The U.S. State of North Carolina is just one place where the trend of couples having a humanist wedding ceremony has been taking off. Wilmington couple Mike and Amanda Holowaty, who are atheists, wanted to celebrate their lives together without invoking a deity, but their families, who belong to traditional faith groups, were not so certain: Amanda’s family is Methodist, while Mike’s grandmother is Eastern Orthodox. They compromised, knowing that they could find a wedding minister through the Humanist Society, and the result was an apparent success. “Nobody seemed to notice that we didn’t mention God,” Holowaty told The Washington Post. “People came up afterward and said it was one of the best weddings they’d seen.”

Make Yourselves Known

Non-religious ordination has been on the rise. The new services are a response to the growing demand for nonsectarian ministers resulting from the rising number of “nones,” or people who are not affiliated with any religion. As it happens, many humanists who become ordained ministers do so through the ULC.

The problem for these groups, says Amanda Holowaty, is one of exposure. Many people are still unaware that there are ministers can perform a secular wedding ceremony, because advertising for these services is largely lacking in the humanist community: most of the ministers listed on the Humanist Society Web site lack a personal site. “As soon as you do the advertising, people are like, yeah, I want that,” said Florida humanist writer and blogger Jennifer Hancock, according to The Post. “When I got married, I was worried. I didn’t want any religious references in my wedding because I didn’t want to start out the most important relationship of my life with a lie.” For marriage celebrants like Hancock, who want the benefits of a wedding ceremony without the religious trappings, all that is needed is a better advertising strategy.

Wedding ceremonies are not just for the pious—secular humanists (who are not always atheists) can throw weddings too, because everybody has the right to celebrate the loving union of two people. Why, then, should those who do not belong to a traditional faith group settle for a minister who fails to represent their values? As Hancock said, to do so would be to lie. For this reason, the rise of the humanist wedding industry fills a much-needed gap, and we as Universal Life Church ministers can be happy for people like the Holowatys.

Source:

The Washington Post

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The case was brought forth in an attempt to show that a wedding was void based on state requirements for officiants. This challenge was not brought by a clerk of the court, or any other government official. Instead, the plaintiff was a husband attempting to dodge a divorce hearing wherein his wife may be granted equitable distribution of marital property. Though he is now charging that he was never married, he has reaped the tax benefits of a “married” status with the I.R.S. for five years.

The courts had upheld the status of the ULC in the past, but the judges in this case felt new scrutiny was required to determine the ruling. Indeed, some have been unclear on the validity of these weddings, including the New York Times in an article published late last year, and it is good to see the matter finally laid to rest.

The ULC Monastery is a Legal Church

In his complaint, the plaintiff emphasized the unconventional way in which the ULC ordains its members, and alleged that the group does not have a physical place of worship. He also claimed that the ULC does not have a distinguishing system of belief, or is not “faith-based.”

These claims were all refuted by the court. In his opinion, Judge Peters stated that “it is not the role of the courts to question the ULC’s membership requirements or the method by which it selects its ministers.” What the court does have an interest in determining is whether the ULC violates the Religious Corporations Law by not having a physical campus nor unique system of belief. It was shown that the ULC Monastery actually does have several physical churches, including in New York, and that unique beliefs have been advocated for by the group since its inception. As such, the plaintiffs claims were unfounded and dismissed.

Now that the question of ULC validity in the State of New York has been answered, the Monastery’s legal team is affixing its gaze on Virginia and Pennsylvania, where the matter is somewhat unresolved. Church leadership will continue to fight for the legal rights of its members, ensuring that states do not violate the Constitution. Freedom of religion is paramount not only to the Universal Life Church, but to the United States as a nation.

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The term interspirituality, according to McEntee and Bucko, was coined by Brother Wayne Teasdale, a Catholic monk who decided to become ordained as a Christian sanyaasi, or Hindu monk. In his book The Mystic Heart: Discovering a Universal Spirituality in the World’s Religions, he writes that “[t]he religion of humankind can be said to be spirituality itself, because mystical spirituality is the origin of all the religions,” adding that “interspirituality—the sharing of ultimate experiences across traditions—is the religion of the third millennium,” and that “[i]nterspirituality is the foundation that can prepare the way for a planet-wide enlightened culture”. Already, strains of Brother Teasdale’s interfaith message can be found in our message as ministers who become ordained online.

