditional positive regard" (Rogers). It is no selfish. Similarly, self-actualisation (Maslow) is a sign of mental health. Anthromophism lies more in the realm of the Christian church, which placed humanity at the centre of the Universe. [I studied Psych. at Sydney and UC Berkely. Four years I, II, two III majors). I don't practice, as I have three higher degrees].

Oliver,
Funny, you mentioning UNIX in this context. Well, I am an avowed adherent of the user friendly Mac OS (in opposition to the mainstream, virus-friendly, OS) that runs on UNIX. You certainly know more about these things than I.

Is this not somehow similar to the situation we discuss? I do not know if Latin is a less precise language for philosophical topics than Attic Greek, but certainly the latter (plus Armenian), is the original language of the New Testament, and Latin, plus other, more modern languages, just "user-friendly" translations, "running on" the languages of the bible. It is this user-friendliness that depends on the cultural and psychological background of the given individual and congregation. However, as the average Macintosh user does not have to know anything about UNIX, only the serious maintenance programmer does, so the average "liturgy user"/worshipper does not have to be aware of the nuances of the original languages, only the serious exegete and "liturgy programmer" do.

Sorry, Arimaic, not Armenian!

Charming people these theologians. Peter here says "The less control the hierarchy has on what happens on Sunday morning the more variability we can expect and, unhappily, the more crimes are committed against Christian worship." In this article, Peter has his brain twisted up in religious mind control techniques, as he discusses the most appropriate and effective means to bake a person's brain within a religious incubator.

But what is this complete acceptance and promotion of worship? Isn't worship how people learn to be stupid and get proselytised by being relieved of their commonsense? Isn't it all about shutting the eye of reason and forgetting the only and the right thing to do which is using our intelligence? It is just amazing how so many people fall for all this deception but it is also painful to imagine that so many poor sods will never be able to rise above this fictional view of life. i.e. A fictional view of life implies fictional people so why do people need the real world when they can have an inexorable and schemingly designed fake one with teddy as a perpetual broadcaster?

There simply is no teddy (god) and our existence is both a natural phenomenon and one to be treasured. In the real world just begin to view each of us as incredible, rare, one-of-a-kind works of art, to be valued and urged to live as fully as possible to the potential of our being. Love is not related to a need for worship especially this infantile teddy worship.

Oliver et al.,
If I might just stick my 2 cents worth in, just for informations sake, my partner is Assyrian and I have been subject to learning by association.
What I can say with some degree of certainty is that the original Aramaic (correct spelling) texts are greater in length and have been subject to various bastardisations over time due to errors in translation by various well intentioned souls.
A recent innovation is the commencement of services in english, due to the larger number of younger Assyrians who may not have the strength of their mother tongue. My first exposure to this is scheduled for this coming weekend, so I will be in more of a position then to comment on proceedings.
Their is a dearth of iconography within the The Holy and Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East due to it's being one of the first created, around 70 A.D., I believe. Thaddeus obviously was speaking with a learned people.
Unfortunately, these indigenous people of Iraq, are now a nation without country, but the practice of their faith including all the liturgy that involves has ensured a strong sense of community where ever Assyrians might congregate. In Sydney alone, a very small population has managed to create 2 churches, a cathedral, community nursing homes, various schools, property holdings.
Liturgy then, while a small part of faith, might be construed as necessary for the maintenance of identity.

Oliver, on Monday, 16 April 2007 posted this ... "My critique of Sells on many topics is his is an "inside" world and religion [any religion] is not subjected to objective forsenic scunity by denominationists in the same way as in the 1950s/60s, Solid State cosmologists had recognise that that 2.7K degrees background radiation supported the Big Bang."

One cannot ignore this bit of funny stuff, Oliver.

The big bang alpha/omega idea is another worshipped religion with its fingers of teddy pointing to Earth, because it interprets everything as if we are the centre of the universe. As I've said on previous occasions, the BB theory is hastily based on the will to believe rather than its opposite ..... the will to find out. The redshift of galaxies via the doppler effect and the 2.7K degrees background radiation do NOT support the BB hypothesis of finite universal causality. Worship of finite universal causality is not about love of forensic evidence because worship can only misinterpret or ignore or deliberately distort evidence.

Even though I'm here writing this with the Einstein Factor on ch 2 running in the background, it surely is time to set aside Newton and Einstein with their finite universal causality and finally let INFINITE universal causality prevail.

Keiran,
The Big Bang is a theory accepted by practically all physicists/cosmologists, religious believers or unbelievers, the same as Darwinian (or neodarwinian) evolution is a theory accepted by practically all biologists, believers or unbelievers. On the other hand, it is certainly true that Big Bang is used as a teddy, as you call it, by some naive believers to support their faith, the same as Darwinian theory is used as their teddy by some atheists (e.g. Richard Dawkins) to support their "unfaith". This, however, should not be the reason for rejecting any of the two theories that are widely accepted by the corresponding specialists. Besides, Big Bang theorists do not "interpret everything as if we are the centre of the universe". At most you could see it as interpreting everything as if our universe were the centre of the multiverse, the reason for this having nothing to do with belief or unbelief in a transcendental God, but with the fact that this all we know about our physical world, that speculations about a multiverse are (still?) just that, speculations.

Hello Keiran,

I thought we touched on this before, because you felt that the Solid State universe contained "infinities" and the absence of alleged infinities in the Big Big was a "teddy". At the time, I believe I mentioned 4-D spacetime in Plank time[ten the minus 43 power seconds] is not well defined [time is a dimension too]. Penrose theorises this event is proceeded by singularities in phase space which would incorporate infinities. Herein, there maybe multiple universes [or we reinterpret the word "universe" to be way outside our physical horizons.]. In science, the BB is a positive heuristic, whether or not one believes in intelligent design. One thread is god created the process; and, an thread if there infinite environments, some environments will permit life sustainable universes: We are one of the latter otherwise we would not be here to contemplate it.

