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Author Topic: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'  (Read 2411 times)

Altair

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'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« on: March 25, 2014, 02:10:24 pm »
According to the World Congress of Families, a coalition of Christian anti-gay groups:

"At a time when Western governments are moving backward to a pagan worldview, Russia has taken a leadership role to advance the natural family."

So is the West turning pagan?

IMHO, kind of, yes, in that the idea that no one religion is the one true religion (and all the others are somehow counterfeit or wrong) is firmly planted in our increasingly multicultural Western societies. It's akin to the ancient pagan idea of many gods, or different peoples having different gods, without one necessarily invalidating the other.

Our secular culture and the idea of tolerance creates the space for many religions, rather than one; the preeminence of science makes it clear that none of our sacred stories are empirically true, therefore there's no objective reason to favor one over another. All this undermines the position of a single dominant monotheism.

Is this a distinctly pagan state of affairs?
The first song sets the wheel in motion / The second is a song of love / The third song tells of Her devotion / The fourth cries joy from the sky above
The fifth song binds our fate to silence / and bids us live each moment well / The sixth unleashes rage and violence / The seventh song has truth to tell
The last song echoes through the ages / to ask its question all night long / And close the circle on these pages / These, the metamythos songs

Sophia C

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #1 on: March 25, 2014, 02:21:00 pm »
Quote from: Altair;143607
According to the World Congress of Families, a coalition of Christian anti-gay groups:

"At a time when Western governments are moving backward to a pagan worldview, Russia has taken a leadership role to advance the natural family."

So is the West turning pagan?

IMHO, kind of, yes, in that the idea that no one religion is the one true religion (and all the others are somehow counterfeit or wrong) is firmly planted in our increasingly multicultural Western societies. It's akin to the ancient pagan idea of many gods, or different peoples having different gods, without one necessarily invalidating the other.

Our secular culture and the idea of tolerance creates the space for many religions, rather than one; the preeminence of science makes it clear that none of our sacred stories are empirically true, therefore there's no objective reason to favor one over another. All this undermines the position of a single dominant monotheism.

Is this a distinctly pagan state of affairs?

 
I think they're using 'pagan' to mean 'secular'. Which is how it's widely used on this side of the pond - don't know about on that side? It is a little irritating.
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Altair

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #2 on: March 25, 2014, 04:10:21 pm »
Quote from: Naomi J;143610
I think they're using 'pagan' to mean 'secular'. Which is how it's widely used on this side of the pond - don't know about on that side? It is a little irritating.


I can see that interpretation. My only problem with it is in the context of the quote: "Western governments are moving backward to a pagan worldview..." I don't think American conservatives consider secularism something of the past, but rather a threat to the future. They see the West's past as blessedly, hegemonically Christian, unless you go back before Christ, when the world was pagan--not so much without religion, but devoted to "false" pagan gods.

Maybe they see paganism as licentious, at the root of the bacchanals and "debaucheries" of ancient Greece and Rome? (And therefore anti-"family".) Oh, let's hope--that such deliciousness should be ours!
The first song sets the wheel in motion / The second is a song of love / The third song tells of Her devotion / The fourth cries joy from the sky above
The fifth song binds our fate to silence / and bids us live each moment well / The sixth unleashes rage and violence / The seventh song has truth to tell
The last song echoes through the ages / to ask its question all night long / And close the circle on these pages / These, the metamythos songs

Melamphoros

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #3 on: March 25, 2014, 05:01:40 pm »
Quote from: Altair;143631
I can see that interpretation. My only problem with it is in the context of the quote: "Western governments are moving backward to a pagan worldview..." I don't think American conservatives consider secularism something of the past, but rather a threat to the future. They see the West's past as blessedly, hegemonically Christian, unless you go back before Christ, when the world was pagan--not so much without religion, but devoted to "false" pagan gods.


I'm not sure if most fundamentalists can tell the difference between secularism and Pre-Christian worldviews.  I mean, irreligion is irreligion...you expect there to actually be nuance?

Quote

Maybe they see paganism as licentious, at the root of the bacchanals and "debaucheries" of ancient Greece and Rome? (And therefore anti-"family".) Oh, let's hope--that such deliciousness should be ours!

 
One can only hope...


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SunflowerP

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #4 on: March 26, 2014, 01:35:18 am »
Quote from: Altair;143631
I can see that interpretation. My only problem with it is in the context of the quote: "Western governments are moving backward to a pagan worldview..." I don't think American conservatives consider secularism something of the past, but rather a threat to the future. They see the West's past as blessedly, hegemonically Christian, unless you go back before Christ, when the world was pagan--not so much without religion, but devoted to "false" pagan gods.

Maybe they see paganism as licentious, at the root of the bacchanals and "debaucheries" of ancient Greece and Rome? (And therefore anti-"family".) Oh, let's hope--that such deliciousness should be ours!

 
Parse Naomi's use of 'secular' as 'apart from God' or 'turned away from God' - that's how many conservative Christians understand secularism (I'm not sure if this is how Naomi meant the word when she chose it or not, but all this is something I've been thinking about a lot in re conservative Christian uses of the word 'paganism', so it's the lens through which I saw her post). That understanding is further developed in context of viewing the Old Testament, particularly Genesis, as mythic history (this isn't limited to biblical literalists; someone can recognize it as metaphor, allegory, poetry, 'making a good story of it', etc, and still apprehend it as cosmic truth, and beyond that as having an accuracy that stands even in the face of contradictory archaeology).

