Category Archives: Pantheism

Look around the Big Tent of Paganism and youll find connections to virtually every ancestral tradition on Earth. Celtic Reconstructionism and my own Druidry draw on what we know of our ancestors in Britain, Ireland, Gaul, and other places where Celtic culture was prevalent. Heathenry and Asatru draw on the heritage of the Germanic peoples. Kemeticism attempts to revive the beliefs and practices of the ancient Egyptians.

We have to revive and restore these practices because Paganism in Europe and European-dominated countries was interrupted by the near-universal conversion to Christianity. While Christianitys influence has diminished since the Enlightenment and especially over the last hundred years, it remains a dominant force in our culture.

But Christianity was never a wholly new thing in any of its forms. It has mythical roots in Judaism, intellectual roots in Greek philosophy, and folklore roots in every land in which it was established. Some pagan beliefs and practices survived, but they were Christianized. They had to be in medieval and early modern Europe it was impossible to be anything other than a Christian (or possibly a Jew, in some places, at some times, for a while).

These survivals and continuations include magic a lot of magic.

Magic is part of our legacy as humans. It is something weve always done, from the earliest cave paintings to spells in verse to the sigils of chaos magic. Christianity couldnt wipe out magic, it just changed its forms.

Right now were seeing a revival of some Christian magic, particularly on the high magic side. Sorcery and grimoire magic seem to be gaining in popularity. Or maybe Im just paying too much attention to Gordon White, but it sure seems that way to me.

To be clear: this isnt magic worked with the approval of Pope Francis or Pat Robertson there is no such thing. This is magic worked within a monotheist worldview (even if their one God is very different from the God of orthodox Christianity) and drawing on Christian traditions, forms, and structures. Its not all that different from what many of the Revival Druids did and certainly not very different from the magic of Dion Fortune.

Magic doesnt care what you believe magic cares what you do. Work this magic properly and youll get results.

But I cant do this magic. I had to make a clean break with Christianity and I cant go back, not even to work magic with the aid of powerful spirits.

Christians have been arguing over definition of real Christianity ever since the death of the historical Jesus (who I think existed, but that cant be proved and its far from certain). There were many Christianities in its first couple of centuries. Despite the rise of the Catholic Church in the post-Constantine years, Christianity has never been one thing.

Today we have Catholics and Orthodox who claim to be an unbroken line back to the apostles, Protestants who claim to a be a restored and reformed version of the apostolic church, liberal Christians who claim to follow the teachings of the real Jesus, and countless variations on all of the above.

In 2014 Gordon White of Rune Soup made a strong case for a reasonable and non-exclusive Christian context for magic:

the churchy components of Joses Cyprian may represent an emotive barrier for a lot of todays occultists. This is a pity. You all know how I feel about the Church (Goldman Sachs with more paedophiles). But you also know how I feel about the saints. (Not just a modesty curtain for savage gods, but also an uninterrupted continuation of at least three different strands of European customs pertaining to the Dead). Only a moron would confuse a criminal bank run for and by paedophiles for the activities of a grandmotherly herbalist in a Venezuelan barrio.

We need to have more sophisticated eyes. Because there is that which remains.

Gordon isnt wrong, and if I had discovered this at age 10 or so things might have worked out very differently for me. But I didnt.

This was Southern low church Evangelical Protestantism: born again Christianity with an never-ending emphasis on the eternal torments awaiting those who werent saved and the Rapture that could happen at any moment. The people in the church were mostly good folks who meant well, but their theology was bad and questioning it was unimaginable.

At a very early age I realized it didnt make sense, but I didnt have the context to challenge it. By the time I started learning about other religions and the real history of Christianity, it was too late the tentacles of fundamentalism were firmly lodged in my subconscious.

I became a liberal Christian, then a universalist, then a Pagan, but the tentacles of fundamentalism were still there, still frightening me, and still keeping me from becoming who and what I wanted to be. I had to develop a new intellectual foundation, but I could not exorcise my inner fundamentalist with reason alone. It took a good and powerful religious experience to crowd out the remnants of fundamentalism.

My inner fundamentalist is powerless and dying but it is not dead. I dont think it can truly die as long as Im alive those experiences were too strong for too many years too early in my life. And if I feed that spirit, it will revive.

This isnt like being an alcoholic who cant be around alcohol for fear of having a relapse. I occasionally go the Methodist church where my wife sings in the choir. I read Christian bloggers and writers from time to time. Im still interested in the historical origins of Christianity. And I have many Christian friends and relatives who are good people doing good work, both individually and in their churches. None of this causes me any problems.

But theres a huge difference between intellectually exploring Christianity and practicing Christianity, even if that practice takes a very unorthodox, very unfundamentalist approach. The magic of Catholic saints is nothing like the hellfire and brimstone of Baptist preachers, and for many people that difference is enough to accept the good and reject the bad.

But if I open the door through deep magical and devotional practice, my inner fundamentalist will start to rise from the dead. It didnt respond to reason before and it wont respond to reason now this Christianity isnt that Christianity wont mean a thing.

Nothing is worth letting that fear back into my life. I will not open that door, not even for access to two thousand years of magic.

In general I have not found the Many Gods to be jealous. They want what They want, but as long as They get Theirs They dont seem to care who else or Who else you work with.

But if I start working within a system that says (officially, if not always in practice) that the Gods are not really Gods, something is going to change. I would be moving away from a polytheist religious worldview and toward a monotheist religious worldview. If I can see what will happen if I crack open the door that leads to fundamentalism, so can They.

And They are never eager to give up a worshipper, a follower, and a priest.

Last year I caught some flack from the occultist crowd for my post Why I Dont Work With Saint Cyprian. They complained that I presented a very superficial picture of St. Cyprian and that I misplaced a magical spirit in a very specific, very limited view of Christianity that was not his own. Those complaints were valid. And comparing Cyprianic magic to cultural appropriation was a poor rhetorical strategy on my part.

