You may recall (or perhaps you don't) that I had a good discussion on Bill Maher's Religulous film in my Vicaarana section about Atheism. Well, about a week ago I saw a preview for this movie called "Oh My God" which seemed to be a different attempt to do what Bill Maher was also doing: grapple with a belief in God. Now, I normally like to go for the socio-cultural side of religion because who am I to say whether or not you should believe in God...its not my place. Buuuut all of these movies keep coming out asking that question: What is God? Why do we believe? I'm not going to weigh in on the question but rather address why I think this film Oh My God was more successful than Religulous in achieving the same intended goal: to put the question out there as to why we as human's believe and God and, more importantly in my eyes, why do we practice religion?
I've gone on the oh so popular religious studies rant about how religion is undefinable, so I will not get into it again. Instead I want to focus on the scope of these two films. In the beginning of his film, Maher says that he is not an atheist, but rather the best thing he can do is say that he does not know. Then he continues the film to pick out the craziest seeming Islamo-Judeo-Christian peoples he can find in the US (mostly), a bit of the UK, and Israel / Palestine and badger them to account for their belief in God and their religious practices. He ends this string of interviews with a plea to the world to give up religion (which is definitely crazy, by his count) and belief in God (which is what religion directly is) and to give in to science or we will destroy ourselves. So much for not being an atheist... My problems, besides the definition of religion itself, are many. Namely Maher's lack of consideration of all aspects of religious life and people, his focus on only the Abrahamic sphere of religious life, and of course his kind of hypocrisy for claiming he is not looking to make a case for atheism and yet being incredibly militant at the end of the movie complete with doomsday pictures and music.
I now want to turn to Oh My God! Oh My God was a documentary made by Peter Rodger that is in the process of being released in select theatres in big cities throughout the US (it was just release in NYC this weekend). The project was the filmmaker's attempt to wrestle with his own belief in God by traveling to 23 countries and interviewing countless people. He also enters with a similar intended mindset as Maher, which is one of neither atheism or theism, however, in my humble opinion, Rodger succeeded where Maher failed. Although Rodger's film is not perfect (for example, there is a huge focus on the celebrities over the common people, but as a small filmmaker when you can get a Beatle, a princess, and Wolverine to speak in your movie, I guess you take it), I really do think he created an interesting film. Rodger managed to a) cover a multitude of religions and worldviews from all different countries and b) to leave the answers to his questions about religion and God ambiguous in the end. Where Maher ended with judgement, Rodger ended with more questions and I think that more closely relates to what we are looking at here: there are no answers. There is no definition for religion. And that's ok. Perhaps that's why we study it and why its fascinating. Rodger's manages to capture the full spectrum of religious life and expression: the positive, the negative, and the multiple view points. These are all the areas of Maher's movie I found wholly unsatisfying, and they were found in this movie. Rodger's main question may have been about the ontological existence of God, but he also addressed why we practice religion as a people, how we do it, and what it means in our relations with one another. Sure he had director's OCD, used weird Moby-like music (according to the reviewer from Time Out New York), and seemed to jump around while moving between topics, but overall I do wish this was the movie that was wide released and Religulous was limited release. Overall, I thought that this movie better (not best, of course) addressed this enigma of our socio-cultural lives that is religion for a mainstream audience. Well, and it was just a goshdarn pretty looking movie, and that always helps!
Religion Dispatches Review of Oh My God
PS- If you happen to see this movie, respond back and let me know if you also noticed the strikingly interesting focus on Islam over all the other religions mentioned. I left the movie wondering what that was all about. Addressing Islamophobia?? haha.
Showing posts with label vicaarana. Show all posts
Showing posts with label vicaarana. Show all posts
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Monday, August 17, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Vicaarana: Are We All Hindu Now?
First I wanna give a special thanks to my friend Aditya for posting this article on his facebook. So, in her article We Are All Hindu in Newsweek Magazine, Lisa Miller claims that America is not *really* a Christian nation, but actually a *Hindu* nation. Not that we are all becoming Hindus, but rather, because Americans are starting to encompass, perhaps subconsciously, Hindu Dharmic beliefs including the famous quote from the Rig Veda: "The truth is one, though sages call it by many names". As much as I can see where this is coming from, I have to put up a small argument that it depends where in America you are. On the coasts, I totally believe it. I've grown up my whole life in the Northeastern US, I went to school up here, and I am going to more school up here. I have met plenty of people from the West Coast who practice, as the author cites, Dr. Stephen Prothero's term "cafeteria style religion". I will even cite myself as guilty of this (look at the name of this blog, after all). I've met the "spiritual, not religious" and I've met the agnostics who just don't know, and those trying to create some sort of meaning. I went to college, after all, and worked in religious life, the spiritual seekers were widespread and hungry for something that wasn't their Mama's religion (often shying away from THAT word, of course). But as many of these people and views of religion in America appear, there are still plenty of the "Christian nation" to contend with (as much as Newsweek has repeatedly insisted we are a Post Christian nation). The Christian political stances on abortion, LGBT marriage rights, and a host of other issues are too hard to ignore. (On a side note, I'm also currently reading Jeff Sharlett's The Family which furthers my belief that we are far from being a post Christian nation. Woah. Its crazy.)
