Category: Religion
-
On Indulgences
I linked recently to a piece hostile to Islam, "the saddest and poorest form of theism." (Schopenhauer) I now point out a problem with a rather happier and richer form of theism, that of the Roman Catholic Church. Here: November is the month the Church especially dedicates to praying for the dead. To encourage this holy…
-
Can Belief in Man Substitute for Belief in God?
A slightly redacted re-post from 26 September 2009. ……………………………… The fact and extent of natural and moral evil make belief in a providential power difficult. But they also make belief in man and human progress difficult. There is the opium of religion, but also the opium of the intellectuals, the opium of future-oriented utopian naturalisms such…
-
On ‘Devout’
One reads that so-and-so is a 'devout Catholic' or a 'devout Muslim.' How would the writer know? Devotion is an interior state inaccessible to observation from without. The practicing Catholic or observant Muslim, by contrast, can be seen to be such by others. So if what you mean to convey is that so-and-so is a…
-
Social Constructivism, Denial of Reality, and the Role of Religion
John Derbyshire gives the following as examples of reality denial: All but a very tiny proportion of human beings are biologically male (an X and a Y chromosome in the genome) or female (two X chromosomes). A person who is biologically of one sex but believes himself to be of the other is in the…
-
To Understand the Religious Sensibility . . .
. . . two books are essential: Augustine's Confessions and Pascal's Pensées. If you read these books and they do not speak to you, if they do not move you, then it is a good bet that you don't have a religious bone in your body. It is not matter of intelligence but of sensibility. "He didn't have a…
-
Continence
The Catholic Church is in sad shape. Have you heard a good sermon lately? I could do better off the top of my head, and I am a very poor public speaker. Here are some notes for a sermon I will never give, unless this weblog is my pulpit. Remind people of the importance of…
-
Brunton Quotes Muhammad
"Contemplation for an hour is better than formal worship for sixty years." (Paul Brunton, Notebooks vol. 15, Part I, p. 171, #16) Brunton gives no source. Whatever the source, and whether or not Muhammad said it, it is true. Aquinas would agree. The ultimate goal of human existence for the doctor angelicus is the visio…
-
Books or Eternal Life?
Albert Camus, Notebooks 1951-1959, tr. Ryan Bloom, Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2010, p. 94: A priest who regrets having to leave his books when dying? Which proves that the intense pleasure of eternal life does not infinitely exceed the gentle company of books. Come on, Al, be serious. Eternal life is an object of faith…
-
Belief Skepticism, Justification Skepticism, and the Big Questions
1) The characteristic attitude of the skeptic is not denial, but doubt. There are three main mental attitudes toward a proposition: affirm, deny, suspend. To doubt is neither to affirm nor to deny. It can therefore be assimilated to suspension. Thus a skeptic neither affirms nor denies; he suspends judgment, withholds assent, takes no stand.…
-
More on the Question: Is Christianity Vain if not Historically True?
Just over the transom from Jacques: Enjoying your posts as always! Thanks for writing so regularly, at such a high level. Reading your posts on Wittgenstein on religion I have a few quick thoughts about religion (or Christianity specifically). When I first started reading Wittgenstein, I initially thought that he had in mind some very…
-
An Easter Sunday Meditation: Wittgenstein Contra St. Paul
1 Corinthians 15:14: "And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain." (KJV) Ludwig Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, U. of Chicago Press, 1980, tr. Peter Winch, p. 32e, entry from 1937: Queer as it sounds: The historical accounts in the Gospels might, historically speaking, be demonstrably false…
-
Good Friday: At the Mercy of a Little Piece of Iron
Simone Weil, Gravity and Grace, tr. Craufurd, Routledge 1995, p. 75: The infinite which is in man is at the mercy of a little piece of iron; such is the human condition; space and time are the cause of it. It is impossible to handle this piece of iron without suddenly reducing the infinite which…
-
Ten Impediments to Religious Belief
Why is religious belief so hard to accept? Why is it so much harder to accept today than in past centuries? Herewith, some notes toward a list of the impedimenta, the stumbling blocks, that litter the path of the would-be believer of the present day. Whether the following ought to be impediments is a further question, a normative…
-
Nature, Signs, and Religious Experience
Reader P. J. offers us for delectation and analysis the following quotation from Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God: [Brother Lawrence] was eighteen at the time, and still in the world. He told me that it had all happened one winter day, as he was looking at a barren tree. Although the…