The Liminalist # 221: Faith & Liminality (with Extrapedestrian)

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Part One: Tests of Faith (0 – 14 mins)

Raised as a Southern Baptist, insistence on historical reality, honors society test, a lesson in humility, tricking the mind, the hallmark of evangelical Christianity, a conversion experience, the surrender principle, choosing to believe.

Part Two: Jesus & Santa (14 mins – 41 mins)

Belief and faith, a feedback mechanism, learning prayer through mimesis, faith and action, being saved by a social contract, self-hypnosis of a group, doctrine as means vs. doctrine as end, mistaking map for territory, flight anxiety, the Lord’s prayer, cultural Christians, Santa & Jesus, the benefits of being tricked, tricking ourselves, the law of attraction appliance of religion, getting up on the cross, Job & tuning into the eternal, when God chose to be human.

Part Three: The Trick of Spirit (41 mins – 1 hr 11 mins)

Belief in Jesus, the first but not the only, how God becomes immanent, an amnesiac aspect of God, the shadows of Christianity, you are all gods, belief without understanding, the goodness of God, belief in George Washington, liminality & faith, looking within, embodying truth, running simulations, being a worthless sinner, old age and death, souls with God, beliefs that generate obsession, stuck in humility, original sin, intentional dishonesty, Eve’s screw-up.

Part Four: Easy Jesus (1 hr 11 mins – 1 hr 35 mins)

Adam & Eve, the remedy for shame, the erasure of sin, the imagery of Hell, asking the wrong questions, Rene Girard, a resonant text, exposing the scapegoat mechanism, Christ talking to Satan, the Accuser, Peter’s faux-pas, the temptation of power, the ease of Jesus, the lesson of the life of Christ, willingness to be crucified, letting the Holy Spirit speak, negative coping strategies, the materialist viewpoint, faith that contains nihilism, the prisoner of infinity.

Part Five: Home in Eternity (1 hr 35 mins – end)

Hearing about eternity, Talking Heads’ Heaven, eternal moments, sacred time, two lives, what’s at home in eternity, a one-way bridge, cycles of reincarnation, what the mind can & cannot comprehend, God the body sensation, Santa as Satan-God hybrid, the spirit of Christmas, revelation of the method, Christmas music, a civic religion, solstice & rituals of hope, Elvis the King.

Outtakes (5 mins):

On Jan Irvin, conspiracy podcasts, acknowledging confirmation bias.

Songs: “Pirates” & “Patience” by Entertainment for the Braindead;  four songs by Extrapedestrian; “Change” by Short Hand.