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Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

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Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#571

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why even bother "trying to live a good life" if "a good life" is just a human construct and there is no judgement on that in the afterlife? By your assumptions, every atheist should just, like, die or at best, live a meaningless life.

Most anthiests seem to be nihilists, so they're already (claiming to be) doing that. I just always find it strange the way that "100% athiests" seem to ignore the logical conundrum of "I don't need a God or theology to live a good life" when our constructed definition of "good" comes from religion.

There is a massive tradition, spanning thousands of years, of people trying to wrestle with morality and the good life with or without a God involved. We broadly call it Ethics in Philosophy, and you can spend an entire lifetime exploring and glimpsing what is at the core of this "being a good human" with or without a God involved.

On "good comes from religion"... you can start with the western classics (or eastern classics, but I do not know them) https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato-ethics/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/

Then maybe take a course or two on Ethics https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/linguistics-and-philosophy/24-23...

Then explore from there.

You can spend a few weekends or a lifetime on this if you'd like, and either way it will be worth the time.

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#572
This thread is surprising to me. Not just as a topic on HN, seems it will be a downvote upvote war lol.

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This response was going to be in reply to ex-Mormon with PTSD but I broadened it to a new thread since this got long.

To answer OP, I do not have a religious or spiritual practice. Unless you call doing things I enjoy and trying to appreciate the moment spiritual.

To respond to the threads, I'm surprised by the number of comments saying religion, and in particular incorporating their children, is a regular routine for their family.

Though most not to the extreme of experience of the ex mormon HN er.

To me adults can believe and do whatever they want. If it makes them happy great. Makes them a better person even better.

So long as it doesn't encroach on others' autonomy and freedom. Especially children.

That often leads to children not having safe spaces or potentially being outright kicked out of their home.

The opposite of what a lot of religions preach.

Encroaching on freedom and autonomy of adults is increasingly happening too.

Potentially the most damaging is having multiple SCOTUS justices openly evangelizing their religious institutions and actively ruling to reshape our country based on their faith.

Damaging to women & gender especially.

Amy Coney Barrett to me is shocking in that she belonged to a super odd fringe group where she served as a literal handmaid (their term, to be fair though it's more like a leadership role).

An otherwise probably intelligent women leading an org preaching that “Women were homemakers; they were there to support their husbands,” one former member said in an interview. “My dad was the head of the household and the decision-maker.” wapo: https://archive.is/S1NSh

Does her husband decision-make her legal rulings?

BTW these strict and forced gender roles are also being forced and hurting with trans treatment bans and other gender identity discrimination.

Scalia is another example. So too was Barr. Oddly all catholics even though evangelicals hold more power and %.

I suggest reading Barr's speech to Notre Dame it was crazy to me. [2]

He specifically said he made decisions based on his interpretation of Catholicism. A bunch of the OG Trump pushers like Bannon are part of this weird Catholic group (example oddness: they built a militaristic monastery compound for 'gladiators' in italy)

They are open about their campaign to reshape the US into what they view as its origins, specifically governed Christianity (also implied white but that's another thread)

Barr said that this decreasing religious participation - specifically christianity - is the demise of rule of law, ethics, & what he considers the breaking up of families (divorce, or what I consider the autonomy not to be in relationships you don't want to be in, or are in danger with). Maybe allowing states to ban divorce is on the chopping block next.

That's scary to me. The people in charge of enforcing and shaping the law will tell you in a speech that they are making decisions guided by their religion, no matter what they tell the Senate that religion has nothing to do with it or that somehow they've never had an opinion on Roe...

Other examples abound in SCOTUS, look to religious schools. Ruling it's 'discrimination' & forcing state funding of religious schools which do actually discriminate in their written rules against for instance LGBTQ students and faculty (actively writing that they refuse them education, which goes against 70 years of SCOTUS rulings). Not to mention not having to actual teach things like you know, science.

[2] https://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/williambarrnotreda...

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Raised Christian, became an atheist, then evaluated a bunch of religions for myself. Found Christianity to be the most historically and spiritually compelling but still didn’t believe. After feeling hollow and aimless for years I re-evaluated things, read about Jesus love for me. Really meditated on His perfect life, sacrifice on the cross, and resurrection. He died for me, in my place. It became personal. When I rea…

I'm curious; do you believe that your subjective experience of God's love to be objective evidence for the existence of God, and thus you made a scientific observation that God must exist and therefore believe in him? Or is it more that your experience touching the divine had such a positive effect on your life that you simply decided to continue cultivating that experience? Or maybe a bit of both?

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s funny too, since some of those kids may eventually realize that they were brought here without their consent, and that they don’t actually like working and paying bills. You, suffering for them, then suffering for their existence, and a death of your previous self, in which you draw yourself as a type of martyr. No one’s happy on your road to Damascus, and yet you’re faith and community demand your consent to yo…

I don't disagree, but your post feels out of place. This Ask HN is "What is your spiritual practice?", not "Debate others' beliefs."

I think pointing out flaws in other people's reasoning is perfectly valid. You could argue the response was mean-spirited, but I actually enjoyed how well it articulated something I was thinking. Honestly I think we need more posts like the above, not fewer.

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strong atheism of the sort you profess is religious in my opinion. It may or may not be spiritual, depending on its flavour. You don't sound like a God hating atheist (which is definitely spiritual).

