As of six ten this morning we have crossed into Summer!
And, for the humanist community a day of celebration for rationalism and naturalism. Looks like a very good match to me.
In the Unitarian Universalist world there is a tension between the theists and the humanists. In past decades when the humanists were in the ascendancy as a group they weren’t always kind to the theists. Sadly, as the tables appear to have turned and theists appear to be in the majority, certainly among the younger clergy, tit for tat appears to be the order of the day.
All this something I just don’t get.
I’ve long come to the conclusion the question of deity in some bottom line sense is an emotional one, not subject to rational analysis. And I think humanists have wasted a lot of energy on insisting everyone see how irrational the idea of a god is. Worse, in my circles they’ve burned off lots and lots of good will, without need.
With a caveat. I find it easy to reject the notion of an interventionist deity, as there is no good evidence of such, and the evidence that is produced is of such an arbitrary sort that any deity it “proves” would be a very unpleasant thing.
That said.
The pantheist expressions of the world as holy makes a ton of sense to me. and I join with those who find a material/spiritual divide no more sensible than total rejectionists of one sort or the other. Two words for something amazing, as I see it. And while I find nothing compelling in the panentheist argument of everything is holy and there’s something more, no skin off my nose. And, who knows?
Whatever.
The world is blessed for the humanist position of rationalism and naturalism. While the word itself implies an anthropocentrism, in fact, no one seems to take the lead about care for the world as wildly interdependent any more seriously than the humanist crowd.
And it is that broad humanism as rational and naturalist oriented that I celebrate.
Indeed.
I hope as we go forward into the Twenty-first century a new humanism will emerge, one that isn’t particularly concerned with disproving a deity, but that is wildly, gloriously, engaged, bringing those most wonderful tools of reason and the scientific method into the great project of life.
Too much to celebrate.
Too much work to do…
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