Stina Kielsmeier-Cook/Katzie & Ben Photography |
Tuesday, June 29, 2021
Blessed Are the Nones by Stina Kielsmeier-Cook, A Review
Tuesday, June 22, 2021
For Small Creatures Such as We by Sasha Sagan. A Review
Sasha Sagan/Brian C. Seitz |
Both her parents were prolific writers and co-wrote many books together. If there is such a thing as DNA-enhanced creativity, I'm sure Sasha's got it.
FOR CREATURES SUCH AS WE is her first book. But she's written articles for a variety of publications and is also a filmmaker and speaker.
In the first pages of her book, Sasha quotes her Mother to set up the theme: "For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love."
Sasha fairly early on makes it clear that she is an atheist, albeit a friendly and empathetic one.
She is well able to make a point, sometimes quite bluntly, but avoids coming across as mean-spirited. Because she genuinely isn't.
She says of religion, "the only sin would be to pretend [to believe]." Later on, she notes that "religion isn't believing, it's behaving."
Which, I have to admit, when you take organized religion as a whole, especially in this day and age, is setting the bar quite high.
For the most part, Sasha's book explores different rituals, including birth, weddings holidays and dying.
She openly embraces doubt, uncertainty and transition as the foundation upon which life is built. And she sees rituals as ways that humans have tried to cope with these realities.
In a nutshell, that is the gist of Sasha's book.
But it would be a disservice to imply that her writing, although rooted in science, is devoid of emotion. The best way to offer evidence of this is to offer samples of what she has to say.
"Why does the provability of something rob us of the thrill of it?"
"Uncertainty is real. It need not be glossed over or hurried."
"As with love, it's our vulnerability that opens us up to something deeper. Our willingness to be wrong..."
A fourth of the way through FOR SMALL CREATURES SUCH AS WE, Sasha observes that xenophobia, authoritarianism, and violence are what's wrong with the human race. She says that cruelty towards each other is the original sin.
She makes a clever distinction between science and religion. She observes that scientists try to disprove each other's theories by building on them, ultimately strengthening our knowledge base; but religion's purpose is to uphold tradition and quite often squash spiritual and intellectual growth.
Here's more of her observations:
"There is something about facing fear that defines growing up."
"It's hard to hold both the mythology of America, its aspirations and promises, and its crimes, in my head at the same time."
She refers to some of her father's work and remarks that we are breathing some of the same air particles as hundreds of generations of those before us.
Her sense of time and eternity is influenced by the fact that some of the stars we see in the evening sky have already burned out, yet we continue to see them.
Turning to the topic of the importance of having a critical eye, she quotes James Baldwin, "I love America more than any other country in this world, and exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually."
In a nod to Baldwin, she goes on to say that "Barbeques and fireworks are all well and good for celebrating national independence. But I propose the real ritual should be teaching ourselves and our children to question our own preconceptions."
One might be tempted to look at Sasha as a very privileged person. Growing up with famous parents, who were financially well off. With a nanny in Ithica, New York. Having ample opportunities to travel and learn. But her insights are not potshots.
When she was fourteen, Sasha lost her father to cancer. One of the last things Carl Sagan said to his daughter, on his deathbed, being an absolute realist, was "I'm sorry."
Sasha speaks of the human condition, "Every loss you withstand in your life reopens all the others. Every goodbye is every goodbye."
"Being alive is a profoundly beautiful thing," she sums up. "For which each of us should feel deeply grateful."
I enjoyed reading Sasha's book, not because I'm an advocate of atheism, but because she offers an honest assessment of her own point of view.
Wednesday, June 16, 2021
Why Is Grace So Hard to Accept?
What if Paul meant what he wrote in Ephesians 2:8-9 [God saved you by God's grace when you believed And you can't take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done..."] NLT.
Or, as another version [NIV] puts it: "For it is by grace that you have been saved - and this is not from yourselves - it is a gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast."
For many of us, Christians or otherwise, it's such a difficult thing to accept!
Oftentimes we live and act from a place of deep denial of this wonderful, amazing reality. The presence of God is free. There is nothing we can do to deserve it.
The challenge is: Modern-day folk living in Western culture seem to apply the tenants of Capitalism to Christianity. That is, they see God as the keeper of a supernatural bank account, and we have to do stuff to earn credit.
Grace becomes the equivalent of spiritual interest that accumulates with every soul that we "save," or good deed done.
With this worldview, the dividend tends to be guilt.
With this worldview, we have to continually prove ourselves. Which keeps us firmly rooted in judgment - because everyone who doesn't hold the same type of bank account as ours is inferior and probably going to hell.
Maybe when Jesus had his famous conversation with Nicodemus about being born again, this is precisely what he was talking about. [See John 3:1-10 for details].
Nicodemus opens the conversation by making a statement. "No one could perform the signs you are doing if God was not with him."
Notice Nicodemus isn't asking God how to get into heaven. He's talking about the ability to see, or sense, or experience the kingdom of God.
Jesus tells him in order to see the Kingdom, a person needs to be "born again."
(White) evangelicals in Western culture tend to use this verse to prove that we need to be baptized, or saved.
Artwork credit: Sojourners Magazine |
At this point, Jesus has a little fun with Nicodemus and replies, "you have to be born of water and the Holy Spirit."
It's possible that Jesus is taking a good look at Nicodemus, who knew the letter of the law and the writings of the prophets. Jesus sees the irony of a scripture scholar getting stuck in literal terminology.
Jesus is trying to lift Nicodemus out of scriptural quicksand and plop him down smack in the middle of the Kingdom of God.
In modern lingo, Jesus might have said, "I'm trying to get you to open your spiritual eyes and your spiritual mind and all of your spiritual senses. You don't have to understand the process, Nicodemus. Relax and trust me."
But instead of trusting, many of us (myself included) tend to codify faith and God and it just doesn't work.
Because that's not how spiritual growth happens.
Much of the Kingdom of God turns out to be counter-intuitive, illogical to the human mind and doesn't make sense. But God has freed us up to receive it and live in it without having to figure it out!
Oh, that really is Good News!
Afterthought: I wonder how much of a connection there is with our inability to accept grace and the current state of affairs in our world - the uncivil, temper-driven communication that has become the norm?
Could a lack of grace we show each other be a reflection of our spiritual state?
Wednesday, June 9, 2021
Sacred Instructions by Sherii Mitchell, A Review
Sherii Mitchell/Photo by Michael Sacca |
Like Robin Wall Kimmerer, in Braiding Sweetgrass, Mitchell proposes a reconnecting with nature.
Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire!
Pinocchio: Art Credit, Disney If ever there were a time for a national "Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire" award, it's now. And certai...
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Slideshare Unless you happen to be a philosopher, the subject of morals and ethics may seem very dry and inconsequential. But, conside...
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2015 saw a continuing resurgence of faith-based films. So many, in fact, that I'm going to pick only five to write about. War R...
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Robin Wall Kimmerer “In the Western tradition, there is a recognized hierarchy of beings, with, of course, the human being on top – the pinn...