Dr. Kurt Johnson, an evolutionary biologist and former Anglican monk, has expanded upon this concept of an “interspiritual revolution,” posing questions for ULC ministers about how their work might dovetail with this emerging movement. Together with David Robert Ord, Johnson trace the lineage of the interspiritual revolution using an evolutionary model in the book The Coming Interspiritual Age. Bringing together world religious traditions as well as findings in cognitive science, consciousness studies, anthropology, and developmental history, they describe a natural phenomenon that has its roots in the Big Bang and has developed over time as different manifestations of one common mystical pursuit. For Ord and Johnson, the evolution of the species is propelled forward by the world’s religious traditions, which form one movement.

Not everyone will embrace this model of spiritual evolution with open arms, however, and both theists and atheists have arguments for rejecting it. The reductive materialist argument against the existence of a spiritual dimension to reality is perhaps most obvious among these, but other people are circumspect about the idea of spirituality becoming untethered from religion. Without the rules and structure of formal religion, they argue, spirituality becomes reduced to an exercise in self-centeredness and hedonism. But religious orthodoxy is also notorious for its concern with money and power, while young, spiritually “progressive” individuals enjoy a reputation for showing compassion towards historically marginalized groups and people who are different from them. We must then ask ourselves whether this interspiritual movement represents our values.

The revolution described by Teasdale and later by Johnson and Ord acknowledges the validity of religious pluralism as well as the pursuit of spiritual enlightenment common to all religious traditions. In doing so it has earned the derision of materialists and religious traditionalists alike, but many of us will find it overlaps comfortably with our own values, and with many of the elements of our vision and mission as Universal Life Church ministers. Part of this mission, after all, is to “do that which is right”, so long as this harms no one, and to recognize that “we are all children of the same universe.”

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The Most Rev Justin Welby, who was made archbishop in March, decried the separation of religion from public life, arguing that reality television can help give us a deeper sense of purpose in life. “[R]eality can often mean people putting their lives on hold, flying off to a desert island, and taking part in bewildering challenges,” he said, “[b]ut there is another kind of reality broadcasting—one that I think delves far deeper into the questions of who we are, what we are, and why we are”. He opined that as long as television broadcasters subscribe to the notion that religion should be a private affair rather than integrated into the public sphere, we are heading down a “dangerous” road—perhaps toward greater religious intolerance.

An Inside Look

To avoid this path, Welby said, we need to cultivate greater religious tolerance by embracing popular media rather than eschewing it as a crass, low-brow outlet for entertainment-starved youth. Reality television can serve as a tool to shed light on the everyday goings on in the lives of the faithful, he explained, and television producers are already exploring this form of educational entertainment: “It’s essential that we support broadcasting that teaches us about those around us. The marvelous portrait of Manchester’s Jewish community in ITV’s Strictly Kosher is one example of how the media can help us to see the people around us as they really are”. Welby also cited the Channel 4 film Islam: the Untold Story as “an opportunity to appreciate the rich and fascinating history of the Muslim faith”. Incidentally, it is the kind of interfaith dialogue Universal Life Church ministers already widely support.

But what would the archbishop’s proposal mean for organizations like the Universal Life Church Monastery which allow people to become ordained ministers online? Hypothetically, it could be a boon for Internet churches. A reality television program about online ordination would not only help to demystify the practice for the average person and answer many of their questions about how to become an ordained minister, but it might also help to break down prejudicial barriers to understanding as well as draw attention to legal issues surrounding sacerdotal rights and religious freedom.

It might seem strange that the leader of the Church of England should recommend reality television as a platform for religious education, but he gives a couple of good reasons: it would cast a reflection on who we are as human beings, and it would help nurture tolerance and understanding in a world rocked with religious strife. In addition, it might help the average layman better understand the plight of ministers ordained online.

