Recovery From Dogma

I recently saw a Facebook post by a "reasonist" page indicating that the author's Christian friend had become an atheist after watching a documentary entitled Zeitgeist , apparently without a word from the already-atheist friend.  The author was obviously proud that he/she had liberated this person from Christianity and turned them to "reason". I read the thread that ensued, watched the movie myself on Netflix then provided a link to a quality skeptic's site with a debunking review ( http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4196 ).  Many were a little uncomfortable with the posting about de-conversion and considered Zeitgeist to be an extremely weak documentary and any de-conversion with this less-than-scholarly work would likely not stand. Others criticized the author for attempting to indoctrinate the Christian into thinking the way they did about religious matters.  I've been grinding on this a bit for the past couple of days.   Many of the atheists / freethinke...

I had an interesting conversation late one night with a very close friend a few months ago.  He's a Christian and has been struggling to understand my departure from theism.  It was a very good, passionate discussion that we left well. In response to one of his questions I said something like "I'm just trying to find the truth.  I've finally honestly asked some hard questions and the answers I'm finding are far more credible than the ones I was told I had to blindly accept before."  His response was "EVERYONE is seeking the truth."  It took me about a nanosecond to declare his statement patently false.  I'm sure he still disagrees with me on this point. This portion of the conversation has stuck with me.  As I look back on the 40+ years I spent as a Christian, I think I thought I was seeking truth then too - with vigor.  I even considered leaving my profession to go to seminary to continue this quest.  But was I really seeking truth ?  ...

It's been a tough week.  On Monday, February 6th, 2012, I returned from a walk around the neighborhood and my dogs were dutifully awaiting my return in the front yard, as usual.  Parker, my dark, 100+ lb. German Shepherd began bouncing and faux-attacking Sonny - the beautiful white Jindo-German Shepherd mix  (we think) pictured above - to clear a safe path to the door for her owner.  Sonny appeared normal until he got to the stairs leading from the garage to the back door; He froze and just looked at me.  I helped him up the stairs, he walked about 12 feet inside the house and laid down, breathing heavily. I rushed Sonny to our veterinarian and they said he was had fluid in his chest, that he was in rapid decline, and they needed to get him on an IV with fluids, anti-inflammatories, and steriods to get him stable.  They called me a couple of hours later telling me he was stable and they think he had gone into anaphylactic shock.  He stay...

I've edited and almost posted this entry at least ten times over the last 10 months.  Just when I think I've got it right, something else changes and it no longer seems relevant.  So, I'm going to have to just take a snapshot in time and get on with things. This is a work in progress.  There are still many people who don't know of my departure from conservative to progressive Christianity, let alone my movement toward Secular Humanism.  There will be some tough conversations yet to come. This is the most important and sensitive topic I've encountered on this expedition.  I place a high value on relationships.  Although I have many friends, few are in the inner circle of trust;  But those who are in my closest circle have earned my respect and my love, all in ways as unique as the relationships themselves.  I'd like to say I can grant all of that unconditionally, but I'd be lying; I don't know anyone who can live up to that ideal.  Suffice it...

Stupidity   is a lack of  intelligence ,  understanding ,  reason ,  wit , or  sense . Ignorance   (or  witlessness ) is a state of being uninformed (lack of  knowledge ). If you spend any time at all following secular humanists, atheists, and agnostics (I'll refer to them all as free thinkers ), you'll find that some of us claim that all believers  must be stupid, just as some believer assert that all non-believers (and people of other faiths) must be stupid not to see the truth , according to them. This is, of course, complete nonsense on both sides.  If one makes such a claim, regardless of which point of view held, they either suffer from a sample size problem or simply deny reality.  I have spent over 40 years of my life with Christians - conservative, moderate, progressive, liberal, evangelical, apathetic, "others" - and found many to be very intelligent (some brilliant), caring, loving, serving, people (the list could go...

Someone very close to me asked "Why are you doing this?  Why are you writing a blog and sharing all of this publicly?"  A simple question that I thought was self-evident from my " Coming Out " post.  Upon further reflection, the answer is far from self-evident.  In fact, it's the best question of all; Why?  I tried to answer her immediately, but the more I spoke, the more I realized that I needed to think more about the question and honestly deal with the answer.  The answer should shape how I go about things from here forward. Why do any of us blog, write books, or tell stories?  If it's just therapy, then we can journal in private and accomplish that objective. But private expression feels incomplete to some; they feel they need to say it aloud and get feedback.  A close friend once told me "That's just who you are; you need to express yourself."  I suppose that is true.  But the next question is " Why do I need to express myself?"...

This will be my last post on  Grace To Wisdom  and my first on  Recovering From Dogma .  The reason will become clear by the end of this post; the former title no longer fits.  I've imported all of my Grace To Wisdom posts to Recovering From Dogma for posterity so that one can trace the story. (** UPDATE - JANUARY 4, 2012: After further consideration, I'm removing the Grace To Wisdom posts from this blog but will leave them in their original location - link above - for posterity.) It's been over one year since my last blog post.  I could blame it on the insane amount of business travel I've endured, but that would be a cop-out.  No, this has taken so long to post because I've had to rewrite it so many times as I've pored over how best to be true to what I say in a manner that is respectful. I've struggled with a disclaimer so as not to offend anyone of differing views.  Instead, I have decided to dispense with it altogether for this simple reason:...