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Well... As the title states, recently (as in June 2nd) was my first time going to Church. Now, having said that, I was taken to Church by my grandparents when my mother was in the hospital a decade or so ago back when I was a single-digiter. However this was the first time I, by my own will, attended Mass. And it was an otherwordly experience... First off: my initial intent was simply to find out when Sunday Mass is--so at around 2:00pm I headed out for my local Roman Catholic Church. I knew where it was because, a year or two ago, it was a place I handed my resume to back when I was green in the work world and I remembered how beautiful the church itself was; with twin statues guarding the front entrance, a tall and proud cross high above, and stained-glass windows facing the dirty streets around it. It was like a pear among a mine full of coals. However the office where one would "sign himself up" (so to speak--I am still quite ignorant of the proper terms and procedures) was closed and I noticed Mass would be held at 4:30. I was curious about whether or not I should wait (by the time I got there, it was around 2:30) so I checked out the beautiful interior architecture; from a wreathed statue of the Virgin to the massive cross bearing Christ over a tabernacle (also the day I learned what that word meant and what it represented) to the portraits of various saints along the walls that framed the upper church (there was a lower-roofed "lower church" underneath!). A church boy told me that confession was going to be held at 3:00, so I waited and then spoke to the reverend who helped educate me about how I can properly officiate myself as a Roman Catholic as well as gave me a brief confession which is when I briefly introduced myself as someone who was seeking wisdom and virtue after having left Socialism a few years ago. I don't recall much of the moment as it wasn't all that special, as it was more an introduction and guidance to entry rather than a proper confession. I then sat an empty pew and contemplated in prayer what I was doing, what it meant, and why I was doing it all. Ultimately I was going to Church not because I believed in God but rather because I believed in the word of God and the wisdom and power behind it. Eventually, Mass was time and sadly I was perhaps the only young person in the audience. It was mostly old people, surprisingly nearly all white. The only young people were a couple converts from India or Korea, though I kept to myself and mostly just spoke to the old woman behind me to help me keep up with the Mass (like what page number the priest at the podium was reading from, or the singer was singing from). Perhaps the most meaningful part, however, was when the reverend I spoke to earlier taught about the desire for recognition. He opened rather simply; "Have you ever spoken to someone, and then they look over your shoulder as if looking for someone more interesting? Or perhaps speak 'hello' to someone only for them to look away and ignore you?..." and from there proceeded to talk about the desire some have for recognition and then tied it to Jesus; stating something like: "Jesus did not do what He did for fame, but rather so that others might learn from Him". At the time I thought little of it as... isn't that common sense? Isn't it better to focus on doing good rather than seeking recognition for it? However when I spoke to my Father later on about it, he helped me realize how relevant it actually was. You see, the 4 reasons as to why I decided to go to Church were: Wisdom, Faith, Family, and Fraternity. Basically I wanted to improve myself and perhaps make some friends from among the parishioners over time. However... I was pulling the cart before the horse. I was going not for the strictest reason of seeking God (or wisdom) but rather for the effects of this. And that's why, when I went to Mass today (Sunday), I went with the singular purpose of leaving with wisdom rather than for the secondary gains that might come with seeking out the best folks in my area. And today's mass was largely the same as yesterday's but with a younger man (perhaps the pastor) giving it and sadly without the wise sermon in between the songs and readings. I focused more on the readings this time as they were the same as yesterday's so I could absorb it more. I think they were under "Corpus Christi" or something; I know the story went something like Moses sacrificing half his livestock to an altar of God and then sprinkling some of it onto the disciples followed by Jesus sending forth a disciple to arrange for passover in another disciple's house in a city. Not sure what wisdom I ought to extract from this, other then take it as part of a larger story on both sides. Perhaps next Sunday, when I go for Mass, the story will continue and become clearer to me (I ought to mention the masses are mostly scripted a year in advance, apparently). Overall it was a very enlightening experience with few distractions. I was quite anxious for today's mass as I was thinking last night whether I was doing it for the right reasons and whether or not I was being honest with myself. To be clear: I don't know if I believe in God or not. I am tempted to say I don't, yet a part of me is inclined to believe there is either due to an instinct to believe or the logic that something must have caused the Big Bang... ...And, if I don't really believe in God, then why I am going to Church? Quite simply: for wisdom, guidance, and a place to think over my week and prepare for the next. These things I got for myself and I am happy though still hungry. Tomorrow I'll be making a call for a meeting and stuff to properly initiate myself back into my ancestral church, and I will make it a regular thing for me to attend mass on Sundays. And, to be clear on the point of sharing this, I am curious what folks think around here. Both the atheists and the Christians. Am I doing the right thing in seeking wisdom from the Church and broadening my fountains of wisdom or am I perhaps being deceitful by not being fully a believer yet going to Church?