What do you think? Should the private lives of the religious be made the subject of reality television programs?

Source:

The Independent

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When Newman asked the world-renowned peace advocate if he would be happy with a woman successor, he answered, “I think [it would be] good because you see, biologically, female[s] have more potential to develop affection or love to other [sic]”, and pointed out that “some scientists, they tested two person, one male, one female looking at one sort of movie. Female [was] more sensitive: response is much stronger. So therefore…now we are 21st century…female have more potential so should take more active role regarding promotion of human compassion [all sic].”

One problem with this argument is the assumption that the participants’ responses were a product of biological hardwiring of their genders and discounts the possibility of idiosyncrasies. For example, just because Jane responds more strongly than John to images of a car crash does not mean Jane is hardwired to be more sensitive—it might simply mean she experienced a car crash once, which is not a product of hardwiring. Similarly, just because a woman responds to a scene in a movie more strongly than a man does not mean she is more sensitive than he—it might simply mean that she has been encouraged to show her feelings while the man has been trained to hide his. This is not a product of biological hardwiring either. Additionally, two participants hardly constitute a representative sample, and even if hardwiring could be proved, it does not make it right, since natural does not equal right.

Compassionate Men

 Besides, empirical research does challenge the Dalai Lama’s assumptions about sex differences. In their book Same Difference: How Gender Myths are hurting Our Relationships, Our Children, and Our Jobs, Rosalind Barnett and Caryl Rivers explain how, when playing a computer game of “bomb the enemy”, women showed as much aggression as men when they knew they were not being observed (p. 136-7); Barnett and Rivers also cite national survey data and their own study of dual-earner couples which showed that men are spending more time with their children, giving them cough medicine, taking them to soccer practice and daycare, etc. (p. 207). In her book Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference, neuropsychologist Cordelia Fine shows that there is no significant sex difference in how amniotic testosterone affects capacity for empathy (p. 108-9); furthermore, testosterone levels do not appear to lessen nurturing instincts in male primates (which include humans); rather, local social attitudes do ( p. 126-7). This should not be happening if, as His Holiness suggests, males are naturally more caring than females.

The Universal Life Church Monastery is happy to learn the Dalai Lama approves of a female successor, but should it be for the reason he gives? Compassion is a key component of our humanity, so arguing that a woman should be Dalai Lama because women are more compassionate than men implies that women are essentially more humane than men. It sends the message that kindness is good, but you should expect less of it from men.

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In her article, Tarico unearths some rather unflattering evidence of the treatment of patients in Mother Teresa’s facilities. Tarico quotes her as saying, “There is something beautiful in seeing the poor accept their lot, to suffer it like Christ’s Passion. The world gains much from their suffering”, and cites an anecdote in which she tells a dying cancer patient, “You know, this terrible pain is only the kiss of Jesus—a sign that you have come so close to Jesus on the cross that he can kiss you”, to which the patient responds, “Mother Teresa, please tell Jesus to stop kissing me.” Tarico also notes that doctors have described the nun’s facilities as “deficient in hygiene, care, nutrition, and painkillers”, enough to cause a former volunteer to establish a counter-practice in Kolkata, called Responsible Charity, which employs medical professionals to look after patients. The picture which emerges is of a person who almost exults in sado-masochism, a trait which most who people become ordained ministers would hardly call humanitarian.

Despite these ugly discoveries, euhemerizing Mother Teresa might prove useful for the Catholic Church, which has suffered from an image problem in recent years due to child abuse scandals and opposition to reproductive rights and equality. Hope for a revitalized Church with the election of Pope Francis I might be bolstered by a sanitized treatment of the famous nun. “What could be better than beatification followed by canonization of [Mother Teresa] to revitalize the Church and inspire the faithful, especially at a time when churches are empty and the Roman authority is in decline?” Tarico asks, quoting a group of Canadian scholars who, after conducting research on altruism, unearthed documents revealing Mother Teresa’s dubious medical ethics, financial practices, and political connections.

