Find out the latest news and topics of interest from Dr. James G. Hood, D.D.S., M.A.!
Archive for the ‘Religion’ Category
Morning Reflections: Prayers for Everyday Life
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Morning Reflections by Karen Jean Matsko Hood is the first book in the Inspirational Reflections Series by Whispering Pine Press International. I have had this book for several weeks now, and have thoroughly enjoyed waking up to its peaceful and uplifting devotionals. Each page features a Bible verse followed by one of Hood’s original poems, with a brief but insightful prayer completing the day’s reading. The devotionals are centered around themes that are reflected in verse, poem, and prayer alike, and this allows the reader to really concentrate on the message and internalize it. The poetry is simple yet poignant, a powerful and often elegant contemplation of various facets of the Christian walk. Thankfulness, praise, the filling of the Holy Spirit, the struggle to live righteously in a difficult world–all these topics and many more are meditated upon in Morning Reflections. I have found that my mornings tend to start much more smoothly when I set aside the time to quietly reflect on God, and Karen Hood‘s gentle, thoughtful words make it easy and enjoyable to do just that.
In the back of the book are three separate indexes that are helpful for finding a particular devotional quickly and easily: Index by First Line, Index by Bible Verse, and an Alphabetical Index. I really appreciated having these indexes handy to help me navigate the book to find my favorite poems and prayers again.
Morning Reflections also offers several other extra touches that I thought were particularly nice. There are several blank pages at the beginning of the book to provide space to write out my own thoughts on the reflection of the day, and there is a another page where you can fill in a personal message if you want to give Morning Reflections as a gift. There is a Reader Feedback form that can be mailed to Whispering Pine Press, something I have never seen before in a book and really appreciated because it shows that the publishers are truly interested in treating their readers right.
Order your copy of Morning Reflections today!
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Catholic TV & Radio Coverage of the 2010 Supreme Convention
Monday, August 2, 2010
Three Catholic television networks and two Catholic radio networks will be providing live coverage of the 128th Supreme Convention in Washington, D.C. August 3-5, 2010.
EWTN television will broadcast convention proceedings via its cable and satellite affiliates throughout North and South America, Europe, Africa and the Pacific Rim of Asia. News Director Raymond Arroyo will be onsite Tuesday, Aug. 3, with live coverage of the opening Mass, the Supreme Knight’s annual report, and the States Dinner, as well as interviews and updates on convention activities.EWTN Radio will also broadcast live from the convention site and provide live audio of the opening Mass and business session. EWTN is carried on many independent Catholic radio stations around the United States, as well as via streaming audio on the Internet.
Canada’s Salt & Light TV will cover the convention events live to its audience of over two million people in Canada alone, and tens of thousands of people the world over viewing the live streaming on the Salt and Light website www.saltandlighttv.org, providing English and French-language reports by Basilian Father Thomas Rosica and a team of correspondents. S&L will cover all three days of this year’s Supreme Convention
Boston-based CatholicTV returns for its third year of broadcast coverage to its national audience. News anchor Kevin Nelson will provide live reports, activities and interviews from the convention site throughout the opening day’s events. Catholic TV is now available on selected cable systems around the United States.
SirusXM Satellite Radio’s Catholic Channel will once again broadcast live from the convention, carrying The Busted Halo Show with Paulist Father Dave Dwyer on Monday, Aug. 2 and Tuesday, August 3 from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. EDT. New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York will also originate his weekly program, A Conversation with the Archbishop, from the convention site.| Click here for the 128th Supreme Convention Schedule and Information. |
Draw Muhammad Backlash, Source: Fox News
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
‘Everybody Draw Muhammad Day’ Advocate Rattled by Death Threats
By Joshua Rhett Miller
Published July 12, 2010
| FoxNews.com
The creator of a now-defunct “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day” page on Facebook fears she may be targeted for death now that the cartoonist who launched the online campaign has been placed on an execution list by a radical Yemeni-American cleric.
The 27-year-old Facebook page creator — a Canadian woman who asked not to be identified due to fears of reprisal — told FoxNews.com that she was visited at her home last week by Royal Canadian Mounted Police officials who advised her to remove her page and not to talk to reporters.
“I’m scared,” she said. “I’m scared that somebody might kill me.”
The woman created her version of “Everybody Draw Muhammad” in late April, days after a Seattle cartoonist launched the online campaign to protest Comedy Central’s censoring of an episode of “South Park,” in which the Prophet Muhammad was depicted wearing a bear costume. The Canadian woman said she will no longer act as the administrator of such a page.
“I just want to be quiet now,” she continued. “I wish I didn’t do this.”
As part of “Inspire,” a 67-page English-language Al Qaeda magazine, Yemeni-American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki — who has been linked to the botched Times Square bombing and cited as inspiration for the Fort Hood massacre and the plot of two New Jersey men to kill U.S. soldiers — targeted the Seattle cartoonist for “assassination,” along with others who have participated in her campaign.
