A Spiritual Faith - part II

This post was written in the effort to fully understand the ‘spiritual’ revolution that I find the Holy Spirit taking me through.

The catalyst for my emancipation from the “dry and insipid rationalism” that I mentioned in a previous post was mainly due to the new church that I have found myself at. I was brought up in a traditional Lutheran church which itself is fairly dry and insipid, and basically devoid of the Holy Spirit. The church I go to now is still a Lutheran church, but is a far more ‘spiritual’ one. The pastor is letting the Scriptures and the Holy Spirit lead him and the church, rather than blindly following hidebound Lutheran doctrine.

This has resulted in a more Charismatic/Pentecostal sort of doxology. You can actually feel the Holy Spirit move through the place and through the people. It’s not something that I can really explain, you have to feel it.

I have been following the example of set in Psalms where David expresses total and unmitigated soulful praise of God for no other reason than that He is truly worthy. Whether we have a good day or bad; whether our mission/proselytising work succeeds or fails, He is worthy of infinite praise.

Psalms shows us that we are to have our focus on God alone. Worldly things/relationships are always vexed and will always let us down at some time and to some degree. It is only God that provides constant and unfailing love. Only God fully understands our pain and woe. I have found that it is this knowledge, when expressed through a total release of soulful praise to the tune of modern Hillsong type music, turns my depression into effusive joy within minutes!

I know that this sounds like a bit of a didactic lecture, but it is just my experience, I have only discovered this new ‘spiritualism’ in the last couple of weeks, and I suppose I am still trying to figuring it all out.

In the last few weeks as I forsook tv (or ‘idiot box’ as my father called it) - to free-up time for other more rewarding pursuits- I came across this little felicitous gem on YouTube.

It sums up quite nicely my opinion of the media.

Homosexual Marriage Survey

I’ve just become aware of a current national survey on the hot topic homosexual marriage. “Inquiry into the Marriage Equality Amendment Bill 2012 and the Marriage Amendment Bill 2012”

It asks for a 250 word explanation of your opinion. I thought I’d share what I wrote with y’all:

Once we cross the line to recognise homosexual marriage (‘homosexual marriage’ is by definition an oxymoron), then we put one foot on a very slippery slope. Once marriage is open to being redefined then there is no logical basis (or any other basis) for denying polygamous, incestuous, zoophiliacal or any other cohabitational variation. We need to draw the line somewhere, and the traditional definition of what marriage is, is the most logical and pragmatic place.

The cohabitation of one man and one woman has always been the criteria for defining what a marriage is. A man and his car is not a marriage; a woman and her wardrobe is not marriage; a dog and it’s bone is not a marriage; a man and a boy is not marriage, and in the same way two men or two woman does not constitute marriage.

As far as I’m concerned, you can not change the definition of ‘marriage’ to include homosexuality any more than you can change the definition of ‘fruit’ to include a spanner.

A Spiritual Faith

Having gone through some rather painful relationship trauma lately (hence the large hiatus between posts), I’ve tried to be more Bible-centric. I’ve spend quite a bit of time ruminating on Psalms.

The spirituality of old-school JudeoChristanity is blowing my mind! As a consequence of my rigid traditional Lutheran upbringing, I’ve been stuck in a very dry and insipid rationalism my whole life – which has been instrumental in my campaign against atheism- but I’m starting to see everything in a far more rich spiritual light. I was struck by a quote of Athanasius of Alexandria on the spiritual response one should get from Psalms:

“And it seems to me that these words become like a mirror to the persons singing them, so that he might perceive himself and the emotions of his soul, and thus affected, he might recite them. For in fact he who hears the one reading receives the song that is recited as being about him, and either, when he is convicted by his conscience, being pierced, he will repent, or hearing of the hope that resides in God, and of the succour available to believers –how this kind of grace exists for him – he exults and begins to give thanks to God”

Lately whenever I find myself in some sort of emotional bind, I have been turning to the Psalms and have indeed found succour in them.

Following the lead of David, I have found that spontaneous and heartfelt hallelujah throughout the day –in addition to prayer- leads to a deeper and more spiritual relationship with God.

Real Science

There is a common myth that 99.9% of people fall for in regards to Science. It is the difference between ‘observational’ science, and ‘historical’ science. The two are qualitatively and fundamentally different, and acceptance of this is critical.

‘Observational’ science is the real science, it is the science where you can actually test hypothesises like the spherical nature of earth for example. The object of this hypothesis is an extant factor, this means that we can go out and make verifiable measurements as to the nature of the earth. We can measure angles and actually fly totally around the longitude and latitude lines of the earth. This can be tested and verified both others at any later time.

But ‘historical’ science is qualitatively different. It is an interloper, it barely qualifies as science at all. This sounds harsh, radical and almost heretical to those who haven’t pondered the philosophy of science before.

The fact is that nothing in the past is verifiable, especially events that are prior to the historical record. How can we observe the emplacement of fossils to test the creation or evolution hypothesises? The deposition of fossils occurred in the past, and the past is a place that is impenetrable to observation. So if data is unobservable, then it isn’t verifiable and thus can not be considered science.

We can certainly speculate using the scientific method by examining data like fossils which themselves are extant and therefore verifiable. But any speculation as to the origins of the fossils is totally outside the realm of the scientific method.

The scientific method is only a very narrowly useful tool. It’s power as a explanatory device is prodigious when it is used appropriately within it’s purview, but we must be careful not to extend it’s use to outside natural bounds and try and use it like a omniscient fountain of knowledge.