But they also missed the point:

Im not trying to work magic in a Christian context. Im trying to create a Pagan and polytheist context for the ecstatic, oracular, magical, devotional, ancestral religion Im practicing along with many others. While I occasionally dip my toe into the waters of sorcery, at the end of the day Im a devotional polytheist who prefers to worship and work with the mightiest of spirits Gods.

Magic is a part of my religion, but my primary concern is religion, not magic.

The grimoire tradition has centuries of power built up in its methods. As with any tradition, diving deeply into the whole system will bring results faster and with more certainty than picking a bit here and a bit there. Thats why I rant against buffet-style Paganism.

But if much of the magic in the Christian tradition is pagan in origin (and it is), then it can be recovered and reclaimed for contemporary Pagans.

This is not easy. It takes a lot more than substituting Pagan names and terms for Christian names and terms. It requires reading the material carefully, figuring out what the writer was trying to do and how they were trying to do it something thats doubly hard for those of us who cant read the original texts and are dependent on translations. We have to find the Christian elements, which arent always obvious the ancient Mediterranean world was a religious melting pot and what appears to be Christian may actually be, say, Greco-Egyptian in origin. Then we have to make a guess as to what the pre-Christian version looked like, and revise it to be intelligible to us here and now.

Then we have to try it out, see how it works, and hope it doesnt blow up in our faces.

Theres a phrase thats popular among many religious liberals (a group that includes the majority of the Pagan community): there are many paths up the same mountain.

I do not believe this is true. While at the ultimate level I am a pantheist (probably, depending on how you define pantheism) a more accurate phrase would be many paths up many mountains. The particular form of Pagan polytheism I practice is very different from Christianity. Im going to focus my efforts on my religion and not on someone elses religion even if they have some cool magical tech.

So if youre a Christian and youre envious of your Pagan friends, know that theres a long tradition of magic within your religion, even if the Pope or your preacher tells you not to do it. If youre a Pagan with no deep religious baggage, you may be able to work with this magic as a Pagan survival despite its Christian context.

But I cant. The only way I could escape fundamentalism, and the only way I can be sure it never returns to my life, was to make a clean break with Christianity.

See the original post here:
Why I Had To Make a Clean Break With Christianity - Patheos - Patheos (blog)

Although he posed as one for propaganda purposes.

Adolf Hitler was not a Christian. The German dictator was a pantheist.Thats the argument put forward by the new book Hitlers Religion: the Twisted Beliefs That Drove the Third Reichby Richard Weikart, published by Regnery. The book comes along at a good time, offering penetrating research in a milieu where everyone from the alt-right to Black Lives Matter is accused of being Hitler. The Fuhrer is the go-to intellectual comfort food for lazy, virtue-signaling hacks.

Pantheism is the idea that all of nature is God, Weikart, a history professor at California State University, explained to me in a recent interview. Because Hitler thought that nature was God, he thought that following the laws of nature was doing the divine will.

In the Judeo-Christian tradition, nature is a creation of God, not God himself. According to Weikart, Hitler believed that God was found in the power of nature, particularly the violent Darwinian struggle for survival. Hitler thought that destroying people he thought as weak or inferior was in perfect accordance with what nature does, Weikart says. After all, in nature, animals get killed, and certain species go extinct. Hitler thought the same thing should go on in human society because he thought certain races were inferior to others, so he thought destroying them was a good thing. This kind of ruthless theology can be found on both extremes of modern politics, from the laissez-faire survival-of-the fittest rants of free market conservatives to the abortion on demand evil of the left (theres also alt-right maestro Richard Spencers sickening pro-abortion musings).

Discerning Hitlers religion is a complicated task. The German dictator often spoke about what religious beliefs he didnt believe in, but never clearly stated which ones he did. He rejected Christianity but also atheism, mysticism, occultism, and neo-paganism. Hitler would often publicly claim to be Christian, even saying in 1922, My feelings as a Christian points me to my Lord and Savior as a fighter. Yet he also said the following: The Christian-Jewish pestilence is surely approaching its end now. It is simply dreadful, that a religions even been possible, that literally eats its God in Holy Communion.

Hitler of course in public at times did claim to be Christian for propaganda purposes, Weikart says. But if you look more deeply Hitler very often in private was speaking very contemptuously of Christianity. In Mein Kampf he actually calls Christianity spiritual terror, which was destroying the ancient Greco-Roman world. Hitler loved the Greco-Roman world, which he thought was produced by Aryans. He thought Christianity had come along and done a disservice by undermining the Greco-Roman world.

Hitlers Religion reveals pantheism was an idea that was popular in the culture of Austria and Germany in the decades leading up to and in the years following Hitlers birth in 1889. It was part of the Romantic movement that arose in the 18th century as a reaction to the Enlightenment. Pantheism is an open secret in Germany, poet Henrich Heine wrote in 1835.

While admitting that Hitler never came out and declared himself a pantheist, Weikart argues that the German leader fit most comfortably in a scientific and materialistic view of pantheism, and often referred to nature as God and vice versa. To Hitler, says Weikart, Evil and sin was anything that produced biological degeneration.

Despite this evidence, Weikart says, the idea that Hitler was a Christian still pops up in liberal arguments and on atheist websites. One of the reasons they argue that Hitler was a Christian is that they are atheists or agnostics and want to bash Christianity. Theyre wanting to show the evils of Christianity, so making Christianity responsible for the Holocaust meets their idea about Christianity representing all the evils in the world.

