<\/p>\n
Catholic <\/p>\n <\/span>Douthat writes in the New York Times<\/i> <\/span><\/p>\n “The question is whether Nature actually deserves a religious response. Let’s If The But Evil
\nRoss Douthat is bothered – more than bothered – by Avatar’s pantheism<\/a>. If one
\nwere looking at an attack on Pagan sensibilities, Douthat’s column would be a
\ngood place to start. <\/span>Beliefnet’s
\nown Rod Dreher of “Crunchy Con” fame uses it to jump on pantheism <\/a>as well. <\/span> <\/span>I offer one response to these in
\nmy mind ridiculous attacks.<\/span><\/p>\n
\n<\/p>\n
\nTraditional theism has to wrestle with the problem of evil: if God is good, why
\ndoes he allow suffering and death? But Nature is <\/i><\/span>suffering and death. Its harmonies require violence.
\nIts “circle of life” is really a cycle of mortality. And the human societies
\nthat hew closest to the natural order aren’t the shining Edens of James
\nCameron’s fond imaginings. They’re places where existence tends to be nasty,
\nbrutish and short.<\/span><\/span>
“Religion
\nexists, in part, precisely because humans aren’t at home amid these cruel
\nrhythms. We stand half inside the natural world and half outside it. We’re
\nbeasts with self-consciousness, predators with ethics, mortal creatures who
\nyearn for immortality.”<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
<\/span><\/font><\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\nstart with the problem of evil. <\/span>As
\nDouthat states it, the problem is actually far more serious to his monopolistic transcendental monotheism than it is to pantheism. <\/span>Karl Rove-like, he takes one of our strengths and tries to
\nmake it a weakness, one of his religion’s greatest weaknesses and tries to make
\nit a strength.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nyou have a deity defined largely by his power, and his claim that he also
\nhappens to be good, the problem of evil is all but insurmountable. <\/span>This is the reason many Christians have
\nbecome agnostics or atheists. <\/span>Bart
\nEhrman the noted religious scholar and Biblical expert was able to handle his
\ndiscovery that the Bible was in no way literally true. <\/span>But Ehrman finally lost his faith<\/a> over
\nthe issue of evil. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nproblem of evil is far more tractable from a pantheistic perspective. <\/span>First it removes us from center stage.
\nWe two leggeds are one part of the glorious reality that is this beautiful
\nworld. <\/span>We may or may not play a
\ncentral role in the drama of life, but the world was not created as our little
\ncupcake to consume as we see fit.
\n<\/span>(If it were, as folks like Douthat seem to think, evil again becomes a
\nproblem. <\/span>Why create such a world
\nunless you are a very bad designer? Or a sadist?)<\/span><\/p>\n
\nwhat if it is a world of creativity?
\n<\/span>And what if the basic division into duality, which makes creativity
\npossible, also necessitates ignorance on the part of partial beings? Creativity requires ignorance, because only then can we bring into existence what has never existed before. <\/span>Life begins simply by
\nreproducing, trying to survive, generating wondrous beauty along the way. <\/span>Natural “evil” is of this sort: the
\neating and being eaten that Gary Snyder, my favorite Buddhist with a Pagan
\nsoul, observes we are all part of the same potlatch, giving when our time comes
\nas others have given that we ourselves might exist. <\/span>This is not evil.<\/span><\/p>\n
\ncomes into existence when malevolent<\/i> intent arises. <\/span>How does this arise?
\n<\/span>I would argue also out of ignorance. Malevolence can arise out of its absence. <\/span>To take a simple example, how many of us have thought dark
\nthoughts at someone we know based on our misunderstanding of what they
\ndid? <\/span>Suppose we had acted on those
\nthoughts, and sometimes we do. <\/span>What we did would seem
\nto that person to be evidence we are evilly disposed towards them. <\/span>They then lash out, and we are
\nconfirmed in our own assumption that they acted evilly. <\/span>And so it goes.<\/span><\/p>\n