It would be irresponsible to blog that I hated the book. Because that's SOOO not the case. There were elements of it that I absolutely adored... The Burns stuff makes me laugh out loud every time I read it, the chapter on Jesus was phenomenal, anything that had to do with the economy and the greed in our culture was (my opinion) spot on. I got lost in some of the sci-fi and gaming stuff, I expected to, they just haven't (yet) piqued my interest.
However, there's an underlying anti-religion message. Keep in mind, that is vastly different from an anti-faith message. Religion is the communal expression of a shared faith. Be it the Catholic religion, the Jewish religion, the Hindu religion, the Buddhist religion, you get the point... Faith doesn't mean squat if it can't be shared, examined, torn apart (more about this in a bit), and subjected to some scrutiny. I believe that people don't come to blindly accept a faith anymore. I think there is far too much evidence in our scientific world to suggest that we can pretty much explain just about everything. And that's cool. But it can't explain that feeling I have when I see my children (or the ultrasound pictures of my daughter's twins). There's something THERE. I don't know what it is, but I think it's the work of the Divine in my life.
I've come to learn to have a profound disrespect for my Church. It's sad, really. I wanted to be a Catholic priest. I would have been an awesome priest. But they wouldn't let me, because I also wanted to be a Dad. My choice was amazingly correct. But I studied the religious aspect of that faith (ad nauseum) and the historical implications from whence it came. I understand how theology adapted to changing society. I understand what happened to the Church (note the capitalization) during the feudal society and the role of the Catholic hierarchy in that society. And I understand that the choices the Church made were easy. After all, their priests and hierarchy were the only ones who knew how to read and write! You see, we have a problem, honestly. We blame the Church. But the Church was simply adapting to the way society was working. That's kind of like all religions have worked over time. Now, does that make religion itself bad?
There's one more step we have to take, though, before we answer that question. Once we "get" the history, we need to realize how it's applied TODAY. The thing that drove me away from the Catholic Church was the sexual abuse crisis. (See past blog on Penn State.) At no point in history should the sexual abuse of children be condoned. So, when a pedophile is a priest and offends, the ONLY fix to that is to say "you aren't working as a priest anymore". Instead, bishops all over the world were complicit in allowing these guys to not only continue to function in their ministries, they just moved them somewhere else WHERE THEY COULD DO THE SAME THING. And assumed no culpability for that. To that, I say "bullshit". Pedophilia is a disease. It should be treated. I pity the men that have that disease, in the same way I pity those who have other psychological disorders. I can't blame them for this. I blame a structure that perpetuated it and never confronted it. And I, personally, need to get past this. I know men who are no longer priests because of this and I know their victims. I know men who are still priests (and some are now deceased, RIP Paul Dudley, one of the finest men I've ever known) who were wrongfully accused. Finally now, it's become a legal issue and not an issue of canon law.
But let's go back a couple paragraphs and look at what religion should REALLY be. It should be a ritualistic expression of an individual's faith celebrated in community. The rituals and the teachings of the religion should reflect the community. OR (and this is a big OR) it should provide the ability of the religion to provide guidance to its adherents as to what they should or should not believe. Sounds Jonestown-like, right? In the final analysis, if a "real" religion doesn't exhibit cult-like features, it really shouldn't be a religion. "Cult" has a negative connotation (thanks James Jones and the Moonies), it shouldn't. A cult is close-knit group of people who are trying to live out their faith as they understand it. And they get together once in a while to share how that's going and celebrate it.
When we're doing it right, that's Church.
