Is that all there is?

For atheists and people of exclusivist religious traditions alike, I think that the universality of religious experience* across all times, cultures, and places, poses a challenge. What do you make of the reported religious experiences of people who do not share your particular religion's worldview? I have been thinking about this for awhile now and have reached no particular conclusion, but the universality of certain practices (for instance, the similarity across the board in certain ritualized practices such as demonic possession, the centrality of death within most religions, the presence of purity issues, etc.) is very curious to me. I think that the common thread of religion that weaves itself through every culture reveals much about human nature, if there is such a thing, and only obscures my understanding of the nature of the divine, again, if there is such a thing.

Thoughts?


*by this I do not mean that all religions expound similar beliefs, but that from a phenomenological perspective, certain practices reveal a commonality in what religion looks like and how it functions within society

After seeing one woman's photos of the wonderworking icon, I think I understand this strange phenomenon a little bit better, at least enough to step down from my grinchy pedestal and stop looking at it as a whole bunch of nonsense. Her documentation of this special visitation has very little to do with the icon that joined our community for a few days. In most images, only the back of the icon is visible so that the faces of the faithful are the subject of the photos. Perhaps there is nothing special about the icon in and of itself, but it is the meaning it holds for the people that is so remarkable. If just being in the presence of this icon is enough to ease the pain in someone's life for a brief moment, to remind someone that a forgotten beauty really does exist, to bring someone to a moment of profound love and peace, then it is enough for me to believe that this really is a miracle-working icon. You know, I waited over an hour in line to kneel before the icon, and the only prayer my hardened heart could come up with was a kyrie eleison, "Lord have mercy." Indeed, Lord have mercy upon me for being so blind when such a rare beauty was apparent all around me in the pained faces of the flock.

" 'Be ever hearing, but never understanding;
be ever seeing, but never perceiving.'
Make the heart of this people calloused;
make their ears dull
and close their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears,
understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed."- Isa 6:9-10

"We've been asking for proper health institutions, proper health equipment. Instead, what do we get? Body bags."

Yet another illustration of the "third world Canada" that most of us do not get to see. While Canadians pride ourselves on our excellent public education system, universal healthcare, abundance of clean water, and safe streets, natives are time and time again denied the same basic services that everyone else takes for granted. Natives ask for supplies to deal with swine flu and not only are their packages delayed over fears they might drink the hand sanitizer included in the packages, but they are sent body bags and a message that the government won't sponsor flu kits. If this isn't a loud and clear message that Ottawa doesn't care about natives, I don't know what is. I sincerely hope that our treatment of natives will be an issue in the next election, but I am not holding my breath.

I'm not really sure how to start this entry, except perhaps by apologizing if it is confusing at times. I'm operating on only a few hours of sleep right now due to Pascha festivities. It feels like not a lot has happened since I last wrote. The baptism was lovely experience, though I still don't really feel Orthodox. However, I have had moments of actual belief during and after my baptism, which perhaps may seem insignificant but it is one of the few things I have to cling to right now. My godmother gave me an icon depicting the Hebrew concept hesed, which has a complex meaning for which we do not have one single word concept in English, but it contains the ideas of loving-kindness, interpersonal obligation, mercy... it is the ultimate attribute of God. Anyhow, it's amazing to me how an icon can open up such a divine and profound concept. In the icon, hesed is displayed through the Virgin, her cheek pressed against the cheek of the infant Christ. Somehow, it is not at all what I would have ever imagined hesed to look like when given physical form; a sign, perhaps, that I spend too much time in the Hebrew Bible, in which attributes of the divine are seldom conceived of as being feminine. With this icon, I prayed again for the first time in a long time. I mean really prayed, not just the prayer that I do on a daily basis, but the real thing. I also felt the sweetness of belief right after baptism. If only it would stay with me a little longer... where does belief go to when it leaves on its flighty whims?

( the predicament: the Christ as a symbol vs. the Christ as literal )

Much of the Hebrew Bible concerns itself with establishing the law, which garners more than its fair share of criticism for some of its seemingly random precepts. I have taken an interest in ceremonial law in particular, as it is the most far-removed from my life of the three types of laws established in the Old Testament. Ceremonial law is distinct from the other two types of law given in the OT, moral and civil law, in that it is neither important for the maintenance of law and order within society (as civil law is, which deals with things such as property and citizenship), nor does it deal with things that are innately right or wrong such as murder or theft, but with rituals to become and remain “clean.” Though Christians are under a new covenant and are not bound by ceremonial law, it is nevertheless important to understand why these purity rules were established in the first place: if these rules were fundamental in establishing God's relationship with Israel, then they can perhaps tell us something about our own relationship to God.

One common trend in attempting to understand certain rules is to find a practical reason behind them. For instance, circumcision is sometimes defended by saying that it was a hygiene issue, or to name another example, the ban on eating pork is sometimes ascribed to the danger of ingesting such an easily contaminated meat in a Near Eastern environment. I suppose that such practical explanations suffice in a few specific instances, but I think that to try to find practical reasons is missing a much more important point. These purity rules serve two important spiritual purposes: they draw God's people away from the world and into a relationship with God in which we strive to become more like Him. In this sense, the spirit behind the law forms the core of the same relational attitude toward God that Christians strive for today: to avoid worldliness (1 Jn 2:15) and to have such a relationship with God that we act according to His example (Jn 13:15).

How then do the oddities of the law convey such a message with rules that seem to have little to no rhyme or reason behind them? What's wrong with pork, mixed-fiber clothing, working on Saturday, and so on? The key here is to understand what is meant by "cleanliness." To most of us, cleanliness implies taking care of one's hygiene or tidying up around home. Ritual cleanliness has an entirely different association; it is all about holiness. For this reason, when asking "why does mixed-fiber clothing/pork/work on the Sabbath make one unclean" we must keep in mind that we are asking "why does x, y, or z make one unholy?" For that matter, what does it mean for a person to be holy?