But for Universal Life Church ministers, this campaign of religious revitalization is insufficient justification for the anguish experienced by those who suffered excruciating mental and physical pain under Mother Teresa’s care. As the famous Serenity Prayer asks of God, “[g]rant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference”, yet Mother Teresa didn’t make this distinction. This fetishization of pain for redemptive or purgative purposes trivializes the horrible experience of pain itself, treating it as a means to an end when in reality the end should be to eliminate it.

To be certain, there are countless compassionate Catholics round the world who would be shocked to discover the doctrine of masochism taught and lived by Mother Teresa, who was only one person. It is our duty to recognize and praise these caring and compassionate human beings as well as expose practices which condone pain and suffering. This is a key part of what it means to be “children of the same universe” and to “do that which is right”.

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Dean Saxton, also known as Brother Dean Samuel, makes regular appearances on campus to give ad hoc church sermons on the school’s Mall in front of Heritage Hill and the Administration building. For Tuesday’s sermon, Saxton—a third-year student of classics and religious studies—voiced his discontent with the way many young women dress on campus. Holding up a sign that said “YOU DESERVE RAPE”, he argued that women who dress immodestly should not be surprised if they are targeted as potential victims of sexual assault. “I think that girls that dress and act like it,” Saxton said, “they should realize that they do have partial responsibility, because I believe that they’re pretty much asking for it.” He argued that “if you dress like a whore, act like a whore, you’re probably going to get raped”. The sermon also drew angry counter-protesters holding signs that said things like “YOU DESERVE GRAPE” and “Nobody deserves rape”.

Almost immediately, the school’s Dean of Students Office received piles of handwritten complaints, emails, and telephone calls about Saxton’s sermon, according to Kendal White, interim Dean of Students. The fracas centered mostly on questions of free speech and student safety. White said Saxton’s behavior did not violate the student code of conduct because his language was general enough that he was not targeting or threatening a particular individual. Additionally, while the Dean of Students Office finds the sermon “vulgar and vile”, Saxton’s words constitute “protected speech” under federal constitutional law, said White after a university attorney was contacted.

Rape Culture

Saxton’s willingness to suggest women deserve to be raped for the way they dress reflects the strong undercurrent of misogyny present in what has been widely termed “rape culture”—a culture in which sexual assault is trivialized, minimized, tolerated, and even condoned. (The global movement Slut Walk has emerged as a counter-demonstration to these attitudes.) A common assumption among rape apologists is that the victim is partially responsible for being raped because she sends signals that she wants to be raped. The problem with this assumption, however, is that it is inherently illogical: it is impossible to want to be raped, because rape by definition means forcible or coercive sex, not consensual sex.

While Saxton technically enjoys the freedom to express his beliefs about rape, the Universal Life Church Monastery strongly condemns his message. It is the duty of ULC ministers and other ministers ordained online to defend victims of sexual violence and demand justice for perpetrators. Women do not mysteriously control men with their seductive “feminine wiles”, and men do not lack control over their sexual impulses. The only person responsible for rape is the rapist, for it is the rapist, not the victim, who consciously chooses to rape.

Source:

The Daily Wildcat

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In an attempt to lend his comment an air of venerability, Robertson relies on a slightly misquoted admonition attributed to former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who famously said, “[t]hose who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” For Robertson, the “crimes” of the Illuminati are being repeated in France and elsewhere:

It has been said that those who do not learn the lessons of history are doomed to live them again. To go back in history to the French Revolution, you find that there was a thrust spurred by the writing of a group called the Illuminati to destroy the family, to destroy the state, to destroy capitalism, to destroy the Church, and it was lived out in the blood of the French Revolution. Well, we have here the debate over same-sex marriage, but is it really just about marriage? Or does it go far beyond that, to destroying the traditional family and building a country without God?

In essence, he implies, the struggle to grant equal marriage rights to same-sex citizens equates with an assault on economic and religious freedom. Somehow, he manages to make a grand logical leap from legalizing a practice which conflicts with his beliefs to enforcing some anti-theistic agenda on Christians. But this is perhaps unsurprising, coming from Pat Robertson.