“The large number of participants makes it easier for us because there are more targets to choose from in addition to the difficulty of the government offering all of them special protection,” wrote al-Awlaki, who is an American citizen. “But even then our campaign should not be limited to only those who are active participants.”
He warned that “assassinations, bombings and acts of arson” are all legitimate forms of revenge against the creators of blasphemous depictions of Muhammad.
“Now, with the defamation of Muhammad reaching the shores of America, I wonder whether the patriotic American Muslim will still have the audacity to claim that he enjoys the right to be a Muslim in America?” Al-Awlaki wrote. “Does he understand that this right includes his duty to fight against those who blaspheme his Prophet?”
Al-Awlaki invited Muslims worldwide to “stand up in defense” of Muhammad and for their efforts to “manifest in all appropriate” means.
The Canadian woman told FoxNews.com that she created her page as a way for Facebook users to discuss Islam “openly and honestly” — and that she has lost most of her anger following her initial outrage.
“I was upset at first, but I’m not too upset anymore,” she said. “I kind of got tired of it.”
She said she now realizes her online actions may have put her in jeopardy. Following the recommendation of Canadian authorities, she said she has altered her routines and will consider changing her phone number.
“I have no way of knowing what might happen to me,” she said.
Royal Canadian Mounted Police Sgt. Pat Flood, citing department policy, would not confirm or deny that police officials visited the woman’s home.
David Gomez, the FBI’s assistant special agent in charge of counterterrorism in Seattle, said authorities consider the threat “very seriously” and confirmed that they contacted the Seattle cartoonist two weeks ago.
“We take the written threat very seriously and we advised her to take appropriate actions,” Gomez said Monday. “We wanted her to lower her profile, basically.”
Gomez said FBI officials felt “obligated to warn” the Seattle woman based on previous attempts by Al Qaeda to target individuals for caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.
“Al Qaeda is a very real organization, they have made attempts on other journalists involved in this type of activity,” Gomez said. “Based on that, we felt obligated to warn her.”
Contacted via e-mail, the Seattle woman declined comment.
A Biological Basis for Mysticism?
Friday, May 28, 2010
Science will always try to reduce explanations to an empirical cause and effect model. In the case of mysticism, this model is a biological one. Unfortunately, science has not made defining mysticism any easier. The studies about mysticism conducted by Newberg and D’Aquili are inconclusive as to whether mysticism has a strictly biological basis, so more studies will be needed to clarify the matter, and suggestions will be raised.
Newberg and D’Aquili are on the cutting edge of mysticism. By using modern technologies, they study the mystical states of devout mystics with the hope to find a biological basis. One such study that Horgan outlines in Rational Mysticism is a study involving contemplative nuns. The nuns meditated and when they reached a state of mystical awareness they pulled a string and a needle injected dye into their bloodstream. The researchers would then take a picture of the brain in order to see where the most active areas of the brain that the dye affected.
The problems of this study on meditation is one shared other scientific mystical research the results are inconclusive because of the research methods used and the nature of mysticism itself. Newberg and D’Aquili used an experimental setting which is far removed from the typical setting in which the mystical experiences happen. Therefore, the experimental setting could be affecting what usually happens during a mystical experience. Furthermore, the image of the brain produced by the study is only a snapshot of the larger mystical experience. It may not have even captured the moment of highest mystical awareness, and mystical experience is an ongoing process. Imaging reflecting the whole experience would be more conclusive, but that would require more invasive research methods which would again lead to more problems. Therefore, the nature of mysticism itself makes it very difficult to study. Because mysticism is such a diverse experience practiced in so many ways comparing results from studies seems almost impossible. Indeed, results from several studies showed brain activity in different parts of the brain.
The nature of mysticism may make it difficult to study, but researchers can take steps to make results more conclusive. Researchers should standardize methods for studying a particular type of mysticism, and researchers must make clear what type of mysticism the research subject practices. Standardizing research methods and clearly labeling the type of research practices by the research subject will make results comparable. Furthermore, researchers will need to be creative in order to find innovative ways to study mysticism. Preexisting frameworks used in the field of psychology should be sought and modeled after where appropriate. Another important element will be replication. Researchers will have to do multiple studies in order to demonstrate that their findings are consistent, and not the result of a flaw in research methodology.
With these ideas in mind, the studies into the biological nature of mysticism that are inconclusive could begin to be remedied. Researchers realize that this largely subjective experience, by its very nature is difficult to study, but research methodology can still be improved. Hopefully, as a result of these improvements, neurotheology will shed some insight into the nature of mystical experience.
Works Cited
Horgan, John. Rational Mysticism: Dispatches from the Border between Science and Spirituality. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003. Print.
