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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   2815 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for March 8, 2023

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

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I've got to say, church is great. My partner and I recently went after almost a decade, despite both being atheists. We are admittedly part of a non-traditional "New Age" style church, but it was great. I actually teared up during the service, which I did not expect.

If you're in a bad way I'd recommend giving it a chance!

What do you do when the adherents talk to you and inquire about something theological, to which you'd either have to lie or admit your atheism?

I'm an atheist and I've often contemplated going to church with my Christian fiance, but I'm always halted by the thought of what the hell I'm supposed to do when people start with the Jesus-speak one-on-one.

I usually say something like "I'm spiritual but not religious" or some other tripe. If pushed I'll say I believe in Buddhist philosophy but think there's a lot of wisdom to be gained in a Christian tradition, and I believe in the importance of community, etc. People are shockingly accepting about it so far at least.

Does this “New Age” church conduct wedding ceremonies for homosexuals?

Absolutely.

How does that affect his recommendation to go to service if you're doing poorly? It isn't a wedding ceremony and it isn't your church.

Might as well ask their thoughts about transubstantiation.

Might as well ask their thoughts about transubstantiation.

This, but unironically. Do people really choose their church based on whether they like the music and not on their doctrine?

This, but unironically. Do people really choose their church based on whether they like the music and not on their doctrine?

Yes. The noughties are over, age of christian-atheist debates is over. No one cares about doctrine, no one cares about apologetics, no one cares any more to prove or disprove existence of God and literal truth of the Bible.

"Just go to church, bro. One full of majestic music, lots of incense, shiny pictures and golden statues. It is based and trad. You want to be based and trad, don't you?"

No one cares about doctrine, no one cares about apologetics, no one cares any more to prove or disprove existence of God and literal truth of the Bible.

The people in the churches that have the highest birth and retention rates do.

You look down on it, but how is that wrong? Ultimately, people have a God-shaped hole. Two millenia of tradness – which is in fact more impressive in person than your tacky description suggests – has a better plugging effect than baseball, Marxism, BLM struggle sessions, therapy counseling, Marvel cinema or whatever is the surrogate of the day. I fully expect people to come out of liturgy in a decent Orthodox church with more noble thoughts and feelings.

Choosing a church based on the music is way more sensible than choosing based on their opinions on gayness. You should go to a church that makes you feel good. If you're choosing a church based on their politics, then politics is your god.

Religion is not about feeling good - particularly Christianity!

I wanted to go to church I could agree with theologically. Both music and opinion on gayness are derivative aspects of the fundamentals. That's how I nearly became a Mennonite before I realized I had to expand my search beyond Christianity.

What did you find?

That I reject revelation as a source of divine knowledge on one hand, and that empirical reason and observation of the natural world are totally insufficient to determine the existence of a Supreme Being on the other. The existence or non-existence of a Supreme Being that has or hasn't created the universe isn't proven or disproven by any faiths and is ultimately irrelevant. It's the believers you have to worry about, since they can and do act according to their beliefs.

Therefore, I don't really care about organized religion beyond avoiding or mitigating its impact on my life. Theoretically, if someone came up to me and explained that if you earnestly believe in some silly things start with axioms A, B, C you end up with a net positive balance of utilons/hedons/whateverons, I would be hard pressed to explain why I won't do this. Waaait a minute, have I just ended up with the plot of South Park S07E12 "All About the Mormons?"?

That I reject revelation as a source of divine knowledge on one hand, and that empirical reason and observation of the natural world are totally insufficient to determine the existence of a Supreme Being on the other

Wouldn't a philosophy like Buddhism or Stoicism be compatible with this?

The whole 'reject organized religion' doesn't mean you have to reject all prior knowledge and thoughts on how to live a good life.

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I wouldn't be surprised if they did. I am not Christian, but if I were, and there would be a choice between a church where I feel nice and welcome, but whose official doctrine is slightly different than mine (not to the point where visiting this church would be religiously forbidden for me, if that's even a thing) and one that matches my views exactly but doesn't work very well for me socially - I'd rather go to the former. Reducing it to just "music" is probably too narrow, but I think social aspect in general should not be underestimated.

I also heard numerous cases of Christians changing denominations for reasons like moving, marriage, etc. I don't think their thoughts about God and the ways to worship Him changed instantly with that, and they still seem to be ok. So I imagine there's some flexibility in there?

The music obviously. Theology and preaching are Satan's schemes to keep you away from direct interaction with God, IE sacral music.

More seriously, that might be relevant question to ask if you're looking to join a particular church, but I can't imagine that was the goal here, nor the point of the general recommendation.

It's strange, after learning how to read the four-part hymns and practicing how to sight-read the bass lines, I've found that many churches, especially the more progressive ones, don't even use hymnals any more, opting to just print lyric sheets and figuring you'll pick up the tune. Like, that's the main reason I would go in the first place, is to sing some harmony. So strange.

I've never been in a church where the congregation is expected to sing multiple parts, the choir does that. I've been to Catholic, Protestant and orthodox churches and I've never heard the congregation sing multiple parts.

Sweden is exceptional at choir singing but I don't think that the Swedish psalm book has ever contained arrangements with multiple parts. The older versions of the psalm book didn't even have sheet music.

Or are you saying that the choir isn't doing multiple parts?

Maybe it's a quirk of where I grew up. We always sang from hymnals with all the parts printed. Nobody was expected to sing anything in particular but those that could, would. Many of the tunes would be uncomfortably out of my range otherwise.

Where I've been people mostly just pick a preferred octave.

I went and checked and there are actually a few songs with two parts in the Swedish psalm book (<1%), and all are newer songs.

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