Holiness in the Hebrew Bible is inextricably linked to God, a link that is established in the commandment that is repeated throughout the Tanakh, "be holy as I, the Lord your God, am holy." When asking what is or is not holy, an early Jewish version of the "WWJD" formula was used: if God is the source of holiness and if what God does is therefore holy, I must do as God does. Thus when we are told that God rested on the Sabbath, this means that the Jew, too, would rest on the Sabbath, and so on. Sometimes though the connection is not immediately obvious. What about the dietary rules, for instance? Before I continue, I should address the logical response to this, which would be an objection to the proposition that we can mimic how God eats in order to determine what holy eating is. In the Hebrew mentality, sacrifices offered to God were not mere symbols, but the offering actually went up to God. The word for the most common type of sacrifice, "olah," comes from the root “alah”, which means "go up." Thus, God actually partakes in the sacrifice that is offered and the Bible often remarks that the odor that went up to God pleased Him. Sacrifice is sometimes even viewed as a shared meal between God and the family making the offering, in the case of the zebach sacrifice in which part of the animal is burned for God’s pleasure, and part is eaten by the family. As such, food was subject to purity laws so that Jews could only eat food that could be sacrificed, those land animals which depend on herdsmen. It is therefore plausible that the “abominable” animals were not themselves abominable (why would God have made them in the first place and then called them good?), but that eating them was since to do so would be to eat an animal that God did not “eat.”

With the fundamental understanding that the law was an attempt to establish a relationship toward both God and the world based on the type of holiness that God as the source of all holiness models, the "random" rules of the law start to fall into place and the logic behind them reveals itself (with a few exceptions that still stump me, but for the most part the OT is much more approachable). I can look at something prohibiting mixed fiber clothing and ask "how does this place the Hebrew people into a proper relationship either with God or with the world" and it becomes a bit more clear (mixed fibers, breeding different kinds of animals, planting a field with two different kinds of seeds all emphasize a desire to maintain distinction: God does not want His people to assimilate to the ways of the world). At least for every less than obvious rule, there is an obvious one when the purpose behind a particular rule is explicitly stated. Circumcision is a good example of this, even though people try to make it more complicated and find alternative reasons to the explanation given in the Bible: that God promised that Abraham's line would multiply and become great, but required that Abraham and his descendants trust God with the instrument by which this great heritage would be achieved.

However, there are instances in which it is not possible for us as humans to achieve the standard of holiness. We are told to be holy as God is holy and in the New Testament we are further told to be perfect (Mt 5:48), so laws that deem certain parts of our biological makeup to be unclean are no doubt a bit perturbing if the theology concerning ritual purity ends here. Indeed, the biological aspects of law have some disastrous implications despite the logic and spiritual intentions present. Feminist criticism of certain commandments are indeed justified: while the same standard logic employed throughout the Hebrew Bible is used to determine that menstruation is unclean since we assume that God does not menstruate, applying this to real life causes an inherent injustice based on sex, even if men too have an impossible standard regarding semen emission.

So what gives? Clearly, we were not intended to be like God in every way, even though God is the standard by which we measure cleanliness and holiness. This is why ritual is important to move us from the state of uncleanliness that is an inevitable byproduct of life itself, to a state of ritual purity. Why then do Christians no longer need the purification rituals, let alone the purity rules themselves? The answer is simple. If the law functioned to bring us into a harmonious relationship or communion with God, this is a communion that Christ has accomplished for us by becoming the ultimate ritual sacrifice. We no longer need to sacrifice a lamb in order to share a meal with God—Christ himself became the sacrificial lamb, and the new meal we share with God, communion, allows us to eat of God Himself. Consequently, the bloodless sacrifice that takes place in the preparation of the Eucharist is the closest we come to following ritual purity laws, and it is all that we need thanks to this new covenant that we have entered.

However, as I hope I have demonstrated, the law is not useless to Christians. On the contrary, the spirit behind it has not changed from the Old Testament to the New Testament, even if our lives have been infinitely simplified for us due to our new covenant. Anyhow, I think I've rambled for long enough. A cookie to anyone who read this far, and two cookies to anyone with anything to say about the supposedly "boring" parts of the Bible ;)

It's amazing how many times recently I've just stopped whatever I happened to be doing to ask myself, "where am I going with this, with everything?" I've been spiritually lazy and I become increasingly selfish with each day. Who am I serving these days? Lack of spirituality is a strange thing. It is seeing the sunset without feeling that sense of awe, or seeing an old couple holding hands with the sweetest and most heartwarming smile on both their faces, and feeling nothing. It is being closed and contained inside yourself and being completely numb to beauty, wonder, and compassion. Such is the state I am in. Nothing is beautiful to me, nothing inspires tenderness or thankfulness or admiration. However, even if the world around me seems inanimate and spiritless, as if there really were no mystery contained within any of it at all, and even if my own heart is unfeeling, perhaps this is when I should strive to serve and follow Christ all the more. The emptiness that I feel is not conducive to charity, but perhaps charity and faith are more meaningful when we least feel inspired toward them. Maybe rather than admiring those who could feel God, I should look to the example of those who have kept the faith even though they were spiritually empty. At the moment, I am looking to Mother Teresa and Teresa of Avila for inspiration, both of whom had only a brief experience of the mystical, which was enough to sustain their devotion for a lifetime despite their profound sense of emptiness. I can only hope that with perseverance, this spiritual dryness will lend itself to a new religious experience. In the past, I would have thought that spirituality was a prerequisite of religion, that those who are not spiritual had a forced "head faith" and not the genuine "heart faith." But really, "heart faith" seems like the easier of the two. No more spiritual apathy, so that I may be able to someday say, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith" (2 Tim 4:7). I don't need a feeling to sustain me; God sustains.

Last night I caught a few minutes of an inspirational story about a woman finally achieving a long-held dream... of becoming a porn star. I've always been really morally ambiguous about porn, though more often than not it angers me. What do you all think about porn? Is it moral? Immoral?

