I asked elsewhere so I guess I will ask here as well:
Do you think/know that what is sometimes called "religion" has an importance or meaning or foundation that goes beyond or comes before the moral and ethical and ritual prescriptions religion can lay down for its various adherents?
My guess/answer would be yes ... but if anyone told you what it was, that would not be it.
Yes, and I'll tell you what it is! It's to attain knowledge of the teapot orbiting the sun...
ReplyDelete"Religion" the word implies "returning". Returning to what?
Dave -- I always thought "religion" was more along the lines of "Middle English (originally in the sense ‘life under monastic vows’): from Old French, or from Latin religio(n-) ‘obligation, bond, reverence,’ perhaps based on Latin religare ‘to bind.’"
ReplyDeleteRather than "return" it feels like implicit "separation" to me.
That's more subtle. Perhaps without the illusion of separation, there's no motivation to bind.
ReplyDeletePerhaps the purpose of religion is to recover what's lost from childhood.
ReplyDeleteWell said. For most, that means a teat to suckle....
ReplyDeleteDave -- Let's not be too dismissive of teats. In the beginning, they gave us all life. After that, it's Nellie-bar-the-door ... religious teats, intellectual teats, emotional teats, worry teats, tit teats... you get the drift. Maybe if we were all more honest, we could start and organization called Teats R Us. It might be a good starting point, don't you think?
ReplyDeleteTeats R Us, sure. "My name is Dave, and I'm addicted to teats..."
ReplyDeleteThe flip side, of course, is that Teats R Us becomes another teat.
When does it stop?
Dave -- A little patience, a little honesty, a little practice and the necessity may ease up a bit.
ReplyDelete