For those of you who don't know, in my
fair city of Chicago, we recently had the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization's 2012 summit. Despite all reports it was something of
a clusterfuck for anyone who wasn't a foreign dignitary. I was on my
way back to the general area when the violence between cops and
protestors broke out and I paid rapt attention. On one report I
heard a protestor mention the tactics of Gandhi and another dismiss
him off hand. Now I am a big fan of Gandhi as a political leader and
as a spiritual one. He seemed, to my mind, not to be Hindu because
of some overt belief in the superstition as much as a respect for the
place it held in his cultural upbringing and the development of his
mores.
This, however, got me thinking of the
place of religious figures in the development and life choices of
Atheists. You see I have always been a big fan of Jesus. I think
his church is a piss poor example of controlling fucks trying to
wield power over people, but I have always been a big fan of the Jman
himself. I respect the way that he stood up to power without leading
a his people hopelessly against it. He played a long game and like
Gandhi was martyred for his troubles. (It should be noted that I
have not seen compelling evidence that Jesus didn't exist. If it's
out there please send it to me so I can adjust accordingly) then
faith steps in and makes him a god. Suddenly his word is inviolate
and can't develop or change as the man himself inevitably would have.
Now we have a church filled with powerful men who see a means to
consolidate their power. But the question remains, what of the man
at the source.
As the name of this blog suggests I
say that the man at the source needs to be taken for what he's worth.
As I began to study Christianity in confirmation I realized that the
church was full of shit, even my rather liberal and open minded
church. For many years I rejected the whole thing outright. Tossed
out the baby with the bathwater. But as I finally sat down and began
reading the Bible and the Analects and the Tao Te Ching. I realized
that there was a some great stuff in all of these documents. I
became a disciple of Jesus in the truest sense; I learned from him.
This approach to religious figureheads
has a couple of major benefits. I am a big fan of JC's work. I
appreciate how it inspired the Black Church in the 60's to stand up
for their rights. I can see how Gandhi used Christianity to develop
Satyagraha. I can see how Muslim philanthropists use the tenet of
Zakat to do good in the world and how father Mike Pfleger in Chicago
can use faith to be such a powerful source of social justice. I can
take all of these things from the great Super Best Friends and then I
can stop. I don't have to listen to the bit about hating your family
and following God. I don't have to care when a text tells me to hate
someone. I get to openly pick and choose what advice I want to take
and then as with any other source of wisdom, I can stop when it gets
crazy.
Every member of the faithful does some
cherry picking to decide what they believe. Some of them struggle
with the idea that a gay relative is going to Hell. Some of them
don't even struggle, they just cut off the love immediately when
faced with a person close to them making a decision they dislike and
blame it on God. I don't have that escape nor do I have that
obligation. I get to think what I want and say fuck all to rest.