Reason and Equality VS Clandestine Manipulation

In reality, the Illuminati were probably a far cry from the frightening creature Robertson describes, and a group which some ministers ordained online might have admired. The original Bavarian Illuminati were a secret society founded in 1776 during the Age of Enlightenment to resist prejudice, superstition, political tyranny, and religious domination over public life, and to support gender equality and women’s education. Ironically, it was the Bavarian government, in league with the Roman Catholic Church, which suppressed and outlawed the Illuminati, and the group eventually disbanded in 1785.

If this is the true portrait of the dreaded Illuminati, is it really such an insult or an omen of evil for Robertson to compare supporters of the Illuminati to supporters of same-sex marriage? For modern secular humanists, it seems hard to argue with fundamental principles like gender equality, political integrity, religious neutrality in the public sphere, and an appreciation of science and reason as a tool for the advancement of civilization. These are principles which many ULC ministers hold. Supporters of marriage equality seem a little less terrifying, then, if indeed this is the sort of milieu from which they derive their inspiration.

Robertson tries very hard to instill fear and apprehension in his viewers, but the link he creates between same-sex marriage proponents and the Illuminati is not as foreboding as he suggests. Perhaps what he is really trying to say is that he dislikes the sort of principles that Enlightenment thinkers, and hence same-sex marriage proponents, stand for, namely: reason, fairness, and equality. But for Universal Life Church clergy, these things are indispensable components of our character.

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Understandably, the Boston bombings must have hit close to home for ministers ordained online in the United States, especially in New England, but the attack quickly brought people together. In a strong show of solidarity, bystanders rushed toward the scene, tearing down the fencing to help the injured as pools of blood stained the pavement. The search led local authorities to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus, where another standoff that led to the death of a police officer and one of the suspects until eventually authorities apprehended the second suspect, who was grievously wounded. The people of Boston rejoiced in their work—they had come together to mourn the death of innocents, seek out the perpetrators, and exact justice upon them for their cowardly act. Tragedy inspires the resourcefulness that enables us to deal effectively and promptly with mentally unstable, unpredictable individuals who show an utter lack of respect for their fellow human being.

But it also brings out the worst in people. Muslims were already telling themselves after the attack, “Please don’t let them be Muslim” when Heba Abolaban, a Muslim woman in a hijab, was allegedly accosted by a man in the Boston area who shouted at her, “F— you Muslims!” and “You are involved in the Boston explosions!” Although Abolaban was not a victim of the explosion, she was a victim of the xenophobic backlash against Muslims and Middle-Easterners—but people of the Muslim world are also victims of horrific acts of violence. Just nine days before the Boston attack, a NATO airstrike left eleven children and one woman dead in the Kunar province of eastern Afghanistan, yet barely a word on this tragedy was mentioned in American media. Why? Are death and violence any less tragic when the victims are perceived as different, or live very far away? As ordained clergy of a “Universal Life Church”, we should reflect deeply on this discrepancy.

The Reverend Susan Baller-Shepherd, a world religions professor, touched on these attitudes in a recent Huffington Post article. Reflecting on the Boston tragedy, she recalled telling a stranger as they watched the news, “I really hope it’s domestic, and not international,” expressing her concern that “if it’s international, there will be even more xenophobia.” (As it turns out, the suspects appear to be Chechnyan, only substantiating her fears.) Baller-Shepherd reminds the reader, however, that there are “people…who have exhibited ‘goodness undeterred’”, and that “these brave people, alive today, come from a variety of faith traditions”. As ULC ministers, it is our calling to prove her right and lead by example.

The Universal Life Church Monastery mourns the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings as well as the NATO airstrike in Afghanistan. If anything can be taken away from these tragedies, it is the opportunity to demonstrate that we can transcend prejudice and xenophobia and recognize our common humanity through acts of courage and compassion. We are, after all, “children of the same universe”.

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