Gonzo Theology
From a link my sister sent me via email years ago which has been sitting in my inbox invoking vague pangs of guilt and curiosity ever since.
Worship without sacrifice. One of MahatmaGandhi's "Seven Blunders of the World". Worship without sacrifice. People are afraid of sacrifice, these days. So many bad sacrifices were made in the past. But it's necessary, you see? To keep the balance. We're going to go too far to the other side, the boat will tip again. Worship without sacrifice. Religion without sacrifice. There must be sacrifice. A price must be paid. Spirituality absolutely must involve a cost, and the cost must be high.
A religion or path which demands no sacrifice is going to end up as a cancer. You'll only get sick if you live off Snickers bars and McDonalds. A religion or path which demands some sacrifice is better. True religion, though, demands everything. Not only to give up what one has, but to give up what one is. My life for Aiur.
But don't give up thinking. Not for a good long fucken while, and you'll know for certain when you have to. For certain. Cults feed off people who trade in their intellect for beliefs and security.
Source: http://www.gonzotheology.com/stories.php?story=02/07/21/0954436
Is sacrifice the only way to prove conviction?
Comments
I don't think Ghandi was suggesting that sacrifice "proved" anything. I'll come back to this.
The whole idea of sacrifice is difficult. I presume that here sacrifice means self-sacrifice - as opposed to disembowelling small furry creatures - in the sense that it means giving up or maybe destroying something that I prize for something that I see as having a greater value or perhaps a more pressing claim.
One problem with ideas of sacrifice is that it easily becomes tangled with ideas of macho, and in that instant we are back with the English Victorian ideas of muscular christianity. The surrender of self for the team, meaning king and country and church and class.
Another greater problem is the element of Nietzsche's ''Will to power.'' He said "My idea is that every specific body strives to become master over all space and to extend its force (--its will to power:) and to thrust back all that resists its extension."
In all this arise the notions of self-discipline, and self-punishment in the forms of shame and guilt.
Self-discipline I take to mean the capacity to persist, but I do not believe that persistence (and from that courage) are created by sacrifice and self-discipline in the sense above. I think it is created by self-acceptance, and so by that developing compassion for myself.
This requires a deep committment, but not sacrifice in the sense in which it is usually used, and this is I believe what Ghandi meant.
I wrote that thing about McSpirituality and religion without sacrifice a long time ago now, and I'd be unlikely to write anything like it these days. This is not to say that my contempt for Neale Donald Walsch and the like has lessened. It's just that now I wouldn't have such a hard-on for total self-sacrifice, which was hooked into my high and mighty ideas about asceticism at the time. Pseudo-religions that act like sedatives, like the fast-food religion books available today, still piss me off, though.
-- Zoot
Hey, welcome to my site ... guess you followed the referer logs
Sorry for making you login before you could contribute, I had to tune the wiki to avoid constant vandalism. -- AdamShand
I am unfamiliar with Neale Donald Walsch, but a glance at his website makes me agree with you. It is always troubles me when "The Truth" is for sale.
I think that all serious investigations into self, spirit and the godhead require courage, sometimes great courage. But I am very wary of the whole notion of sacrifice, I have seen it abused so often, and when it is, it always does frightening damage to people and their lives.
--Brett