(no subject)
Aug. 7th, 2005 12:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
holyoutlawThank you for the blessings bestowed upon me and may I always strive to walk the path that best honors them.
I have no idea who the you is in that prayer. I basically think all forms of spirituality are attempts to find succor and comfort, to rationalize an unpredictable, casual, and capricious life. This is, really, an argument for their necessity. All forms of religion are about cementing the temporal authority of the religious body, as an arbiter of self worth. (In this case, religion is to spirituality as advertising jingle is to symphony.)
The two prayers I learned in Catholic grade school -- the Our Father and the Hail Mary -- are about powerlessness and idolatry. There is no obligation to act in them (other than the nudge about "as we forgive those who trespass against us" in the Our Father). Certainly no obligation as strong as that in the prayer that begins "Lord, make us intruments of your peace."
I have no idea who the you is in that prayer. I basically think all forms of spirituality are attempts to find succor and comfort, to rationalize an unpredictable, casual, and capricious life. This is, really, an argument for their necessity. All forms of religion are about cementing the temporal authority of the religious body, as an arbiter of self worth. (In this case, religion is to spirituality as advertising jingle is to symphony.)
The two prayers I learned in Catholic grade school -- the Our Father and the Hail Mary -- are about powerlessness and idolatry. There is no obligation to act in them (other than the nudge about "as we forgive those who trespass against us" in the Our Father). Certainly no obligation as strong as that in the prayer that begins "Lord, make us intruments of your peace."