FredP

You admit that I'm looney?

Great thoughts! I think you're exactly right that we see the infinite reflected "in" the finite. From the philosophical angle, it's important to remember that "infinite" is a negative concept, i.e. it doesn't mean huge beyond huge, or the largest and biggest imaginable, but rather without limits, without bounds. A limit or a bound is always a dividing line between something and something else, but in God there is no other, no else, no division. It's this transcendent oneness, this utter indivisibility that captures the meaning of "infinity," not the notion of hugeness beyond measure. Hugeness is a property of things, and God is No Thing.

I don't know what to say, I've basically stopped caring what far right fundamentalists think of my views. If I let myself care that much, I'd drive myself crazy, and frankly I'm quite looney enough as it is, as most of my friends and family will attest.

Well, the joke really turns on the fact that Unitarian Universalism has become a really big tent. While there are still loose historical ties to the actual doctrines of Unitarianism and Universalism -- which both arise out of liberal Christianity -- UU isn't really a Christian denomination in any sense of the word anymore. Not that there aren't plenty of Christian UU's, but it's become just as much a home for the eclectic spiritualist, as the liberal Christian. UU has become particularly attractive to pagans, for whom there isn't really much else in the way of established religious community. So it's an attractive alternative for that reason. UU is all about finding your own path, your own theology, your own spiritual practice, etc., so there really isn't any "UU theology" per se.

Oh, puhleaze! Aren't they calling the 40's the "new 20's" now? Anyway, you're far more open-minded than most of the 20 and 30 year old "whipper snappers" I know anyway. The only age that really counts is in your head. Seriously though, I think any effort to replace the mindless chatterbox with activities that really flex the brain, will pay off big dividends both now and later in life. My grandmother, for example, turned 84 this year, and still reads voraciously on all kinds of different topics, gets involved in local activities, takes classes, was active in the affairs of the local library for many years, etc. She still has an open mind about issues in society, culture, politics, and religion, long after everybody else on either side of my family has turned into a broken record. (My parents' generation included.)

Maybe there's some significance to the fact that there are only three complete sentences in that entire post. But it's the Alan Parsons Project reference that clinches the argument for me. Great album, by the way.

Hmm, now that I think about it, I didn't at first either. It's a joke on the fact that Unitarians are famous for not agreeing or knowing exactly what they believe about anything.

It probably was a knee-jerk reaction by people who weren't to happy to have a "cult" preaching at them. Heh, yeah I suppose so. Oh yeah, so what do you get when you cross a Jehovah's Witness with a Unitarian? Somebody who knocks at your door, but doesn't know why.

Not exactly, but it's still based on the same thematic idea of small changes having large-scale effects. I tried not to get my hopes up too much about it, as I wasn't sure how well Ashton Kutcher would pull off a semi-serious role, but I actually really liked it. Boo hoo! It took me an hour and a half to get home from work in the snow last night!

Ahh yes, the gifts. Gold is what you give a king, incense is what you burn at funerals, and myrrh is what you embalm people with for burial. If the magi had literally brought these gifts to an infant it would have been silly. Their value is symbolic: this would be a king who would rule by dying. Actually, I believe the consensus is that the magi were astrologers. Obviously, the mastery of astrology was considered to be an advanced form of wisdom in the East and West alike; and these men were, after all, following a star which they believed would lead them to something of import. From an inner perspective, the astrological connection seems worth pointing out, in the sense that the New Birth can take place in us when all the various parts of ourselves are properly aligned.

I was referring to the topic title, not to anything you said. What can I say, that's just really interesting! I just can't recall anyone in my experience ever getting too banged up about it. I can even remember a pastor or two saying Jesus was probably born in the spring anyway. Probably motivated by some of the same Bible-centrism that the JWs are coming from -- Bible doesn't say December 25, so some Catholic probably came up with it, and you know how much fundamentalists loved being identified with those papists. I guess it's just a big world out there. I was just making the observation that the December 25th obsession is not universal among fundamentalists.

I've owned it for about 6 years. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yes, but have you READ it?

You know what? Even in my fundamentalist church growing up, we didn't have any particular fixation on December 25 as being the historical birth date of Jesus. And considering all the conservative and fundamentalist Christians I've known in my lifetime, I can't think of a single person who does. As the above article makes clear, the Bible makes no mention of the date, so any reason for celebrating it on December 25 is clearly based on tradition of some sort. I honestly don't know of any "extreme right view" about Christmas that includes an obsession with the date of December 25. Exactly. Personally, I think Christianity intuited something profoundly right in its adoption of the winter solstice for the Christmas celebration. It symbolizes that God comes to us in the midst of our darkness -- in our darkest hour, in our darkest places, when we can barely detect that there is any light left to follow. And so we celebrate the New Birth on the darkest day of the year, at midnight, surrounded by the dim glow of candlelight, as the world slumbers in its ignorance.

If there's not a Monty Python sketch about this, there should be.

