For Dec 11 we could discuss religious naturalism (RN) - is it an oxymoron? Some think not, since they argue we can have legitimately religious responses to accepting that nature is all there is.

Here are some recommended readings I just discovered:

William R. Murray's terrific (imho) sermon on RN: http://www.rruc.org/s...

Another article by Murray on RN: http://www.uuworld.or...

P. Roger Gillette's article on RN: http://meadville.edu/...

And if you haven't yet seen them, I strongly recommend the videos of the recent Beyond Belief conference, see http://beyondbelief20...

The conference addresses the question "If not god, what?" from many perspectives, and has some first class presenters such as Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris.

Hope to see you on the 11th.

Tom

Hi Tom,

As one who frequently finds something akin to a church-bound religious experience in nature, i think this will be an excellent discussion topic (although to be perfectly honest, I've never had a church-bound religious experience so am only assuming what that might be like). For an idea of what one was like see this http://www.omniscopic... (one of many possibly sentimental entries on my blog). In any case, there is nothing supernatural about it. Hypernatural? maybe, supernatural? just not necessary.

May I also suggest http://www.sciencemus... - Chet Raymo's disucssion on what the future of the church might look like.

I never did buy into SJ Gould's NOMA suggestion but maybe this idea could serve as a a sort of bridge between the NOMAS.

If not god, what? I'm a master's student trying to address that very same question. So I second that strong recommendation to watch the beyond belief series. Hopefully we'll get the two cold and rainy days required for folks to watch the whole thing. I can't sit inside long enough otherwise...I mean with god calling me outside and all

Looking forward...

rich

I covered the topic of religious naturalism in these May posts, including this one and this one, covering such figures as Russell, Dewey, Roy Wood Sellars, Mordecai Kaplan, and Tillich.

Jim Farmelant

I also touched upon the issue of religious naturalism within the context of Russian Marxist debated here

Rich, Jim, and others,

Thanks for a great discussion on religious naturalism, most invigorating. Rich, thanks for the link to Chet Raymo's">Raymo's piece. Seems like he's trying to naturalize Catholicism. Now, if that's not an oxymoron, I don't know what is!

Raymo is a fantastic writer (his Skeptics and True Believers is a must read) but his idea that we should regard reality as "holy" (that is, we substitute nature for god) seems untenable. I don't find I'm inclined to worship nature. We don't bow down before it, rather we stand in awe.

And I think that most of the Catholic tradition that Raymo reveres is too saturated with supernaturalism to ever be redeemed, so to speak.

If you really let go of god, you end up a naturalist, imho. But maybe eventually there will be secular Catholics, like secular Jews, who retain a beloved cultural identity pretty much just for identity's sake.

Tom