Souvent quand je vais au château avec mes parents, je ne vais pas à l'église le dimanche matin. Néanmoins, le dimanche matin est un temps sacré encore. Mon père et moi allons autour du lac à la brillance du matin, l'air si froide qu'il mord mes poumons. Entre les arbres de bouleau, vide de leurs feuilles, je vois l'eau, le bleu la couleur d'un cristal au soleil. Plus proche, l'eau ressemble la glace, un bleu parfait et clair à côté du sable blanc. J'écoute le son de l'eau qui se déplace au vent. J'aime cette place; j'aime le Canada avec la nature calme toutefois brillante. J'aime la tranquillité du matin.

Le weekend a eu un des petits plaisirs : un verre du vin le soir en regardant les étoiles qu'on peut voir seulement en dehors de la ville, le temps passé avec ma famille, les promenades avec mon chien. Trop souvent j'oublie que celui-ci, c'est le temps sacré aussi. Pendant que la semaine d'école s'approche, j'essaye de me tenir sur ce sentiment, mais il glisse entre mes doigts.

Between the Canadian election and the American one, I have not been a very happy person lately. Sarah Palin (no longer "what's-her-face"; she has most certainly earned a celebrity status by now what with her affinity to drama) is mostly to blame.

Admittedly, Palin herself has little to do with my greatest annoyances this election season. Don't get me wrong, she's contributed her fair share, but the enormous onslaught of sexism that has surfaced has nothing to do with her. I had to turn off my tv today when CNN was reporting that Palin was chosen to leech Clinton supporters from the Democrats. This is offensive for two reasons. Firstly, it assumes that Palin was chosen because of her sex and not her accomplishments, which is made more offensive by the fact that for once, I actually think that it is pathetic on the part of the Republicans, but true. I hear this nearly every time a woman makes it to the higher echelons of politics and it always makes me cringe that we don't take the accomplishments of women seriously. In Canada, we heard it about accomplished women like Belinda Stronach and Rona Ambrose who, yes, earned their achievements. While I absolutely hate that the automatic assumption about women who achieve high political rankings is that they got there because of their sex, I have to wonder if in the case of Palin this is true. Palin does not by any means possess the experience necessary to be VP, especially when McCain is so old and it is therefore more likely to need a VP who can step up to the captain's seat. I am saddened that this time, the usual assumption with women just may have been proved right, that her sex probably did play a role in her current position--if not based on her experience in politics, on what basis did McCain choose her over every other qualified candidate? True, Palin has some very legitimate accomplishments to her name that she undeniably earned but nothing VP-worthy, whereas many VP-worthy candidates were overlooked because the Republican camp thinks that an unqualified female candidate is the way to win female votes. How insulting towards Palin, female voters, and all of the women politicians out there, the Belinda Stronachs and Rona Ambroses, who did earn their accomplishments and are yet put in the same "she only got it because she is a woman" camp as Palin.

That the Republican camp is labeling any criticism of Palin's lack of experience as sexism does not help. Legitimate criticism of a politician's experience and policy, regardless of the sex or race of said candidate, seems strangely equality-based to me in the midst of an election that has been absolutely obsessed with sex and race. Finally, a step in a progressive direction, and the Republicans are trying to quell any legitimate discussion by calling it sexist. Thank God the Obama camp isn't employing a similar strategy by labeling any criticism of Obama's lack of experience as racist. Perhaps Obama is actually interested in having actual politics be the topic of discussion rather than the usual race and sex topics, whereas the McCain camp would rather avoid the political discussions surrounding their VP candidate. How telling!

Secondly, the suggestion that Palin was offered her position to lure Clinton supporters offends me because Palin and Clinton have next to nothing in common policy-wise; the only significant thing they share in common is their sex. The suggestion is obvious: Clinton fans only like Clinton because she is a woman. Clinton fans won't notice or care that Palin is very different from Clinton because they just want to see a woman in office. How degrading and offensive! Truthfully, we all no that no real comparisons between Clinton and Palin can be made. We don't compare, say, old white men to one another. We respect them as individuals with their own policies. On the other hand, we paint female politicians as if they are all the same and we automatically start comparing them to one another. It needs to stop. I supported Clinton, and I supported her because of her policies, ideals, and accomplishments, believe it or not. That isn't to say I ignored her sex; how could I when I so often heard comments like, "her husband is behind this operation controlling the whole thing." Sadly, there was too much sexism there to move past it as an issue. Funny how when Bill was in office, nobody suggested that his wife was the brains behind his operation, but when a female gets to the position she did, we assume that her husband must have been behind it.

And to top the list of Palin-wank, ever since Palin was announced, political blogs have been flooded with photoshopped pictures of Palin in bikinis, or with huge photoshopped breasts and so on. I don't like Palin, but have some respect. Yes, she's a female. Get over it.

None of that is even mentioning the things that Palin herself is responsible for that annoy me, and there are many. Her environmental stance, her separatist past, the (good) possibility that she abused her power in office, her lack of national experience, etc. Oh yes, and the little bit of drama surrounding her that has bogged down the television and newspapers for the past week, which again, I suppose is hardly her fault except for the irony that her abstinence-only education stance has caused.... anyhow, I wouldn't be too surprised if she got dropped from the ticket. I don't think she will because politics is all about appearances and dropping a VP candidate would look bad, but I think that Palin will have repercussions on the party, if voters remember all these scandals by November, that is. Two months is eons in today's world and voters have short memories, but we'll see.