In that context, monotheism is the original framework, and all polytheism, animism, secularism, atheism, etc - collectively 'paganism' - were later developments, the result of, as above, people 'turning away from God'. Some of the most entertaining stories in that mythos are about God's reaction to being turned away from (the flood, the Tower of Babel story, etc).

As I understand it, the development of this into a cohesive whole as mythic history in this way is relatively recent (I can't provide even guesses at dates, but I bet Naomi or Valentine can!), and has little if anything to do with how the same mythos works as Judaic mythic history - but it's an influential factor in the 'culture wars' now. I've come to the conclusion that, when conservative Christians rail against the increasing 'paganism' of Western culture, that's the sense they mean it in.

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #5 on: March 26, 2014, 08:02:47 am »
Quote from: Melamphoros;143638
I'm not sure if most fundamentalists can tell the difference between secularism and Pre-Christian worldviews.  I mean, irreligion is irreligion...you expect there to actually be nuance?

Bingo.  Also, I suspect what they are really saying is that western governments are no longer very keen on enforcing conservative positions on Christian social values by law. Which (to them) means they are now "pagan".
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MightyAntler

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #6 on: April 26, 2014, 05:49:25 pm »
Quote from: RandallS;143682
Bingo.  Also, I suspect what they are really saying is that western governments are no longer very keen on enforcing conservative positions on Christian social values by law. Which (to them) means they are now "pagan".

 
I found more detail on the statement on Right Wing Watch. The WCF considers any view that does not champion the nuclear family, anti-abortion, and the innocence of children (whatever that means to them) to be "pagan." It could be that they associate the very word pagan with the slanderous stories in the Hebrew Bible about the religions of the neighbours of the Israelites. They may not have Hellenismos or Ásatrú, for example, in mind.
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Altair

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #7 on: April 26, 2014, 10:04:19 pm »
Quote from: Djaty;146260
I found more detail on the statement on Right Wing Watch. The WCF considers any view that does not champion the nuclear family, anti-abortion, and the innocence of children (whatever that means to them) to be "pagan." It could be that they associate the very word pagan with the slanderous stories in the Hebrew Bible about the religions of the neighbours of the Israelites. They may not have Hellenismos or Ásatrú, for example, in mind.

Yeah, as others have noted, I definitely give the conservative Christians too much credit, presuming that they're using the term "pagan" in any sense we'd understand it.

But then, on the other hand, there's this:
http://truthxchange.com/
« Last Edit: April 26, 2014, 10:04:52 pm by Altair »
The first song sets the wheel in motion / The second is a song of love / The third song tells of Her devotion / The fourth cries joy from the sky above
The fifth song binds our fate to silence / and bids us live each moment well / The sixth unleashes rage and violence / The seventh song has truth to tell
The last song echoes through the ages / to ask its question all night long / And close the circle on these pages / These, the metamythos songs

Darkhawk

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #8 on: April 26, 2014, 11:37:31 pm »
Quote from: Altair;146268
But then, on the other hand, there's this:
http://truthxchange.com/

 
I skim down that and encounter "In the beginning, reflecting God’s Trinitarian image of difference in unity, human beings were made male and female" and go BUT IF TRINITARIAN WHY ONLY TWO?

... clearly I take their shit more seriously than they do and I don't take their shit seriously....
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as our ashes turn to dust
we shine like stars    - Covenant, "Bullet"

MightyAntler

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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #9 on: April 27, 2014, 12:39:42 am »
Quote from: Altair;146268
Yeah, as others have noted, I definitely give the conservative Christians too much credit, presuming that they're using the term "pagan" in any sense we'd understand it.

But then, on the other hand, there's this:
http://truthxchange.com/

 
Sorry if I seemed to re-emphasize what other readers posted. Really just wanted to show Randall that what he suspected was accurate. :)

The authors of that website have an odd dichotomy that Christianity is theistic while Neopaganism is monistic. *scratches head* Heh. I guess that means only Christians can be polytheists!
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Re: 'The West Is Reverting to Paganism'
« Reply #10 on: April 27, 2014, 07:34:35 pm »
Quote from: Altair;146268
Yeah, as others have noted, I definitely give the conservative Christians too much credit, presuming that they're using the term "pagan" in any sense we'd understand it.

But then, on the other hand, there's this:
http://truthxchange.com/

 
They're aware neoPagans exist, and have a hazy, superficial, but not completely inaccurate notion of one flavor of cosmology that's middlin' common, though far from universal, among neoPagans (and others who aren't neoPagan, including some atheistic folks); see 'hazy and superficial'). Contrariwise, they appear to have less awareness of, or less knowledge of the theology/cosmology of, quite a few other nonChristian religions, as Djaty points out.  (Or they're disingenuously framing their stuff that way.)

Honestly? It just looks to me like the exact same thing I described in my post above, but made - slightly - more sophisticated by aligning the nonChristian side with very basic NeoPagan 101 FAQ stuff.

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