The one...with no name...and various connections

Thomas said:
I honestly don't see how ...?


I think we're talking a different order of thing here.

If God removes the option to believe or not believe ... where is our freedom to accept Him?

Whether we then obey God or not is another matter – that's the kind of question we are asked all the time – whether I can get away with a drink before I drive, eat this jam bun, smoke this cigarette, etc.

I'm not saying we've lost the option to be reckless, or wilful, or stupid.

And, no doubt, there would be those who would:
A – think that this irrefutable revelation was in fact an illuminati- or government-type conspiracy, or
B – think that this irrefutable revelation was simply a natural phenomena we as yet do not understand.

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Re your blood-sugar analogy ... supposing the option was, the next jam bun and you'll drop dead on the spot?

... and I write this, with the full knowledge of someone, the single-parent father of two young children, who was told in hospital his next drink might likely kill him, and he discharged himself, and popped into the off-licence (liquor store) on the way home ... and not too much later, it did.

Or the clip I saw on TV of the woman who did so much crack cocaine she was having a heart-attack, called the ambulance, which arrived so promptly she locked herself in the bathroom to do the rest – they had to break the door down.

Where humans are concerned, go figure ...

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Precisely to all.

Hence my thoughts: That to believe that there is any TRUE religion (that is, its claims being aligned with reality) it would help to have clearer and more verifiable evidence.

Everything else you said following more or less proved MY point: People know the information with some clarity, and it can be more fully verified, and we still make choices to the contrary. (contrary to what is healthy)
So clear verifiable evidence clearly DOES NOT remove your option to choose. You seem to think/assert having more evidence would remove our freedom to choose, but then every example you give supports the contrary claim (that is, my claim that it would be perfectly fine and even better to have more clear cut evidence and that it WOULD NOT, ipso facto, take away our right to choose).
 
Thomas said:
New Thought falls under the 'mind-health' paradigm, but Philosophical Idealism, but a philosophy alone is too intellectual and lacks a mythological narrative for people to get hold of... Christianity offers that in shedloads – as does Hinduism, Buddhism, but that was too alien for the 19th century American mindset. Native American Wisdom could have done it, but no-one knew or particularly cared about it in the 1880s.

New Thought teachers like Charles Fillmore of Unity came up with the Prosperity Gospel – NT was initially about mental and physical health, but Prosperity Theology gave it real traction and it became a major emphasis of the movement, finding fertile soil in the values of American Idealism.
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My understanding is that the Fillmores were very interested in Hinduism and Buddhism and that colored their understanding of the Bible. They used the bible because that is what they were familiar with, and, that was probably the only thing that made it socially acceptable at the time, or even recognizable as a religion.

I do know know how much they knew about Native American spiritualities or whether they rejected them or did know and incorporated some.
I had not previously heard the specific claim that the prosperity gospel came ffrom the Fillmores or out of Unity at all. Do you have any articles? Is it in one of the Filmores books? It's been awhile since I've read those books and I don't remember the prosperity gospel in particular. I remember when I new minister came in at the Unity church I used to attend, and tithing and prosperity gospel were on the table, it felt pretty foreign.
 
TheLightWithin said:
My understanding is that the Fillmores were very interested in Hinduism and Buddhism and that colored their understanding of the Bible.
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Yep, but New Thought was the basis, religions provided the necessary mythopoeic dressing.

TheLightWithin said:
I do know know how much they knew about Native American spiritualities or whether they rejected them or did know and incorporated some.
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I don't think NA spirituality was a thing at the time, I always assumed it's very much a 60s phenomena, unless I'm mistaken?

TheLightWithin said:
I had not previously heard the specific claim that the prosperity gospel came ffrom the Fillmores or out of Unity at all. Do you have any articles?
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Fillmore authored Prosperity ...
 
TheLightWithin said:
Hence my thoughts: That to believe that there is any TRUE religion (that is, its claims being aligned with reality) it would help to have clearer and more verifiable evidence.
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Doesn't this form an unavoidable Catch-22 situation? Every faith with an established wisdom tradition is well over a thousand years old...when each was founded, folks still thought the Earth was flat and the sun revolved around the Earth - the Earth was the center of the Universe.

