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Salvete,
I'm back for a while it seems. The National Guard weekend went fine.
But our apartment fell through. While I was away, my wife went to pick up
the keys and we would have been spending this weekend moving. However, upon
arrival she discovered the apartment had already been broken into! Some
local derelict had broken in through a window and had his sleeping mat on the
floor. He had also broken off the door of the washing machine. The police
have a good idea who he is thanks to the fingerprints, so we will see what
happens. He is a local crack addict.
Needless to say, we cancelled the apartment and are looking again for
another one.
I also managed to get scheduld for an interview with the county Sheriff's
Dept.
Gaius Lupinius Festus
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Salvete,
Many thanks to Pontiff Graecus for his post and quoteation from Cicero!
I'm not a religio practioner myself, and I tend to be a skeptic on matters
such as divination, as Ciciero himself was. I could briefly state my basic
views, without taking up space giving the reasons for these views, in the
following credo.
I believe...
1. Human beings have a limited capacity for what is called "free will". We
are not merely beings of matter, and we are not mere animals. We are
different not only in degree, but in kind from other animal beings.
2. That there is a non-material, non-physical being we can call God, which
brought the cosmos into existence and keeps it in existence. I do not
believe the material cosmos is eternal in it's own right. It is not a
necessary existence. Because of the philosophical principle known as
"Ockhams Razor", I have no compelling reason to believe that more than one
God exists.
3. Divination is troublesome. I tend to be wary of it's claims, but I do
not reject the idea a priori. The problem is it's vagueness. Being that I
accept free will, I of course reject divination if it is employed to "prove"
that all our actions and our ends are somehow predestined. Ultimate Fate is
a concept I reject.
4. The universe and it's contents, which include human beings, are not gods.
If one says that we are divine in the sense that we have roles within a
divine plan, or that we are valued by God, or that our capacity for free will
points to a certain "divinity" within human kind, than I have no problem with
this. Such a divinity however, is not ours by nature. We do not have it in
and of ourselves. It is bestowed on creation by the creator. But to say that
we are God/Goddess is an error, and the height of arrogance.
5. We do not "create" truth. We possess knowledge, or truth, when our
thoughts coincide with how things actually are. The old over-used adage that
"what is true for you may not be true for someone else" is error. If there
are no gods at all, or if there are more than one, then my belief in a single
deity is wrong. There is no "pluralism" of truth about it! The subjectivist
notion that truth is relative and that one belief is as good as another is
perhaps the lowest level to which Western Civilization has fallen. While the
holding of diverse beliefs may be protected under civil law, it is absurd to
think that beliefs are all equal in worth or truth.
That is, in a small nutshell, a summary of my views regarding religion.
Gaius Lupinius Festus
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