This post is majorly delayed as I have been camping for the past 3 days, so it feels almost like old news by now. Anyways, I usually avoid watching the Republican and Democratic conventions because they tend to strike me as just a bunch of empty "go America, rah rah" dribble in which everyone gets really sentimental about how great America is, but nothing of substance is said. However, I caught Obama's speech on Thursday night. No, it in no way challenged my expectations of a bunch of empty patriotic rhetoric, but I actually did think that it was quite interesting. Obama is undeniably a fantastic and highly motivational speaker. Even as a Canadian, I couldn't help but feel a little bit of that warm and fuzzy God-Bless-America sentiment, but I also couldn't help but feel a little disconcerted. Major plan after major plan was announced to the delight of the thoroughly sold crowd, with little mention of how these plans could possibly be funded. This, of course, is pretty typical. Politicians make promises that they can't keep all the time. What was particularly shocking was the shamelessness of it. As a Canadian, I nearly started laughing when he announced his national healthcare "plan"--get this--to be funded not by tax increases for you, run of the mill American, but by repealing Bush's tax cuts for the rich. Really? Is there really that much tax money from the elite that makes the difference between the status quo and a national healthcare plan? Considering the fact that here in Alberta we spend one third of our entire budget on healthcare and desperately need to increase that amount drastically, this seems too good to be true. Indeed, according to the NY Times, the revenue from the elite would only cover half of his plan.

After a very eloquent but brief talk about how "every American will have healthcare" followed by wild applause, Obama just moved on like that to the next big expenditure: billions of dollars into alternative energy development. No more mention of where that money will come from (the pot of gold beneath the rainbow, perhaps? hey, it exists just as much as all that healthcare money does), but I got the impression that he thinks that this, too, can be funded by those billions upon billions of imaginary corporate corruption/loophole dollars and those taxes from the elite. Wow! I'm sure there are corporate taxation loopholes that can be eliminated, but Obama's plans are endless whereas corporate loopholes (much to the regret of corporations, I'm sure,) are not.

Then he went on about his proposed tax cuts. Again, really? 90% of the population can apparently get a big fat tax cut, yet social spending will be dramatically increased? Yes! Because this money won't come from "ordinary people" but from "big corporations and the elite." A common theme throughout seemed to be making a scapegoat of corporations. They're the reason that the average American is struggling a bit more than usual. Americans want answers as to why they are less well-off than before, someone to place the blame on, and some way to justify increase spending while decreasing taxes--they want to hear a quick fix, "hey let's just tax somebody else!" rather than a hard answer that would mean that their immediate situations aren't going to improve just like that. Perhaps under Bush, the super-rich got too many tax cuts. But not that many that America will be able to afford all this new spending while decreasing taxes for nearly everybody else. Increasing taxes for the insanely-rich is probably a good idea, but not a fix-all solution for every proposed expenditure.

This speech took the typical empty political rhetoric to completely new heights and the audience was loving every minute of it. Yes, it made me feel warm and fuzzy inside to look at the goodness that exists within America, especially since we so rarely hear of it. Who wouldn't find stories about people generously offering refuge to strangers after Hurricane Katrina heartwarming, or stories about the crowds of eager Americans gathering to hear Martin Luther King Jr. speak? I like these typical convention stories designed to promote patriotism, and part of me wishes we had similar conventions in Canada because God knows that Canadians could use a little bit of patriotism. But I have to wonder, is Obama so inexperienced or delusional that he actually believes his own rhetoric, that he can actually make these changes while cutting taxes? Or is he just making empty promises? If that is the case, I wonder which of his policies he will even attempt to implement and which he will let fade into the background. Perhaps I'll try to catch McCain's speech at the RNC for a comparison. Obama was probably my last choice for the Democratic candidate (I liked Edwards and Clinton, say what you will about the whole Edwards scandal, I still think he would have been good for the job) and McCain was actually my top pick for Republican. I think that Romney and Huckabee are absolutely nuts and Ron Paul seems reasonable at least, even if I disagree with libertarianism and think that he isn't the sharpest tool in the shed. The others never stood a chance.

I can't believe this, but I may actually prefer the Republicans given the options. Biden brings up the Democrat stock quite a bit for me and what's-her-face-Palin drags the Republican stock way down. Because of McCain's age, I think that he needs a really qualified VP candidate and let's face it, what's-her-face won't cut it even if she appeals to military-supporters and pro-lifers. Also, I'm really hoping that McCain is pulling a politician's fib (or what the rest of us would consider to be a lie), when he says that he has changed his mind from a deficit-reduction focus to a tax cut focus. I'm going to assume that reducing the deficit is just as important to him now as it was a few months ago and say that I prefer McCain, as much as it really (and I mean really) freaks me out that I prefer the Republicans. The end must be near, repent, and so on. Or maybe I'm having a moment of weakness and will wake up tomorrow and think "well, an attempt at universal healthcare is better than no attempt at all!" Or maybe I will make the assumption that Obama is lying about tax-cuts. If he actually owns up as to how he will get this money, I'm not opposed to a lot of his plans. Both McCain and Obama want to develop alternative energy sources (though McCain is talking about offshore drilling, eep), I like that Obama doesn't support school vouchers and that both him and McCain want a merit pay for teachers, and despite all my complaints about the Canadian system, I like universal healthcare. But as it stands now, I don't know whether Obama is lying to get votes or whether he actually has no clue what he's doing, whereas at least McCain has a plan. Oh well, I guess at the end of the day I should be happy that whoever gets in, it will mean that Dubya is out. Woohoo!

