Living Irreligiously

Seeing a gangster-looking man (or man-boy) today at the Indian convenience store/restauraunt grabbing a soda, I noticed him wearing a huge metal cross, made of adamantium, studded with diamonds, rich with the excesses of the West.

And I thought - what does it mean to him that he wears the symbol taken up by Christianity?

But I must make a small note here - something that has bothered me for a few weeks - about what people exactly mean when they talk about Christianity. The tradition that people claim to be a part of is altogether too huge and too amorphous to be anything really coherent in itself. There was Jesus and then St. Paul... but we mostly forget the Gnostics and the Rabbis of the Talmud. In any case, Christianity is a highly 'pick-and-choose' religion, although most of its adherents have their version chosen for them, determined usually by the city they grow up in. 

And that is what I also find kind of disgusting about religion(s) in general. It is so obviously culturally based, so obviously passed down from parent/community to child, that it begins to look ridiculous when the rhetoric of 'truth' or 'absolute truth' is thrown around. 

Whatever truth may mean (and there is still much to think on concerning what this word means), there is at least one kind of truth that we know very well: that which is applicable on world-wide scale. The law of gravity falls into this category, as does the theory of evolution (or, more specifically, the fact all species now living on earth have evolved from another species that lived in the past). We could add mathematics, certain principles of geology, and many other things. But into this group are never placed things that have been chosen by humans on a cultural basis. 

The gowns worn by college graduates are not a 'truth' in this world-wide sense - they are used for a specific ceremony, at a particular time, to commemorate a certain accomplishment. There would be no contention on the part of Americans or Europeans against a culture that uses different ceremonial wear to commemorate the completion of their highest educational curriculum. 

Why do some religions, which arose out of a specific culture, time, and for certain historical reasons, then make claims about its world-wide applicability? I don't deny that there can be kinds of moral truths embedded in religious texts and teachings, but I obviously have some great contention with the idea that "No one comes through the Father but by me" from the Gospel of John (which was written some 50 or more years after Jesus' death and is generally not taken as a reliable representation of what the historical Jesus actually said) is something that should be applied world-wide. 

What a joke.... I'm not even going to write about this anymore. 

Anyway, about this gangster-man that I saw.....

Oh pah! Who knows why he wears what he wears and believes what he believes? I was here going to say that my life might be more intractable because I don't have anything like a god to keep watch over me, but now I realize that I probably have more well-defined thoughts on ethics and morality than do most people who call themselves Christians. 

Deep thinking is the most important basis upon which to build a life. Cultural inheritances may come and go, but wisdom stays.