Talossans in Christ Church

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

A thought on social traditions.

I am, as many of you know, an initiate of a Sufi order, and for a while I lived at the order's local meeting house (khaniqah). The leader of the local order asked me to respect the feelings of visitors they might have who had conservative social mores - eg. 'not wander around in a bikini'.

My reply is: "I don't wander around in a bikini at the best of times. But surely what would offend such people more is my relationship with my woman partner?"

He thought for a moment, then replied: "Well, it doesn't matter whether you're from Saudi Arabia, Iran or wherever - it's rude to pry into someone's personal life." In other words, then my personal relationships were no problem.

That's what I feel every time I see queer or trans people of faith negotiate whether they have a place in their community. My wife could go into great details about who in the local Anglican Communion thinks they have the right or duty to pry into their fellow parishoners' private lives.

[Éovart Andrinescù]

Sufism is much more widespread than I initially realised. There's even a Sufi bookstore way out in Broken Hill—from which I bought a collection of Rumi's very beautiful and profound poems.

[Breneir Tzaracomprada]

I was raised Catholic in an area of the US which is well known as a center for African American Catholicism so I do have affinity for the institutions of the Roman Catholic Church. I recently visited the Vatican last October and was very moved.

I had a trip to Italy in the works before the pandemic came along and wiped that out  :(
But speaking of the See of Rome, we should reach out and ask that a papal nuncio be assigned to us. What kind of a nation are we if we don't have a nuncio?  :P

The appointment of a papal nuncio for Talossa would be quite a breakthrough for our Foreign Ministry, for sure. Sorry to hear your trip to Italy was delayed by the pandemic.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

Sufism is much more widespread than I initially realised. There's even a Sufi bookstore way out in Broken Hill—

I don't know much about the order (tariqa) that these brothers belong to, but that's a pretty styly shirt he's wearing.

from which I bought a collection of Rumi's very beautiful and profound poems.

Ha ha, I hope it wasn't the awful, inaccurate, bowlderized Coleman Barks translation which is so popular among New Age types. :D

My motivation in beginning to learn Persian was to be able to read the poetry of our late master, Dr. Javad Nurbakhsh, in the original - and by extension, if God wills it, that of Mawlana Rumi, since the literary Persian language has changed surprisingly little over the intervening 800 years.

[Éovart Andrinescù]

It was the Barks version, only one they had on offer. Doesn't strike me as bowdlerised since all the original fornication, drunkenness and animal genitalia is still in there. I also can't be arsed learning Persian just to read the Mawlana in his original language. But, horses for courses.

[Marcel Eðo Pairescu Tafial, UrGP]

Theres a Twitter thread about the low quality of the Barks version:
clichetz aicì

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

It was the Barks version, only one they had on offer. Doesn't strike me as bowdlerised since all the original fornication, drunkenness and animal genitalia is still in there.

... and none of the Islam.

Anyway, I hope the parishoners of this Church can forgive the Rumiposting, I'll take this elsewhere.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

Would you like to hear some Sufi stories about Christ, though? They're very respectful, and funny :D

[Ián S.G. Txaglh]

so many catholics :) i was baptised in catholic church when like one or two years old, but not by my non-practising catholic parents, but by the lady who took care of me when my both parents had to work 12-h shifts in factory / hospital (interesting infoid: bolshevik government thought in 70ies here, that early parenting is over-rated and children had to be put asap to infant day nursery since almost one year of age; my parents tried to avoid it, with me they succeeded, with my bro they did not. yes, you are right, it was a plan for early indoctrination and forming of homo sovieticus).

then, when i was 17, i tried to find a way out of the baptism, since i fell it is as an obligation i do not want to keep. i tried any formal act of defection, i tried to get excommunicated... then i resigned and became just apostatic atheist (i prefer slightly sarcastic term by alex rosenberg - nice nihilist, meaning being humanistic but not religious). in a broad sense, i am pantheist, a physicalistic monist, if to specify it. i am very sceptical towards organised monotheisms and duotheisms, less worried about the polytheistic religions. i am quite in a favour of theravāda (not surprisingly, my wife is a theravāda buddhist), which i find to be not a religion, but rather life-style, much less to mahāyāna and vajrayāna, who copy too much of the theistic stuff.

scientifically, i am fascinated by religions (as anything related to mind). i am not in the subject per se, but i am close to it with my cognitive linguistic research.

[Sir Lüc]

then, when i was 17, i tried to find a way out of the baptism, since i fell it is as an obligation i do not want to keep. i tried any formal act of defection, i tried to get excommunicated...

Ha - but apostasy is already punished with excommunication latae sententiae by Canon Law 1634, §1. Make of that what you wish.

Apparently the most tangible act you can make is to get your parish to make an annotation on the register that you wish to leave the Church. You can't have your entry actually struck from it, though.