Read the rest here:
Hitler Was Not a Christian - Splice Today

TalkBack 8:48 a.m. ET April 11, 2017

No Name: About two years ago, I made an appeal through this column for yarn. This yarn was used to make hundreds of winter hats for various charities. The guarantee is that none of these hats are ever sold. While we are at the end of this winter season, I will continue making hats in preparation for winter of 2017. Once again, I am asking for yarn. I hope that as were doing our spring cleaning, well find something that will help with this worthy cause. Please phone me at (810) 385-1131. Thank you very much in advance.

No Name: I see the Kimball Township offices will be closed Friday, April 14, in observance of Good Friday, which is a holiday of no secular significance. Can government offices close to observe strictly religious holidays?

No Name: On the heated storage for boats: Did you think that anybody would allow a man named Mr. Cain an IMS, International Modern School system, that is inclusive with atheism, pantheism, humanism, communism, all these isms under the sun, which is a technological advanced school which always fail because kids are inquisitive, did you ever think the city would say no to that? Just the fact that hes going to raze 150 old trees growing on that beautiful property, you ever think theyd say no to that? You know why? Because this town really doesnt care about its children, its just a free-for-all for anybody to throw their theology at these young people that just come out of the blue.

Again, that electronic device on the pole near Crull school belongs to Verizon. It is used to manage cellular data. In Verizons case, IMS stands for IP Multimedia Subsystem. It doesnt stand for the name of an English-language school in Cairo, Egypt.

No Name: To the limey about St. Pattys Day: You can sit down and you can download Irish slavery. The Irish were the first slaves in the United States, going back to the 16th century.

Mrs. Leeter: I wish to thank a member of the River Church for buying our coffee and donuts at Tim Hortons yesterday. It was greatly appreciated and we will pay it forward.

No Name: I was in town recently for services and it sure does show that they have cleaned up the city and the buildings are looking really good. Can you tell me what goes behind the filtration plant? It looks like all them fishermen live back there in tents while theyre fishing down there. They look like a family camping. Is there a place you rent to stay behind the filtration plant for a week?

When it is cold and windy, the fishermen set up tents as windbreaks. Camping is prohibited.

No Name: Now that you mention smoking in front of the doorway, whats with this smoking porch at the Blue Water Convention Center? That cant be legal. I went to that horrible craft show there and there must have been 40 idiots out smoking on that balcony on the east side of the building. Tell me whose idea that was.

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Winter is coming; help me turn yarn into warmth - Port Huron Times Herald

1 Apr 2017, 10:30 p.m.

???The sign in the ash storage room of the Sydney crematorium said it all: "Family to collect at a later date."

???The sign in the ash storage room of the Sydney crematorium said it all: "Family to collect at a later date."

Bereaved families are leaving the ashes of their loved ones behind in boxes in funeral homes and crematoria at a greater rate than ever before, according to NSW funeral directors and industry sources.

About 67 per cent of the 56,000 people who die in NSW are cremated, and only a third of them are "memorialised" at a cemetery, according to Crematoria and Cemeteries Agency NSW (CCA), the government body set up in 2014 to oversee the industry.

Its figures on the "disposition of ashes" (the volume of ashes scattered at a cemetery or interred) shows only 32.5 per cent are interred, for example in a niche wall, or scattered in a cemetery.

As a result, thousands of boxes of cremated remains are believed to be sitting uncollected and forgotten in funeral directors' offices and crematoria.

Many families choose to scatter cremated remains across favourite beaches, shoot them into space, or sprinkle them (often surreptitiously, as most councils require permission) on sporting fields and ovals, vineyards and backyards or just leave them in an urn on a mantelpiece.

At one large crematorium in Sydney, which handles 1200 people a year, a storage room contained about 800 boxes of remains.

Despite repeated efforts by staff to contact the families, some ashes date back to 2003.

A collection of smaller boxes on a shelf contained the cremated remains of infants, babies who died only a few days or weeks after birth. The uncollected ashes of one baby date back to June, 2004.

An executive who showed us the facility said the crematorium staff attempted to contact families to ask if they'd like the ashes or if they should be scattered on consecrated grounds, which is done once a month.

Andrew Crook, who owns The Little Funeral Company and previously worked for a large funeral company, makes a huge effort to return ashes to families after a cremation, often driving around Sydney with the ashes in the boot of his car only to be thwarted by families' lack of interest.

The trend reflects a breakdown in families, and the increasing number of people who live and die alone or are alienated from friends and community, he said.

"It is just really sad," Mr Crook said. "I have had to do funerals where there is no money, no family, and they are on their third or fourth wife, the kids don't talk to each other, and at the end of the day you are just left holding the wreckage of someone's life."

The chief executive of the Southern Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust, Graham Boyd, said sometimes families were too sad to collect the ashes. "One father told me why he did not collect his young boy's ashes because ... his grief was too great to face the reality that his young son had died."

Mr Boyd argues the rate of memorialisation is more than 8 per cent higher than reflected in the CCA's figures, and varies widely from cemetery to cemetery.

Mr Boyd said only small percentage of families didn't collect ashes. "Whenever we scatter or bury such ashes which have not been collected, we place rose petals with them and we, for that moment in time, become the deceased families," he said

He has written to the CCA to say these numbers don't include the number of ashes that were scattered on existing graves. For instance, about 250 ashes were placed in existing graves in a year when 3007 cremations had taken place at its crematoria at Woronora and the eastern suburbs It was common for families who chose to cremate a relative to dispose of these ashes in the grave of another family member who had been buried at the cemetery.

The practice of scattering ashes has grown so much - even among Catholics, who are strongly urged to opt for burial - that the Vatican last year issued guidelines saying ashes shouldn't be kept at home or divided among family members. It was not permitted to scatter ashes in the air, land or sea because it would give the appearance of "pantheism, naturalism or nihilism", the guidelines by the Congregation for the Faith said.

Many families are also opting for inexpensive no-attendance funerals. It is common for these ashes not to be collected.

