Yes Rambi. <To replace O Holy Night with Frosty the Snowman appalls me. It's the liberal counterpart to the religious who want to ban the teaching of Darwin and others in the classroom. The ground is getting littered with babies and bathwater. >
I'm a registered atheist but I LIKE religious stuff in a togetherness way and in the non-superstitious parts [generally, without the stonings and hand choppings] of the philosophical foundations [generally]. I like pondering the imponderable.
I celebrate Xmas because Jesus Christ [from what I understand], like Mqurice Winn, was a Libertarian = the individual, free will, self-determination, and the philosophical foundations of brotherhood of man [let's leave aside the genderist linquistics for now] in cahoots with the laws of nature, versus the Mighty State Collective of the Roman Empire where totalitarianism was the rule and the horrors of the arenas saw legions of people tormented to death for entertainment, and to keep the mob in thrall to the rulers.
Plus it's a jolly good family time.
Plus I love "Oh Holy Night" and other Xmas music. One of our daughters was Mary carrying baby Jesus through a crowd of thousands when she was about 8 or so. I was not in the slightest worried that she might be contaminated by superstition as a result. She had and has a mind which works just fine.
I would not have allowed her to do that in Islamic surroundings as they'd probably kill us all if they found that Mary was actually an unbelieving infidel. I thought Christians would be charitable about such an interloper. She was selected by the school, not us. It was a great experience for her.
My father was a headmaster of primary schools. He wasn't worried about religious instruction at the schools [about half an hour three days a week] as he thought the children could cope and mostly [he said] the instructors were so hopeless that the children could see what a load of malarkey was being spouted [which is as I remember it at school].
What we see is not what we get. There are lurking in the cosmos puzzles enough to keep anyone bewildered. Anyone half conscious should be very suspicious of what the heck is going on. Which is not to say that any crank who puts women's clothes on after visiting a mountain top to get a direct and personal hot-line to Go- should be treated with reverence as being a variety of messiah who should be put in charge of the money, the monuments and the girls [or boys all too often].
I like a good religious sing a long myself. School assembly was quite enjoyable in that respect [not at all were the songs all religious - we also had militaristic ones].
I have held hands in a circle with religious people in California. I didn't feel contaminated or threatened. I felt flattered [being the centre of the gathering, the prayer being that my trip would be successful and the aircraft wouldn't crash - I shared the sentiments].
Now I have read of LindyBill's illness, I have sent him some Genki Dama en.wikipedia.org I was going to say I was rooting for him, but I can't find my original comments which so enraged him [because he didn't understand them] when I made them to Faultline when he suffered a serious health crash. My SI membership isn't high enough for my search to find it. He'll have to make do with Genki Dama [which should be enough].
Mqurice |
