Thoughts of a Freethinker

One of the best articles I have seen about religion discussed Japan . To me, much of what goes on in the minds of Japanese is similar to what goes on in minds in the West. It's just that we have different names for these thoughts. Japanese do not understand ours; we do not understand theirs.  Before discussing Japan, let's recall the Pagans of the Western World. There was plenty of superstition and different gods in different communities. There were spirits and invisible beings.  Japan's Shintoism goes back to prehistory. The link says only that Shintoism is about many different spirits. It is not uniformly thought of as religion but a set of ceremonies and practices. About the year 550 CE, Buddhism came to Japan. Over many centuries the two have overlapped and merged. Along with the Chinese Confucianism arrived with Chinese occupation and has been put into the mix. These practices are not linked to an original leader nor do they have a "home office" somewhere tha...

Priests and perhaps preachers everywhere lament the decline in the number of marriages and the choice not to be married in churches. The clergy/church wedding was a marketing concept that probably delayed the decline in church numbers. It is easy to see in retrospect the church had no business pushing itself into the practice of marriage. They have nothing to do with each other. Along with marriage, the Christian faith has inserted itself into several issues it should never have entered.  Everyone who has studied anthropology probably come across ancient marriage practices. Marriages were arranged by the tribe or clan to establish military or economic business arrangements. It never occurred to young people their coming marriage would be to someone they chose. There may have been some religious overtones from whatever religion was practiced but the main variable was marriage to help the tribe or clan. A good review of all that is here .  The early Jews worked religion into uni...

Most public discussion today of the faith called Judaism centers on support or opposition to Netanyahu and the election there coming very soon. It was refreshing to read a thoughtful Rabbi's reflections on the origin of the faith and its place in an increasingly secular U. S.   Over the years, many have tried to "backwards engineer" history, take existing archaeology discoveries and/or what is documented in surviving ancient writing or inscriptions, taking the chain of groups backwards in time to conclude where they came from and why. This has been hard to do with the Jews of ancient Israel. No one knows where they came from or who they were before they showed up in the Bible story and known history during the Roman Empire.  The link talks of Abraham and his finding God. The Rabbi admits there are two theories about when Abraham discovered God. One is that it came to him when he was four years old, the other that it was when he was 40 years old. One the sources was Maimon...

A survey of pastors found giving was down more in small churches than large and down more in churches regarded as "black churches". So far as I know these are not random samples but email requests and only those who choose to respond do so. This method may introduce bias of one kind or another. Reliable information about the lives of churches is hard to come by. There are surveys of church members asking how often they attend. Preachers are asked about attendance. Both of these yield much different and more optimistic numbers than drone photographs of church parking lots on worship day. The latter show lower attendance than the self-reporting. In recent months Christian sites repeat results of a survey or two that found the decline in Christianity has leveled. That seems to refer to the rate of decline, it is not increasing but decline continues. The number of churches closing has not slowed. One would guess churches, which are small businesses, close at about the same rate a...

I've not seen any historian determine when Christian fundamentalism began to steamroll every other political and religious idea and win elections. If readers know there is such an agreed upon date when this exclusivity was first successful they can add it to the comments. There is always some subjectivity in such a judgement but perhaps agreement is possible. There are a few atheists in the House. Their political success is not the same as a national election or a state one that has national publicity. The coming Midterm might be the first to challenge the power of the false notion Christianity, and only one view of it, is the only legitimate political force in U.S. elections. A well-known Christian writer reviewed the history of Christian exclusiveness, reminding us that public statements against Jews by Christians has been acceptable for a long time.  At this moment, we have two opposing views of the Christian faith. Conservative Christians had a press event blessing President Tr...

Interviews with Republican office holders and party offices revealed they are preparing right now to blame someone else for the coming election failures. Trump is blaming staff of individual campaigns. He has ordered some staff fired and sent his own replacements. Some blame the Republican National Committee for not sending enough money soon enough. Others say Republican candidates have not come up with reasons for people to vote for them. Many point to Trump forcing out good candidates because he felt they did not pay proper respect for him and then he had loyalists selected who are terrible candidates.  Many Republicans, of course, know the principal reason things are not going well for them is Trump's tariffs, Russia in Ukraine and the war in Iran. Many Republican candidates are swimming against the current. Where I live in Iowa the Republican candidate to an open senate seat has served in the House. There she apparently voted seven or so times in favor of Trump's tariffs. ...