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The Individual's Ability And Freedom To Think

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Posted by Michael W. Pearson on March 11, 2002 04:28:01 UTC


What concerns me is what religious organizations do in conflict with the U.S. Constitution and Amendments. I don't even mind if they teach that Noah brought the dinosaurs on the ark, as a minister told me. That minister is a pretty caring and humble person, last I knew.
We had a Darwin Day where our state senator, who is considered a religious conservative and had proposed (in the Washinton state legislature)banning the teaching of evolution, was a panel member. Almost paradoxically, I agreed with many things he said...which also agreed with an article on evolution which I read in Humanist magazine.
Natural science must not govern human affairs. Human policies must reflect the greatest comprehension of natural science, including the fact that our natural life support system does very little thinking and will not be very resilient if we punch it down. Our natural pecking-order, based in part as it is on cronyism and intimidation, is not necessarily the best order. Sometimes a religious organization exemplifies this as well as the most forward-looking civil or corporate organization.

Human development is a funny field. We must heed the biology and neurology of individuals, and recognize some social needs are determined by our inherited coding. Then we must also work on ethics, idealism, mindfulness, and continuity of culture. Here, a religious organization may be woefully lacking or actually doing pretty well.
I have found how liberal they are in philosophy is not always a guide to how liberal (ie. modern) their management style is. This presents a dilemma sometimes in mid-conversation. At what level are we communicating?
Maybe I should not communicate too much with churches, but the book I was reading by Will and Aerial Durant this morning was in a church.

I am not sure whether the Mormon church is scary or not. I have had some nice conversations, but they have some very high standards for behavior they name, which are almost too much to promise.

And they imply that bad things happen to persons who talk against them. I don't have any idea why they would say that...except maybe they would interpret any analysis at all as "talking against them." That's sad...I had some nice Mormon friends as a young kid growing up, and now I'm not sure whether I feel safe. Some of them make comments which are kind of spooky.

I hope they understand when I am not there, I am only exercising my freedom. I think it's nice to get together and sing songs and talk about ethics.

But maybe there's something going on that I don't understand, something that should not be there, something like a violation of the Constitution, like spying on persons in their homes while they insist they don't do that. They can have a religion without doing that, can't they?

Sincerely,
Mike

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