What is significant is that background radiation was forecast before it was discovered.

My comment about Sells was merely that he should read general history outside theological posits of historical events.

Kieran,

Just re-read your post. Readshift is a doppler-like effect, but not a true doppler effect. Popular science books are just using a metaphor. It is caused events inside the universe being limited by the c [speed of light in a vacuum] and the universe itself expanding faster than c

Hey all,

Some interesting stuff appearing regarding the change in the speed of light and greater insight in zero point energy.

Google awayyyyy......

tRAKKA,

Thanks, I will have a search.

George,

I have enjoyed your music metaphors in relation to understanding lithergy, and recall, was it, "Herr Mozart, 'too many notes' " [Austrian Monarch?]. John Casti [mathematician] suggests good music needs to be interesting, popular music is to repetitious and some classical music, as you say, a required taste. Casti examined the relationships between power strectum, frequency and notes and suggested Bach's, "First Brandenberg Concerto", as as "Goodolock's porridge", "just right". Kenneth Hsu [physist] also worked with Bach "distilled" Bach's Invention 5 from its original form down to fractals. It was possible to maintain the essence of the Bach piece, but with less complexity.

I guess one problem for a Minister is to achieve an interesting litugery. But, I don't necessarily agree with the captain of the alter concept following a script determined by head office. If I were a theist, I would still have a problem with the compliance to top-down authority and would see altars and sacramental worships, as primitive. I feel that the Churches treat "their flock" much like the English historically treated the Irish. "Keep 'em igorant".

Sells,

The liturgy of the Christian Churches, is very much post Constantine. Jesus roamed and engaged in question and answer sessions. In the cultic phase, there was home and and small group gatherings.

I see no reason why a suburban church cannot revisit the divinity of Jesus and the godhead. To the Greeks, [Greek philosophy] akin to the Unmoved Mover [Aristotle], one version of god, is god cannot change or suffer. Yet, Jesus visits Earth, after the fact of creation, suffers and is transfigured. This counter- point is as valid, as in cosmology, noting some stars are too old to neatly fit with estimates of the age of the universe. Herein, the congregation can act as a forenic jury on their Church, and, their provide deliberations to their churches. [Luther, double plus]

Oliver,
Thank you for the remark. " If I were a theist (Christian), I would still have a problem with ..." reminds me of my 60 years old aunt many years ago, who said "If I were again 25 years old, I would never marry" to which my obvious answer was "Auntie, if you were 25 years old with a 60 years old mind, nobody would want to marry you."

The point is that if you were a practising Christian you would not view liturgy with the mind of a non-Christian, or even atheist. Your views are, or can be, interesting to a practising Christian, an we should be grateful for different perspectives you provide, but they are nevertheless perspectives of an outsider.

Perhaps not unlike the perspective provided by Thomas Kuhn, or even some less serious "social constructivists of science", can be interesting to a scientist to SEE HOW a sociologist or historian, i.e. an outsider, sees what scientists do, but not if he/she claims to KNOW WHAT they do without "indwelling" -- to use your favourite expression -- in the subject of their research, which in this case means having the corresponding specialist qualifications.

George,

Thank you. I take your point. And smiled at your story.

I have a treasured copy of the proceedings (1961) of Woolf, Wilks, Crombie, Kuhn, Guerlac, Shylock, Boring, Spengler, Boring and Gerard dissecting, "Quantification - The History of Meaning of Measurement in the Natural and Social Sciences". Alistair Crombie wrote on Medieval Physics and Thomas Kuhn Modern Physical Science". I do have penchant towards using discipline "A" to analyse discipline "B".

Just the same, I do appreciate, say the Dreamtime of the Australian Aboriginie, would experiential, known unto them. Guess, that said, alternatively,looking at the 20-30 years before, Constantine or even Islam, I see, if the blocks had been arranged differently, we would a different tradition just as rigorously defended by alternative "legitimate" religions

With this article, Peter gives us this complete acceptance and promotion of worship where he gets all twisted up over the most appropriate and effective mind control techniques. My comment is that worship needs to be disassociated with love. Love always maintains the critical functions of the mind but worship effectively is designed to strip away critical functions and create obedient stooopids. Worship embodies a psychosis and can only create false versions of the world that clash with the reality. It creates through intellectual dishonesty a Goebbels with Nuremburg Rallies to absurd beliefs like the big bang fireworks.

Oliver, you say "What is significant is that background radiation was forecast before it was discovered" and here we agree but this was all without reference to any Big Bang cosmology.
e.g.
In 1896, Charles Edouard Guillaume predicted a temperature of 5.6K from heating by starlight. Arthur Eddington refined the calculations in 1926 and predicted a temperature of 3K. Eric Regener predicted 2.8 in 1933.

However Gamow's predictions with reference to the Big Bang, ranged from 50K to 6 K. Other big bangers had very high predictions too but when the COBE satellite measured it to be only 2.7K, astonishingly all the Big Bang proponents claimed victory. This is astonishing because the Big Bang proponents had NO reasonable degree of accuracy. The fact is that Big Bang cosmology has failed to anticipate any landmark discoveries because it is plainly illogical. i.e. Nothing cannot be the cause of something if there ever was such a thing as nothing which is impossible anyway.

