This survey from the Pew Forum indicates an increasing number of Americans are playing mix and match with their faith. This is not terribly surprising; religions have been borrowing from each other since they first came into existence. Now with the world at nearly everyone's fingertips through technology and globalization, it's much easier to find the bits of other spiritual worldviews that one would like to take for a test drive and perhaps even add to their own supernatural garage.
What I find myself wondering is is this a good thing or not? While I welcome the departure from literalist fundamentalism, it seems to me people are just moving their irrationality around and the door is left open for a revivalist snapback once the elusive answers are not found in the tarot cards or healing crystals. It still bothers me that a quarter of the people I encounter out there think they can know something about me just by cross-referencing the D.O.B. on my driver's license with an arbitrary series of charts and tables.
Rather than a step toward the new age of reason I hope for, this is just a reshuffling of the deck. I'd still rather hear "God is in the trees" than "God hates fags", but there is a lot of room for improvement.
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1 comment:
I am a bit late commenting on this, but I really enjoyed this post.
""I'd still rather hear "God is in the trees" than "God hates fags", but there is a lot of room for improvement.""
This made me laugh. I would rather hear that too. I think the problem is that we as humans (or many humans) have a deep seated craving for the mystical and transcendental. Even with secularized ideas this craving can remain. How do we eliminate irrational belief, maintain secular ideals, and satisfy this craving?
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