While the number of deaths across Australia will double to 300,000 by 2051, IbisWorld forecast that funeral and cremationrevenues would grow slowly, at about 2.5 per cent a year. "Consumers have been increasingly choosing cremations or basic funeral packages over the more expensive burial options," it said.

About two thirds of people in NSW choose cremation, although the rate varies across NSW. Photo: Cemeteries and Crematoria NSW

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The story Families leave thousands of cremated remains behind first appeared on The Sydney Morning Herald.

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Families leave thousands of cremated remains behind - Bellingen Courier Sun

Ananya Chatterjee (name changed on request), a techie working in Gurgaon, was browsing through a news website recently when she read that Lucknows iconic kebab outlet, Tunday Kababi, had been forced to stop selling its signature buffalo meat kebabs. The reason was the shortage of meat following raids at abattoirs across Uttar Pradesh. Ananya was reminded of her own favourite street food in Kolkata. She sent a message to fellow-foodie Malini (name changed on request).

Do they still sell the beef samosas from that lane near Chowringhee? she wrote.

A good Hindu doesnt eat beef, Malini replied.

She was being sarcastic, explains Ananya. But I was irritated. Why should some self-appointed custodians of Hinduism tell us what to believe and how to practise our religion? The Hindutva warriors though, couldnt care less for such sentiments. In Gurgaon, for example, protestors, some of whom claimed to be with the Shiv Sena, reportedly tried to force restaurants selling non-vegetarian food to down their shutters during the period of Navratra.

Rise of right-wing Hindus

It is difficult to pinpoint the exact date of origin of this brand of Hindutva or Hindu nationalism. But the first half of the 1920s is usually considered the beginning. In the early 1920s Vinayak Damodar Savarkar wrote Essentials of Hindutva. He differentiated between Hinduism and Hindutva Hinduism according to him, was only a part of Hindutva. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was set up in 1925. Historians have written of how in the 1920s and 1930s Hindu nationalists projected those different from themselves as enemies. While some present-day Hindu nationalists have at times claimed to use the term Hindu to denote all people who believe in, respect or follow the eternal values of life that have sprung up in Bharat rather than a religion, they contradict that claim when those eternal values are given a religious slant.

Hindutva has nothing to do with Hinduism as a faith or a religion, but rather as a badge of cultural identity and an instrument of political mobilisation, says author and Member of Parliament, Shashi Tharoor. Hinduism is a religion without fundamentals no founder or prophet, no organised Church, no compulsory beliefs or rites of worship, no single sacred bookWhat we see today as Hindutva is part of an attempt to semitise the faith to make Hinduism more like the better-organised religions like Christianity and Islam, the better to resist their encroachments.

The accuracy of Tharoors statement is reflected in an article on the website of the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP). The Hindu nation as a mere community was equated with the Muslims and Christians who came here as invaders and aggressors and the Parsis and Jews who came here as refugees being driven away from their respective homelands, rues the article.

Another article on the website declares, Hindu interest is national interest. Hence the honour of Hindutva and Hindu interests should be protected at all costs. A similar mission is espoused by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) on its website: Expressed in the simplest terms, the ideal of the Sangh is to carry the nation to the pinnacle of glory through organizing the entire society and ensuring the protection of Hindu Dharma.

Ayodhya, 1992. On December 6,1992, the Babri Masjid was demolished by Hindu nationalist groups. (Sanjay Sharma / HT Photo)

Its all in the manifestation

In recent times, that protection of dharma has translated into gau raksha or the protection of the holy cow, a severe ban on beef consumption in many states and a demand for a Ram temple in Ayodhya. In some cases it also means a celebration of Shiva or Krishna or other mainstream gods and goddess. But there is a complete neglect of both local faiths and the deeper philosophies of Hinduism. Hindutva has no use for Hindu thought or philosophy of religion, for that would go against it, says historian Harbans Mukhia. All it needs is a few symbols of Hinduism which can be mobilised to create tension vis--vis minorities. The cow is that symbol.

The last couple of years have seen an almost insane veneration of the cow. In an interview last year, Shankar Lal, pradhan of the Akhil Bhartiya Gau Seva Sangh, reportedly said that they make pregnant women eat cow dung and urine paste to ensure a normal delivery.

Hinduism is a conglomeration of a number of religious beliefs and practices, says historian DN Jha, author of the book The Myth of the Holy Cow. Beef-eaters in Kerala or the North-East are Hindus, but such people may be ostracised in the Hindi belt. Brahmins in most parts of the country are vegetarians but in Bengal and Mithila (in Bihar) they are non-vegetarians our ancestors (sage Yajnavalkya for instance) even fattened themselves on sacrificed beef. Sociologist Ashis Nandy agrees that one of the Sanskrit synonyms for Brahmins in some parts of India was goghanas, or those who ate beef.

Akshaya Mukul, author of the book Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India, says the debate on the cow began in the last century. The cow protection movement reached its peak with unprecedented violence in 1966 in Delhi. But the movement could not find takers across India. After that, Hindu nationalist groups worked consciously towards creating Ram as a nationalist symbol. The movement to build a Ram temple in Ayodhya got revived in the 1980s in a big way with LK Advanis famous Rath Yatra, eventually leading to the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, he says. Now, with the recent appointment of Yogi Adityanath as the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Hindutva nationalists have begun voicing their conviction that the temple will soon be built.

Hinduism vs Hindutva

Most scholars feel that far from protecting Hinduism, a structured Hindutva movement is a blow to the very essence of the religion. Hinduism embraces an eclectic range of doctrines and practices, from pantheism to agnosticism and from faith in reincarnation to belief in the caste system. But none of these constitutes an obligatory credo for a Hindu... Hindutva seeks to impose a narrow set of beliefs, doctrines and practices on an eclectic and loosely-knit faith, in denial of the considerable latitude traditionally available to believers, says Tharoor.

