Skip to main content

Sing Your Own Special Song

By Carl S. ~

One might conjecture that the realities of human life are like a 20th century symphony, with dissonances and unexpected changes in tempo, rhythm, dynamics, and melodies; vast and lengthy, overflowing and enwrapping everything. Life is made up of variations on the themes of atoms, DNA and RNA. Evolution is not only the greatest show on Earth, but the song of Nature.

Song Sparrow in songImage by Alan Vernon. via Flickr
Societies have their own themes, dogmas, philosophies, and stories - all evolving, adapting in attempts to answer the age-old questions which keep aggravating humans. Like the themes used in a symphony, sometimes they are modified, re-introduced, rejected eventually, only to turn up again later as new information and ideas arise.

Consider the edifices built on the beliefs of the divine powers of kings and priests and gods: temples, cathedrals, pyramids, palaces and the like. Rising to crescendos in glorious harmony and splendor, they eventually are destroyed or fall into ruins, the result of indifference, ravages of time, enemies. Is this theme indicative of the eventual endings of religions? No longer must the seeker of employment have to build these edifices in order to sustain his life and that of his family, as in the past. God beliefs were never a good reason for their construction. A building is only a building, no matter what label is on it. Gods do not need them. Religious organisms have been sporadic and a Frankensteinian construction from the body parts of older religions, a veritable DNA-style stew of primordial superstitions. While the songs of vanquished religions are ended, their melodies linger on; sometimes even those one hates.

Recently, I read a book on England's King Henry VIII, which was more about his character and times than dry history. As the author states, "There are three positions, it has been said, in which a man can stand in association with whatever he considers to be his god - moral, physical, or ritual." Henry's religious conscience, probably typical of the believers of his time, was powerfully Old Testament-based, a matter of rewards and punishments resulting from one's own good or bad actions toward God - but ritual deeply affected the outcome of these actions. Ritual, both in court and church, became all-important; so important that one might wonder if "moral" figured at all in his decisions. Henry bargained with his god and clergy for blessings: male progeny, wives, and conquest over his physical, religious and psychological enemies or potential enemies. (These are likewise the OT themes of God's chosen people and the psalmists).

Something about Henry's struggles with religion struck a chord in me. Where had I heard these tunes before? They were in Elisabeth Kubler-Ross' book, "On Death and Dying," as the five stages of dealing with one's demise: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. I think all the themes of all religions are comprised of these. There is the denial of a finality to one's existence, denials that a loving god may not exist as millions around you perish in plagues; the anger when that god punishes you and yours casually; the bargaining, especially through prayer, petition and penance, to delay, allay or avoid suffering and death; the depression of despair as one doubts that god even exists, based on overwhelming evidence, and then there is an acceptance that the god has a plan and that everything is ultimately for the best.

When one feels he has no control over his situation, one petitions someone who is supposedly in control. The true believers, like Henry VIII, live in the firm conviction that God can be coaxed by prayer and ritual into granting the wishes of man. This is a very old tune; the Egyptian priests did the same, with rigid rituals and precise words. The RC church uses contract-prayers, based on Roman legal contracts. (And does, "Ask anything in my name and it will be given to you," sound familiar?)

Those persistent and intractable rituals, those superstitions, are like melodies you can't get out of your head! Or society's, either. They don't work, don't make sense, and, as Aldous Huxley put it, “Stupid things can be said and accepted without thinking about the words - if they're tuneful.”

Henry VIII played ritual and bargaining games with his god, and he played the clergy. BUT, the clergy played him, too, because they set up the rules, for the most part. He was a practical man. There was no practical value in believing some of the foolish things in his religion, but there is value in exploiting those who do. In this, he and the clergy were together. The "Henrys" are all around us, even today, never on a secure footing with their deities, despite incantations, rituals, denials, penances, atonements, pleas and prayers. Talk about "depression!" (My father would pray the rosary every day and observe the novenas - as a guaranteed way to keep from going to hell, according to his church's teaching. Did not Henry practice his own versions, for his own "salvation?")

The themes and songs for believers are [...] handpicked by the god experts, and adapted by them for their societies, to seem like they're natural to the believer's personality; implanted there so that they "know in their hearts” that what they’ve been taught is true!The themes and songs for believers are not from within, but are instead handpicked by the god experts, and adapted by them for their societies, to seem like they're natural to the believer's personality; implanted there so that they "know in their hearts” that what they’ve been taught is true! Are not belief systems implanted neuroses?

Every culture has music; for celebrations, seduction, mourning, communication, community, longing, and entertainment. And every culture has religion. For thousands of years, spokesmen of the gods have been like Pied Pipers, leading the flocks, orchestrating the decisions of kings, other heads of state, and the mass "faithful," on what to believe, how to think, and what to think about. They have led the band into wars, orchestrating the torture and death of millions with their mesmerizing melodies.

It's about time people stopped listening to that music. For a growing few, there is now a peaceful silence; all the gods have been discredited, including the best known one. Long overdue is the time to have a final dirge for gods and a pyre for their spokesmen's traditional powers. As Alice exclaimed, "You're nothing but a pack of cards!" Now are the days for anti-hymns; the time for lyrics to Buckminster Fuller's, "I am a verb," and a time to put music to Robert Ingersoll's "The clergy know that I know that they know that they do not know.”. What a nice rhythm those words have!

