Teaching 'Thinking'
(Top Posts - Philosophy (FREELOVER) - 072001)

Had an interesting conversation with my dad, yesterday. We
actually talked about God, my atheistic views, his seminary
teaching, his life as a pastor.

Many issues came up, all of which we're quite attuned to in
this newsgroup (alt.atheism).

One point I brought up was 'thinking' and my experience of
not being encouraged to 'think' within the atmosphere of my
upbringing in the Southern Baptist church.

My dad mentioned that 'thinking' was currently a subject of
great debate within the Southern Baptist faith. He encouraged
me to seek "the reality of God" [implication, God was to be
found and the manner in which God was found was not, for
me, anyway, part of the traditional Southern Baptist biblical
literalism, but he did refer to the bible as the historical narra-
tives at one point].

Many issues came up, which I won't go into, but I'll just say
that compared to the stereotypical image of fundamentalism
and Southern Baptist being one in the same, my dad departs
from that, while at the same time remaining frustratingly tied to
something I can't quite put my finger on... but here's my take
on it ...

I think my dad sees the whole religion journey and God and
belief in God (of various ways) as requisite for good (or, at
least, that's what I picked up from our recent conversation)
as he stated (and we've all heard this before) "why be good
if there is no god?" In any case, he sees good and religion as
closely tied, with his own personal God interpretation not requi-
site to this good, as each must find his/her way to the reality of
God in his/her own way (I may have gotten that wrong, but
that's my interpretation of what his views are).

He said he was taught to think in his seminary and when I asked
him if doubt was part of that, as doubt was required for thinking,
he said doubt was part of that and unanswered doubts, he dis-
missed.

As for expressing one's views, he felt that each person must be
dealt with on their terms and that a position such as I've adopted,
that of 'there being no god', is ... [well, many things, but suffice to
say, he pitched for the standard 'if you don't believe, at least be
agnostic about it' (implication - silent and unsure of yourself, as
god/no god are exactly the same, logically speaking)] ... I, of
course, differ with that and expressed my view of there being no
god out there and with no god out there, anything folks say about
god is a mere reflection of that which it is to be human, no more,
no less.

Anyway, I found the 'thinking' aspect of great interest, as I really
did find that aspect to be absent from my church upbringing and
without thought, what can religion be but a mindless following of
whatever church leaders want their followers to believe ...

The conversation was civil, we all love one another, and I told
my dad that he should be proud that he raised me to think and
should reject (and dismiss) those who criticize him for not raising
me to be a mindless drone/clone of his views on God/religion (as    
is the case with far too many children) ...

I love my dad - he's so very cool.

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