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Spirituality Center for Naturalism Naturalism.Org Philosophy Applied Naturalism | |
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Spirituality |
Although naturalism may at first seem an unlikely basis for spirituality, a naturalistic vision of ourselves and the world can inspire and inform spiritual experience. Naturalism understands such experience as psychological states constituted by the activity of our brains, but this doesn't lessen the appeal of such experience, or render it less profound. Appreciating the fact of our complete inclusion in nature can generate feelings of connection and meaning that rival those offered by traditional religions, and those feelings reflect the empirical reality of our being at home in the cosmos. Some external resources on naturalizing spirituality are here. A sampling of content: No Hindrance: Emulating Nature in Service to the Self - how mindfulness meditation can help in achieving acceptance - original version written for The Pragmatic Buddhist, newsletter of the Center for Pragmatic Buddhism. Spirituality Without Faith - explores the spiritual possibilities inherent in naturalism, and how these compare with traditional approaches to spirituality. Enlightenment: Myth and Reality - an imagined dialogue in four parts about naturalizing the enlightenment experience, by Paul Breer, author of The Spontaneous Self. Reason and Reverence - a review of William R. Murry's fine book on humanistic religious naturalism. Debunking Enlightenment - a review of John Horgan's Rational Mysticism: Dispatches from the Border Between Science and Spirituality. ~ Chet Raymo's excellent book, Skeptics and True Believers, gets reviewed here. Here's a taste: "To admit that we are matter and mechanism is to ground our selves in the wholeness of the cosmos. In the new physics, self coalesces from the stuff of the stars, exists briefly,... then flows back into wholeness. Such a concept of self can be ennobling, cosmic, ecological—more so than the ghostly spirit soul I encountered in freshman theology.... To understand that we are structurally no different from the rest of the cosmos is to let ourselves expand into infinity." ~ Ursula Goodenough's The Sacred Depths of Nature, a must read about religious naturalism.~ Institute for Religion in an Age of
Science (IRAS)
~ Center for Pragmatic Buddhism - a group that's modernizing Buddhism to become more naturalistic. ~ ThinkBuddha.Org - a very thoughtful blog by a philosopher-Buddhist. ~ Humanist Contemplative Club - modeling an experiential and interpersonal approach to existential concerns. ~ On
religious atheism - not the oxymoron it
appears. *********
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