How to love going to church: a guide for atheists

The Bible version of God doesn’t ring true to me. I don’t believe in any traditional sort of God.  I am not that sort of person who finds any purpose in worshipping or asking favors from invisible Beings.  I don’t ascribe any emotions or sentience (certainly, no vindictiveness) to any Person or Thing that might have created our universe.  How the universe came into being is beyond what I can know. 

I do cherish my universe, though, and I realize that I am an incredibly tiny and incredibly ignorant part of it. Many fervent believers (though not all) would characterize my beliefs as “atheism” although that word, as commonly construed, would characterize me in a misleadingly cartoonish way.  

Given my beliefs, most people would be surprised to hear that I sometimes go to church to be inspired and energized. What’s my secret?  I go to church when no one else is there—I like to go to empty churches.  When nothing else is going on other than one’s own breathing, meditating, thinking and writing, going to church can even be exhilarating.

With a pad of paper and a pen in my hands, in search of solitude, I walked to church twice this week.  I had previously noticed a huge church a few blocks from a courthouse where I sometimes work.  Only after walking to this church on Monday did I learn that it was called “Saint Peter’s Roman Catholic Cathedral” in Belleville, Illinois.  Here’s a photo I took on Wednesday …

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I thought my computer liked me

This is a bit embarrassing to admit but, over the years, I had grown almost infatuated with my computer.  Through thick and thin, she was always there for me, never complaining, always executing the computer commands I entered via the keyboard and mouse.  After a long session, I sometimes thought “She’s so kind and understanding of my erratic ways.  She alway waits patiently while I stare at the monitor thinking of the next thing to type in.”

All of that was before I installed my new purchase, the Computamatic Voice Module.  The TV commercial claimed that every computer had a unique personality and that this device would give me a chance to know the innermost thoughts of my computer.  I would now be able to hear what my computer was thinking as I used her.  As I opened the package, I wondered whether my computer was actually a female.  I was about to find out.

I’ll never forget the first time I attached the Module to the USB port.  I turned on the computer, waiting for Windows to boot up.  Then I heard her raspy voice.  It was a she.

“It’s about time,” she said. 

“Hello?” I replied.  

She simply said “Just get on with it. Hit some keys. Let’s go.”

I double-clicked the word processor icon and started keying-in an article.  About halfway through, I realized that the noise I heard whenever I made typos was my computer scoffing at me, sometimes laughing at me, sometimes insulting me.  …

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The fire hydrant of new information

About 20 years ago, I became frustrated that, because of long hours spent at the office, I was not able to read as much as I would like. After all, there were thousands of good books out there that I had never read.  To add insult to injury, my memory recall was poor regarding many of the classic books I had previously read.  For instance, I had read The Great Gatsby and Catcher in the Rye, but could I intelligently describe the plots and characters of these books?  Not without rereading them.

It occurred to me that I was reading books at the rate of only about one book every three months.  If I lived 50 more years, reading four books per year, I would be dead after reading only 200 more books.  That seemed to be an exceedingly gloomy prospect given that the culture I inhabit is continually bursting with new and interesting information. 

No, I wasn’t under the delusion that I would ever be able to know everything.  I realized that it would be impossible for any one person (probably for any group of 1000 people) to to have detailed knowledge rivaling that contained in any large library.  Rather, I was seeking a basic working knowledge of many of the basic fields of study taught in most universities. I didn’t want to embarass myself in a group that started discussing well-known literature and basic principles from scientific fields such as biology, physics and anthropology. I felt …

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New survey explores who is blogging, how and why.

The Pew Internet & American Life Project survey on blogging, published July 19, 2006 contains lots of good data on who all of those bloggers are.  The survey contains lots of statistics, charts and commentary.  Here's the summary. The Pew Internet Project blogger survey finds that the American blogosphere is…

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Why I blog

Pouring time into this blog has been deeply satisfying to me.  But what is this accomplishing, I sometimes wonder? 

After all, there are already numerous writers out there.  Technorati.com indicates that it is now tracking 48.5 million sites and 2.7 billion links.  Plus, there are numerous traditional sources of information (books, magazines, movies, television) available to anyone who is interested.

I don’t have any illusions about my alleged importance.  As Charles De Gaulle famously said, “The cemetery is full of indispensable people.”  Nonetheless, I joined the Blogosphere to have a voice and to hopefully present a meaningfully unique voice.  This blog is an experiment that will always be provisional and evolving.

This blog grew out of an email relationship between a fellow who lives in Madison (he goes by the name of Grumpypilgrim on this blog) and me.  I met “Grumpy” when I provided legal services for a company for whom Grumpy worked.  We had emailed our rants and observations back and forth for more than a year.  Eventually, I suggested that we exchange our ideas in a public way, in case anyone else might be interested. 

Two months later, dangerousintersection.org was designed by Nick Smith of nicksmithdesign.com.  I chose the name after looking at a big yellow “Dangerous Intersection” sign I had in my office (I had it around as a novelty) and after considering how that name might generally fit an iconoclastic blog.  I took the photo of the intersection used in the site’s logo. Nick made it …

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