Department Of The Partridge Of The Week
It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself will be hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard. [1]
Can you guess this week’s guest Partridge?
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Department Of Yet Another Blast From The Past
Seeing as how MH and I are hosting Thanksgiving/harvest day festivities at our Humble Abode ®, moiself will not be sober enough able to do my usual Thursday night blog editing.
Thus, a rerun.
Apropos of…something I’ve already forgotten, I was recently given cause to look up what I had, previously in this space, written about ancestor worship (from 2-17-17):
As regular readers of this blog know (and new or sporadic readers will likely surmise), I am not a religious person. I was raised by church-going, Christian parents; [2] flirted with/researched a variety of denominations during/post college; was a member (even served as a deacon, holy shit!) of a UCC church [3] for many years; happily (read: finally) came out over 15 years ago as a lifelong skeptic-atheist-Freethinker-Bright.
While I hold a modicum of respect for some of the ideals and practices of, say, contemporary non-theistic Buddhism and Unitarianism and Jainism, I find all religions to be more-or less silly/offensive/just plain fallacious. There is one “spiritual” practice, however, which I can somewhat understand, if only in that it makes a teesny-tiny, infinitesimally wee bit o’ sense:
Ancestor worship.
Yes, really.
Make that, ancestor *veneration,* not worship. For the love of the FSM, [4] get off your knees, open your eyes, and stop bowing your head – nobody should “worship” anything.
Worship: VERB
[with object] Show reverence and adoration for (a deity)
1.1 [no object] Take part in a religious ceremony.
(English Oxford Living Dictionary)
Unlike the claims of religions which have one or more deities, you don’t have to take your ancestors’ existence on “faith” [5] – you know they have lived (you yourself are evidence of that); you’ve likely met them one, or two or sometimes even three, generations back. From the photo albums and other heirlooms to the birth certificates, school and county records, family businesses, homes, farmsteads, and kinfolk near and far, you’ve an idea of what they have “given” you, materially, intellectually and emotionally – you’ve some idea what you might be grateful for.
Best of all, you’ve little incentive to argue or go to war with other people over whose interpretation of what their Imaginary Friend wants is correct. Your neighbor’s ancestors are their business, and yours are yours.
Of course, the option of ancestor veneration leaves out a small subset of people: those who have little or no knowledge of their forebears, such as certain kinds of adoptees, [6] as well as those who have just enough information (e.g., children in the foster care system) to…well, I’ll put it this way: if you come from two generations of meth addicts, ancestor veneration might not be the spiritual practice to float your boat.
Now then. By ancestor veneration I’m not talking any kind of belief system wherein the dead are beseeched to intercede on behalf of the living – that’s just as silly as all the others. I do not believe that my deceased grandparents and parents have a continued existence in a spirit world, or that their spirits look after moiself and my family in particular or the world in general, or that they somehow can influence the fate of the living. I’m talking about a practice of honor and appreciation, in which a person might use the roads paved and trails blazed by previous generations as a focal point for remembrance and gratitude.
Thanks for the dimples, Dad.
I’m not sure what brought the previous topic to mind. A likely suspect is the recent death of my mother. Anyway, y’all have my permission to honor your ancestors…as well as my fervent wish that that is as far as your theology goes. However, as I look at the state of the world, it appears that the old superstitions have some staying power. As long as people will continue to proclaim and dispute over whose invisible leader is the best-est, I’d like someone to come up with another dog in the fight.
As the Bay Area’s own Huey Lewis, the Bard Of The Bammies, once sang, I Want A New Drug.
Putting it yet another way, y’all have my encouragement (if you are religiously inclined) to come up with a new religion, within the following parameters: in this belief system, it is the men who are required, in one form or another, to cover themselves.
That’s it. Yep. That’s the entire theology in a nutshell. [7]
From a light veil or hijab – make, that, he-jab – to a full-body, Bro-burqa, your theology must include all the usual nonsense reasons (modesty; an easily offended deity; protection from your fellow believers who will beat the holy crap out of you if you show any evidence of human form) as to why certain people – in this case, those with boy parts – must be covered in public.
Duuuuude – put a scarf on it.
We swear on Her Holy name, it doesn’t make your butt look big, no, not at all.
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That was then; this is now. Last week, reveling in an awesome autumn day, I found moiself thinking about Wicca and/or the contemporary pagan/nature spiritualities – those which mark the passing of the seasons – as another category of spiritual practices which make more sense to me. This doesn’t mean I am or would consider being a sun or “goddess” worshiper; it’s just that, unlike the tenants of the so-called “revealed” religions, [8] with those nature-centered ideologies we can see and directly experience what is being venerated.
Humans living in extreme regions – i.e., at the poles or the equator (or Southern California) – [9] don’t have the dramatic difference of the four season changes that we who inhabit the middle latitudes experience. Still, the earth has seasons and cycles; we live here; they affect us. But again, this form of spirituality gets my Nod Of Approval® for *acknowledgement,* not worship. As in, after a period of torrential downpour I appreciate the sun; after an unremittingly unrelenting bout of summer heat moiself appreciates the rain.
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Punz For The Day
Planet Earth Edition
How can you tell the ocean is friendly?
It waves.
I love the way the Earth rotates – it makes my day.
How can you tell Mother Nature watches a lot of Oprah from June – November?
Because it looks like everybody gets a hurricane.
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May you take care of your Mother;
May you appreciate the seasons;
May you enjoy those leftovers;
…and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
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[1] Specifically, in our pear tree.
[2] Lutheran, specifically: what was once called the ALC and now ELCA, for those obsessives interested in denominational nitpicking. It wasn’t one of the “synod” denominations (Missouri & Wisconsin), which are closer to Catholicism in their conservative doctrines (e.g. women cannot be ordained as ministers; liking to snipe about other denominations as being the “not true” faiths) .
[3] Which I have, since leaving, recommended to people who, for whatever reasons, are looking for a liberal Christian church experience and/or community.
[4] The Flying Spaghetti Monster. “All praise to his noodly appendage.”
[5] Although, especially at Thanksgiving when someone brings up politics, you may have to take them with a helluva big grain of salt.
[6] If you’re counting “blood” kin as the only kind of ancestors which matter. Which I hope you are not.
[7] Which is the proper receptacle for all theologies.
[8] Revealed religions are religions based on the supposed revelations of god(s) to humans, particularly as described in the scriptures of those religions. Thus, the existence of these gods depends on revelation by said gods, to humans, of ideas that would not have been arrived at by natural reason alone. Examples of revealed religions are the primary monotheistic faiths – Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Baha’ism, Mormonism, Hinduism, Sikhism.
[9] Growing up in So Cal we used to joke we had two seasons: brown and tan.
