Many Catholics are questioning whether they necessarily have to be nationalist…
Someone on Slugger came up with a great term, Catholic Unicorns for that fabled and vast herd of Catholics who habitually express what we might at best describe as a positive ambiguity towards the United Kingdom. It tends to arise any time anyone on Slugger is foolish enough to quote the relatively stable and consistent findings of the Life and Times survey.
Well, someone of some standing with the Catholic community has finally put their head above parapet and explained why it might be that even some Sinn Fein voters currently prefer things the way they are rather than risk a difficult manoeuvre at this stage at least. Father Eugene O’Neill has been speaking to the News Letter:
NO Roman Catholic priests under the age of 45 are interested in removing the border and many Catholics are re-thinking their nationalism, a Catholic priest has said. Fr Eugene O’Neill said that many Catholics were questioning whether as Catholics they necessarily had to be nationalist and look to Dublin when the United Kingdom was more respectful of Christian churches.
Yokel, that seems to me to be the fallback position of religious belief. When the mythical foundations of religious belief are exposed then those who can recognise this but still want religion as part of their lives often point to the structures of religion that help people lead better lives. This essentially is a kind of lifestyle choice. Go for it if you believe it does you good but I wouldn’t build a house on those kind of foundations.
I can’t seem to access comments 113-151. Is it just me, or is there a missing page here?
Not just you Billy P . I noticed that too .Perhaps the powers that be haven’t noticed or its a tech error or somebody or something has not done those things which they ought to have done ? Who knows . I hope they’re restored or a reason given as to why they won’t be or can’t be ?
They’re still there, including my extremely well-reasoned and wonderfully erudite cockroach theory, shame you can’t access it.
TS I have no particular religious belief,( I would class my self as a devout agnostic) but I find Dawkins as arrogant and dogmatic as ‘born agains’ like Paisley.
It is an entirely artificial division to equate non- belief in evolution with with belief in religion i.e. many religious people have no problem accepting evolution, big bang theory etc.
Below is an article by John Grey from the BBC web site
“Too many atheists miss the point of religion, it’s about how we live and not what we believe, writes John Gray.
When he recounts the story of his conversion to Catholicism in his autobiography A Sort of Life, Graham Greene writes that he went for instruction to Father Trollope, a very tall and very fat man who had once been an actor in the West End.
Trollope was a convert who became a priest and led a highly ascetic life, and Greene didn’t warm to him very much, at least to begin with.
Yet the writer came to feel that in dealing with his instructor he was faced with “the challenge of an inexplicable goodness”. It was this impression – rather than any of the arguments the devout Father presented to the writer for the existence of God – that eventually led to Greene’s conversion.
The arguments that were patiently rehearsed by Father Trollope faded from his memory, and Greene had no interest in retrieving them. “I cannot be bothered to remember,” he writes. “I accept.”
It’s clear that what Greene accepted wasn’t what he called “those unconvincing philosophical arguments”. But what was it that he had accepted?
We tend to assume that religion is a question of what we believe or don’t believe. It’s an assumption with a long history in western philosophy, which has been reinforced in recent years by the dull debate on atheism.
In this view belonging to a religion involves accepting a set of beliefs, which are held before the mind and assessed in terms of the evidence that exists for and against them. Religion is then not fundamentally different from science, both seem like attempts to frame true beliefs about the world. That way of thinking tends to see science and religion as rivals, and it then becomes tempting to conclude that there’s no longer any need for religion.
This was the view presented by the Victorian anthropologist JG Frazer in his book The Golden Bough, a study of the myths of primitive peoples that is still in print. According to Frazer, human thought advances through a series of stages that culminate in science. Starting with magic and religion, which view the world simply as an extension of the human mind, we eventually reach the age of science in which we view the world as being ruled by universal laws.
Frazer’s account has been immensely influential. It lies behind the confident assertions of the new atheists, and for many people it’s just commonsense. My own view is closer to that of the philosopher Wittgenstein, who commented that Frazer was much more savage than the savages he studied.
