“There seem to be only two kinds of people: Those who think that metaphors are facts, and those who know that they are not facts. Those who know they are not facts are what we call "atheists," and those who think they are facts are "religious. " Which group really gets the message?”
- Joseph Campbell

Here’s one metaphor for you:

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances.
— William Shakespeare, As You Like It,

Dear George,

My heart goes out to you. You must be banging your head against a brick wall with the responses you get from these guys.

You being the lone calm star in the sky among the noisy fire CRACKERS.

You either get it or you don’t. The ones that don’t get it are mere fundamentalists.

Literal readings, vs. deeper readings (the ones with spirit).

Unfortunately, because of the pervasive influence of the Enlightenment on our society today, we value metaphorical language less than literal language, even distrusting metaphorical language.

AJ Philips,

You obviously have your own answers to all those questions - rhetorical or not - that you ask, answers you yourself have already formed in support of, or as a consequence of, your world-view.

That is fine, it is the same with me, except that I listen to other’s opinions, perspectives, in order to both refine and broaden my own perspective. Without expecting answers to questions I pose through which I can prove myself right and them wrong in situations which admit other than just yes or no answers. This is true when trying to interpret for oneself ancient “sacred” texts, this is also true when trying to interpret the findings of science, i.e. when crossing the threshold from science to philosophy of science, as I tried to hint at in http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=14464.

[Nevertheless, let me try to address your second last paragraph: If God is seen as represented by the Abrahamic religions, for a human to judge as irrational or immoral his actions or the way He revealed them to us is even more absurd than for a three years old son of an e.g. a university professor to judge his father’s professional activity or the appropriateness of the way he explains these to his son. As to the latter, of course, the son can simply say, I don’t understand, and the benevolent father would not use coercion to make him “understand”. That is why we have also atheists. This, of corse, is again a metaphor not an argument.]

Dear Constance,

Thanks for the words of appreciation expressed via a fitting metaphor. As said before, all I was interested in when launching this thread: whether, in a perfected secular society that everybody is aiming at, basic Christian convictions could coexists as respectable alternatives to secular humanist convictions, or whether Christianity will eventually be forced to go underground as it almost happened in Communist countries. So I appreciate even those reactions here that, in your words, are brick walls I have to bang my head against.

Dear George,

You have posed what I think is a false alternative. You asked if Christianity would be regarded as a respectable alternative to secular humanist convictions or would it have to go underground in a secular society. I understand a secular society to be one in which worldviews regarding religion are simply no business of the state. The state in a secular society does not care whether a citizen is a Catholic, a secular humanist, a New Ager or anything else in that line. Secular humanism is not the official worldview in a secular society. There is no official worldview. Whether a secular humanist considers Catholicism a respective alternative or not is completely irrelevant. The state in a secular society simply considers religious or non-religious worldviews no business of the state.

In a communist society there was an official view called Marxism in which religion was a relict of a past unenlightened age. My understanding of a secular society is quite different.

I appreciate the worldview informed by Catholicism even though I don't respect it as according to reason. Right now I am reading "Jerusalem, Jerusalem" by James Carroll, a Catholic who has left the priesthood but not the church. I am enjoying getting to know his outlook as a Catholic and have read several other books by him.

I enjoy reading Joyce. Although he was at odds with the church his books are permeated with Catholicism. One doesn't have to feel views are respectable for them to be worthwhile and fascinating. I can also appreciate worldviews that I think are not informed by reason. Perhaps none of them are. Perhaps we are slaves to our passions, and reason simply justifies them. That was Hume's view, and maybe he was right.

Dear david f,

>>You asked if Christianity would be regarded as a respectable alternative to secular humanist convictions ... <<

I ask whether Christianity (or Juadism, Hinduism etc) should be an accepted (to avoid the word respectable) by the state alternative (not THE alternative) of (atheist) secular humanism (not society!), with no a priori privileges for either e.g. on the basis of "we are right, they are wrong". I hope so, and so does for instance the atheist philosopher Jürgen Habermas, whose views are respected by many Christians. I think he even coined the term secular society. See for instance his “The Dialectics of Secularisation” coauthored with the present pope (Ignatius Press, 2010).

“Jürgen Habermas has surprised many observers with his call for "the secular society to acquire a new understanding of religious convictions" ... Habermas discusses whether secular reason provides sufficient grounds for a democratic constitutional state. Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI argues for the necessity of certain moral principles for maintaining a free state, and for the importance of genuine reason and authentic religion, rather than what he calls "pathologies of reason and religion", in order to uphold the states moral foundations. Both men insist that proponents of secular reason and religious conviction should learn from each other, even as they differ over the particular ways that mutual learning should occur.” (Book description by amazon.com)

>>I understand a secular society to be one in which worldviews regarding religion are simply no business of the state.<<
I agree, provided "secular humanism" is not pushed into the postion a religion (e.g. Christianity) used to hold in a pre-secular society. What you write then is a description of a secular society, that I agree with, and I think is also in agreement with Habermas’ understanding.

Where we differ is the application of the adjective “respectable”: I can respect other world-views that differ from mine (not all) because I do not think that those who subscribe to an atheist world-view (however perceived) are ALL immoral, neither do I think that those who subscribe to a religious, e.g. Christian, world-view (however perceived) are ALL irrational.