There are six main schools of philosophy of Hinduism Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Samkhya, Yoga, Mimamsa and Vedanta. But people often identify with sects such as Vaishnavites or Shaivities or worshippers of Shakti. There are innumerable local gods and goddesses who have a cult following in specific areas.

A sadhu smokes a chillum made up of traditional clay pipe as a holy offering to Lord Shiva at Varanasi. There are six main schools of Hinduism, but people often identify with sects such as Vaishnavites or Shaivities or worshippers of Shakti. (Rajesh Kumar / HT Photo)

It is, in fact, commonly said that there are 330 million gods and goddesses in the Hindu faith. But you can choose not to believe in any of them and still be Hindu, scholars explain. The Nirguna sect is a very prominent sect which worships a formless god. There are schools of atheists among the Hindus, says Mukhia. The Carvaka philosophy in ancient India was explicitly atheist, and many Hindus believe in the divinity of the sacred texts rather than in that of a Supreme Being, says Tharoor. Read Ishwar Krishans Sankhya Karika, the most authoritative book on Sankhya darshan, and you will find it rejects the idea of creator. Then we have Vigyan Bhikshus text (Sankhya Pravachana Bhashya) that makes the same point. Purva Mimansa also questions the concept of god, says Mukul. And the Bhakti movement of the medieval era preached an intense devotion in which the worshipper realised that he was a fragment of gods being and dependent on him.

But the Hindutva narrative, in order to achieve its larger goal of Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan, has no appetite for multiple voices, schools of philosophy and even traditions from within the Hindu religion, says Mukul, a thought that is shared by Tharoor. They also do not recognise the resistance of lower-caste Hindus and adivasis against the dominant Brahmanical tradition, adds Mukul. The idea of Hindutva is to Hinduise everyone and make them read one history that glorifies the ancient Hindu past...

It finds easy targets, feels Nandy, among the substantial portion of Hindus who are now urbanites and out of touch with their roots. Many have very localised faiths. So, when they migrate they need a different version of Hinduism, a laptop version, that began in the 19th century. It helps the political needs of the RSS and the BJP.

The way forward, feels sociologist Dipankar Gupta is to decide what is democratic and what is not. He says, To argue that certain political practices are against the essence of Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam or Christianity is certainly not the way to argue for democratic rights. Religion should not be brought in when one discusses issues of citizenship.

Not everyone will agree. In an unsigned online article Hindutva: The Great Nationalist Ideology, the writer declares The future of Bharat is set. Hindutva is here to stay. It is up to the Muslims whether they will be included in the new nationalistic spirit of Bharat... But what of Hindus who dont identify with the Hindutva movement?

Originally posted here:
Hinduism vs Hindutva: The search for an ideology in times of cow politics - Hindustan Times

Courtroom exterior [iStockPhoto]

On March 22, 2017, two former Kellogg employees made their appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit after a lower court found insufficient evidence that the two Adventist plaintiffs were treated unfairly when they were fired for failing to work on Sabbath. A decision from the court of appeals, located in Denver, Colorado, is expected in approximately three months.

The United States District Court for the District of Utah granted Kelloggs motion for summary judgment on the claims for disparate treatment, reasonable accommodation, and retaliation on July 7, 2016. At that time, the court also accordingly denied Richard Tabura and Guadalupe Diazs motion for summary judgment.

Tabura and Diaz were both fired in 2012 from their manufacturing jobs at a Kellogg USA, Inc. plant in Utah for missing work on Saturdays as they honored their religious belief to observe Sabbath. In 2011, Kellogg increased production and implemented a new work scheduling program known as continuous crewing. This program created four separate, rotating shifts, in which employees were to work approximately two Saturdays a month26 Saturdays a year. While both plaintiffs made attempts to use paid days off and work swaps with other employees they eventually were assessed too many absence points within a 12-month period and, after what Kellogg describes as progressive-discipline measures were exhausted, were terminated.

The plaintiffs lost at the trial court level, said Todd McFarland, associate general counsel for the General Conference (GC or world headquarters) of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. The court said that Kellogg offering the use of their vacation time and swaps was enough. They didn't have to actually eliminate the conflict; they just had to give them the opportunity to do it, and that the fact that there wasn't enough vacation time or enough people to swap with wasn't Kellogg's problem.

The Office of General Counsel was part of the Tenth Circuit appeal. The appeal argues that the district court erred in holding that an accommodation can be legally sufficient even if it does not eliminate the conflict between a work requirement and a religious practice. It also contends that treating the forfeiture of vacation and sick time as a legitimate accommodation is not appropriate.

It's a cold comfort to an Adventist to say, You only have to break half the Sabbaths. If you don't have to eliminate the conflict, then that does no good, said McFarland. So this [case] is important to people of faith about what's required from employment to accommodate Sabbath.

For some, the irony is unavoidable. Kellogg, a food manufacturing company, was founded as the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company in 1906 by Will Keith Kellogg and John Harvey Kellogg. John Harvey, at the time, was a Seventh-day Adventist and director of the Battle Creek Sanitarium, owned and operated by the Adventist Church. The sanitariums operation was based on the churchs health principles, which include a healthful diet, regimen of exercise, proper rest, and abstinence from alcohol and tobacco.

According to the Kellogg website, the brothers changed breakfast forever when they accidentally flaked wheat berry. Will Keith kept experimenting until he was able to flake corn, creating the recipe for Kelloggs Corn Flakes. John Harvey eventually turned away from church beliefs, espousing what many believe was a form of pantheism.

The case was argued at the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals by Gene Schaerr of Schaerr Duncan. The case was handled at the district (trial) court by Alan Reinach of the Pacific Union Conferences Church-State Council along with Erik Strindberg and Matt Harrison of Strindberg & Scholonick.