I don't understand this comment. How is it exactly religious?

There are many kinds of Atheism. I have met people to whom the very idea of God was just a weird thing they heard of once and thought was kind of cute or whatever but a matter of genuine indifference to them. On the other hand we have the parent comment which professes a strong Atheism. A little bit of analysis on it shows I think a strong emotional and philosophical attachment to the importance of their own disbelief as a system of thought and a way of life in opposition to another system.

> 100% atheism. Was raised some kind of protestant I forget which one

He forgets which one? Either he really wasn't raised in it at all or more likely he wants to emphasize his contempt for it by "forgetting" what it even was.

Religion is "absolute nonsense" and "laughable" - twice. He derives "tremendous spiritual and psychological relief" in an alternate way of looking at things.

> As an atheist I was suddenly responsible for making my own moral judgements and conclusions (I had to decide upon my own objective basis for making moral judgements)

He has developed an entirely new personal system of moral values - based on what? It's just an implicit religious system based on our current secular politics.

> forgiveness was something I had to work towards myself (as in I had to forgive myself for things, which is not easy, but is incredibly rewarding) versus simply getting it for free from some nonexistent deity. All in all, was an incredibly positive change in my life, and I do believe

He's worked some pretty uniquely Christian ethics about personal forgiveness into it too. This stuff isn't universal.

> there can be a weird sort of spirituality to 100% atheism that people don't really acknowledge.

Exactly right.

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#576

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might want to look at some of the more modern / postmodern branches of Christianity. Some people who practice it sincerely don't think of the Bible as a literally true document that has no mistakes or inaccuracies, nor a rulebook that must be followed in every particular, but rather a series of subjective recountings of different people's encounters with God over the course of many centuries, strongly colored by…

> You might want to look at some of the more modern / postmodern branches of Christianity > Some people who practice it sincerely don't think of the Bible as a literally true document that has no mistakes or inaccuracies, That's not “modern and postmodern” Christianity, that's just OG Christianity. The view that, as doctrine, the Bible is entirely literal and without error in any sense (rather than often nonliteral a…

A very good and relevant point.

I was raised in conservative American evangelicalism, and sometimes forget how oddly small this culture is in the global and historical scope.

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#577

100% atheism. Was raised some kind of protestant I forget which one, and derived tremendous spiritual and psychological relief when I realized all of that was absolute nonsense at the age of 9. I knew I was gay at the time and wouldn't come out until I was 18 or so, but my life just got a lot easier when I removed religion completely. I also recall discovering increased moral agency -- as a Christian I had been taugh…

"What is your favorite pizza?"

"I don't eat pizza."

"Huh, thanks for answering, I guess?"

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#578
post #538
post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not arguing that God's morality is somehow inferior to mine - I'm arguing that by trusting and obeying Him over my own moral judgement (I know murder is wrong, yet God tells me to kill someone), I am shifting responsibility for my own actions onto Him - Abraham's greatness is that he does not doubt the Lord. The ultimate accountability to God is inherently at odds with my responsibility for those around me. "He t…

> The ultimate accountability to God is inherently at odds with my responsibility for those around me. If you believe that God is more loving than you are, it is not at odds at all. In fact, if you want what's best for those around you, you are responsible to obey the Lord first and foremost, as he loves those around you more than you do. He also loves you more than you love yourself. If, however, you don't trust in…

I do believe we are talking about slightly different things here - you put an emphasis on God's love and His care for the world, while I focus on the human (Abraham's, etc) need to renounce the world and (by extension) the ties and moral responsibilities that bind us to it, in order to fully embrace God. Regardless, I'd like to thank you for taking the time to chat - I've had fun trying to work through and structure my thoughts on the topic.

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#579
post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

as it represents a way for people to justify reprehensible acts And in that view, it also represents a way for people to "justify" incredible acts of grace, mercy, and kindness to fellow man. At least in the US, the broad majority of charities and social work organizations that care for others' many needs (both internal and external to this country) have some sort of religious background. Even further, religious free…

My observation is that while religious people are kind and charitable, religious societies tend to be the opposite. An example is that the US is full of charitable organizations, yet in the aggregate, we are relatively uncharitable as a nation, especially towards the poor and weak. And how religious organizations actually spend their money overseas is anybody's guess, when a little bit of money can buy a lot of polit…

I'd check your assumption that the US in aggregate tends to be uncharitable.

While it doesn't tell the whole store, in financial terms the US leads the world in per capital charitable contributions (by a significant margin).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_charitabl...

Re: Ask HN: What is your spiritual practice?

#580
post #506

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“God hating atheists” don’t hate the actual God, it doesn’t exist. The hate is directed toward the concept of god, which is definitely real.

But what's actual difference between God and concept of God? This is rethorical question, 'cause there is no easy answer, and yet my original statement is valid. In this case god-hating atheists confirm the existence of god in the form of 'concept' you may say.

I don't really understand, seems like there is a very easy answer. In the case of belief I would've thought that's obvious. I can be afraid of zombies without believing zombies exist.

I don't think anyone denies the existence of the concept of god. I'm an atheist, but of course the concept of god exists. People believe in it, it can and has been talked about.

Seems like you're equating the concept of god (i.e. people's beliefs), with the actual entity of God (i.e. the man in the sky that created everything).

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