I'm back from my trip to the UK and Ireland and it was fantastic. I'll try to keep this as brief as possible so as not to bore you all with every little detail. If I had to pick a favorite place, it would be Ireland. My expectation of Dublin had been pretty much entirely formed by James Joyce's The Dubliners (you can laugh at me now) and by Belfast, which only served to reinforce my depressing expectations of Ireland; Belfast is still experiencing the turmoil between Catholics and Protestants and there is still a wall running through the city to segregate the classes--1999 attempts to tear down the wall were not well received, apparently. After the gloomy and apprehensive mood of Belfast, Dublin was a surprise. It has a lighthearted and youthful vibe to it, which actually shouldn't be that surprising at all since it is one of the youngest cities in Europe. I loved learning about Irish history and actually being able to see "this was established by the vikings" or "this is a vessel used to ship Irish men to Canada during the potato famine", but I won't go into that for the sake of brevity. Also loved the churches. I found it amusing that Saint Patrick's does not have a statue of the saint bearing its name in the front, but of Guinness, the unofficial patron saint of Ireland, it seems :P Beer is held in really high esteem in Ireland and it seems like all everyone wants to do is be merry and have a drink. The obsession is a little over the top, by any standards: hospital patients are given a pint of Guinness daily, seniors in old age homes are given a pint each day to keep up their strength, and blood donors are given a pint of Guinness in exchange for a pint of blood... I love it :D I also love the Irish saints! I think I may have found my patron saint over there: St. Brigid! I relate to her struggle with her father, who did not support her conversion to Christianity let alone the zeal with which she approached the monastic order (some stories say she disfigured her face so that no man would marry her while others say she gouged out an eye, so clearly the woman had some fight in her), and I find hope in the fact that eventually her father came to Christ, albeit on his deathbed. But the coolest part is that she was ordained not as a nun but as a bishop, or at least so say some versions of the story; it is very hard to sort out exact details of the lives of early saints and often people tacked on things that couldn't possibly have happened. I think it goes without saying that she was (is) a very strong woman. And I guess now that I'm babbling on about potential patron saints, I should say that this trip has made it much more clear that Orthodoxy is right for me, though that's another post entirely.

What else to say... I tried strange foods that are worth mentioning. What I have concluded about the Scottish is that they have a developed appreciation for the taste of cat food. I'm pretty sure we used to serve a cheaper version of haggis to the cat (though it isn't as disgusting as most people who haven't tried it make it out to be), and paté reminds me of wet dog food, not that I've tried dog food... in London I ate a pigeon, which was actually really good aside from the thighs, which were too fatty. Surprisingly, I did a lot of shopping in London (and by a lot, I mean "I spent $100 CDN" haha, but I spent a long time doing it so it felt like a lot of shopping, plus I'm cheap so by my standards, I went a bit crazy when abroad) and the highlights there were the british museum and national gallery (duh). I wish that I had had more time so that I could have done an audio tour of every single painting at the gallery. I'd probably need weeks because I don't have the attention span to spend more than a few hours nonstop :P Another highlight was Bath because the roman baths were gorgeous beyond description. I also went to Wales but I have nothing to say about the entire country except that in the 12 hours that I was there, I was almost raped and was held hostage in a room while 4 huge angry men were trying to pound down the door and were threatening to kill me and my sisters :/ It made me think twice about my travel plans for next year... I was planning on going to Turkey alone for a month, but now I'm not so sure. Other people I met said that two of their female friends went last year and in an afternoon were molested 3 times and then just left the country, but wikitravel says it's a safe place... but then again wikitravel says that Wales is a safe place, too, so I guess the moral of this story is that stuff can happen anywhere so I think I will continue with my plans anyways even if I can't find someone else who will go with me. I'm going to stop now or else I'll just go on and on and I think I've already broken my promise to keep this short. I'll probably post photos in a few days.

Henry Morgentaler has received the Order of Canada, as I'm sure all the Canadians reading this have heard. For those who don't know, Morgentaler was a prominent abortion activist here in Canada, and due to his effort, we still do not have any legal restrictions on abortions. The Order of Canada is the highest award that anyone can receive, so there has been quite a bit of controversy. I myself am a bit torn. I hate that abortion is common and that it is seen as something casual, but at the same time, the law prior to Morgentaler's crusade was completely ridiculous. Women were only allowed abortions in the case of emergency, but the catch was that they had to wait weeks or months to plead the urgency of their case in front of a 3-person panel. Obviously, the consequences of any true emergency are likely to be realized in such a lengthy time-period. Morgentaler was one person who was willing to stand up and lobby the government and to take action on his own (illegally) to provide a service that he considered to be a right of women to receive. Still, it really irks me that we're basically honoring abortion with the highest award possible. I guess this issue reveals my hypocrisy: I think abortion should be legal, but when someone does the dirty work stands up for this right, I'd rather not really think about it because I think that in all but extreme cases, abortion is just so wrong.

What do you think?

I have been hit over the head too often in the last 24hr period with what seems to be the predominant, prepackaged male fantasy. I work at a welding place, so I eat with 10 or so men between the ages of 18 and 50 and sit with them on my breaks. The summers, in which I get to interact with the world that exists beyond church and the academic haven that is university, make me realize that most people I know are not normal people. I can say with confidence that everyone I interact with on a regular basis is refined, respectful, and has a strong sense of integrity. In the real world, it would seem that most people aren't like this. Tomorrow one guy is bringing in a photo of the before (I'm assuming this would be oral or vaginal sex) and the after (I'm assuming this would be a photo of his girlfriend either looking angry, disgusted, or hurt, and having cum all over her face) of "pulling a spiderman" on his girlfriend of over a year, and then immediately snapping a photo to show all his friends. Their whole attitude towards women is *awful*. Their motto is "feed me, fuck me, and shut the fuck up." My experiences at previous places I have worked and my very limited knowledge about what type of pornography is popular tell me that this attitude is not uncommon. It is very popular. This view is what sells.