In the immortal words of a Mama Cass song, it's time to "make your own kind of music, sing your own special song."

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Are You an Atheist Success Story?

By Avangelism Project ~ F acts don’t spread. Stories do. It’s how (good) marketing works, it’s how elections (unfortunately) are won and lost, and it’s how (all) religion spreads. Proselytization isn’t accomplished with better arguments. It’s accomplished with better stories and it’s time we atheists catch up. It’s not like atheists don’t love a good story. Head over to the atheist reddit and take a look if you don’t believe me. We’re all over stories painting religion in a bad light. Nothing wrong with that, but we ignore the value of a story or a testimonial when we’re dealing with Christians. We can’t be so proud to argue the semantics of whether atheism is a belief or deconversion is actually proselytization. When we become more interested in defining our terms than in affecting people, we’ve relegated ourselves to irrelevance preferring to be smug in our minority, but semantically correct, nonbelief. Results Determine Reality The thing is when we opt to bury our

So Just How Dumb Were Jesus’ Disciples? The Resurrection, Part VII.

By Robert Conner ~ T he first mention of Jesus’ resurrection comes from a letter written by Paul of Tarsus. Paul appears to have had no interest whatsoever in the “historical” Jesus: “even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, we know him so no longer.” ( 2 Corinthians 5:16 ) Paul’s surviving letters never once mention any of Jesus’ many exorcisms and healings, the raising of Lazarus, or Jesus’ virgin birth, and barely allude to Jesus’ teaching. For Paul, Jesus only gets interesting after he’s dead, but even here Paul’s attention to detail is sketchy at best. For instance, Paul says Jesus “was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” ( 1 Corinthians 15:4 ), but there are no scriptures that foretell the Jewish Messiah would at long last appear only to die at the hands of Gentiles, much less that the Messiah would then be raised from the dead after three days. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus—an event Paul never mentions in his lette

Christian TV presenter reads out Star Wars plot as story of salvation

An email prankster tricked the host of a Christian TV show into reading out the plots of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Star Wars in the belief they were stories of personal salvation. The unsuspecting host read out most of the opening rap to The Fresh Prince, a 1990s US sitcom starring Will Smith , apparently unaware that it was not a genuine testimony of faith. The prankster had slightly adapted the lyrics but the references to a misspent youth playing basketball in West Philadelphia would have been instantly familiar to most viewers. The lines read out by the DJ included: "One day a couple of guys who were up to no good starting making trouble in my living area. I ended up getting into a fight, which terrified my mother." The presenter on Genesis TV , a British Christian channel, eventually realised that he was being pranked and cut the story short – only to move on to another spoof email based on the plot of the Star Wars films. It began: &quo

ACTS OF GOD

By David Andrew Dugle ~   S ettle down now children, here's the story from the Book of David called The Parable of the Bent Cross. In the land Southeast of Eden –  Eden, Minnesota that is – between two rivers called the Big Miami and the Little Miami, in the name of Saint Gertrude there was once built a church. Here next to it was also built a fine parochial school. The congregation thrived and after a multitude of years, a new, bigger church was erected, well made with clean straight lines and a high steeple topped with a tall, thin cross of gold. The faithful felt proud, but now very low was their money. Their Sunday offerings and school fees did not suffice. Anon, they decided to raise money in an unclean way. One fine summer day the faithful erected tents in the chariot lot between the two buildings. In the tents they set up all manner of games – ring toss, bingo, little mechanical racing horses and roulette wheels – then all who lived in the land between the two rivers we

Morality is not a Good Argument for Christianity

By austinrohm ~ I wrote this article as I was deconverting in my own head: I never talked with anyone about it, but it was a letter I wrote as if I was writing to all the Christians in my life who constantly brought up how morality was the best argument for Christianity. No Christian has read this so far, but it is written from the point of view of a frustrated closeted atheist whose only outlet was organizing his thoughts on the keyboard. A common phrase used with non-Christians is: “Well without God, there isn’t a foundation of morality. If God is not real, then you could go around killing and raping.” There are a few things which must be addressed. 1. Show me objective morality. Define it and show me an example. Different Christians have different moral standards depending on how they interpret the Bible. Often times, they will just find what they believe, then go back into scripture and find a way to validate it. Conversely, many feel a particular action is not

On Living Virtuously

By Webmdave ~  A s a Christian, living virtuously meant living in a manner that pleased God. Pleasing god (or living virtuously) was explained as: Praying for forgiveness for sins  Accepting Christ as Savior  Frequently reading the Bible  Memorizing Bible verses Being baptized (subject to church rules)  Attending church services  Partaking of the Lord’s Supper  Tithing  Resisting temptations to lie, steal, smoke, drink, party, have lustful thoughts, have sex (outside of marriage) masturbate, etc.  Boldly sharing the Gospel of Salvation with unbelievers The list of virtuous values and expectations grew over time. Once the initial foundational values were safely under the belt, “more virtues'' were introduced. Newer introductions included (among others) harsh condemnation of “worldly” music, homosexuality and abortion Eventually the list of values grew ponderous, and these ideals were not just personal for us Christians. These virtues were used to condemn and disrespect fro