Groundhog Day in the Universe
February 2, 2023 8:44am
Groundhog Day. Appropriate.
I once was an inhabitant of the universe. A cyclic universe that created and destroyed itself over and over, a never-ending cycle of death and rebirth. We think we know a general timeline for the demise of our present universe but who can know what really happens or what comes after?
Once you accept that space itself is expanding and you grasp the revelations of quantum quirkiness, it’s a small step for the insane to assume that we know very little and that our cosmological paradigms are …. incomplete!
Perhaps we are now seconds away from some as yet unknown phenomenon rending the fabric of space and time. Then the models of a 5-billion-year life of the sun are moot and we’re relegated to the black hole of history…the history of a universe that once was and whose story is now lost forever.
Even if the universe is recreated, nothing of the previous iteration remains and we have no record of the physical manifestation of that earlier universe or the beings that might have inhabited it.
I once was an inhabitant of that universe.
Belief and its Antipode
February 9, 2023 11:18am
I am not an atheist. I have no reason to rebel against virtue, goodwill, decency, or love. All must choose their path in life, and it seems clear to me that the words and example of Christ ensure his followers the best chance to prosper in that best of all possible worlds. And, in the end, his teachings simply lead to more stable relationships between the individual and herself, between the individual and his fellow humans. Stability in our civilization is the byproduct of the “fruits of the spirit.”
I believe that all people have a spiritual component. Even those who profess atheism still struggle with the eternal questions: where did we come from, why are we here, where do we go? These existential dilemmas create in all of us a kind of spiritual quest and what some would call a soul – the part of us that seeks answers to our most compelling questions. So no, I am not an atheist. Rather I am a sad and worn out searcher for the truth. A truth that billions before have sought with such ardor that the vast majority (all?) created belief systems that we know to be false in their attempt to give their lives meaning. Of the 2500 gods we believe have been worshipped by humans, how many do you now revere? If you are like most faithful on this planet, you will say that, at most, you recognize ONE of those 2500. Into the dust bin of theological history, you cast the other 2,499 without a second thought. Billions of their faithful cry heresy and believe you will suffer in the afterlife for your unbelief. So it goes.
I am not an atheist. I’m just a weary man who now recognizes that while my faith has made me a better person, there is no heaven waiting to welcome me – and more importantly (for me), no overarching, profound purpose or meaning to this life we live. No, oblivion is the only certainty…and in the meantime we have only the possibility of making our time here less short, less brutal by following our wise teachers in loving our neighbors as ourselves.
Ages of Sophistry
February 16, 2023 9:37am
Storms rolled through and awakened us around 6am. I unplugged some electronics and went back to bed. The rain will abate shortly but return in the early afternoon.
As you age, you realize there are only a few themes in this life and all the rest is just variations. You’ve seen it all, nothing is new. The young and the unenlightened believe themselves to be exploring new territory – to be breaching the gates of tradition. “We are new beings unconstrained by your dogma,” they cry. But, in the end, the weary old world has seen it all too, yawns and continues as it has through countless ages of sophistry.
No, there’s nothing new under the sun as a wise man once said. While we hope for something truly novel, a glimpse behind the painted veil, we suffer from our limitations and cannot see beyond our short horizons – if, indeed ANYTHING at all lies in that uncharted land.
Worst of all, the thrill-seekers and the cultural avant-garde miss the real iconoclasts, those few teachers whose lessons offer tectonic shifts in our thinking and our lives with their simple ideas about love, justice, honesty, gentleness, courage, sacrifice, wisdom, and integrity. Universal adoption of those precepts would lead to a real revolution in the history of humankind.
Simple or Complicated
February 23, 2023 10:55pm
Sometimes life seems very complicated. There is too much to know, deciphering motives is impossible, and people deliberately deceive us. Other times, I realize that *I* am responsible for the complications – I interact with all the subtleties of life, I worry over all that I cannot understand, and I ultimately agonize over things I cannot control.
The dead tell me to lighten up – to quit resisting the inevitable, to accept life just as it is…. with all its contradictions. They tell me that when you reach that state, dying is the easiest thing you’ll ever do.