Worship can only misinterpret or ignore or denigrate or deliberately distort evidence. e.g. When the Big Bang high priests found out about the Hubble-Humason redshifts, they decided that those must be Doppler redshifts, to serve as the first and only proof of the big bang expansion. This is the barefaced lie because Hubble, in actual fact, was a life long doubter of velocity being the cause of cosmological redshifts.

Keiran,

An interesting post, but suggest you misrepresent science. If a better model is available scentists have an obligation to work the model. That said, one does not do "U" readily. My limited understanding is that the BB does not have an alpha and omega point, the expanion and contraction [one] solution isn't the universe breathing "into" 3-D space. Rather, 4-D spacetime is created in energy states, from singularities, expnasion isn't into anything in our concept of the 3-D world. Time is created. All of this is a model, and, forecasts [I was taught never say prediction.] based on maths and observations, and, reinterpretation. If you have a better model it is incumbent on science to evaluate it. Alternatively, you can choose to hold a model outside the paradigm [Kuhn] the community of practice [a lonely place].

But, please let me iterate, to the best of my knowledge, we don't believe in infinities is not the case with BB.

In 1919, the prediction that sun would bend light was forecast by other scientists, not on Einstein, and, for different reasons. Einstein, was given the big tick , because he seemed have the better model.

I find the COBE photograph amazing. It is colourised, "usually" showing "uniform" background radiation, except for expected perputations. The structure of the temperature was more important, than the actual the actual temperature.

Defending a good model is good science. Worshipping a model against contrary evidence is bad science. I would hope the BB advocates would drop the model, if a better model came to light.

I don't believe cosmologists are arrogant. They recognise the difficulty of incorporating QM into their models.

Neither, BB or SS, fully addresses first cause, IF first cause is other than causality. A theist might point to their divinity. I would point to (a) some incomprehensible dimensionality, or, (b) comprehensible but yet unknown probability mathematics.

Indeed, one can have very distorted ideas about liturgy, worship if one does not accept the raison d'être of worship, a transcendental Deity, be it the Christian God or what. Equally, one can have only modest, based on popular science and often distorted, ideas about the physics of cosmology, including the Big Bang theory, if one does not understand the relevant mathematics that formulates these theories before they can be verified.

You cannot speak critically about an established physical theory (e.g. gravitation, QM, Big Bang) if you do not understand the mathematics it is based on. [Of course, with theories still in the making (e.g. string theory) also the mathematics might still "have to be discovered" so a layman is even less in the position to criticise.] Infinity, singularity are clear mathematical terms a second year student of mathematics should completely understand, but in physics they appear either as part of the mathematical model underlying a physical theory or as concepts used in popularising the physical theory. After Cantor, both in theology and physics "infinity" has become just an intuitive, not very clear, concept.

I think that similarly, one cannot make critical statements about liturgy or worship, only about its appearance to this or that external observer, if one does not understand - or denies - the metaphysical presuppositions it is based on, as well as the psychological make-up of the worshipper.

George, love always maintains the critical functions of the mind and does not cripple Eros but worship certainly does a pretty good job with various degrees of destructiveness and depression where we see it can only create false versions of the world that clash with the reality. i.e. Lesson 1, don't ever become a worshipper, Keiran.

Keiran as an example of love. As a thirteen-year old I had this remarkable teacher with an interest in astronomy. He gave a few extracurricular lessons at the end of the year and that is where I first heard of the big bang hypothesis. I can remember saying to the teacher that it didn't make any scientific sense. Like how can you have a bang in a vacuum if indeed a vacuum could exist?

George as an example of worship. Fifty years later we see this absurdity, the big bang hypothesis, not as a theory but as an official religion. Like all official religions, it requests funding to spread its message. Here, the modern person saw this as good fairie dust because we can retain a sense of pride in this new cosmology with its high priests. (i.e. intellectually dishonest mathematicians with their old “gravity-only” theories and non-falsifiable hypotheses). Of course, the downside is that future historians of science will judge this era insane.

Lesson 2
Love is the source of real breakthroughs while worship embodies a psychosis and delivers at a cost nothing but very phony, cosy environments for those who conform (which is akin to Thanatos).

Keiran,

The BB is an improbable [not impossible] thermo-entropic event given certain parameters in phase space and symmetries in the extremely early universe. Roger Penrose states that these symmentries when they stabalise [the universe cools to only billions of degrees K!] create the environment for spacetime and known nuclear forces. Physics debate about the threshholds and caps but the aftermouth has been measured by looking back in time. In Penroses chapter there is a diagram. Here, the is a line, a bit like a Gausian curve. Unlike a normal distribution curve, several standard deviations is illustrated cross-sectionally by severval intercessions at separate intervals. In the early unstable [but incredibly stable from the referential frame of phase space], the entropic deviations are large but progressively settle down overtime. What is happening here not like a fire cracker exploding in a vaccuum. Rather, the increase in entropy is a metaphorically a "flash" into nothing creating spacetime and allowing the second law of thermodymics to be sustained for billions of years.

You seemed have had a good educator when you were young, especially his/her own time to work with you. Good. When I was in high sschool, there was question: How states of matter are there? If I recall, I answered, three [what I was taught by teachers], solids, liquids and gas, even though I had read outside of the curriculum about ions being a state of matter.

Good scientists will both defend and challenge the BB. Some will try to make complex equations appear more refined (called eloquent], meanwhile, others will throw-in complications, e.g., spin/momemtum. Ask questions, Is there enough matter to eventually arrest the expansion? This is science. Holding to the SS posit is science too, but, it is not supported by key peers, within the current generation astrophysists and cosmologists. Ulimately, the BB could be shown to by flaw/incomplete but it is the existing working working model in the accepted paradigm [Kuhn].