Spirituality or reason? Is it a false dichotomy? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOSs2Wknsqw

In this video this famous ex-comic book writer ( Alan Moore, creator of the V character in V for Vendetta which is originally a comic book story that later became the symbol for the anonymous movement after the success of the movie) talks about many interesting subjects and ideas, among them, he talks about his own idea of what magic, art and fiction are, and proposes a different meaning to the word magic ( jump to 27:35 if you want to go straight to that, although I personally suggest to watch it all, I think it’s really worth it) Also I think in this video is presented an idea that perhaps can help to settle at last the old issue between science and spirituality, what it is and what role it may play in our lives in a way that I think can be very healthy and constructive http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Xkw41UdPGY What is interesting in the concepts and ideas he presents there is that I see finally a possible way that we can reconcile the basis of religious thinking and science, in a way that they don’t get mistakenly and unnecesseraly mixed together, or that one tries to eliminate the other,they both just have different perspectives and focuses on life that are valid (look in 36:05 in the video) I think we all can agree that we don’t need to think fictional stories and metaphors that are very moving and help us think about reality and have an emotional resonance for us needs to be scientifically accurate or real for us to think they are valuable. Like any good poem that we can think of uses metaphors to express ideas without the need to be objectively real and yet touches us on a emotional level Could we say there are two definitions or two ways we can talk about something being “true”? One being the objective reality proven by empirical scientific testing and another being what is true regarding our feelings about things? They both seem to have fought against each other a lot in the history of the development of our thinking, I think they should both be valued properly without being too much of one in detriment of the other, wich generates imbalances and can generate abuse and violence between people, caused by an impossibility of understanding between them. The main problem with the concept of religion is the necessity of infliction of the dogma in others, not necessarily in the reading of reality that those beduines that created the many tales that eventually got compiled in the bible( using a common example,) did thousands of years ago(another problem of course is the morality of those societies that we clearly recognize today how primitive they were, and if we’re able to separate things we can sort out where we can see real value in those stories without the need to subscribe to that primitive morality). In the case of monotheism the necessity of trying to monopolize one view or limiting it to one single god not only limits the way you can see things through symbols and concepts (see between 45:25- 50:43 ) but also generates conflicts and I think that is the reason why, as long as religion existed, there is this attempt to try to prove those fictional stories to be objectively real, to the point we get that even today with all knowledge that we have and advancement in science there is still this attempt to try to prove those stories to be scientifically true, even though there really is no necessity of that for people to see value in them, and also I think to be scientifically precise was never ever the point in creating any of those symbols, they really were actually a form of emotional comforting for people, a way of coping with reality in the best way they could, it deals with one specific way of processing reality that has nothing to do with science but it is also important, being our emotional understanding of our own internal reality, wich you could argue is solved by self knowledge alone, but both of them are important for the processing of our world I'd argue. And I think perhaps this has been forgotten these days by a lot of people, specially by statists atheists who thinks we only need science to deal with reality and nothing else, I also think this subject has not being addressed in any of the FDR shows I’ve seen yet. I think in great part religion is actually the main guilty part for the increasing rejection by society about the importance of this form of reading reality, because they basically monopolized it and limited people to only serve these old dogmas and their priests, institutions and authority completely apart from any kind of truth with the goal of serving opportunists trying to control people for their own advantage. Another reason why people today is negligeable to the value of that form of looking at life is because art today is mainly used to numb us and accept our current reality as slaves to the state and just keep going with it (see in 29: 15 and 31:45) he also talks about self knowledge( see in 36:25 ) like I said before, there's a lot of interesting ideas in the video Hope you all like it and comment, enjoy!