[Buddha-l] Re: Multi-cause vs single-cause

[Richard P. Hayes]

On Tue, 2005-03-15 at 14:28 -0500, Stanley J. Ziobro II wrote:

> Do you, Joanna (and Richard), object to God talk per se or to certain
> usages thereof? 

Speaking only for myself, I have no objection to any kind of talk,
provided it ends when all the points have been made. The only sort of
discussion that begins to strike me as fruitless is that in which one or
more parties seem determined to get the last word and begin to repeat
themselves.

> It seems to me that the sort of God talk objected to (at least by
> Richard) is that utilized by his beloved right-wing brothers and
> sisters.

Any sort of fundamentalism or dogmatism grates on my nerves. These days
I am receiving e-mails from a forum of student socialists (since I
agreed to be their faculty sponsor), and I find it just about the most
irritating stuff I have ever read. Although I may be a little left of
center (especially in a country such as the USA, which is, by
international standards, pretty far right of center), I really cannot
stomach left-wing sloganeering and triumphalism any more than I can
stomach the same sort of rhetoric from the right. Moreover, I admire a
number of commentators who are far enough to my right that I almost need
a telescope to see them. 

On religious matters, I think quite a few readers of buddha-l would find
that I am as ready to pounce on Buddhist blind faith as on any other
flavor--probably more ready to pounce on Buddhist blind faith than any
other flavor. (I am, after all, the author of a talk entitled "No faith,
please, we're Buddhists," which is packaged with three other items in a
thing called "A Buddhist's reflections on religious conversion," which
can be downloaded for your delectation from
http://www.unm.edu/~rhayes/conversion.pdf )

> But what of God talk that is concerned with perceptions of reality,
> and the like?

There are few people in the world whom I admire as much as Swami
Vivekananda and George Fox. It is difficult to read a paragraph by
either one of them that does not contain several references to God, and
it never bothers me in the least. I also love reading Saint Augustine,
the desert fathers, and such poets as Kabir and Rumi. And, as you
probably know, I very much admire Jim Wallis. Intelligence and sincerity
in God-talk, or any other kind of talk, is always welcome here. But some
discourse, even here on buddha-l, does fall a little short on both those
virtues, and one does occasionally sense a certain amount of
poseurishness and obsessiveness.

> I'd hate to think the same sort of bigotry of which the right-wing God
> talkers are accused is being transposed and manifesting itself here.

So far I have not seen any evidence of that sort of bigotry here, but if
it does manifest, be sure it will earn the author thereof the right to
be moderated and to have at least some messages rejected by our team of
keen-sighted but fair-minded moderators.

-- 
Richard Hayes
Department of Philosophy
University of New Mexico