Oliver, you know when you are dealing with finite systems people when they talk about "inside the universe", expansion of the universe, age of the universe, or something referred to as a multiverse. Whilst we can talk about systems of all types, simple or complex, we are only in fact making quite arbitary assumptions about closures/boundaries and starts/ends. Daily we are in fact systematic but that should not exclude other possibilities nor ignore connectivity. If we are seeking to understand existence then models, cosmologies and exclusive systems are plainly irrelevant and history says so. For myself the default hypothesis will always be an infinite material universe not as some closed or set of SYSTEMS but as a connected whole ENVIRONMENT. Why?

We really do not need old faked up, gravity-only, closed cosmological models that simply thrive on absurdity after absurdity and all shrouded in nonsensical mathematics delivered by high priests like Einstein, Hawking, Davies, Smoot, Mather, even Dawkins. We see an entire zoo of invented fictional entities and forces tossed to the media .... such as a speck appearing instantaneously from nothing, an expanding universe or is it inflating, black holes, dark matter, dark energy, accretion disks, ultradense objects, gravity warping of space-time, "visions of God", string theory, multiples of dimensions, time travel, etc, etc.

One of the glaring oversights of these high priest's gravity-only model is an assumption that electricity doesn't do anything. Just how terribly wrong can one really be? Take Halton Arp, who worked with Edwin Hubble and who has been called a latter day Galileo, has shown that active galaxies give birth to quasars, which in turn become companion galaxies. Galaxies are the largest plasma discharge formations in the visible universe where stars are the cosmic electric street lamps that light them. He has shown that the intrinsic redshift of galaxies is quantized which spells the end of the big bang hypothesis. He says "After all, to get the whole universe totally wrong in the face of clear evidence for over 75 years merits monumental embarrassment and should induce a modicum of humility."

Keiran,

You probably know the formula for a straight line: y=a+bx. With several procedures, clusters around a line of best fit or regression, one can see the maths works. Penrose, historically, Durac et al. with their greater knowledge of physics do the same thing. They can tether their thinking.

The age of this universe is only relevant after Planck time because timelike space is a dimension. Pushing into phase space or in QM quantum indetermancies, infinities do exist. [No teddies.] Moreover, contrary to intuition some infinities can be larger than others!

The prior existence of the expanding universe does not prevent the creation of black holes or new matter [provided the Law for the Conversation of Charge Matter/Antimatter is not broken.].

Science does allow you, your own personal paradigm, but, you need to apply rational methodologies and formulate null hypotheses. Galaxies popping in what you [not me] might call empty space, just does not do it.

As George notes, there is also sub-structure to consider. Strings? Manifolds?

[ Respect your right to have a different opinion. ]

Keiran,
Thank you for your sincerely expressed views on maths and religious activities. Some people mistrust religion, especially the established ones, some people mistrust science, especially that part of it that depends heavily on mathematics. You seem to mistrust both. Your second paragraph could have been written by a fundamentalist creationist. He is worried that contemporary cosmology could rob him of his belief in a "God who created the world in six days", you seem to be worried that it could rob you of your belief in an "infinite universe". It does neither. Contemporary cosmology, even less mathematics, challenges neither a belief in a God, unless He is naively understood, nor the belief in an infinite universe/multiverse, unless it is naively visualised.

Oliver,
You cannot compare strings with manifolds: the former are physical concepts (like electron, photon) the latter is a purely mathematical concept (like sphere or a prime number). E.g a pseudo-riemannian manifold of signature (3,1) - a mathematical concept - is the model of space-time - a physical concept - in Einstein's theory of gravitation.

George,

Thank you for that clarification. I did not have Reinmann in mind, nor, Euclidean space*. Rather, [n > 3,n > 4**] n-manifolds non-Euclidean space. Like you, Penrose notes that manifolds are best regarded from the perspective on general physics:

"To consider n-manifolds for which n is larger than 4, since ordinary spacetime has four** dimensions. In Fact manay mondern theories such as string theory, operate in a 'spacetime' whose dimention is greater than four. BUT (my emphasis, your point?) quite irrespective of the question of whether actual 'spacetime' might be appropriately described as an n-manifold, there are quite compelling reasons for considering n-manifolds generally in physics." Penrose, 2004.

I stand corrected regards my approach.

[With Reinmann surfaces, I think of malformed dohnuts comprised of co-orinates. Then, I think of a coffee break ;-)]

Keiran,

1. If the unification of cosmology and QM finally, once and for all [although should be tentatively held], indicate infinities and the spontaneous creation of matter; that does not make it IMPOSSIBLE that the PROCESS is not of intelligent design:

ONE possible agent for the CREATION of the processs is divine. It just happens, I feel the latter a highly degraded heurustic. I would be more inclined towards a mathematical architecture as the positive heuristic, over a theocrasiac architecture, which cultural anthropology can explain.

Moreover, I find frustration that while I am willing to maintain a null hypothesis, a priest will not.

2. It is an oversimplification but think of solids becoming liquids and liquids gases under heat. More energy that elections fly off their orbits, more energy an tradition sub-atomic particles break-up, yet, more excitation [might be a better word] sub-sub-structures fail, neuclear-binding forces zap! Now think of the aforementioned great pressure. Okay? Reverse the process and think of thermodynamics and entropy and the creation of spaceetime.