I don’t belong to any religion, but the idea that religion is a relic of primitive thinking strikes me as itself incredibly primitive.
Science helps us understand how the world works – but to what extent?
In most religions – polytheism, Hinduism and Buddhism, Daoism and Shinto, many strands of Judaism and some Christian and Muslim traditions – belief has never been particularly important. Practice – ritual, meditation, a way of life – is what counts. What practitioners believe is secondary, if it matters at all.
The idea that religions are essentially creeds, lists of propositions that you have to accept, doesn’t come from religion. It’s an inheritance from Greek philosophy, which shaped much of Western Christianity and led to practitioners trying to defend their way of life as an expression of what they believe.
This is where Frazer and the new atheists today come in. When they attack religion they are assuming that religion is what this Western tradition says it is – a body of beliefs that needs to be given a rational justification.
Obviously, there are areas of life where having good reasons for what we believe is very important. Courts of law and medicine are evidence-based practices, which need rigorous procedures to establish the facts. The decisions of governments rest on claims about how their policies will work, and it would be useful if these claims were regularly scrutinised – though you’d be well advised not to hold your breath.
But many areas of life aren’t like this. Art and poetry aren’t about establishing facts. Even science isn’t the attempt to frame true beliefs that it’s commonly supposed to be. Scientific inquiry is the best method we have for finding out how the world works, and we know a lot more today than we did in the past. That doesn’t mean we have to believe the latest scientific consensus. If we know anything, it’s that our current theories will turn out to be riddled with errors. Yet we go on using them until we can come up with something better.
Science isn’t actually about belief – any more than religion is about belief. If science produces theories that we can use without believing them, religion is a repository of myth.
Myths aren’t relics of childish thinking that humanity leaves behind as it marches towards a more grown-up view of things. They’re stories that tell us something about ourselves that can’t be captured in scientific theories.
Just as you don’t have to believe that a scientific theory is true in order to use it, you don’t have to believe a story for it to give meaning to your life.
Myths can’t be verified or falsified in the way theories can be. But they can be more or less truthful to human experience, and I’ve no doubt that some of the ancient myths we inherit from religion are far more truthful than the stories the modern world tells about itself.
The idea that science can enable us to live without myths is one of these silly modern stories. There’s nothing in science that says the world can be finally understood by the human mind.
If Darwin’s theory of evolution is even roughly right, humans aren’t built to understand how the universe works. The human brain evolved under the pressures of the struggle for life.
Through science humans can lift themselves beyond the view of things that’s forced on them by day-to-day existence. They can’t overcome the fact that they remain animals, with minds that aren’t equipped to see into the nature of things.
Darwin’s theory is unlikely to be the final truth. It may be just a rough account of how life has developed in our part of the cosmos. Even so, the clear implication of the theory of evolution is that human knowledge is by its nature limited.
It’s been said that the universe is a queerer place than we can possibly imagine, and I’m sure that’s right. However rapidly our knowledge increases, we’ll always be surrounded by the unknowable.
Science hasn’t enabled us to dispense with myths. Instead it has become a vehicle for myths – chief among them, the myth of salvation through science. Many of the people who scoff at religion are sublimely confident that, by using science, humanity can march onwards to a better world.
But “humanity” isn’t marching anywhere. Humanity doesn’t exist, there are only human beings, each of them ruled by passions and illusions that conflict with one another and within themselves.
Science has given us many vital benefits, so many that they would be hard to sum up. But it can’t save the human species from itself.
Because it’s a human invention, science – just like religion – will always be used for all kinds of purposes, good and bad. Unbelievers in religion who think science can save the world are possessed by a fantasy that’s far more childish than any myth. The idea that humans will rise from the dead may be incredible, but no more so than the notion that “humanity” can use science to remake the world.
No doubt there will be some who are deeply shocked by Graham Greene’s nonchalance about the arguments that led him to convert to Catholicism. How could he go on practising a religion when he couldn’t even remember his reasons for joining it?