There is also an underlying presumption...certainly since the Enlightenment and only further entrenched since, that humans have the Universe all figured out. The entrenchment now is at the point of arrogance, of course we know it all now.

And we didn't know then...

This arrogance is foundational to the dismissal of religion as a whole, and used as a cudgel against Judism, Christianity and even Islam.

Newer smorgasbord religions attempt to appeal to this arrogance, offering à la carte spiritualism without the benefit of wisdom teachings, or alternately putting modern spin interpretation on diluted wisdom teachings.

TheLightWithin said:
Everything else you said following more or less proved MY point: People know the information with some clarity, and it can be more fully verified, and we still make choices to the contrary. (contrary to what is healthy)

So clear verifiable evidence clearly DOES NOT remove your option to choose. You seem to think/assert having more evidence would remove our freedom to choose, but then every example you give supports the contrary claim (that is, my claim that it would be perfectly fine and even better to have more clear cut evidence and that it WOULD NOT, ipso facto, take away our right to choose).
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Ah, free will vs predestination...always a lively discussion.

I think of the times I've presented verifiable evidence to those who still stubbornly cling to cherished beliefs as if a life preserver in the open sea. People choose their truths, and few surrender their truth and then only grudgingly. The arrogant are the most stubborn, and typically are the least learned on the subject. The evolution vs creation debate illustrates this for me; those who dig the deepest trenches are those with the least involvement in the actual field. Those versed in the field tend to be more lenient, more flexible in their understanding...on both sides.

Cartesian knowledge is a wonderful thing, but it isn't the only, or even the "best," way of looking at the world around us. It is only one of many ways. Wisdom surpasses knowledge, a matter Cartesian knowledge does its best to overlook and ignore, or feebly attempt to usurp.

Understanding tomato is a fruit is knowledge, understanding not to put tomato in a fruit salad is wisdom.
 
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Thomas said:
Prosperity Theology took off and prospers well beyond Unity – Pentecostalism; the 'self-help' and 'get-rich' industry, the Healing Revivals of the 1950s became Televangelism of the 1980s ... and oif course it's been exported worldwide with missionary zeal.
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While portions of New Thought contain what grew to prosperity gospel, you know that is not is basis. And as you describe the pentecostal and tent and TV fire and brimstone literalists ran with it and still are running far from the transcendentalist and new thought origins.

In unityit is more wytayba what you think about you bring about.

Thoughts in mind appear in kind.

Whether it is negative or positive, lack or abundance....the law of mind action (you call it prayer, praying to your God) we call it focusing our mind on our desire for good for all concerned rather than fear.

If it is to be it is up to me...we just don't feel the need to rely on the supernatural when the natural world works fine for us.

We understand you think differently brother, but don't understand how our thinking so concerns you.

But the Tammy Faye Bakers of the world...you cannot blame on Fillmore or Unity...well ya can... it is however a similar stretch I would have to make to believe in a G!d I have to obey.
 
Thomas said:
I don't think NA spirituality was a thing at the time, I always assumed it's very much a 60s phenomena, unless I'm mistaken?
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Thomas said:
Fillmore authored Prosperity ...
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A lot of things became big in the 60s, but I don't think they came out of nowhere. I don't know what the history was leading up to it in terms of the NA spirituality.
I'll have to look into the Fillmore books about Prosperity. It wasn't emphasized when I was in Unity and the one minister talked about the Fillmores quite a lot. When the new minister came in and was promoting prosperity gospel, I don't recall her even mentioning the Fillmore book (however I wasn't going to those classes for long so I may have missed it)
 
TheLightWithin said:
Maybe I will create a delicious fruit salad with tomatoes to challenge conventional wisdom!😋
🤣o_O😋
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Quoting myself here: Others have beaten me to it, there are recipes out there already.
Not surprised of course, anything we think of has probably been tried
 
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