George, blind trust ultimately relates to the worship mindset where the desire to believe is easy and the exacto opposite to the love to find out and gain understanding. Trust can only be earned and when one examines the likes of Einstein, Hawking, Davies, Smoot, Mather, Dawkins with their belief in a nonsensical expanding universe I just see, and even from when I was a thirteen year old, a group of high priest mathematicians doing their best to design their own universe. (Now I am finding Oliver doing much the same.) Why they even make ridiculous assumptions for the suckers, like a sucking gravity ( as an attraction) when it can only be a push. Hawking for twenty years plus was speaking of classic black holes where nothing escapes. What a dead head but all this sucking up sure gets people sucked in. Years ago my response was that they cannot exist unless the universe is symmetrical around the black hole, which is impossible. Quite recently, Hawking was forced to come out and admit he was wrong.

Oliver, in Einstein's famous equation, E=mc^2 what does the 'm' represent .... mass or matter? i.e. Because trust can only be earned, just what assumptions are made in formulae and equations? They may all look impressive but all have embedded agendas and many in fact may be quite fictional.

Also, prior to 1920 we humans couldn't see beyond our galaxy the Milky Way and this was thought to be the whole universe. We now see countless galaxies with much improved instruments. Some are huge. Because there is so much that cannot be explained or known it is still not unreasonable to make the statement that we have an infinite environment always existing. We can only base this on reasoned and logical deductions from what we do know and this all points to infinite processes. Like, let's have an emphasis on the enlightened, find and ye shall seek, rather than tight closed cosmological systems.

Keiran,

Answer: Mass

Better still, “µ” represents the rest mass of a relativistic quantum particle [Penrose]. E=mc2, as expressed [Einstein], does not clearly indicate negative mass/energy. Therefore, Davies noting Dirac (1929) states, E2=m2c4. Expanding the equation and substituting notation, we have, [(c2+µ2) + c2p2]½ . Where the particle is in motion, kinetic energy is additive.

- Hope the symbols print. Numbers a superscript. A half-power indicates a square root.

I would prefer testable to fictitional

Keiran,

With E2 = [(c2+µ2) + c2p2]½, you have postive and negative solutions, including solutions for matter and antimatter.

George, is likely to know more than me.

Whether one holds to the BB, SS or something else, retaining a null hypothesis as degraded heuristic against convictions is insurance against fictions.

George,

Trust Keiran has gained some insight into how Science works. Beliefs must always be tested.

On the weekend, I borrowed a copy of Dawkin's, "The God Deception". Normally, I don't like Dawkin's style of writing. This book is more readable than others** and he raises some interesting criticisms about religion. Howver, he makes a few errors on cultural matters, which clouds my assessment to trust him in areas, where he makes assertions; but, I am less well read.

** Dawkins, the geneticist, tends leap readily to realisations, for me. I realise he is paleo-anthrologist, but, I prefer someome like Richard Leaky. Bronowski was a good popular writer.

Have societal axioms to make into structural equations...

Cheers,

O.

Oliver, I think you mean "The God Delusion" described e.g. on amazon.com as a "surprisingly intolerant book, full of scorn for religion". And similarly by other reviewers knowledgeable about religion, though not as knowledgeable about molecular biology as Dawkins. I have not read it, and do not intend to, since I could see already in "The Blind Watchmaker" how he can combine a brilliant exposition of Darwin's theory with all sorts of non sequiturs regarding religion. I mean its metaphysics, because from the psychological point of view Dawkins is as much religious as those he attacks. I think an atheist will find his "teddy" in reading the book; it might confuse some naive theists, but I doubt it can lead to the conversion of a person with a reasonably mature understanding of what both science and religion are about. However, I have to admit, I do not have the time, and will, to read the book.

Oliver, I think you mean "The God Delusion" described e.g. on amazon.com as a "surprisingly intolerant book, full of scorn for religion". - George

You are correct about the title, and, Dawkin's feelings certainly do come agressively through. If he has a point to, make it is a bitter point. He says, he avoids direct debates [with exceptions] with religious folk and in this respect differently sees religionists as his opponents. In many ways, he is the opposite pole to Sells. Sells has said he sells people with differing points of view opponents.

However, like me, Dawkins would agree on a seven-point theist(1)- total atheism scale, one cannot have the absolute knowledge to a seven. [Sells, are you a one?]

Unlike Dawkins, my "interest" is in how societies discover knowledge and feel much of the content in the Bible replicated other theocrasia and OT and NT are at the same enjoined but disjointed. If the Bible were an equation for me it would be ineliquent. I would take at it with pruning shears! What "could" be problematic is, what if Jesus was divine, but, all the literature is not. That would a rub.

Many religionists and many athiests seem to be "missionary", yet, I prefer the course of the discovery. One has to be open and honest with the evidence or gaps in the evidence.

Oliver, I appreciate your answer of "mass" because matter cannot be created by energy, so how do you propose to explain the creation of the universe from nothing if that in itself could exist? A bang in a vacuum is out of the question but for you to explain ...... where in this fantasy big bang origin of the universe did all the matter come from if matter cannot be created from the energy of an explosion?

Let me make the point again, that systems people can only be experts with closed systems (of course if you can find them). To understand existence and the universe of which there can only be one by definition, we need to get over this worship of finite universal causality and finally let INFINITE universal causality prevail. There is voluminous evidence that redshift is not about velocity and that quasars are intrinsically redshifted objects ejected from lower redshifted galaxies. This is evidence already 40+ years old that makes all the associated hypotheses and nonsense (such as expanding universes, warped space/time as a dimension) derived from the big bang, completely false, thus representing a monumental error for astronomy and science in general. Being so false, just how with this cover up can humanity collectively ensure a continued appreciation of the beauty of existence?