Being all deep and stuff: My Thoughts on Pascal’s Pensées (what I’ve read so far)
Friday, May 28, 2010
Religion is a powerful force in the world, being one of the few ideologies that millions of people have been willing to die for over the centuries. Many people grow up with a certain system of belief and may go on until death believing in a religion based on faith without fully exploring the rational groundings for that particular system of belief. What about the rest of us who do not simply accept God’s existence as a self evident fact? Pascal posed this exact question and he attempted to answer it with a wager demonstrating God’s existence, and although persuasive in many respects, Pascal’s wager involves many assumptions and begs many questions that must each be respectively explained and answered before Pascal’s argument can be considered a strong, sound one.
Pascal lays the foundation for his ultimate assertion that God exists by first establishing that humanity is weak and limited. Pascal comes to the conclusion that humanity is weak and limited by a long and complex series of arguments. First, he demonstrates that when people shape their worldview they are either dogmatists or skeptics. However, neither of these perspectives works. Being a total skeptic goes against human nature because humans constantly try to make sense of things, and in order to do so humans will believe in something. Furthermore, being a dogmatist goes against human nature because it is not rationale. No empirical evidence exists to support this faith-based claim. From this point, Pascal asserts that humanity must embrace the third option—belief in God. From this point onward, Pascal bases his argument in the Judeo Christian perspective and many assumptions from this perspective, accepted as premises, are used to support the claim of humankind’s dual condition: people have aspects of being corrupt and not being corrupt engrained into their nature. Humans realize their dual nature which entails never attaining full knowledge and must be content with a level of happiness only approaching perfect happiness. To extend this point, Pascal discusses the concept of original sin, and the fact that most people cannot come to terms with it. He argues, therefore, that because humans’ nature and the concept of original sin are inaccessible through reason, reason cannot be the ultimate means through knowing God and ourselves. Next, Pascal provides numerous illustrative examples to demonstrate that humans cannot grasp the ultimate nature of the metaphysical world. Infinity exists in both directions according to our perceptual observations both on the macroscopic and microscopic scales. Therefore, humans must realize that they are weak because nothing can be fully comprehended. Humans should take solace in the fact that unlike all other creatures in the universe, we are self reflective; therefore, our goal should be to think and think well.
All of this argumentation lays the framework for Pascal’s Wager. Pascal begins with an argument by analogy: We know an infinite number exists without knowing its nature. In the same way, we know infinite God exists without knowing his nature. Afterwards, Pascal extends his argument by describing God’s characteristics and proving his existence accordingly. The first premise is that God is incomprehensible. Therefore, rationally proving God’s existence would be nonsensical. Following the same reasoning, a person cannot be judged based on whether he/she believes in God. By referring to the previous argument of human nature which establishes that humans will adopt a worldview either consciously or unconsciously, a disjunctive syllogism concerning belief in God presents itself: a person must believe in God or not. Having established that a person must choose to believe in God or not, Pascal examines the stakes and possibilities for reward for each decision. If the belief in God is correct then the person gains everything and if not then that person loses nothing. Considering the stakes more specifically, someone will notice that by making a finite wager for the possibility of infinite gain a person must make the wager. No matter how small and insignificant the finite chance actually is for God to exist is irrelevant. The award is incomprehensibly worth it, so faced with that wager a person must choose to believe in God. However, being the skeptical reader Pascal’s proof begs the question: does someone truly believe in something (God) only if they are doing so because they feel they should?
Pascal answers this question by arguing that if a person recognizes the truth or at least the seeming truth in his argument then that person should change his/her actions to be those of someone who believes in God. As Pascal argues, using behavioral activation (changing one’s actions to those that accord with a different way of thinking) will eventually change one’s way of thinking to what was previously unthinkable.
Pascal’s argument is problematic because it diminishes the honest quest for truth. Pascal is ultimately arguing that the wager is a well calculated gamble. The point should be emphasized that Pascal’s wager is still a gamble; therefore, evidence may still be found to counter Pascal’s wager. By using behavioral activation on oneself, would seem to brainwash a person into believing in God, which is not justifiable for bringing about belief.
Furthermore, Pascal’s wager is problematic because it only considers the benefits for why a person should believe in God, not people’s personal motivations. Considering people’s motivations in God shows that believers believe in God only out of self interest. In this way, believers are no different from atheists except for the fact that believers seem to be striving for infinite gain while nonbelievers strive for finite gain. If God looked at motivations, how could one be judged to be better than the other?
Except for these tantalizing questions, Pascal’s proof of God has been quite persuasive; the problem is that all of these questions are based on is Pascal’s assumption that people should believe in a Christian God. After all, the wager would not work if God was not the benevolent, all-powerful God of the Christians that judges people based on belief, and then sentences them to the appropriate afterlife: heaven or hell. Pascal may have answers to these questions in the wider works of the Pensées, but based on the given argument Pascal’s wager is ineffective at providing justification for belief in God.
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