I’d like to think I’ve mellowed, but lately I’ve succumbed
to the other side of old: disgruntlement. With all this unbridled hate based on skin color and now religion, from so many Americans, I have to hold back a loud
screaming, “A pox on all your houses!” Except that some houses are actually
worse than others, despite the fact that most of them claim to be God’s house.
Unfortunately God, in all his or her guises, has been
imagined re-imagined, co-opted, adopted, politicized, interpreted, and
reinterpreted to serve mankind’s baser instincts. The so-called “word” has been
translated into so many languages so many times no one really knows what was
intended, not even the folks who claim to have heard the word directly from
God’s mouth and transcribed it for posterity. Then again, what do we usually
think about taking advice from people who hear “voices?”
What’s going on here and around the world really is a battle
of the superheroes, each with their bands of often violent followers who demand
you believe in their made-up story, not the other guy’s. There has been and will
be torture and torment in nearly every land in the world because someone says
Mohammed is the greatest, another says Christ, another Buddha, another Ganesha
(my personal favorite).
Moses fits in there
somehow. And then there’s that whole Zeus-Jupiter dispute, not to mention sun
Gods, which kind of makes sense to me. And let me add: I think pantheists are
under rated too.
There is enough confusion just in Christian circles. When I
was growing up, I was curious about the seeming unexplainable. A Catholic kid who lived a couple of houses
away learned that my family was Lutheran and told me matter-of-factly that I
was definitely going to hell. Only Catholics went to heaven. I told a young friend of mine, an evangelical
Christian, what my other friend said and he told me to stay away from Catholics
because all Catholic schools had guns in their basements and planned to kill us
all when the time was right. In my formative years I went to various churches,
places where bodies were dunked in water, eventually sputtering, coughing,
choking to the surface suddenly saved or reborn. I could do that at home, in
the bathtub, I thought. I’ve always had an independent streak. I could save
myself, thank you. I listened to those souls who testified, in a state of mind
just short of a voodoo trance. In high
school, a group of us regularly met in a basement to discuss such matters
without resolution or agreement, but with mutual respect and the enjoyment of a
hearty discussion. In college, nearly
every night of my freshman year, often while playing euchre, was spent discussing
the meaning of life, and sorting, with my friends, through various
philosophies, Eastern and Western. Despite my focus on theatre and journalism,
over the years I took elective courses in Western Philosophy, Buddhism and
Hindu. And like most folks of my generation, I dipped into the literature of
Hermann Hesse and Carlos Castaneda.
After sitting at a bar in Bloomington, Indiana with still
another group of intellectually curious friends, a young man whom I’d never met
and never saw again said that everyone searches for an epistemology. I asked
about him later and no one in our little group heard from him again. Perhaps he found his epistemology or perhaps
he went off on a search. A third possibility was that he thought the whole idea
was foolish and that his comment was far from an endorsement, more of a futile,
disappointing observation.
He may have been puzzled at the notion that we need a rulebook
at all.
At the time, I thought that by
epistemology, he meant people needed a set of rules to live by. Most religions
had them, it seemed. That would explain this extraordinary and to me silly
dependence on so-called sacred text, no matter in what part of the world, or
when it originated. Nearly everyone may be looking for the official rulebook,
the one that would guarantee him or her not only an afterlife, but a damn fine
one at that.
So imagine if you think
you’ve found it and you did your best to live by it, then someone comes along
and says you’ve been reading and abiding by the wrong rule book all your life
you are going to get pissed. Why not just try to live a good life?
You know how to do that. Do you really need a
book to tell you not to do harm to others?
There are more than 4,000 religions on earth, and more than
seven billion people, (a few more than can fit in a one-bedroom apartment in
San Francisco). So maybe we, at least here in the U.S.A., need to listen to our
founders who fled religious persecution and wanted religious freedom for all.
That’s who we are, as a nation. Work to protect all our freedoms and not be pro
one religion and anti-another. So believe what you will, live as you like as
best you can in just manner, and keep your
rulebooks to yourself.
Incidentally, “epistemology is the study of knowledge and
justified belief,” according to The
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
I was looking for
an epistemology, something that would give meaning to life, but something that
also made sense. Whoever he was, he was right, I think.
A final note: We, in the U.S., are approaching elections to
determine who will represent our interests at home and abroad. In the last
few days we have experienced a slew of candidates who seek office by tapping
into our fear and ignorance about other cultures and religions. They take advantage of world events, reshape
their meaning to ride the fear they have created. They skew statistics and
blatantly lie. Some would revisit the tactics of the Nazis used on certain
people they considered dangerous or inferior. Some would reinstate pre-Selma
voting laws that would prevent certain Americans from voting. Some would deny
full rights to minorities based on little more than unverifiable folktales.
Let’s put the bluster of modern–day Mussolinis to rest. Let’s keep the old-style Klan-inspired
segregationists a footnote to history. Let’s ignore those who believe this is a
nation that holds a single religious belief.
I don’t regard pride as something to seek, necessarily. However the United States of America should
be proud of being a melting pot of the world. It has been our single, most
outstanding accomplishment. It has been the source of our entrepreneurial
energy and the inspiration for invention. With the possible exception of native
Americans — and they likely came from somewhere else, only much earlier – we
are a nation of immigrants. Many colors,
many languages, many faiths. Let’s not get caught up in the cynical attempts to
scare us into hate and discrimination.
Happy Thanksgiving.
My favorite mainstream cop series was “Homicide, Life on the
Street” and its dark, cynical humor. I never missed an episode of “NYPD Blue,”
despite its complete lack of humor. I hoped I’d see Sipowicz smile – just
once. Nope. On the other hand, “Law & Order” wasn’t
as character-driven. It was issue-driven and compelling, largely because the
stories were “ripped from the headlines.” which meant covering timely, but more
important, controversial subjects, putting public issues on public display.
Sadly many of those early issues – the show premiered in 1990 – are still not
resolved and still under debate. The
repeats remain fresh. We’re not only caught up in the police procedural aspect
of the drama, but also the legal maneuverings that examine in dramatic fashion
the moral and ethical nuances of the crime. Sometimes the difference between law
and justice are painfully apparent. 
Personally, I’d love to see it. Unfortunately some of the actors are no
longer among the living. Jerry Orbach, Fred Dalton Thompson and Dennis
Farina have passed on. However, heavyweights Sam Waterson and Chris Noth
might be up for a brief revival, one more season to give the show the formal
farewell it deserved (it was axed abruptly) as well as set the record for the
most seasons for a prime-time dramatic series. Currently, “Gunsmoke” is tied with “Law &
Order” at 20 seasons each. To put the numbers in perspective, “Perry Mason” had
nine.