This brings me to my second source of aggravation: porn. A friend of mine showed me a porn video last night that was quite eye-opening. As we know, the porn-industry caters to the male fantasy; this is where the money is. Just to be clear, though porn displays the predominant male fantasy, I am not at all trying to imply that this is a universal fantasy; I know many men who would be offended by the things in these videos. However, the fantasy shared by the masses deeply disturbs me. The fact that a woman was in this video seemed almost entirely incidental. Her presence, it would seem, was only necessary in order for the male power to assert his masculinity. Even when she was in positions of dominance, she was completely dominated. Her small role was being moved around, carried, thrown around, bounced around, slapped around, choked even, as the male saw fit. My male friend told me not to be disturbed by the choking, that this would help her have a better orgasm (!!?!??!)... woe is the day when young men are being "educated" by porn on such disgusting myths as this one. This was not a D/s video, either; it was a regular "vanilla" porno, yet she looked like a little rag doll most of the time. If this is what turns quite a considerable amount of men on, I think that our society has a problem on our hands. I didn't expect porn to be about mutual love and respect, but I didn't expect that a female presence would be completely absent from this video. In my horror, I browsed as many videos as I could stand; they were all slightly different versions of the same fantasy, which paradoxically excludes females, except in the most literal sense that they are physically--but barely--present. Now doesn't it seem just a bit gay to be removing women in all but the most literal sense from the sex-act? But of course, this observation would probably drive these guys crazy because gayness does not fit in with the macho-male persona. Two strong individuals, each having integrity and a sense of self, would seem to me to be more conducive to displaying a strong man, but maybe that's just crazy-talk. *sigh*

Benjamin West's The Expulsion of Adam and Eve From Paradise

In struggling with the Eastern understanding of blessings and curses, I have finally come to complete my personal interpretation of the story of Adam and Eve. While this myth has been a source of intrigue and fascination for many, I think that it is often frustrating to Christians so I would like to share how I have come to view it. My understanding of this story is constantly evolving so feel free to share any thoughts or interpretations that you might have, or to tell me if you disagree with me :)

First off, I take a literary approach instead of a literalist one. I have a few new people on my lj whose views I do not know, but I am going to take for granted that almost everybody on my list is on the same page with such an approach, so I won't go into the whole "is it literal" debate unless someone brings it up.

With that said, I think that Adam and Eve are Everyman and Everywoman. They are you and I, not real historic people. Therefore, I do not think that this is a story about how two people spoiled paradise for humanity, and I am confident in saying that it certainly isn't a story about original sin since 1) I don't believe that two such people existed, and 2) we are told that "The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son." (Ezekiel 18:20). Instead, we have a timeless story that is not about the first sin, but in a way, about every temptation and sin. Adam and Eve find themselves in a world filled with what would seem to us to be simple choices, but choices nevertheless. The simplicity of the choices involved are a stumbling block to many people. I can't tell you how many times I've heard the frustrated exclamation, "but all they did was eat a piece of fruit! The punishment is hugely out of proportion to the crime." Another common objection is to the idea that God would punish people for acquiring knowledge, as it seems silly that God would want us to be blindly ignorant. Lastly, I often hear that by placing this tree in the centre of the garden, God booby trapped Adam and Eve. I can easily see how people could reach all of the above conclusions (heck, I've come to these conclusions myself before), but I think that these objections are all formed when one takes the story at a superficial and literal level without digging any deeper into what is a much more profound tale than it is given credit for.

As I do not regard this as a story of two people with the responsibility of humanity on their shoulders, but of a story about choices, I don't think there is much basis to the claim that God has set up a trap for Adam and Eve. Though Eve gives the account that the tree of knowledge of good and evil is at the centre of the garden (Gen 3:2), we know that in fact, "in the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil." (Gen 2:9). What we have here is not a temptation in the centre of their lives, but a crossroads, so to speak, as the two trees are side by side. What they have is a choice, as all of us face daily. On a very literal level, they're making a choice between two fruits, but to read this on a very literal level would distort the message of the story. Adam and Eve's decision is no simpler than any of ours: they are faced with the choice between Life and Judgement. For Christians, seeing the capital "L" Life is an obvious giveaway to the Christocentric reading that I'm going for because we are very familiar that Christ claimed to be the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14:6), and that He is the very bread of life (John 6:48). Thus, we are told that when we experience temptation, we are choosing between Life(following God and pursuing union with Him) and Judgement, as this was not a tree of generic knowledge (thereby invalidating the claim that God plays the role of a tyrant who wants to keep humanity ignorant), but this tree would cause Adam and Eve, who had only experienced goodness up until this point, to also gain a first-hand understanding of evil through rejecting Life.

Rather than telling the tragic tale of The Fall, a story that tells us how we came to be, we are presented with a portrait of how we are, and of the many falls that we will face. Adam and Eve have the generic tree of life and tree of judgement to choose from, and while our temptations are personal to each of us, our temptations also come down to these two choices as well. The ending, of course, seems rather grave since just as the natural consequence of jumping off a cliff is that you will experience a fall, sin also has a similar inevitable consequence. However, our stories (since I think I have made the case that each of us can claim this story as our own) do not stop there. In the words of Paul once more, [d]on't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. (Romans 6: 3-4). Despite our falls and our tendency towards choosing Judgement, we still have the opportunity to partake in the Life that is Christ--good news indeed :)

I'll stop on that note because this is already so long that my hopes of some discussion might be dashed. You get a cookie if you read this far :P

"Acquire the spirit of peace and around you thousands will be saved."- St. Seraphim of Sarov

What a simple but profound lesson, as all good lessons should be. The soul so craves peace that it becomes a salvific force. Beautiful.

I have become conscious of the fact that I usually walk around with my eyes closed to my surroundings, so I have been putting in an effort to open them a bit. The smells, sounds, and sights all around me are stunning--how have I never noticed them before? Walking to church this morning was perhaps a greater spiritual experience than the service itself as I became aware of nature. Everything is so lush and green right now, so unusually humid for the prairies. It felt like I was walking through someplace tropical with the singing and calls of so many different types of birds, the scent of flowers in bloom hanging thick in the air due to the moisture from all of the spring rain. It was so unlike Alberta that I kept thinking to myself that it was like I was walking through some foreign and beautiful land. As I caught myself in my thought, I became a bit disheartened. How rarely do we notice the beauty in the familiar! So rarely that when I do notice, my first thought is "wow, this feels like someplace else."

Whenever I go to the mountains, I pay particular attention to all of the Japanese tourists. Tons of them, everywhere. They absolutely love the Rockies, and I take them for granted because I spent the summers of my childhood there, where my Dido has property. I watch the tourists and their fascination and I try to emulate them. Why am I not captivated by the mountains? When things become familiar, we fail to see them anymore unless we purposely go out of our way to open our eyes. Anytime I visit somewhere foreign, I notice the beauty of the place because I am going there for the purpose of seeing it. How different my day to day life would be if I went everywhere with the purpose of seeing it, as if it were a great place that was actually worth going to! Walking the familiar path to church this morning became not just a commute to the destination, but it became an experience itself. Something to work towards, I guess.