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Adventists appeal court ruling on Kellogg Sabbath accommodation case - Adventist News Network

Christopher Theofanidis Creation/Creator was performed by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus Friday night at the Kennedy Center.

On Friday evening Washington Performing Arts and the Kennedy Center presented the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, under conductor Robert Spano, as part of SHIFT: A Festival of American Orchestras. The featured work was an oratorio titled Creation/Creator, by composer Christopher Theofanidis, who created the work for the Atlanta forces.

Creation/Creator is a syncretistic 15-movement work. In his program note, Theofanidis says, I sought texts thatcohered at some deeper philosophical level. Since he juxtaposes pantheism and monotheism and other completely contradictory things in what seems like a mishmash from a freshman world religions textbook, what might this deeper level be?

The eclectic selection of texts touts everything from Hinduisms extinction of the ego to its extension in various forms of artistic solipsism, ancient mythologies, bowdlerized biblical citations, and obiter dicta from various composers, scientists and other artists.

Underlying all appears to be Theofanidis desire to universalize the universal, a somewhat redundant task, which he undertakes by presupposing that various religions and mythologies are simply variants of one and the same reality. To make the point musically as well as textually, he uses an array of styles, but nothing very far out of the neo-tonal framework in which he typically writes.

The problem is Theofanidis seems not to understand any of the traditions he calls upon as they understood themselves and ends up homogenizing them in a New Age-y soup. If everything is reduced to symbols that are in the end interchangeable, the symbols themselves lose their seriousness.

That is why one finds nothing in this work of comparable power to, say, Haydns Creation which takes its sources seriously. As lovely as some of the music is, particularly in the vocal and choral writing, the work is curiously unmoving overall and seemed long at under 80 minutes.

It would be extremely difficult for anyone, even with Theofanidis evident gifts, to set his huge amount of text in melodically memorable ways. The work is stampeded by the sheer number of words.

Also, far too much of this work is at the declamatory level, whether by the speakers themselves or the chorus and orchestra together. Theofanidis uses his considerable skills as a composer effectively to illustrate words, but things go so much better when he slows things down in a section like Two Girls, based on a short poem, for soprano and mezzo, that demonstrates how gratefully he writes for voice when there is time for a melody. One wished for more such moments of repose and grace.

Nothing could be faulted on the performers parts. Whatever reservations one might have about the oratorio, it is always thrilling to hear an orchestra and chorus of this caliber perform so well, under such a capable conductor as Robert Spano, in a work they obviously know well. Soprano Jessica Rivera, mezzo-soprano Jessica Rivera, tenor Thomas Cooley, baritone Nmon Ford and bass Evan Boyer all sang solidly.

There is a 2015 CD recording of this work by these same forces, which is pleasant enough in parts, but not to the extent that it would invite frequent rehearing.

Link:
Composer Theofanidis unconvincing as theologian in Atlanta Symphony's Creation/Creator - Washington Classical Review

The sign in the ash storage room of the Sydney crematorium said it all: "Family to collect at a later date."

Bereavedfamilies are leaving the ashes of their loved ones behind in boxes in funeral homes and crematoria at a greater rate than ever before, according to NSW funeral directors and industry sources.

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Set against the stunning backdrop of the industrial seaside town of Port Kembla, a feisty and resilient community group have determined to take back the responsibility that most of us leave to someone else - to care for their own dead. Trailer courtesy Scarlett Pictures at http://www.tenderdocumentary.com.au

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Police ask former deputy mayor of Auburn council Salim Mehajer to leave another taxi, after allegedly assaulting a taxi driver at the Star Casino. Courtesy Seven Network

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Residents by Wilson's River say they want to get back to their lives once the floodwaters subside.

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Former deputy mayor of Auburn council Salim Mehajer has been arrested by police after allegedly assaulting a taxi driver at the Star Casino in the early hours of Sunday morning. Vision: Channel Seven.

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Emergency services were called to a town house in Sadleir to find a man in his 40s bleeding heavily, early on Sunday morning. Vision: Channel Seven.

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A 27-year-old man suffered a deep cut to his head in an assault in a carpark at Coogee Beach over night. Vision: Channel Seven.

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Rockhampton is bracing for its worst flood in 60 years, while waters start to recede in south-east Queensland. Vision courtesy ABC News 24.

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Thomas Lacombe, has a BMI rating that puts him in the overweight category because BMI doesn't distinguish between fat and muscle.

Set against the stunning backdrop of the industrial seaside town of Port Kembla, a feisty and resilient community group have determined to take back the responsibility that most of us leave to someone else - to care for their own dead. Trailer courtesy Scarlett Pictures at http://www.tenderdocumentary.com.au

About 67 per cent of the 56,000 peoplewho die in NSW are cremated, andonly a third of them are "memorialised" at a cemetery, according to Crematoriaand Cemeteries Agency NSW (CCA), the government body set up in 2014 to oversee the industry.

Its figures on the "disposition of ashes" (the volumeof ashes scattered at a cemetery or interred) shows only 32.5 per cent are interred, for example in a niche wall, or scattered in a cemetery.

As a result, thousands of boxes of cremated remains are believed to be sitting uncollected and forgotten in funeral directors' offices and crematoria.

Manyfamilies chooseto scattercremated remains across favourite beaches, shootthem into space, orsprinkle them (often surreptitiously, as most councils require permission) on sporting fields and ovals, vineyards and backyards or just leave themin an urnon amantelpiece.

At one large crematorium in Sydney, which handles 1200 peoplea year, a storage room contained about 800 boxes of remains.

Despite repeated efforts by staffto contact the families, some ashesdate back to 2003.

A collection of smaller boxes on a shelf contained the cremated remains of infants, babies who died only a few days or weeks after birth. The uncollected ashes of one baby dateback toJune, 2004.