But despite all this, I understand the point being made, things aren't like they were. Americans now have choices and new interactions with Diaspora communities and different faith traditions that were never made available to them in the past. Even death, Miller points out, is being treated differently as more and more people, Catholics included, leave behind that old adage of body and soul = self and go for cremation for their remains (How very Hindu indeed!). So, while I don't think there's gonna be a whole rush of people to begin installing murthis (images) of Sri Rama at their new local Mandir (temple), some of the underlying philosophical ideals of the Hindu tradition are, I can agree, starting to slowly grab hold of the American subconscious.
On the other side of the coin, as Americans are becoming more Hindu, are Hindus becoming more American? It could be argued that some of the American freedom and individualism ideology is equally grabbing hold of the South Asian Hindu diaspora psyche. So how does this new Newsweek article fair for the other side? Does it make more Americans aware and accepting of their likeness to Hinduism, or does it continue to morph the continually Americanizing Hindu tradition as it makes the transformation from India to American culture. Eventually does everyone meet somewhere in the middle? Where does culture and tradition go after we make that sort of jump to the everyone's happy little bit of everything religion, or can we just accept everyone's religion as is and live together? The author claims a little bit of both is happening, and I've seen it around me, however, as I said before, I'm living in a Northeast coast world, and I wonder if these claims are true of the whole country.
But despite all this, I understand the point being made, things aren't like they were. Americans now have choices and new interactions with Diaspora communities and different faith traditions that were never made available to them in the past. Even death, Miller points out, is being treated differently as more and more people, Catholics included, leave behind that old adage of body and soul = self and go for cremation for their remains (How very Hindu indeed!). So, while I don't think there's gonna be a whole rush of people to begin installing murthis (images) of Sri Rama at their new local Mandir (temple), some of the underlying philosophical ideals of the Hindu tradition are, I can agree, starting to slowly grab hold of the American subconscious.
On the other side of the coin, as Americans are becoming more Hindu, are Hindus becoming more American? It could be argued that some of the American freedom and individualism ideology is equally grabbing hold of the South Asian Hindu diaspora psyche. So how does this new Newsweek article fair for the other side? Does it make more Americans aware and accepting of their likeness to Hinduism, or does it continue to morph the continually Americanizing Hindu tradition as it makes the transformation from India to American culture. Eventually does everyone meet somewhere in the middle? Where does culture and tradition go after we make that sort of jump to the everyone's happy little bit of everything religion, or can we just accept everyone's religion as is and live together? The author claims a little bit of both is happening, and I've seen it around me, however, as I said before, I'm living in a Northeast coast world, and I wonder if these claims are true of the whole country.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Vicaarana: Is Atheism a "Religion"?
Nothing starts a controversy like claiming atheism is a religion-- at least in my world. But in my opinion it is one just like any of the major 8 and the minor hundreds. And the debate always comes up between friends (we are East Coast living, libral arts graduates after all!) and I always insist that atheism surly is a religion because it really depends on how you define "religion" (See the intro post to this blog about the word "religion" and the word "dharma"). Its the same argument Brent S. Plate makes in his criticism of Bill Maher's Religulous (glad to know someone out there felt similarly about this movie): you can't have an old school definition for a new school understanding. Meaning just this: religion is more than "belief" and "God". Those are not the only things that constitute a religion. Those terms may be included in a definition of a specific religion but it inacurrate to say that is what defines religion. And the search for the proper definition of what is and isn't a religion can go on and on for as many hours as it takes to teach 1000000 Theory of Religion seminars (and how many hours during those classes I have to pinch myself to remain awake! haha). But meaning is everything and as long as the definition is black and white, there are atheists and believers and never shall the two meet.
However, its more complex than that, especially in America. There are the culturally religious, the agnostically spiritual, the organized atheists, the Unitarian Universalists of a varying degrees, the right wings of all sorts, the left wings of all sorts, the New Agers, the Old Time Religions (as many Pagans sometimes call themselves) , and the list goes on. Religion is more than belief and non-belief (but those American Protestant origins tend to give us all a little bias in this black and white)-- there are rituals, expression, community, communitas, and multifaceted brakets of religion go on and on.