I guess I'll wrap this up now with a very endearing piece of nature caught on my friend's farm last night. Who am I kidding, I can't resist sharing this photo because it's so darn cute :)

Ah, to be part of the working world again. I wonder if my experience in it is universal; does everyone else just live for the weekend? Two out of seven days--is that all there is to us? Does my mother live for the weekend? My father? I don't know, but I sure do. When I arrive at work in the morning, I walk into the building with a sense of defeat and resignation, as if I were walking into my own funeral. In a way, I am. Time stops here. Existence itself stops here. I sink down into my chair and log in to my computer, simultaneously sinking down into a lower state of consciousness. Mind turned off, I am ready to float through the day. It is almost a spiritual experience, surreal in a sense. Sometimes I get my consciousness low enough that when the phone rings I momentarily forget where I am.

"Good afternoon....(thinks).... Company X, Lauren speaking."

Entering data, the mindless job of a drone and so a drone I become. My friend tells me that to pass the time, she makes lists. Hearing this excites me; I also make lists. Are lists the fuel of drones?

To Do:
Finish laundry
Look up a good salmon recipe
Go for a jog
Read 50 pages...

Will I finish that all tonight between five and nine? Doubtful. But the list gives me comfort: there is life outside of this place. There is hope, something to look forward to come 4:30. I look at the clock now. 9:30. Seven hours more.

The ironic part is that my evening activities are largely the same in terms of the drone factor. I swim or run most days, with dancing 3 times a week. Dancing at least is lively; a reminder that I have a personality. Running and swimming, on the otherhand... Some people get a lot of deep thinking done when they run or swim but I do not. When I run, I focus on breathing. When I swim, I count. My consciousness of my breathing or counting is always in the background. The foreground of my mind is focussed on repeating the same word in my mind again and again. I meditate on the word. It doesn't matter what the word is, but this is what I do. I try not to; it seems obsessive to me. I feel that I should be one of those people who work out all of the complexities of life or philosophy while running, or that I should plan a novel or think of something big. My mind just doesn't do that when I run or swim. It doesn't make it past that one word, but just pedals it over and over in a cycle. Oftentimes, it is a word I don't even understand, usually some spiritual concept from a foreign mentality that I can't wrap my mind around. Tantra, tantra, tantra.

My work drone self and my swimming/running self feel really different to me though, despite the fact that neither really engage my mind. In the former, I don't exist to myself. I think and feel nothing. In the latter, I am more aware of my existence than I am at any other time. My mind, body, and soul feel like one entity, like I am made up of one current. This is a strange thought because I wonder if I actually am one essence. So many different interests and personality traits, always changing from interaction to interaction. Do I have a self? Does anyone? It seems romantic to believe that I am a constant and continuous entity, silly almost. But that's how running or swimming make me feel. The kicking of my legs, movement of my arms, breathing, repeating the mantra, counting... all of these things are part of one cycle. My father asks me why I have been on such an exercise kick lately. I wouldn't tell him why, but I look forward to it all day as I sit at work. It is the light at the end of the tunnel. My chance to push myself hard at something, to exist again. To be outside surrounded by trees and nature, or to experience aches in my muscles and the feel of cool water gliding past my slippery body. It draws me into myself and reminds me that I am not a drone. Except at work. Ah well, the weekend starts soon enough I guess.

*For the record, I feel strange writing at work... but I have permission to read or just do whatever as I will have very little to do for the next week.

Spring seems to be the season of doubts. It was this time last year that the doubts were planted to see their full bloom in the middle of the summer, my summer of atheism. This spring, the same feeling is coming back... that sense of futility in dogma and creeds and these things that try to rationalize our existence. These things were part of the cold edge of winter; they did not seem so bleak against that dark and grey backdrop. Instead, they seemed rather beautiful. At a time when the world was dark and cold, my candles were lit in devotion. Church services were shrouded in black as we rose in darkness for the early service and gathered in darkness again for the evening service. Hollow sounding chants against the silence of winter and prayers murmured into the emptiness were just so fitting. These comforts warmed the heart in a time when warmth was needed most. But in the spring, that sense of seriousness in the cause disappears. What seemed so real and logical before now pales in comparison to the world that is bursting with life around me; surely all of this beauty cannot be contained within those doctrinal limits of religion?

Solomon warns against those who fail to "recognize the artisan while paying heed to his works" (Wisdom 13:1) for they "supposed that either fire or wind or swift air, or the circle of the stars, or turbulent water, or the luminaries of heaven were the gods that rule the world" (13:2), and this is how I feel as the cold and darkness make way for beauty and life; it feels as if these natural forces truly are the only things that rule the world. But Solomon does make a great point: "if people were amazed at their power and working, how much more powerful is the one who formed them. For from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their creator." (13:4-5). I was always taught to be wary of any spiritual belief that did not lead one to Jesus (they even had a cute name for this principle at my church: the Jesus Litmus Test); seemingly harmless things like meditation and celebration of the earth were therefore met with unfriendly responses and raised eyebrows. But I think that this deuterocanonical book does show that good can come out of my perhaps romanticized view of nature come spring time: the creations can yield a corresponding perception of the Creator.

As a bit of a theology junkie, my seasonal perspective makes me wonder if in some ways, doctrine and dogma are futile when we stop philosophizing and have to actually face reality in our daily lives. Like philosophy, religion amuses our intellectual inclinations but at the same time, there is a sense of vanity in trying to philosophize everything. Philosophy comes up short in explaining the human experience because our lived experience cannot be contained. If philosophy fails in explaining humanity, how much more then does theology fail to explain the divine! Perhaps then, my springtime disillusionment with religion is an appropriate reminder of what I already know about religion: that it cannot adequately contain Truth. That isn't to say that religion is unimportant--religion is incredibly important and the collective wisdom of those who came before us is absolutely priceless. But at the same time, doctrinal statements that "I believe that Christ suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried, descended to the dead, rose again, etc." are great ideas but did this statement of faith make my faith more real to me today? Not at all. Though seeing leaves budding on the trees did.