Oliver, one of your clangers has been to refer to Fred Hoyle's Steady State hypothesis as the Steady State model which is really something different and to do with electricity. I must say that I found your mix up rather hilarious but in an odd way a reference to electricity is really not far off the mark when one considers the extraordinary observational work from Halton Arp.

My mistake in the above, Oliver. Should read that you refer to the Steady State as the SOLID state which is something more to do with electricity and nothing to do with Fred Hoyle's hypothesis. Incidentally, where did you get this solid state terminology?

If we are back talking Dawkins, we may well examine this quote of his ....
"Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? September 11th changed all that. Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness."

This I feel is where Dawkins is coming from when he attacks established religions. But one evening on an ABC radio science program he expressed his views on the big bang cosmological model where for the first time I heard mention this Mad-Hatter idea of multiverses. e.g. He said we have one based on its ability to support carbon life forms but there must be other universes.

My thoughts are that even someone so well ingrained in the system and as obviously intelligent as Dawkins has not been able to break the sucking gravity and curved space-time of Einstein/Newton, which for him seems to explain everything or even the righteousness that theory can be bent to fit. Most unfortunate really. i.e. If mathematicians remain the fashion leaders in physics then physics just becomes an intellectual game with no reality principles.

Dawkins may want to be seen as a daring outsider with regard to religion but just where do we find true blue outsiders or people with a 360 degree view of the world?

Keiran, if you attack belief in a transcendental God, you will have - if one is to believe a recent survey - about 35% of (American) scientists against you. If you attack Big Bang, or even Einstein's gravitation theory, you will have 99% of physicists and cosmologists against you (the 1% being probably Halton Arp and his sympathisers). Without Christianity you would not have the notion of human rights, without mathematics you would not have your computer and the internet. You can look at a tree without being aware of its roots but you will not understand how it came to life if you ignore the roots. Without the long (and often tortuous) Christian journey that started at the Sermon on the Mount (an experience "invisible" to an ex-Christian) you would not have Enlightenment; without contemporary mathematics you would not have contemporary physics to write about in popularising books in which the mathematics must remain "invisible" to the layperson.

Keiran,

Thought we had lost you!

A bigger clanger was when I was studying psychology at uni., and working in a bank, wherein, I wrote about a Freudulent cheque. Yep, I know the difference between a transistor and a galaxy. Oops.

I am not a lobbyist of the BB, but, from what I have read infinities, regarding the BB, do exist in the maths schools. Of course, mathematicians need to on guard not fall into the same trap as the Euclian geometricians of centuries past. It rests, on the professionalism not to so. Besides, Science has worked differently, since c. 1750.

It is valid to maintain a belief in the STEADY state universe, if you test and accept the supporting the evidience. But, I would not hold that mathematicians are scared of timelessness and infinities. There build and argue models and make forecasts, to be tested. If someone can point to some trillion year old matter, the cosmologists would be obliged to explain it.

BB vs. SS. I see a forum for debate. I do not see "teddies". Cosmologists and quantam physicists are into weird and real unrealities. For the older ones, infinity was their favourite Ben Casey symbol :-).

Common matter is made up of elementary particles. As best I known, matter "was" created from energy when our universe cooled. A pysical object will increase its mass upon acceleration, significantly so, at a fraction of c.

Newtown in (co-)developing calculus, allowed us better to understand numbers, rather, than just use numbers. Perhaps, Mandelbrot sets allude to the development new forms of mathematics?

Phase space would conjecture multiverses. Is it not a teddy to not even entertain the possibility? Or, do we have the War of The Teddies?

Thanks.

O

George,

In the US 35% of [hard?] scientists is a significant minority.

I have finished Dawkins' "The God Delusion". Not impressed. He would have been better to have edited an anthology having chapter specialists. Like Sells, I found him too missionary.

Some key threads were the OT god was a misognist warmonger and that good does not require a theistic foundation. His points about virgin birth [why not Joseph, if Jesus represented the House of David] and divinity [Nicaea] are general knowledge. "How" he writes concerns me,
a toally lack of tact, even if I agree conclusions. People, who don't share his opinions are adversaries. Again, like "our oponents" Sell. But, Dawkins sits on the no-God pole.

One redeeming feature for me was he felt no-one can be logically absolutionist about being an atheist. I agree. I suspect Darwins and I are 6.5 on his 7 point scale. I hope Sells is at least a 1.1. Herein, I feel, neither religionists nor athiests should regard themselves infallible in thought and judgement. That is why I advocate evidence weighted concurrent positive and negative heuristics.

Sells,

As asked, elsehere, if God exists, what is the greatest probability, God Exists [in some/any form] or Jesus is God?

Sells,

Are you a 1.0 on the Dawkins scale? That is, an entrenched absolutist? Infallible? If not, you should have no resistance to replacing/supplementing lithurgy with forsenic histographies. Even, before Nicaea, it would be interesting to investigate characters, that, now, merely subsist,shadows, such as, Alexandrandos (aka Paris) and Joshua (aka Jesus). Just the same, a generation either side of Nicaea deserves a fresh look, first.

"Under a misunderstanding about the ministry of all believers, all distinction is erased between clergy and laity, the clergy do not distinguish themselves with vestments and hand over as much of the service as possible to lay leaders." - Sells

The above reads as elitist. Guess, the Orthodox Church with its Holy of Holies, is more extreme to Sells' posit. I have an Anglican Minister friend in training [Moore College], when visiting an Orthodox found himself, under reprimand for standing/going where he should not. Superstition?

Of course, we have High Court Judges and their Santa Clause suits. Luckily, academics now minimise the wearing of their gowns.

