Fluidity and Religion

Published by

Clarissa

July 23, 2016

Religious people in major religions are much better suited to adapting to fluidity than those who don’t belong to a religious tradition. The Mormon colleagues I know, for instance, keep having to move a lot because that’s what academic lives are like. But wherever they go, they have an instant circle of new friends who share their basic beliefs, bring food, offer baby-sitting, and organize their social life.

The greatest hardship of a fluid life is loneliness and isolation. But religious people have that problem solved. From outdated, old-fashioned weirdos, they might just turn into the pioneers of successful fluid living. Rod Dreher’s Benedict Option may lose relevance even before the actual book is published.

Rate this:

14 responses to “Fluidity and Religion”

cliff arroyo

July 23, 2016

I had a name for that but I forget what it was….. travel that’s not really travel because the “traveller” spends most or all their time around people who are mostly like them just in different places.

And this also indicates that fluidity sucks for people like me, who don’t especially socialize easily (I can but it’s an effort that tires me out) and cannot pretend to belong to any religious community….

LikeLike

Reply
1. Clarissa
  
  July 23, 2016
  
  I’m the same about socializing. I can do it, I’m even great about it. People love me if I try. But it just wipes me out completely.
  
  Maybe I subconsciously sabotaged the nannies because it was very hard to have somebody in the house for hours.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
  1. Shakti
    
    July 23, 2016
    
    I’m the same about socializing. I can do it, I’m even great about it. People love me if I try. But it just wipes me out completely.
    
    That sounds classically introverted. I can adore someone and know them for most of my life but at some point I need alone time. Hanging out can be mutually reading books in the same room.
    
    LikeLike
    
    Reply
    1. Clarissa
      
      July 23, 2016
      
      Exactly. That’s introversion for you.
      
      Contrary to popular opinion, extroverts can be horrible at communication but they feed off it anyway.
      
      LikeLike
      
      Reply
cliff arroyo

July 23, 2016

It also occurs to me that this could plant the seeds of eroding individuality. This kind of life requires one to be first and foremost a groupmember in good standing.

Now that I think of it a lot of things going on in modern cultural/public life seem to be eroding the idea of indidividual subjectivity in favor of being a drop in some fluid pool….. yech.

LikeLike

Reply
1. Clarissa
  
  July 23, 2016
  
  Yes, the reason why people deify identity is precisely what you say: the terror of loneliness in a fluid world. To be honest, I’d rather they practiced religion than worshipped at the altar of identity because that’s so vacuous.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
  1. cliff arroyo
    
    July 23, 2016
    
    “I’d rather they practiced religion than worshipped at the altar of identity ”
    
    You think there’s a difference? I would tend to disagree. I think most of the evidence points the other way, especially for hereditary religions (that people practice mostly because that’s what their parents or their group does).
    
    LikeLike
    
    Reply
    1. Clarissa
      
      July 23, 2016
      
      Of course, religion is not a guarantee. But there is a chance of something meaningful and sincere in religious practice. The worship of identity, on the other hand, doesn’t even give a shadow of a hope.
      
      The Mormon fellow I’m talking about is somebody who is so clearly at peace, there’s light coming out of his head. And they are completely not preachy. I had no idea they were Mormons for a long time. I just thought they didn’t drink coffee for health reasons.
      
      LikeLike
      
      Reply
Z

July 23, 2016

You don’t need a religion to find a group of friends in a new place. I always look for hiking / Alpine clubs, ceramics studios, and certain kinds of environmental / political / civic organizations. Also foreign language classes (not in the language of the place I am, but in a language people like to study there and that I am also working on). You do meet people in these ways.

I also don’t think you need a retro religion to walk in spirit — religion most often limits / harms people. It is so much easier to be an illuminated being without that, with wisdom instead of dogma.

LikeLike

Reply
1. Clarissa
  
  July 23, 2016
  
  Maybe it’s regional, but where I live, people are so hard to draw out that the amount of effort needed to connect with them is simply too great. One can meet them, for sure, but they just sit there in complete silence. There should be something bigger than themselves forcing them to open up.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply
  1. Z
    
    July 23, 2016
    
    I wonder if it’s that way in the Arctic, or something like that. I’ve heard that people in Minnesota are this way.
    
    LikeLike
    
    Reply
    1. Z
      
      July 23, 2016
      
      And people in the Pacific Northwest are rather shy. Not introverted — shy.
      
      LikeLike
      
      Reply
DWeird

July 23, 2016

Okay, but is that really fluidity? If it’s primarily a cultural concept, then moving from one place to another with your social life and beliefs uncontested isn’t really fluid.

From what you described, these folk are definitely rigid, in a sense. But if that’s true, then ‘bits’ of cultural rigidity can survive and be more advantageous than total fluidity. That doesn’t really sit well with what I take to be your usual position, which is that fluidity and rigidity are both internally cohesive (work with an internal logic that’s unique to them) and mutually exclusive (don’t have any weird bits from the other one).

Has there been a change to your thinking on the matter?

LikeLike

Reply
1. cliff arroyo
  
  July 24, 2016
  
  “If it’s primarily a cultural concept, then moving from one place to another with your social life and beliefs uncontested isn’t really fluid”
  
  Nation states can and do put limits on the movement of capital. Relgions don’t.
  
  It’s true that formal institutions and those representing them may be financial players themselves and that organized religions might try to impose some kind of informal tax like tithing or zakat but they don’t erect trade barriers.
  
  LikeLike
  
  Reply