Gazing into the heavens for what was right under my nose.

My starting point is simple. Having listened to theological debate, and from time to time participated with zest, the conversations in churches and seminaries, other conversations in mosques and synagogues, temples and Buddhist practice centers, I imagined that the heart of religion must be belief in something, some god or hierarchy of gods or at least some guiding philosophy. All these people seem to be talking and arguing about something. As a matter of fact, listening to the participants, where you stood regarding that “something” is what really matters: does god exist, and existing, how does this entity or reality function in relation to my life and my relationships.

Late on a very dark night I stood on the deck of an overnight boat in New Zealand’s Milford Sound looking into one of the clearest, deepest views of the Milky Way possible from earth; although the view seemed upside down, it points into the galactic center of the constellation. I tried to hold this “god-question,” and just wait. I practice in a school of Zen Buddhism so I waited a fairly long time. As I was headed back to bed with no answers but strangely refreshed, it hit me that the only reason I even entertained the question at all was that my mother’s mother’s sister-in-law, Aunt Edna, gave up her opposition to my mother marrying my father who was neither Irish nor Catholic which produced me. Then through a series of adolescent experiences, followed by a very thorough liberal education, I found myself working through the first post Vatican 2 version of the Jesuit ratio studiorum, and voila both my questions and answers.

I’d assumed that the question itself, or even a constellation of questions after years of attempted answers has been honed down to a few targeted inquiries about a set of principles that undergird the universe and life itself. The assumption is that among possible solutions there is perhaps a group that can be labeled monotheist, another animist, others atheist, generally Buddhist or questioning, and purely scientific (my list is not exhaustive). We imagine that by exercising the revered technique of careful reasonable debate, time and again, after many generations we come to something at least closer to things as they really are.

But what if all that questioning itself carried a kind of genetic code?

We all know that any objective observer has to take his or her personal proclivities into the matrix of the arguments formulation. The point is to really be objective and remove all the personal bits.

But my personal questions seemed to be leading in another direction.

Here’s a hypothesis: the questions themselves are not useful because their answers are totally predictable. It is not as if we had a set of mathematical problems that the best brains in the universe had been puzzling over forever and never arriving at a solution. Nor am I talking about a set of assumptions and prejudices that shape and distort my peculiar take on the world. That would mean that the questions themselves were fresh and appropriate to the situation that presented itself. What if they were not designed to do that?

I was trying to find out how many Christians, of the many varieties, exist in the world. I came across a pretty straightforward analysis of the percentage of the people who currently belong to one of the world’s religions now, and how many will be expected to follow that set of beliefs and practices by 2065. The Changing Global Religious Landscape was produced by the Pew Research Center so the science behind the analysis is reasonably reliable. Belonging to a religion covers a multitude of sins, but it at least sorts out the proportional weight my fellow humans will be giving to the current ways that the god-question is being addressed in broad strokes. It also gives some predictors, given current demographic information about the social, racial and cultural make-up of the populations in question. And there were some startling predictions: that Muslims and Christians would be numerically equal within 40 plus years; there will be no major religious conversions, lateral shifting due to marriage and other circumstance only; that Buddhists, one of the smaller demographics, would continue to diminish. I have cast my fate with a non-aggressive sect without much clout.

Also my beloved “none's” would neither increase nor decrease. Their proportional strength can be predicted simply by statistically figuring out the birth rate among "none” mothers in just the same way that the scientists determined the relative number of children born to spiritualist mothers. It was shocking to see that the “none's” were treated the same as any other category. To my mind, their choice to not follow a religion was perhaps the clearest of the intellectual/philosophical positions with regard to the god-question. But the Pew researchers said with confidence their numbers would not increase.

My precious questions about the nature of reality, the existence of god, and the virgin birth had their origin in the moment that Edna gave up her opposition to my mother marrying my father. And this much is also predictable: in 2065 the same questions will be asked with the same responses. Their genetic code does not tolerate innovation or dissent. I am not exactly sure how to apply Darwin to the genetic code of the god-question. Our environment is changing, pressures are shifting and will favor different adaptations, but will this require thousands or millions of years?

Getting arrested by the fashion police!

I have often heard jokes about the fashion police. I’ve even tried to make some, though my jokes usually don’t work well. But when I see some poor man who has no fashion sense at all who finds himself the unlucky object of a paparazzi's lens, I would know enough to call the fashion police. Please. This is probably not shot in Florida so not DeSantis's goons arresting a drag queen.

Is someone being arrested, the guy in sloppy blue shirt should be for his own well being and ours.

In Italy beginning in the early Renaissance until about the middle of the 17th century,  there really were fashion police. The Sumptuary Laws attempted to control what people wore. For example, priests did not always dress in black as they do today, but in the 15th century it became regulated, I think first in Florence.

But laws were enacted in Florence, Siena, Milan, Venice and I presume Rome, which restricted things like jewelry, furs, leather, gold, sleeves. It seems to be an attempt to reinforce a social hierarchy, nobility keeping the upwardly mobile merchant class in its place, the women of the upper classes attracting husbands of means, etc.

I’ve researched some of the history of the fashion police.

This is apparently an Neapolitan woman being arrested for wearing too much refinery in public.