Minimising power distance is good. We need mentors and students.Not leaders and follows. Scrooge was wrong. It's not just bah; but bah, bah, bah.

The debate over liturgy is not new. Around the time of Justine the Martyr, the syncretion of The Law of Moses [OT stuff, rites] and the Creeds of the Nazarines [NT stuff, non ritual] was a topic of much discussion. The pre-second temple Jewish faith, because of exclusivity, upset, at different times, the Assyrians, Persians, Egyptians, Greeks and the Romans. As Gibbon notes, with the temple gone, "the times", then, were," a changin'".

Hadrian expelling the Jews to Pella is significant. This happened just as surely as the world was not created 6,000 years ago. But, how can Christians hold these as falsehoods?

What continues to surprise is the way Sells seems to deny history.

END NOTE:

I can assume from the silence and the nature of much of the engagement over this and other threads: That West and I are right.

Religionists can't. Simply can't hanle history:

One can debate science and religion in creation/creationism. But, when it comes to known history, sometimes literally set in stone, it is, game, set and rubber, for the historians, against the fabrications of religions. And, its ever set too!

:-) O.
:-) W. (by proxy)

Oliver,
"One can debate science and religion in creation/creationism. But, when it comes to known history, sometimes literally set in stone, it is, game, set and rubber, for the historians, against the fabrications of religions."

It is hard to "debate science and religion" with a scientist who calls religious interpretations of science's findings fabrications. The same if "science" is replaced by "history".

George,

Would you accept confabulation? In Psychology with age-regression hypnosis adult people remember taken back to say their seventh birth, upon emprical investigation tend to actually reporting perhaps the 4, 7 and 8 birthdays. A [false] fabrication is constructed using related facts, unrelated facts and fictions.

Simarily, Paul Hellenised Jesus worship and Nicaea created doctrine and creed. Where an historian might differ from the prieshood might be the influence of the poltical context. Paul wanted to generalise the Jewish religion. The debates between 190 (half council) and 325 (Nicaea) look at various trinities and interpretations of the divinity of Jesus. The fourth century church seems to decided on THE TRUE CONSTRUCTION and set that in concrete.

My dictionary states, "fabrication" means, "construction, manufacture and invention". Herein, the New Testament is an extension of the OT and there are many theocrasic constructions, there. Both Paul and Constantine [and Origen and Augustine], morphed Jesus' teachings from a cult [in the sociologists use of the word which is a category not an insult) into a broader instrutionalised religion. Just like taking bricks and "fabricating" a permanent house. The OT, in particular, is full of invention or at least inventions of allegory. The institionalised Christian church I posit morphs Jesus' teaching with Mystery Cults [Mithras]. I see no reason why these matters cannot be studied.

In the same way an anthopoligist would/does keep revisiting Troy, in the face of new evidence, I assert that Christians should understanding the constructions, especially the effects of Hadrian exiling the Jew from the Holy Land to Pella and the trinity/divinty debates a generation or two before Nicaea. Unlike, pre-Planck phase space, there are records.

“The theologian may indulge the pleasing task of describing Religion as she descended from Heaven., arrayed in her native purity, A more melancholy duty is imposed on the historian. He must discover the inevitable mixture of error and corruption, which she contracted in a long residence upon the earth.” - Edward Gibbon (1776)

Studying Amorite and related histographies (c. 1700 - 1500 BCE) I read, the God Shamash praised the Just and punished “evildoers”, and, gave Hammurabi a code of laws. Here, I am reminded Moses –centuries later—received The Ten Commandments from the OT God.

After the Sargonid Empire (2050-1950 BCE), we enter a period of conflict. Immediately later, when Hammurabi conquered Isin and Larsa, we have [religious] epic poems, The Epic of Gilamesh, the Epic of Creation and The Righteous Suffer: Creation and Destruction [The Flood to later Hebrews/Jews/Christians] are themes.

Further, is it only a coincidence hundreds of years beforehand, [the God of Wisdom] Ahura Mazda, states, “They who at my bidding render him [Zoroaster] obedience shall all attain Welfare and Immorality”? [ Yasna 43:11 in McNeill] --Unlike Muslims, I see parallels with Islam.

… “ In immorality the soul of the righteous be joyful in perpetuity shall be the torments of the Liars. {Yasna 45: 5-7, Trans. Gathas in Moulton, in McNeil]. Unlike, Christians, I see parallels with Christianity. How can Mazadiaism, Zorocasterism, Islam and [OT & NT]Christianity “all” not include theocrasaic building [fabrication]?

A house is fabricated. Clothes are fabricated [from “fabrics”].

I posit one can argue most gods by definition cannot be fabricated. Just the same, religions can be constructed. "Temporal” interpretations become buildings/fabrications of “religious” creed.

Christians, denying the histories: between the Sargonid Empire and Moses, Jesus' death and Paul, c. 190-325 period, is like denying background radiation after the BB. For me, religious scientists readily denying the former [history] and studiously accepting the later [science], is a puzzlement.

I agree with Gibbon, Religion is not pure, having undergone millennia of borrowings, reinterpretations and transformations.

oliver,
well, perhaps you did not mean "fabrication" pejoratively (my dictionary says =deliberately false or improbable account), though I am not so sure.

For the rest of the facts posted I am thankful to you. However, I am neither a historian nor a theologian to appreciate their effect upon the evolvement of various contemporary religious, especially Christian, models of Transcendental Reality.

I might have some insight into the relation between (natural) science and religion, where the dialogue depends essentially on a mutual interpretation of data. You are probably aware of the unprecedented interest that this topic has suddenly attracted in the last decad. That probbaly scared also Richard Dawkins into writing his book about the Delusion.