The answer is that he did remember – but his reasons had nothing to do with arguments.
Human beings don’t live by argumentation, and it’s only religious fundamentalists and ignorant rationalists who think the myths we live by are literal truths.
Evangelical atheists who want to convert the world to unbelief are copying religion at its dogmatic worst. They think human life would be vastly improved if only everyone believed as they do, when a little history shows that trying to get everyone to believe the same thing is a recipe for unending conflict.
We’d all be better off if we stopped believing in belief. Not everyone needs a religion. But if you do, you shouldn’t be bothered about finding arguments for joining or practising one. Just go into the church, synagogue, mosque or temple and take it from there.
What we believe doesn’t in the end matter very much. What matters is how we live.
Lol Harry. Sorry to have missed that!
@ yokel ,
I found myself nodding mostly in agreement at your epistle to the unbelievers/rationalists / scientists / atheists above until I got close to the end . There were a few points that struck me as worth commenting on as it seems you may have misread or misunderstood some comments.
‘Science has given us many vital benefits, so many that they would be hard to sum up. But it can’t save the human species from itself.’
It could be argued that science has given man the capabability and know how to wipe humanity off the face of the Earth . Is this what you mean by ‘it can’t save humanity from itself ‘? Humanity is probably more likely to destroy itself in a nuclear armageddon or be destroyed by a major geological or extra terrestrial catacysmic event than anything else . And there is not a whole lot if anything that humanity can do to prevent or avoid the latter two exit methods if the dice falls on either of those sides.
‘They think human life would be vastly improved if only everyone believed as they do, when a little history shows that trying to get everyone to believe the same thing is a recipe for unending conflict’
Well full marks for the obvious here . The medieval RC Church was very keen on conformity of belief so too was Mohammed so too was Calvin and so too are the ‘modern ‘ Ayatollahs .However those advocating belief in ‘evolution’ are not espousing any religion -they are simply the modern day equivalent of espousers of gravity, plate tectonics , or modern physics .
‘What we believe doesn’t in the end matter very much. What matters is how we live.’
Fair enough comment if what you believe in does’nt affect how you live your life but what if it does and lets say you believe that all westerners are infidels and Mohammad has told you to kill them ? We know from history that what some people believe can matter very much for other people who don’t share those beliefs. When Hitler was ranting about the Jews and Socialists and Gypsys and Communists there were many who scoffed and said he was just being a little crazy and that he’d never do anything if/when he got into power . When Mohammad said his faith would be spread by the sword he meant it . When the Popes gave their blessings for ethnic slaughter during the Crusades one presumes they meant what they said ?
‘What matters is how we live ? Well yes as long as you don’t try to impose any wacky belief systems on other’s simply because it’s the path of least resistance and makes for a trouble free earthly sojourn for your ‘saved’ as opposed to the great unwashed ?
Perhaps
‘Never mind what they say but watch what they do’ would be a better guiding principle AND it does matter what people believe in particular if their beliefs are wacky enough to get themselves and hundreds , thousands and millions of people killed for reasons patently insane
Hers a short list of belief sytems that have ‘mattered ‘ and some which still matter .
Stalinism
Nazism
Islam
Christianity
Judaism
Imperialism
Capitalism
Fascism
Racism.
GF Apologies, I did not make it clear that most of what I posted was written by John Grey and copied straight from the BBC web site. I thought it was an excellent and thought provoking article so I posted it.
I think ‘Never mind what they say but watch what they do’ is one of the points both he and I are trying to make, or as it says in the bible ‘by their fruits shall ye know them’. If I was Paisley I would be getting worried.
‘If I was Paisley I would be getting worried.’
But why ? I can think of hundreds of other clerics on this island and in other parts of the world from all religions who ‘ought ‘ to be more worried if they truly believed their ‘faiths’ but then perhaps they never did and thus why would they worry if they’re not going anywhere other than a hole in the ground or up a chimney flue ?
