Comments on: Sunday reading. http://pinkomag.com/2008/11/22/sunday-reading/ Hedonism + Activism Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:13:30 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: benwyskida http://pinkomag.com/2008/11/22/sunday-reading/comment-page-1/#comment-3029 benwyskida Sun, 23 Nov 2008 17:12:10 +0000 http://pinkomag.com/?p=2910#comment-3029 Oh Sandy you mean IT TAKES A VILLAGE. You are such a centrist clintonite. Oh Sandy you mean IT TAKES A VILLAGE. You are such a centrist clintonite.

]]> By: Charles London http://pinkomag.com/2008/11/22/sunday-reading/comment-page-1/#comment-3028 Charles London Sun, 23 Nov 2008 17:08:57 +0000 http://pinkomag.com/?p=2910#comment-3028 Thanks for the Slate article...that's kind of the thesis of the book I just finished: community makes things better (it doesn't have to be a religious community), though there's a caveat. The content of that community matters. This is where religion can play an important role as a set of organizing principles for a community based on one of the major premises of just about every religion: care for the other. Of course, too often, religion plays the opposite role. The Taliban, Mormons, right-wing settlers in Hebron, they care for some, but they wield their religious code to write people out and to destroy empathy. Ultimately, why religion works, I think, has something to do with assisting us in practicing empathy, a capacity it is all too easy to neglect. Hitchens' argument falls apart for me, because he has no comment on religion in itself, but on the failures of people to live up to it. Thanks for the Slate article…that’s kind of the thesis of the book I just finished: community makes things better (it doesn’t have to be a religious community), though there’s a caveat.
The content of that community matters. This is where religion can play an important role as a set of organizing principles for a community based on one of the major premises of just about every religion: care for the other.

Of course, too often, religion plays the opposite role. The Taliban, Mormons, right-wing settlers in Hebron, they care for some, but they wield their religious code to write people out and to destroy empathy. Ultimately, why religion works, I think, has something to do with assisting us in practicing empathy, a capacity it is all too easy to neglect. Hitchens’ argument falls apart for me, because he has no comment on religion in itself, but on the failures of people to live up to it.

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