Flow, Only you could take us from Mandelbrot, to Ancient Egypt, to Sir Isaac Newton, and back again, in about four paragraphs. I am aware that Newton had personal ties to "esoteric arts" like alchemy and freemasonry, but I don't quite see how they form the "foundational knowledge base out of which modern physics and chemistry have grown." The more obvious tie seems to be to Enlightenment rationality and empiricism. I was reading some FAQ's on fractals today, and came across some reference to the way Fibonacci series play into the contours of fractal shapes. I always forget the exact mathematical definitions of the Mandelbrot and Julia sets; and then every five years or so, something taps me on the shoulder to go remind myself (thanks des), and I am once again transported into the realm of sheer stupefaction. How the hell can imaginary numbers possibly account for this?! And yet, there it is, eternally, composed in the poetry of pure mathematics, the closest thing we've ever seen to the language of God; a tapestry of shimmering beauty transcending all the muck of space and time, just waiting for a mind capable of comprehending it. And then I'm reminded of why I'm a Platonist.

Here are some really gorgeous images of regions of the Mandelbrot set. There really is something mystical about it...

Hmm, that's an interesting comment, considering there's not a single random thing about a fractal.

Ahh, nothing says majesty and wonder quite like a sausage biscuit. I'm lovin' it!

I actually do have the idea of a fractal consciously in my mind when I think about the basic metaphysical structures that undergird reality. The processes of differentiation, integration, and opposition, for instance. No matter what scale of reality you're looking at, they show up. Every single manifestation of them, at any scale, is completetly unique upon close inspection, even though the basic contours are the same. No matter how much you zoom in or out, the same shapes and structures keep coming into view over and over again. Things that appear to be in opposition to each other at one scale, work together to oppose something else at the next, and so on as far up or down or in or out as you'll ever have time to examine in all the ages of the universe. And here's something else wicked cool: the mathematics of fractals are based upon imaginary numbers -- numbers that have a formal definition, but don't actually exist anywhere in reality. Actually they're doubly so. Even simple negative numbers don't exist in reality, which is why the discovery both of zero and of negative numbers was an enormous leap forward in the human capacity for conceptual abstraction. But even-numbered roots of negative numbers go beyond even that kind of non-existence, to the point of not even being capable of quantifying reality at all, positively or negatively! Anyway, remember way back when we were discussing privation theory and the problem of evil, and I suggested that the ontological negativity which was classically called "evil" by Platonism and early Christianity had structural, but not material existence? (This may have led more than one undergraduate math student to exclaim, "Imaginary numbers are evil!" But that's beside my point.....)

As long as what you mean by "self" is the ego and its attachments, desires, and sense of competition and domination over others, then you're absolutely right -- we need a whole lot less of that. But we have been invited into a New Self, which is Christ in us. To love this Self is to nurture God's great gift of life in us and everything around us, to transcend the boundary between "self" and "other," and to live out of the boundless compassion that comes from the depths of God's infinite love for us. These two meanings of "self-love" could hardly be more different! Indeed!

I definitely respect how frustrating that can be, especially being the "minority report." I appreciate that you continue to come back anyway. Putting myself in your shoes, I'm not sure how long I'd put myself through it! On a side note, I do appreciate the challenge that you and our other more conservative brothers and sisters put on us to take the Bible's message with utmost seriousness. I agree that some progressive Christians do twist scripture and history to make it say just about anything they like -- indeed, many out there would accuse me of precisely that. Personally, I do everything in my power -- with the help of the Spirit, I trust -- to not let my interpretation of scripture be driven by what I like, or what I want, but by what in all earnestness I believe it communicates to us. Some of what I believe the gospel to be about, truth be told, I really don't like or want that much at all, at least a whole lot of me doesn't. It calls me to such a degree of examination, purification, and transformation -- both of myself and of the world around me -- that the current state of my heart is embarrassing by contrast. In the biblical story of the passion, for example, I see an allegory of the path I must take to the Cross, to renounce my limited self, by God's grace, and all the battles that entails. None of this particularly excites me! But I believe it, and stand by it. Hopefully this is still somewhat on-topic.

Does seem that way, eh? But given that Willow tends to have rather performance- and drama-oriented worship services, a DVD might be just the right medium. And for only $9.95 we'll also send you a bonus disc, which includes outtakes, interviews, and an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at how the annunciation scene was shot.

Behold The Spirit: A Study in the Necessity of Mystical Religion, Alan Watts The Courage To Be, Paul Tillich Psychology and Western Religion, C. G. Jung

What an interesting and overcomplicated view of eschatology. So, everlasting life on earth would be the continuance of a mortal life (just without the whole pesky thing about dying); whereas immortality in Heaven would be a superior mode of existence where one would transcend mortality, time, space, etc., altogether? I think the everlasting continuance of mortal life on earth would get really, really boring after, oh, I don't know, about 3,385,238,213,328,453,432 years. "What's for dinner, sweetie?" "Meatloaf." "Again? We just had that last millennium....." Eh, not this month. I'm still recovering from the last one! I think I'd like to spend Advent meditating a little less on the New Birth in my head, and a little more on the New Birth in everything else!

I don't know what the norm is, but it seems one could just as easily be a predestination Universalist as a free will Universalist. (Parenthetically.... Of course, the language we've been using contributes to the problem. I think the apparent contradiction between "predestination" and "free will" always goes away as you get more philosophically precise about the God-world relationship; but then the discussion starts to revolve more around language and concepts than around the original topic! And I don't want to derail a really good discussion, as I'm wont to do.)