A few thoughts on fundamentalism
... poorly educated.
... isolated from other cultures (tend to be xenophobic, racist, shun outsiders.)
... tend towards big families, many children.
... poor treatment of their women.
... authoritarian, emphasis on militarism
... typically poor, without much leisure time.
... censor anything which falls outside of their paradigm
... call the rest of the world evil, an us-vs-them mentality
... sexually repressive
... anti-intellectual
... and what do these cause? it's a recipe for disaster. I would never say that anyone's faith EVER is wrong... but I will say that certain mindsets are destructive to the self, destructive to one's happiness, and destructive to their societies. The MINDSET of fundamentalism is what is destructive, and it goes beyond the religion. I have known some peaceful, well-educated, intelligent, thoughtful open-minded Christians and Muslims. They weren't of a fundamentalist mindset though.
Interestingly, fundamentalism happens in Wicca too. There are a lot of people out there who think that they have the "ONE TRUE WAY" and everyone else is doing it wrong. These people are assholes, and I've met plenty of them. I have to constantly watch myself and ask myself, "Am I doing this?" because I think it's awful. I do challenge people a lot - and I challenge them to think deeply about what they're doing. If they want to do ceremonies to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, that's fine, but what I'll ask is - "Have you thought through deeply what you are doing? Does every step of the way make sense to you? Do you really understand what you are doing?". WHAT you do isn't as important as KNOWING WHY YOU ARE DOING IT.
Me, I can think of some perfectly excellent reasons why and when and how I would do a ceremony to the Great and Holy FSM. I'd do it on some absurd holiday, like Emperor Joshua Norton's birthday. Why? I'd do it to celebrate the absurdity of life, to celebrate silliness and laughter and play. I'd do some readings from Hakim Bey and Rumi and some Kerouac and Ginsberg, then throw in some crazy Zen koans. Why? Because all of these people celebrated a bit of that delightful enlightened madness which a ceremony to the FSM would certainly be all about. Then I would suggest everyone don some old clothes and have a spaghetti fight (outside of course) and don't worry about getting messy, we can all have a shower after and relax with some wine.
It's so important to be flexible... rigid thinking is the way to hell. It gets you stuck in a rut. Keeping a flexible and clear mind makes it much easier to change if you find that the path you are on is taking you nowhere good.. Once I realize I'm doing something wrong, I make sure that I don't have anything like pride or greed holding me back from changing my path as needed. I often boggle when I hear people in elections accuse someone of flip-flopping or waffling. If I were the person being accused, I'd say, "I have thought it through again and after careful consideration, I have come to the conclusion that this is the better way to go. Do you have a problem with that?" However, rigidness of thinking is often considered "solidness" and "staying the course." Fundamentalists like rigid thinking.
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