[Éovart Andrinescù]

then, when i was 17, i tried to find a way out of the baptism, since i fell it is as an obligation i do not want to keep. i tried any formal act of defection, i tried to get excommunicated... then i resigned and became just apostatic atheist—

I had a similar experience when I was a little younger—everyone has their edgy atheist phase, after all—but I eventually came to the conclusion that rebelling against the Church would imply that I recognised its authority. All the same, I'm glad I was raised Catholic. I think it balanced my view on religion. Gave me the chance to make a more informed decision about whether it was going to be important in my life, because I knew what I was signing up for if I stayed with the Church. I've known people who were raised without religion and as soon as they left home, especially for university, got suckered in by evangelicals and made a bigger commitment than they were prepared to make, and then crashed really hard out of Christianity afterwards.

i am very sceptical towards organised monotheisms and duotheisms, less worried about the polytheistic religions.

I'd be interested to hear you elaborate on this. I'm not aware of any duotheistic religions. What makes polytheism less suspect than monotheism in your view?  :)

[Ián S.G. Txaglh]

then, when i was 17, i tried to find a way out of the baptism, since i fell it is as an obligation i do not want to keep. i tried any formal act of defection, i tried to get excommunicated...

Ha - but apostasy is already punished with excommunication latae sententiae by Canon Law 1634, §1. Make of that what you wish.

Apparently the most tangible act you can make is to get your parish to make an annotation on the register that you wish to leave the Church. You can't have your entry actually struck from it, though.

ha, the canon law 1634, §1, here you are!

in fact, the annotation on the register was the only thing i managed through the parson of the church, where i was baptised. when i was of legal age (18 here) they let me do that. he was really unhappy and trying to convince me not to do that, but when we talked, he accepted my decision.

[Ián S.G. Txaglh]

i am very sceptical towards organised monotheisms and duotheisms, less worried about the polytheistic religions.

I'd be interested to hear you elaborate on this. I'm not aware of any duotheistic religions. What makes polytheism less suspect than monotheism in your view?  :)

manichaeism and zoroastrism seems to be duotheistic religions, at least the most prominent ones, since their cosmology/teaching is based on a struggle of two opposing deities. christianity is not the true duotheistic one, cos the then evil was a good in the beginning, it is not based on eternal struggle of those. there are also similar religions, e.g. later usirev/set cosmology of egyptians.

monotheists are more often claiming "we only have got the TRUTH" and polytheists often do not bother with such worldview. yes, they are also often intolerant or aggressive toward other religions, but more often as a response than conceptually. polytheisms tend to blend with less blood spilled, monotheisms also pick this-and-that from other religions, but often feel the need to glue it with blood. honestly, i have damn difficulties to imagine a personal god to exist, so it is hard for me imagine how that influences someone's worldview, but as far as i am able to, it makes lot of stuff about the world pretty exclusive and incompatible with other's views.

i prefer this metaphor about different worldviews / religions / philosophies - there is just one hill (of life / universe) and we climb it from different sides. your side, my side, all good, what i would really not like, it is to be told that my side is the wrong one only because it is some other side.

does this make it? :)

[Miestră Schivă, UrN-GC]

A Sufi Story about the Prophet Jesus (source)

It is narrated that the Prophet Jesus, upon whom be peace, was being followed around by a man who kept bothering him. "Show me a miracle!" this man would repeat. "Raise the dead!"

Eventually Jesus tired of this and said to the man: "Here is a pile of bones. If this pile of bones rises from the dead, will you then leave me alone?" The man eagerly assented.

So Jesus prayed, and by the grace of Allah the bones rose, and formed themselves into a mighty lion, which - with one swipe of its paw - beheaded the man who had been annoying Jesus.

[Éovart Andrinescù]

i prefer this metaphor about different worldviews / religions / philosophies - there is just one hill (of life / universe) and we climb it from different sides. your side, my side, all good, what i would really not like, it is to be told that my side is the wrong one only because it is some other side.

I strongly agree with this. I think all religion involves striving after something transcendent. An education in world religions is necessary for all people. Ecumenism and understanding are very valuable.

So Jesus prayed, and by the grace of Allah the bones rose, and formed themselves into a mighty lion, which - with one swipe of its paw - beheaded the man who had been annoying Jesus.

Is this view of Jesus in line with the mainstream Sunni and Shia views of Jesus? It certainly cuts against the grain of the Christian view. Unless it's just a joke and I'm reading too much into it. Some Muslim pamphlets I've read appealed to the (presumed white and Christian) reader on the basis that Jesus is revered in Islam as a prophet, but given that Islam holds that Jesus was not crucified—in other words, that a very well documented and well attested historical event did not occur—leads me to suspect that the Jesus of Christianity and the Isa of Islam are not necessarily one and the same.