And so I have come to realize that I am a panentheist. While I love reading about theology, I gain more spiritually through direct experiences, and I do consider experience with nature to be a spiritual experience because I believe that God dwells within these things. If anyone has time or interest, I would recommend this article starting at paragraph 5, "Let us begin with two visions of a tree." It describes panentheism more beautifully than I ever could, but let me conclude by saying that I trust my inclinations. Instead of posing a challenge to my faith, as I initially thought these inclinations were, they are instead urging me to see Christ outside of religion as nature surely falls outside of the religious realm. I love that I am constantly seeing new perspectives on God that I had never noticed before and I can only imagine where else my spiritual journey will take me. Everything holds the potential for revelation for those who search. As the article I linked says, nature itself is a theophany, so enjoy :)

In Buddhism, the second noble truth is that desire is the cause of all suffering. Desire is therefore seen as an unequivocal evil. I find this view to be rather shocking--to me, desire is what makes life worth living. Some of you who have viewed my profile will have seen that the only thing on it is this quote by DH Lawrence, "I think that desire is the most wonderful thing in life. Anybody who can really feel it is a king, and I envy nobody else!" To me, that quote rings truer than anything else I have ever heard. Depression can be characterized by the inability to feel desire; this inability to desire is what makes life unbearable. It is desire that supplies us with the zeal and passion necessary for happiness. Desire causes us to become engaged in our daily activities, which I also find is a very important component of happiness. It gives us something to work towards and a sense of direction. While the fulfillment of desire may seem like it is what makes us happy, it is the desire itself that fills our lives with passion and meaning. That isn't to say that we shouldn't take pleasure in the object of our desires--by all means, we should. Pleasure is another thing that makes life worth living. But the desires themselves are what give us passion. I would agree that there are negative desires, and the pursuit of these can lead us to negative ends. I would also agree that desiring impossible things can lead to suffering. Even so, a healthy dose of desire will lead us to a wide variety of life experiences, an engaged attitude in pursuing these experiences, and a full and accomplished life. It just doesn't make much sense to me to say that desire is always a bad thing, but I guess that's why I'm not a Buddhist :P

King Solomon, who is acclaimed for his wisdom.

Today the Orthodox church celebrates Holy Friday. Though it is somewhat beside the point, the point of this day being the crucifixion of Christ, many of the readings really provoked me to think about pursuing truth and the nature of wisdom. The first passage read was Exodus 33:12-23. In this passage, Moses boldly presses the Lord for assurance of His faithfulness despite the immediately preceding unfaithfulness of the Hebrews. Moses asks, if not the Lord, who will accompany the Jews into the Promised Land? In response to this question, God assures Moses that His presence will be with the people. Again, Moses presses the Lord for commitment, and again, God assures him that He will indeed be present. With the emboldenment of such favorable responses to his last two questions, Moses goes on to ask of the Lord, "now show me your glory." In this request, a truth about the human nature is revealed: God's presence does not satiate our lust for knowledge, but we always demand of God the insight into divine mysteries. How often in my own pursuit of God have I been left unsatisfied with His presence! In my own pursuit, I often want knowledge and answers, which leaves me unsatisfied. But God does not want us to pursue answers; He wants us to pursue questions. Wisdom comes from accepting that these great truths of God are beyond our sight, and not being discouraged by that. This is what God intends for us, and it is consequentially foolish to expect that Christianity will provide answers to these eternal questions. In response to Moses's demand, God does not flatly deny him his desire to see glory, but God does not make His glory plain to Moses, either. Instead, He gives Moses just enough of a glimpse to satiate him, and just enough to leave him with further spiritual pursuit ahead of him. It is important that we seek out truth as Moses does here, and important also that we recognize how limited our earthly pursuits are and accept that. I think that many people become discouraged that religion, which is supposed to lead them to God, just brings more questions. They ask, "if God wants us to believe in Him, why can't He make it more obvious?" I don't know why God does not reveal Himself to us all at once, but He clearly thinks our pursuit of His glory is more important than just understanding everything. King Solomon, acclaimed for his wisdom, comes to terms with this beautifully: "As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother's womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things." (Ecclesiastes 11:5).

Another passage that was read further emphasized the elusive nature of wisdom, 1 Corinthians 1:18- 2:16. In 1 Corinthians 2:7, we see that though wisdom "has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began," through the Spirit, we can learn more of these mysteries. We are further cautioned about particular intellectual traps that are extremely common today. It would seem that it is in our nature to demand signs and that we have always scoffed at the lack of rationality in the claims of the mystical:

"Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength." (1 Corinthians 1: 22-25)

We are therefore cautioned against demanding signs or trying to rationalize the mysteries of the divine and are compelled to instead approach wisdom with humility. Like Moses, we demand answers now, to have God revealed to us now, but God has different plans: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate" (1 Corinthians 1:19).

I have been thinking about this lesson quite a bit lately, but tonight it became pretty clear to me. I now realize that it is for the best that God does not show us His glory, but only allows a glimpse of His goodness to pass by us so that we are sustained in our need for knowledge. I realize that when I broke away from Christianity last summer, it was largely due to my disappointment in realizing that the Bible isn't an answer book for life's questions (questions like why do people suffer, what is my purpose in life, and so on). Christianity does not possess these answers, and that made Christianity seem less true to me. Now I realize that anything that proposes easy answers is something to be wary of. I like that clear cut answers do not exist, and that we are instead called to look to the wisdom in the journey instead of the wisdom in a bunch of answers. It makes Christianity more genuine, something more intuitive and Spirit-led.