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A review by erine
Agnostic: A Spirited Manifesto by Lesley Hazleton
4.0
I had a moment of "soul" today, watching all the kids after working in the garden. A moment of being open to the world with a full heart. This moment came just after I finished reading Agnostic, a series of musings on the nature of faith, belief, conviction, and doubt. Her take on the necessity of doubt to any kind of faith - religious or otherwise - resonated deeply for me.
At first I was turned off a bit by the author's slight condescending tone, but as I continued reading it became clear that she wasn't really having a go at religion, but instead at fundamentalism. It's a fine distinction, but important, and she sharply criticizes dogmatic atheists as well. She hits on topics like death and the afterlife, the reality of doubt in science, and the essence of soul. Every so often she lost me in a lofty swirl of big words and complex concepts, but mostly it provided a lot to think on. Some bits that stuck out for me:
15 "Spare me your labels... Like so many others, I am tired of stale assumptions - of the demand that I choose sides..."
74 "...faith - and the vulnerability and humility that come with it - is the most important thing lacking in fundamentalists of all religious stripes... By insisting on absolute belief, they have found the perfect antidote to thought, and the ideal refuge from the hard demands of faith."
76 "The statements of science are not of what is true and what is not true, but of what is known to different degrees of certainty." (quoting Richard Feynman)
137 "What's wrong with dying?"
145 "By refusing to accept death - by seeing it as failure - both physicians and their patients act out the assumption that death is the enemy... as though being ill were not hard enough, it is often transformed into a trial of moral and physical endurance..."
158 "For myself, I have no intention of only half-living this life in anticipation of a hypothetical next one. I want to live my life as well and as fully as I can - in consciousness, in commitment, in full acknowledgment of its difficulties as well as its pleasures, its absurdities as well as its mysteries."
201 "Soul as a matter of courage? If so, it's not the obvious courage of a lauded hero, but the quieter, everyday kind of courage it takes to be open to the world... To live within fortified walls was to be constantly on the alert for possible attack; what was meant to make you feel safe also made you more conscious of how unsafe you might be."
At first I was turned off a bit by the author's slight condescending tone, but as I continued reading it became clear that she wasn't really having a go at religion, but instead at fundamentalism. It's a fine distinction, but important, and she sharply criticizes dogmatic atheists as well. She hits on topics like death and the afterlife, the reality of doubt in science, and the essence of soul. Every so often she lost me in a lofty swirl of big words and complex concepts, but mostly it provided a lot to think on. Some bits that stuck out for me:
15 "Spare me your labels... Like so many others, I am tired of stale assumptions - of the demand that I choose sides..."
74 "...faith - and the vulnerability and humility that come with it - is the most important thing lacking in fundamentalists of all religious stripes... By insisting on absolute belief, they have found the perfect antidote to thought, and the ideal refuge from the hard demands of faith."
76 "The statements of science are not of what is true and what is not true, but of what is known to different degrees of certainty." (quoting Richard Feynman)
137 "What's wrong with dying?"
145 "By refusing to accept death - by seeing it as failure - both physicians and their patients act out the assumption that death is the enemy... as though being ill were not hard enough, it is often transformed into a trial of moral and physical endurance..."
158 "For myself, I have no intention of only half-living this life in anticipation of a hypothetical next one. I want to live my life as well and as fully as I can - in consciousness, in commitment, in full acknowledgment of its difficulties as well as its pleasures, its absurdities as well as its mysteries."
201 "Soul as a matter of courage? If so, it's not the obvious courage of a lauded hero, but the quieter, everyday kind of courage it takes to be open to the world... To live within fortified walls was to be constantly on the alert for possible attack; what was meant to make you feel safe also made you more conscious of how unsafe you might be."