An executive who showed us the facility said the crematorium staff attempted to contact families to ask if they'd like the ashes or if they should be scattered on consecrated grounds, which is done once a month.

Andrew Crook, who owns The Little Funeral Company and previously worked for a large funeral company, makes a huge effortto return ashes to families after a cremation, often driving around Sydney with the ashes in the boot of his car only to be thwarted by families' lack of interest.

The trend reflects a breakdown in families, and the increasing number of people who live and die alone or are alienated from friends and community, he said.

At the end of the day you are just left holding the wreckage of someone's life

"It is just really sad," Mr Crook said."I have had to do funerals where there is no money, no family, and they are ontheir third or fourth wife, the kids don't talk to each other, and at the end of the day you are just left holding the wreckage of someone's life."

The chief executive of the SouthernMetropolitanCemeteriesTrust, Graham Boyd, said sometimes families were too sad to collect the ashes."One fathertold me why he did not collect his young boy's ashes because ... his grief was too great to face the reality that his young son had died."

Mr Boyd argues the rate of memorialisationis more than 8 per cent higher than reflected in the CCA's figures, and varies widely from cemetery to cemetery.

Mr Boyd saidonlysmall percentage of families didn'tcollect ashes. "Whenever we scatter or bury such ashes which have not been collected, we place rose petals with them and we, for that moment in time, become the deceased families," he said

He has written to the CCA to say these numbers don't include the numberof ashes that were scattered on existing graves. For instance, about 250 ashes were placed in existing graves in a year when 3007 cremations had taken place at its crematoriaat Woronora and the eastern suburbs It was common for families who chose to cremate a relative to dispose of these ashes in the grave of another family member who had been buried at the cemetery.

The practice of scattering asheshas grown so much even among Catholics, who are strongly urged to opt for burial that the Vatican last year issued guidelines saying ashes shouldn't be kept at home or divided among family members. It was not permitted to scatter ashes in the air, land or sea because it would give the appearance of "pantheism, naturalism or nihilism",the guidelines by the Congregation for the Faith said.

Many families are also opting for inexpensive no-attendance funerals. Itis common for these ashes not to be collected.

While the number of deaths across Australia will double to 300,000 by 2051,IbisWorldforecast that funeral and cremation revenues would grow slowly, at about 2.5 per centa year."Consumers have been increasinglychoosing cremations or basic funeralpackages over the more expensive burialoptions," it said.

About two thirds of people in NSW choose cremation, although the rate varies across NSW. Photo: Cemeteries and Crematoria NSW

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Families leave thousands of cremated remains behind - The Sydney Morning Herald

SRINAGAR: The efforts of government to rejuvenate and revive the teachings and personality of Abhinav Gupta, a philosopher of Shaivism of 8th and 9th century is thought provoking, said Dr Muhammad Qasim, the chief of Muslim Deeni Mahaz (MDM). In a statement issued here, Dr Qasim said the efforts to start a pilgrimage to Abhinav cave in Arizal, Budgam in central Kashmir a couple of years ago and also a recent seminar held in Jammu University on Acharya Abhinav Gupta are very important events. Indian government by disseminating the teachings (Philosophy of Shaivism and the idea of Pantheism) of Abhinav Gupta wants to attain three objectives: To propagate the teachings of Shaivism especially the idea of Pantheism which is its inseparable part; to prove Sufism especially the teachings of Muslim saints as an offshoot of Shaivism; and to propagate the idea of monotheism as included in Shaivism in place of Islamic monotheism, he said. The MDM chief said the teachings of saints in Jammu and Kashmir are rooted in Quran and Sunnah not in Shaivism. Lives of Hassan Basari, Junaid Baghdadi, Zunoon-e-Misri, Imam-e-Ghazali, and Syed Abdul Qadir Jeelani are worth emulating in Islamic Sufism. Through these efforts, it is being tried to cut off Kashmiri Sufism from Arab and Central Asia and connect it with Shaivism and Abhinav Gupta. He said the similarities between Shaivism and Islamic Sufism are not due to any impression of former on the latter but because they are universal realities. We request the intelligentsia in Kashmir to keep a vigil on these efforts of the Indian government and propagate the ideas of Islamic Sufism in its right context and perspective, Dr Qasim said.

CIVILIAN KILLINGS, Dr Qasim, Indian Army, Kashmir conflict, Kashmir Dispute, Kashmir killings

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Need to propagate Sufism in its right context: Dr Qasim - Kashmir Reader

Korban, animal sacrifice. Photo: Wikipedia.

Does Judaism really need animal sacrifices? Would it not be better off without them? After all, the sacrificial cult seems to weakenJudaism. What shoulda highly ethical religion have to do with the collecting of blood in vessels and the burning of animal limbs on an altar?

No doubt Judaism should be sacrifice-free. Yet it is not.

So, is the offering of sacrifices Jewish, or not? The answer is an unequivocal yes. It is Jewish, but it doesnt really belong to Judaism.

March 30, 2017 3:32 pm

If Judaism had the chance, it would have dropped the entire institution of sacrifices in the blink of an eye. Better yet, it would have had no part inthemto begin with. Think how much more beautiful the Torah would be without sacrifices how wonderful it would be if a good part of Vayikrawere removed from the biblical text, or had never been there in the first place.

So what are these sacrifices doing there?

The answer is that the Torah doesnt really represent Judaism. Not in its ideal form. Not in all its glory.

There are actually two kinds of Judaism. There is the Judaism of today and the Judaism oftomorrow. There is realistic Judaism and idyllic Judaism. What fills the gap between them is the world of halacha. Halacha is the balancing act between the doable and the ideal; between approximate means and absolute ends; between whatisand whatought to be. It is a great mediator, and a call for hope.