Before I go on and on any further about the importance of "religious studies" in society (justifying myself in a bad economy, right? haha)--let me return to the topic at hand using what I have just mentioned: Is Atheism a religion? Yes. Yes it is. And to go futher, it sometimes even goes as far to be exactly what it claims to despise: ideological and sometimes radical.They call them the New Atheism , and they are just as much a "religion" as the rest in the American Dharma spectrum. Bill Maher's documentary is a great example of this. In the movie Religulous, Maher only focuses on the negatives of "religion" (Western only, might I add) and he emplors the viewer to "convert" to his side (for the sake of science!). Its the same sort of mind set that sparked the Tibetan exile by the Chinese ("saving" the Tibetan Buddhists from the "terrible theocrasy" in which they lived; freeing them from the bonds of religion. They saw themselves as liberators the same way that the American government saw themselves as the liberators in Iraq). There is right and there is wrong, black and white, believers and atheists, and the dichotomies continue. But the point is, its not like that at all. And that is how atheism is a religion.
Well, you could say, God must be in a religion! Wrong. What about Theravada Buddhism? Well it must have a faith community, books, centers, ect. And Atheists have all this and then some. They have their poets and prophets, their leaders, and beliefs. They have their own hardliners and even their own (anti-)religious violence (Polpot, anyone?). About the only thing they don't have yet is their own tax break. But their belief in the separation of church and state means they're morally opposed to that of course! ;).
You can disagree with me all you want but there is as much a case for the religiousity of atheism (which as far as I'm concerned is just that- no god, not no religion) as there is for the Jedi-ism and the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. May you be touched by his noodly appendage!
Read More:
Purpose Driven Atheism by Frank Schaeffer
The New Atheism and Something More- Peter Steinfels
Don't Stop Unbelieving- Scott McLemee
What Would Jesus See: Fireproof or Religulous? - Richard Corliss
The Variaties of Non-Religious Experience- This one is a little old, but still useful
(ed: In keeping with my new idea of Sanskrit names for some segments, I've named this segment vicaaraNa (विचारण), which means "discussion", "reflection", "inquiry", "examination", and, as often with religious discussion, also means "agitation" )
However, its more complex than that, especially in America. There are the culturally religious, the agnostically spiritual, the organized atheists, the Unitarian Universalists of a varying degrees, the right wings of all sorts, the left wings of all sorts, the New Agers, the Old Time Religions (as many Pagans sometimes call themselves) , and the list goes on. Religion is more than belief and non-belief (but those American Protestant origins tend to give us all a little bias in this black and white)-- there are rituals, expression, community, communitas, and multifaceted brakets of religion go on and on.
Before I go on and on any further about the importance of "religious studies" in society (justifying myself in a bad economy, right? haha)--let me return to the topic at hand using what I have just mentioned: Is Atheism a religion? Yes. Yes it is. And to go futher, it sometimes even goes as far to be exactly what it claims to despise: ideological and sometimes radical.They call them the New Atheism , and they are just as much a "religion" as the rest in the American Dharma spectrum. Bill Maher's documentary is a great example of this. In the movie Religulous, Maher only focuses on the negatives of "religion" (Western only, might I add) and he emplors the viewer to "convert" to his side (for the sake of science!). Its the same sort of mind set that sparked the Tibetan exile by the Chinese ("saving" the Tibetan Buddhists from the "terrible theocrasy" in which they lived; freeing them from the bonds of religion. They saw themselves as liberators the same way that the American government saw themselves as the liberators in Iraq). There is right and there is wrong, black and white, believers and atheists, and the dichotomies continue. But the point is, its not like that at all. And that is how atheism is a religion.
Well, you could say, God must be in a religion! Wrong. What about Theravada Buddhism? Well it must have a faith community, books, centers, ect. And Atheists have all this and then some. They have their poets and prophets, their leaders, and beliefs. They have their own hardliners and even their own (anti-)religious violence (Polpot, anyone?). About the only thing they don't have yet is their own tax break. But their belief in the separation of church and state means they're morally opposed to that of course! ;).
You can disagree with me all you want but there is as much a case for the religiousity of atheism (which as far as I'm concerned is just that- no god, not no religion) as there is for the Jedi-ism and the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. May you be touched by his noodly appendage!
Read More:
Purpose Driven Atheism by Frank Schaeffer
The New Atheism and Something More- Peter Steinfels
Don't Stop Unbelieving- Scott McLemee
What Would Jesus See: Fireproof or Religulous? - Richard Corliss
The Variaties of Non-Religious Experience- This one is a little old, but still useful
(ed: In keeping with my new idea of Sanskrit names for some segments, I've named this segment vicaaraNa (विचारण), which means "discussion", "reflection", "inquiry", "examination", and, as often with religious discussion, also means "agitation" )
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