In my opinion, a parallel, similarly mature, understanding of the relation between history and the evovment of various (Christian), models of Transcendental Reality, i. a. exegesis, hermeneutics, is still in the coming. However, as said before, I am no expert in this field . And, of course, I am aware that all this does not make much sense to him/her who does not believe in the existence of a Transcendental Reality, which I define as that part of reality that is not accessible through (natural) science, and consequently neither by mathematics.

George,

- The Bible is a facbrication [meaning one]. It is a syncretion. Relatedy, Many of posts have been about the cross-relion theocrasis and godheads and borrowings.

- The Roman Catholic Church's until recent teaching on the Shroud of Turin, is a fabrication [Meaning Two]. A deception. The Church knew very well it was a Middle Ages forgery, while its Brothers taught it to be the real thing. Likewise, the churches are happy to sit on the fense, if lay people wrongly believe Gnosis and Pagan is overtly to with the Occult/Devil. The former refers to "knowledge] and teh latter countrymen/civility. If is suits their course, false formulations are allowed to suppurate among the Lay.

So, both "fabrications" apply:

In this Forum, I am more inclined towards "assembly" and "borrowings", which I posit is a perfectly valid use of the word. Paul's Hellenisation of earlier Jesus groups, I feel leans more towards transformation. But can know his motives? Deceit? I don't know. Nicaea, I posit, has political and familial [was not Constantine's mother a Christian?] dimensions.

Many gods subsist in religions which do exist, even if those gods do not exist. This circustance, if true, would be a societal construct of sorts. Gods are fabricated, but suggest it is architecural rather than deceptive in most instance. When curtain aspects of the foundations of a given are protected from scutiny, then, I suggest that is problematic. Deceit, perhaps not, rather, a defence of mechanism around the kernel/nucleus?

Dawkins is at the other pole to Sells, his writing is biased and driven. In some areas, he would have been better to have a topic expert write the chapter. Were I he, I would have taken the course of an anthology. Despite his impressive Oxford creditials, in the popular press, he Liberace not Rubenstein. Karen Armstrong is a far better popular writer and researched on the same topic.

Oliver,
I think writing about what one believes in without being derogative about what other people believe in is more informative, than simply attacking views and positions that one does not share, even does not understand.

In this sense Richard Dawkins is more interesting and credible when he writes about what he believes in as a personal evaluation of the facts he describes in "The Blind Watchmaker", than when he writes a book on “Delusion” just to attack the Christian world view that he obviously does not understand.

I think this should apply also to OLO discussions: facts supplemented by info about one's own priorities and beliefs are more valuable than unsympathetic presentations of other priorities and beliefs, especially if they contradict known facts (For instance, there was never any official position of the Catholic Church on the Turin shroud; it was actually the Church who authorised the carbon dating).

As I wrote in another post already, I do not want to dispute most of the facts, you present, like I would not mind if you stated that 96% of my DNA is identical with that of a chimp. I would only mind if you concluded there was not much difference between my thoughts and those of a chimpanzee. The same when making statements about the "DNA" of Christianity or the Catholic Church, and drawing your unflattering conclusions.

As the now 100 Muslim signatories of the "Open letter" to the pope wrote, "the object of interreligious dialogue is to strive to listen to and consider the actual voices of those we are dialoguing with, and not merely those of our own persuasion". I think this applies also in case where one of the participants considers himself "areligious" or perhaps "multireligious".

George,

Thanks for your post. I agree with most of all first two paragraphs.

When I was at School I recall being visited by the Brothers, who ran a slide show on the miracle of The Shroud. My example, was draw for a life experience. Another is "Defender of the Faith" as applied to the British Monach. Henry VIII received the title for a religious thesis, and, I think I am correct in saying he died a Roman Catholic. My point is that churches will knowing allow a broad public to beleive an untruth, to support their institution, when the truth is known to them. I would need to check, but I thought The Shroud was in private hands?

Dawkins I feel is writing "to" an audience in the style that audience would like to hear. I'm sure he is a brilliant geneticist, but, for me, not a Renaissance Man.

The closeness between Human [apes] and Chimps is sometimes exaggerated because some of the matched gene are inactive and/or redunant, and, our neocortex is more highly developed. As you you would know, our brians have layers, with reptilian functions low-down and mammalian functions more recent developments. We are "paragon of the animals' [quote], but an animal none the less.

Regarding religioisity, it has been posited brain layers interact and interaction are not independent [Greenfield?]. Belief in the afterlife and religion, being related to interactions between surival instinct and higher brain centres. Anthropoligical observations on how rapidly cargo cults emerge, suggest we are primed for religiosity. But, I personally don't see this outcome as stand alone, ecological factors [Triandis] and reinforcement [Skinner] would be required.

My views not in opposition to believing in the existence of God, if the process of knowledge discovery is methodologically honest and open to change, and, not creed and closed. Herein, one can have different opinions on the same evidence, like, Troy VI and Troy VII. Churches don't do this, and, parishoners are incouraged to "indwell" [Polanyi, again :-) ] in a performace elsewhere directed. For me, Sells, presents this Follow the Church, approach.

... Relatedly, Church and Religion are separate constructs. Perhaps, the Universe was intelligently created outside the History of Man, with its multitudes of religions. Was it Edison who said that he found 2,000 ways to not invent the bulb? To understand the existence/non-exitsence of God, one needs present all religions to outside objectivities, as evaluative agents. [The religions don't like being examined!]

Cheers,

O.