This is also a picture of a very well dressed man making some kind of advances on a woman.

But then Google took me in another direction with regard to the Italian fashion police. I got sidetracked into a survey of the current state of Italian police fashion, and it is quite a statement in itself!

I think that it is probably not good to run afoul of the law in any country. But if you want to be arrested by well dressed police, Italy's the place. They do take fashion seriously.

“Don’t speak ill of the dead.”

My mother said that many times. It might be an old Irish warning before they broke out the whiskey at the wake.

OK, but I am not going to join the chorus of praise for the pope emeritus either. And it has begun in full force. I will bet money that the cause for his canonization has already been written and is a foregone conclusion. He was probably not the pernicious conservative rat that the neo-libs want to portray, but he was no angel. He loved his cats, so not all bad, but he was a little too gay for most conservatives. There might be a fight between cat lovers and opponents of those crazy red pumps. 

I just listened to an interview with the neo-conservative George Weigel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-B24f34jUU. He talks about the bromance between John Paul 2 and Ratzinger. According to Weigel, this is the heart of their argument: “The Council had really been the work of the holy spirit but its implementation had been less than satisfactory because it had not been properly understood. It was not seen in the context of the church’s settled tradition.” So they set out to give the Council an authoritative interpretation. Their contention was that the Council was not a paradigm shift; it was not starting the catholic church over again. 

This is my view. When the fathers in charge surveyed the work of Vatican 2, and realized that it spelled the end of the monarchy that their power and livelihood depended on, they began the process of limiting the damage. Paul 6 was the harbinger. Still in the thrall of John 23, he was neither a visionary nor a strong man, either would have been disqualifiers for the enclave that elected him. John Paul 1 may or may not have unleashed a hornet's nest by starting an audit of the finances of the Holy See, and he didn’t live long enough to even really begin the work. However the scare was enough to propel the unlikely, and extremely conservative Wojtyła to almost 3 decades of fomenting and leading a backlash, hounding Arrupe and all the liberal Jesuits who were involved in social action and, god forbid, liberation theology, the list goes on, but he had an amazing team of supporters, Subito Santo. He anointed the man who just died to continue the work of “reinterpreting” Vatican 2. 

I was elated when Ratzinger resigned. He lived on, and had a nice retirement. But my gut feeling is that he became a kind of Silenced Saint. Support for an all powerful papal monarchy has become more entrenched, and perhaps even increased. Look at how tired and worn out Francis looks after 10 years.

How much support could we gather for a “Get back to Jesus” movement in the Roman church. Well at least Ratzinger is no longer available to write a compelling list of reasons against it while pretending that it’s already in place.

The word for the day is “bowdlerize,” as in he was great if we can just cut out the offensive parts, or why in hell didn’t he consult the damage control consultants beforehand. Here are some of my favorite bits from the life of Ratzinger et al:

Regarding the rehabilitation of neo-Nazi Bishop Richard Williamson of the Society of Pius X  by lifting his excommunication. https://truthspinners.blogspot.com/2009/02/problem-with-benedict.html

And moving right along, his pandering to sex abusers mixed in with his nifty red slippers, https://truthspinners.blogspot.com/2021/07/no-sackcloth-and-ashes-for-these-guys.html

Francis is not going to win the cold hearts of the neo-con's with this less than regal pic.

What in the name of god were we thinking?

What did we imagine we were doing? 

A woman friend from Claudio Naranjo’s early Berkeley SAT groups called and asked if I would be interested in joining her for some kind of spiritual event. I can’t remember if there was any real information about the evening other than it was being organized by a friend of a friend, a Chinese-American woman whom my friend had met in Scientology. She lived in the predominantly Asian suburb of El Cerrito.

It was just before dusk when we began looking for street parking between the driveways of the ordinary middle class, very non-descript track homes. Most of the neighbors were already home from work so it took some time. We eventually found our way into a large two car garage, complete with neatly arranged storage boxes. My memory tells me that there were more than 50 people sitting on the folding chairs, but my rational mind won’t admit more than 35 into the space. There was as I recall a slightly raised platform where the speaker sat. He was introduced by our hostess. 

After he told us who he was, and I think some history of his spiritual lineage, he said that he was going into a semi-trance and the spirit of Rasputin would be speaking through him. Though he, or Rasputin, would not invite questions, he said that if we paid attention, and held a question in our hearts, we would find an answer.

‘

Actually our medium had been a used car salesman as I recall who found his way to Dianetics. Apparently a bit of clearing opened the way for a Russian mystic gone rogue who could now proffer valuable advice so that we need not repeat his tragic mistakes. I found no answers but maybe I didn’t have any good questions except where did our semi trance medium pick up the Russian accent. It was pretty hilarious. Yes, he did more than a full hour sounding like a drunk Boris Yeltsin. 

I held my tongue, paid the requested donation of 5 bucks, it might have been as high as 10, and left rather unenlightened other than knowing that finding parking in El Cerrito hills after 6 PM was not a piece of cake. I think it turned to my friend and said, well that was something. I don’t know what the financial arrangement was between the host and the medium, but the take could have been anywhere for 350 to 500 dollars, or more--in 1990 dollars. Not bad, better than hanging out trying to sell beat up Toyotas or Volgas.