The vanguard among the intellectual radicals have been turning to Traditionalism, or Radical Traditionalism, in their attempt to deal with the decadence and degeneration of the West and the East. While I can understand their frustration it is based on a metaphysical error.
Where does the blame lie for the degradation? Those who blame our degradation on the loss of faith and tradition do not see where the faith itself played a big part in the decline. From Plato's time, and prior to that in Vedic and Babylonian times, what is called the Perennial Tradition began the Great Spiritual Blockade against the material world, and it was this great error from the start, ejecting of the Outward Path, which has led to the degradation of religion, art, and culture.
By the time Nietzsche declared that God is Dead, which influenced all the modern philosophers, religious influence had been greatly diminished. The fact that this metaphysical error was exploited by the enemies of Western Culture was secondary, although of course very damaging as well. Secular or non-Christian wills-to-power had an easier time kicking down a door that was already rotting. The only alternative there seemed to be to materialism-hating, life-hating religion was atheism, gross consumerism, or strict fundamentalism.
To bring back what has been lost, traditionalists and conservatives advocate going back to the same materialism-hating values and morals. No matter how clever and pedantic the religious scholars have been in trying to somehow include the world in their apologies (eg. better to marry than burn), the revealed traditions essentially hate the material world, and that is the great error.
What is needed to revive religion and culture is the theological materialism of the Evolutionary Christian Church (ECC), which retains the religion of our fathers in the Twofold Path, but redefines or revitalizes Godhood as the Zenith of Material Evolution. Tradition identified with the God Within of the Inward Path, but the Outward Path materially evolves to the Godhood first seen in the Inward Path.
Where does the blame lie for the degradation? Those who blame our degradation on the loss of faith and tradition do not see where the faith itself played a big part in the decline. From Plato's time, and prior to that in Vedic and Babylonian times, what is called the Perennial Tradition began the Great Spiritual Blockade against the material world, and it was this great error from the start, ejecting of the Outward Path, which has led to the degradation of religion, art, and culture.
By the time Nietzsche declared that God is Dead, which influenced all the modern philosophers, religious influence had been greatly diminished. The fact that this metaphysical error was exploited by the enemies of Western Culture was secondary, although of course very damaging as well. Secular or non-Christian wills-to-power had an easier time kicking down a door that was already rotting. The only alternative there seemed to be to materialism-hating, life-hating religion was atheism, gross consumerism, or strict fundamentalism.
To bring back what has been lost, traditionalists and conservatives advocate going back to the same materialism-hating values and morals. No matter how clever and pedantic the religious scholars have been in trying to somehow include the world in their apologies (eg. better to marry than burn), the revealed traditions essentially hate the material world, and that is the great error.
What is needed to revive religion and culture is the theological materialism of the Evolutionary Christian Church (ECC), which retains the religion of our fathers in the Twofold Path, but redefines or revitalizes Godhood as the Zenith of Material Evolution. Tradition identified with the God Within of the Inward Path, but the Outward Path materially evolves to the Godhood first seen in the Inward Path.
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