The Judaism of today is a concession to human weakness, but at the same time, a belief in the greatness and strength of man. It calls upon people to do whatever is in their power to climb as high as possible, but warns them not to overstep and fall into the abyss. Judaism asks humans to be magnificent beings, but never angels because to be too much is to be less than.

YetJudaism also believes that people may one day reach the point where whatwasimpossible mightbepossible: Whatought to bemight someday become reality. It is this gap that halacha tries to fill. Indeed, it is a mediator.

Many people believe that concessions to human weaknesses are incompatible with the divine will, which should not be compromised by human shortcomings.

But Judaism thinks otherwise.

Judaism is amused by Baruch Spinozas ideal world in which passions and human desires have no place, since they upset the philosophers good life ofamor intellectualis Dei(the intellectual love of God).

Spinozas philosophy is so great that, with perhaps a few exceptions, it is not viable. He proved the shortcomings of his own philosophy when he became enraged at the political murders of the Dutch influential De Witt brothers in 1672. He told the great philosopher Gottfried Leibniz that he had planned to hang a large poster in the town square, readingultimi barbarorum(extreme barbarians), but was prevented from doing so by his hostess who locked the door on him, as she feared that Spinoza himself would be murdered.

Perhaps Spinozas ethics arethe ideal, but how immature to believe that theyare attainable. How different his ethicswould have been had Spinoza married, fathered children and understood the limitations of daily life.

Halacha is pragmatic. It has no patience for Spinozas ethicsand no illusions about human beings. Indeed, it expects people to extend themselves to the limit, but it acknowledges the long and difficult road between the is and the ought-to-be. And it understands all too well that theought-to-bemay never be reached in a persons lifetime.

Judaism teaches that the Divine limits itself out of respect for the human being. It was God who created this imperfect person,so He could not have given the sthicsof Spinoza at Sinai; indeed, he could only give Divine, imperfect laws that deal with the here-and-now and offer just a taste of theought-to-be.

Judaism teaches that if the perfect is unattainable, one should at least try to reach the possiblethe manageable, that whichcanbe achieved. If we cant do it all, let us attempt to makesomeimprovement. If you must wage war, do it as ethically as possible. If universal vegetarianism is inconceivable, try to treat animals more humanely and slaughter them painlessly. That isdoableJudaism.

True, this is not the idealindeed, the Torah is sometimes an embarrassmentbut its all that Godcouldcommand at Sinai. Its not theought-to-beJudaism, but its abetter-than-nothingJudaism.

The great art is to make thedoableJudaism, with all of its problems, as ethical as possibleand instead of despairing about its shortcomings, to live it as joyfully as we can. As Spinoza taught us, Joy is manspassagefrom a lesser to a greater perfection.

Sacrifices are not part of theought-to-beJudaism. They are far removed from the Judaism that Spinoza dreamed of. But they are a realistic representation of thedoablewith an eye toward theought-to-be.

In one of his most daring statements, Maimonides maintained that sacrifices are a compromise to human weakness. The ancient world of idol worship was deeply committed to animal sacrifices. It was so ingrained in the way of life of the Jews ancestors that it was impossible to go suddenly from one extreme to the other. He also said that the nature of man will not allow him to suddenly discontinue everything to which he is accustomed. Therefore, God permitted the Jews to continue the sacrificial cult, but only for His service, and with many restrictions the ultimate goal being that with time the Jews would be weaned from this trend of worship(they would gofrom theisto theought-to-be).

By making this and similar statements, Maimonides no doubt laid the foundations for Spinozas dream of an ultimate system of ethics, just as he planted the seeds of Spinozas pantheism. But Maimonides realized that the time had not yet come, that it was still a long road from the reality to the dream.

In contradiction to his statements in theGuide for the Perplexed, Maimonides, in his famousMishneh Torah, spokeabout the need for sacrifices even in the future Temple. I believe he thus expressed his doubt that theought-to-beJudaismwouldever become a reality in this world.

Maimonides did not live in the Dutch town of Rijnsburg, in an iron tower far removed from the real world, as did Spinoza. Maimonides lived in a down-to-earth world full of human strife, problems and pain. He was a renowned halachist, and he knew that the halachic system is one that instructs man to keep both feet on the ground while simultaneously striving for what is realistically possible.

Still, perhaps the institution of sacrifice is grounded in deep symbolism, whose meaning and urgency escapes our modern mentality. The fact that idol worshipers made use of it in their abominable rituals doesnt mean that it cant be of great spiritual value when practiced on a much higher plane. And yet, thisdoesnt contradict the fact that itought to bedifferent, so that even the higher dimensions of sacrifices become irrelevant. When Judaism and Spinozas ethicswill one day prevail, there will indeed be no need for sacrifices.

But what happened in the meantime? The Temple was destroyed and sacrificial service came to an end. Wasthis a step forward, or backward? When religious Jews to this day pray for the reinstatement of sacrifices, are they asking to return to the road between theisand theought-to-be, between the dream and its realization? Or are they praying to reinstate sacrifices as a middle stage, only to eventually get rid of them forever?

We need to ask ourselves a pertinent question: Is our aversion to sacrifices the result of our supreme spiritual sophistication, which caused us to leave the world of sacrifices behind us? Or have we sunk so low that we arent even able to reach the level of idol worshipers who, however primitive we believe them to have been, possessed a higher spiritual level than some of us who call ourselves monotheists?

This question is of great urgency in a modern world that slaughtered six million Jews and continues to slaughter millions of other people. Have we surpassed the state ofisand are we on our way to theought-to-beJudaism? Or,are we on the brink of a Judaism that is not even at the stage ofis, but rather in a state of regression, while we convince ourselves that it is in a state of progression?

This isa haunting question, and one that we cannot escape.

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Why Sacrifices? - Algemeiner