According to the pope we do.
What do you think?
Is (philosophical) materialism really that bad?
Do We Live In A Spiritual Desert?
by hamilcarr 8 Replies latest jw friends
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OUTLAW
No..The desert here,is real..So is the deer in the front window....What a beautiful animal!.............
...OUTLAW -
hamilcarr
Maybe it's a strange paradox that only after the fall of communism US capitalism has spread all over the world, by doing so introducing hard-edged materialism in countries like Germany, Russia and China (why not adding entire continental Europe).
Christian political factions have played an important role in this process. Is the pope's cry in the desert still credible?
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jaguarbass
I think I live in a spiritual desert. So I guess I will say we live in a spiritual dessert.
But I do see people go to church, And I see people go to AA. So there is an oasis if people can avail themselves to it and comprehend it.
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almostbitten
Let me share with you something that a practicing Buddhist wrote:
"Contrary to popular belief, the prevailing religion of America isn't Christianity, it's Individual Materialism. It's a system that endorses blind self-interest and urges us to look away from the suffering of everyone around us in favor of our own financial and material gain."
Angel Kyodo Williams, "Being Black: Zen and the Art of Living With Fearlessness and Grace." p.177
I am a non-affiliated Christian who likes to observe the world around me. I'm afraid this lady and the pope are on to something that didn't just happen overnight. If it makes you feel better, you can blame brother John Calvin for all of this. -
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lawrence
The pope and all the clergy (paid and unpaid) live in hells they create. A spiritual desert is a step up from their boogeymen and "dead men religiosities". No hell can be worse than what these self righteous hypocrits create. Jesus would be killed in every church today, and that says why these men feel the wasteland. They are the wasteland.
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WTWizard
I think the spiritual desert is that people have been taught that morality needs to be so complicated that only religions can explain them. Take down that mountain, and the desert would be no more.
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Satanus
Religion has very little to d spiritual, except maybe those that encourage introspection. I find no spirituality in the rat races that are called cities. That's not to say that many of those people aren't spiritually bent. It's the pressures of time, spaces, noise that squash the spiritual. As well, human manufactured things like steel, concrete, ashphalt are dead. That's not to say that there aren't human made things that exude spirituality. Stained glass windows, some grafitti, some old stone churches and other art forms reflect spirituality. Nature exudes the spiritual. However, predators ripping apart their prey is questionable.
S
...OUTLAW