.And then there is the ‘forgiveness’ add on of most faiths in which those who have erred are forgiven in a form of soul therapy .
There’s a lot worse out there than Paisley and frankly while I could never agree with the man’s politics I think it can be said that he has lived long enough to make a positive difference .
I’ve probably been harsher on Paisley and his unique religion /politics combo than most and I probably regret some of the things I may have stated in the past about the Doc but for those who believe in a hereafter -don’t be too surprised if you ever get there to find the Rev Member for Ballymena off to one side in the non drinkers of the Devil’s Buttermilk lounge having a forever Chuckie brothers laugh in with his peers .
I can accept evolution as a proven fact of life and the scientific method as the most important tool of material progress and also accept the artistic side of our nature’s as a critical component of our humanitarian advance . But I can’t prove there is a God nor can I prove there isn’t . That’s a matter of faith for those who have it -which I don’t . But there are times when I wish to God I could believe in a God which is they say the default position of the Irish atheist or perhaps even Irish agnostic ?
But there are times when I wish to God I could believe in a God which is they say the default position of the Irish atheist or perhaps even Irish agnostic ?
Depends what you mean by God, GF. I suspect there are as many different answers to that as there are people who believe( or don’t believe) in a God
Since te conversation has shifted, well worth listening to Eamonn’s interview with Michael Longley for the reference to Dawkins:
@ yokel,
No need to apologise it was thought provoking and I can agree that Richard Dawkins can be irritating for some but then thats the way of it . I used to find quite a few priests & bishops ‘irritating ‘ in their messaging and some quite frankly off the wall with a small number if not loathsome then bat shit crazy . But then there were also those who were first class teachers and were the best people you could ever meet in your life -regardless of your faith or non faith or denomination.
@Mick ,
Thanks for the video . I’m not into poetry apart from an odd personal sally into the rhyming (in the broadest sense ) McGonigalls ) but Michael Longley always comes across as a genuine ‘dacent ‘ and honest man for whose works the entire island should be grateful .
@harry flash c/o cockroach zone somewhere in another universe
‘Interesting creatures cockroaches’
True they don’t have an anus and they excrete through the soles of their feet . It’s got to get out somewhere ‘
.’We have never found fossils of proto-cockroaches, just about to emerge into fully-evolved cockroaches.’
Fossils are very rare anyway and 98% of all fossils found are from creatures which lived in the sea/oceans . Any creature which dies on land leaves no trace of it’s existence after a few years never mind millions of years . Those which do become fossilised are very rare indeed .
‘How come in the millions of years they’ve been knocking around, billions of generations they haven’t evolved further’
They fill a niche and are perfectly adapted to it and as long as that niche continues to exist so will they .
‘ why are they not sending manned (cockroached?) flights to the moon given they had such a time advantage over us?’
For a start they don’t have a hand with fingers which can make tools and secondly they lack the cognitive capacity -you may understand the phenomenon . Our hominoid ancestor Homo Erectus survived for a million years whereas Homo Sapiens has been around for maybe 150,000 so while time is important it’s not the only factor in evolution . Environmental change , climate change , geographical isolation and periodic mass exterminations of life forms by geological events related to plate tectonic activity and vulcanism as well as external -extra terrestrial asteroid impacts also are major factors .
‘Why have they never managed to evolve a way of righting themselves after they topple over on to their backs’
They don’t have to . They are a successful species . Just like the millions of ‘bacteria ‘ that use the surface of the human body as a food court and the trillions of bacteria that live and die in your intestines all doing the necessary work which helps to keep you and I alive to provide them with a food source . Bacteria have been around for some 3.5 billion years on Earth and perhaps longer elsewhere and they’ll never fly to the Moon or drive a car or read a book but they’ll be around when the Sun explodes which won’t be the case for homo sapiens .
Go and read Mr Darwin and stop reading those Jehovah Witness comicuts