Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site unc.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!duke!mcnc!bch@unc.UUCP (Byron Howes )
From: bch@unc.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: religious obsolescence
Message-ID: <6367@unc.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 4-Dec-83 17:15:46 EST
Article-I.D.: unc.6367
Posted: Sun Dec  4 17:15:46 1983
Date-Received: Mon, 5-Dec-83 04:55:11 EST
References: <2656@utcsrgv.UUCP>, <539@sbcs.UUCP>
Organization: University of North Carolina Comp. Center
Lines: 20

Religion is a matter of the heart, not the mind.  The most obvious reason
for observing religious laws and traditions is that in doing so, one bonds
oneself to one's forbears who observed the same laws and traditions.  It
is a matter of belief and identity and sacrifice for that belief and
identity.  I am sure that even those of us who are not Jews or Catholics
practice small familial rituals that we were brought up to observe in our
families, particularly in this time of seasonal observance.  My wife's
family continues to hang up stockings on Christmas eve, a ritual in which
I happily participate, even though we wind up filling them ourselves.
(Everyone *knows* there is no Santa Claus.  Right?  Well, maybe....)

I have gone to mass (fortunately years ago before folks decided it needed
to be relevant and in English), sat Seder, and like most of us -- observed
Thanksgiving.  Each of these things puts us in touch with something larger,
and probably more important, than our practical rational selves.
--

					Byron Howes
					UNC - Chapel Hill
					decvax!duke!mcnc!unc!bch