One of my deepest issues with standard religions is the exclusion of the sexual from the sacred. (To say that the sacred is sexual to the exclusion of all else is also wrong.) To be of the sex that is excluded seemed the extension of the blind spot, not a separate issue.
Growing up in enforced catholicism, albeit of an assumed rather than explicit version, chafed against my own strong instincts, which I knew to be reliable. This became very clear once I lived on my own, and walked urban streets alone, knowing that I was vulnerable, but capable and aware of subtle changes. Raised by a dangerous and unpredictable parent trained me better than I could have dreamed. I may never have felt indestructible when young, but I ventured out as though it didn't much matter. And I knew when to trust my instincts, and have been proven right. Or at least not proven wrong.
Any faith that excises Any kind of human experience has immediately gotten a hole. Often displacing it in another area. For us to deal with our human condition, we have to start with the human part, and use everything we got. Every impulse, every altruistic thought, every selfish vice has to be accepted and turned toward living a worthwhile and humane life, in an ideal religion, for it to be worth bothering with. It has to take us as we are, and ask us to be our best possible selves. It has to be like real love.
It has to include our infinite gender variations, our sexual selves in all their messy glory, our ingestions and excretions, our highest intelligence and our silliest jokes, our violence and failings - lest they obsess us and take over, our vague dissatisfactions and angelic aspirations. Our fears and joys and small pleasures alike.
The abhorrence by the orthodox of the idea of a religious buffet, an eclectic mixture certainly is more about power and authority than the care and feeding of a healthy soul. Why not find what is good from each, for you in your unique life, to grow deep and true? I've never heard a rational argument against picking and choosing.
I like the idea of Enlightened Laziness, and Mobyism.
2 comments:
Picking and choosing indeed. I go to church regularly, am Catholic, but simply do not choose to adhere to certain of my church's policies.
lovely post! and so true. i have always been offended by christianity's asexualisation of the goddess. sure, we can bear children and lose them for the higher good, but heaven forbid we have sex! i think it's one of the reasons that religion appeals so little to me, this desire to excise, to shut out whole realms of human nature. that, and making god so much less than the sum of ourselves, when by definition s/he ought to be infinitely greater, not a mere bureaucrat or middle manager or whiny spoiled child calling for attention.
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