What does the Church of Reality do? What is it that we are about? Here is a quick overview of what we do using some of our own Terminology. These are the Seven Sacred Missions of the Church of Reality.
1. We believe in Reality - the way it really is! - If it's real - we believe in it. The Church of Reality is a Personal Commitment to the Truth. We Realists explore the universe together with our minds. We think about thinking. We wonder about wondering. We attempt to understand the Understanding of Understanding. We ponder the Great Questions. We are a curious people and we are bound together in our quest to know more.
2. We Spread the Sacred Message - Reality - Our mission is to promote reality in society. Every time we mention Reality we spread the Sacred Message. We are here to ask the Sacred Question - "What is Real?" in order to raise the status of Reality in society. We want people to consider reality when making important decisions. By spreading the Sacred Message we cause people to be Real in the Sacred Moment (which is Now). Our mission is to say "Reality" as many times as we can and to get other people to think about reality as often as we can. We introduce the Terminology of Reality into the Tree of Knowledge so that we have a common vocabularity to talk about reality in religious terms.
3. We Choose the Sacred Direction - Forward - The Sacred Direction is forward - onward and upward. Our Principle of Positive Evolution commits us to envision a future that is better than today. We are one planet and we are all in this together on our little ball in the universe. In order to answer the Sacred Question and explore our reality society must move forward. We take responsibility for our future and we commit to making tomorrow better than today.
4. We Honor the Tree of Knowledge - The Tree of Knowledge represents the sum total of all human understanding. It is what separates us from the animals. The Tree of Knowledge represents the soul of humanity. We are better than we were hundreds of years ago because our Tree of Knowledge has grown and if we continue to evolve in the Sacred Direction our Tree of Knowledge will continue to grow. It is through the tree that we explore reality as it really is and attempt to answer the Sacred Question - What is Real?
5. We Ask the Sacred Moral Question - What is Good? - The Sacred Moral Question is, "Is this a Good Thing?" What does "good" mean? That too is part of the Sacred Moral Question. We believe in the principle of positive evolution and the sacred direction as well as the other Sacred Principles as a foundation for determining right and wrong. We believe that right and wrong are important concepts that deserve to be carefully considered in realistic terms. Often reality is ignored and no one asks if the decisions that are being made are a good thing. We believe that when reality is ignored and no one asks if the decision is good that we end up with bad results. We as Realists are dedicated to Asking the Sacred Moral Question so that we make better choices so we can move in the sacred Direction
6. We Issue the Sacred Challenge - The Sacred Challenge is a challenge to other faiths and religions to ask themselves - "How do we know that what we believe is real?" The Sacred Challenge applies first and foremost to this church itself. Our Principle of Self Scrutiny demands that we constantly audit ourselves to make sure we are not deluding ourselves. We consider Reality to be a sacred thing and there are many other who claim their beliefs to be real when it just isn't. Many people want to be good moral people and are trying to "do what is right" but what they think is right has never been put to the reality test. Our message to people of other faiths is - question everything - challenging your beliefs is a good thing. We ask you to fully understand what exactly you do believe. We therefore ask other faiths to adopt the Principle of Self Scrutiny, to ask the Sacred Question, and to encourage your members to challenge your beliefs on the basis of if it is actually real. We require our members to scrutinze us. We challenge you to match us.
7. We make it Happen - We are a religion that is an activist religion. We don't just find problems - we solve problems. We are committed to coming up with solutions and to take responsibility to bring the concept into reality. We make sure that the job is done right. We are a community and we do the work to make community work. We go out and learn and we try to understand and we spend a lot of time thinking and we give of ourselves for the connon good of all people. In the Spirit of the Tree - our shared knowledge - we support sharing. It is our duty to look around and figure out how to make it all work.
Dear Church of Reality Members,
There's a new virus spreading - I don't know what it is yet and it hasn't made the news. But I have observed several making it through the virus filter. The virus is an email attachment that clains to be a password file and has an attached document inside of a ZIP file.
If you are running windows you will see an attached file with a DOC.zip extension. Depending on tour windows settings you might not see the .zip on the end. So ......
Unless you are expecting the document and you look to see if its suspicious in any way - DO NOT OPEN THE FILE. If you are in doubt you can forward it to me.
Soon the virus definitions will update and the problem will be blocked.
Pass this warning on to as many of your friends as possible. Feel free to include it in your newsletter. And - you might want to do a special mailing about it.
I have been working a LOT lately with the Church of Reality web site. The Titles and Terminology page in particular:
http://www.churchofreality.org/terms.htm
I have doubled the number of definitions and I hav included far more detailed explanations of the Terms. But I have included new concepts not found in any other religion. These new concepts include terminology for understanding cult behaviour. I have included a number of tests and examples for people to determine if that are in a cult. For example - if you are "one of the chosen" - you are in a cult. I have included definitions that talk about being addicted to praise and Ego Masturbation that keep people plugged into the cult mind.
The world is becoming a cult and the time has come for the CoR to step out and make itself known. Adding this new material is a step in the process. I am still on track for our first radio campaign and I am in the process of crafting the message. For those who don't know - I used to own a couple of Computer Stores about 15 years ago and radio works. I've done this before and I think I can do it again.
The plan is for the radio to be self sustaining and leverage the Church into the news media. Get some interviews on bay Area newscasts and talk shows. And hopefully the word will spread. The plan is to get noticed by the other religoins and get people talking about the name and what it means to have a reality based religion. If it accomplishes no more that that it will have a huge impact at raising the status of reality in society.
So - that's the plan. Anyone want to help make it happen I'm always looking for ideas. Mostly at this point the mission is to spread the word. There's a new kid on the block and his name is Reality - and he's here to stay.
Dear Church of Reality Membership,
As you all know in last weeks election reality was a big loser in my opinion. I am very distressed with the results as it would appear that extremists are moving to take over America. More and more people are moving away from reality the way it really is and I am trying to come up with a specific plan to reverse that trend.
First - I would like to say that the idea of becoming a religious leader is not something I'm looking forward to. I would much rather spend my life writing spam filters and other useful software - but - as it turns out I'm a big picture kind of guy and it seems that I'm the one who needs to come up with a plan to move the Church of Reality beyond just being a website.
I have been thinking about this a LOT lately and I'm close to putting together a plan that I think is going to work. About 15 years ago I used to have a computer retail store called Computer Tyme and I was very successful with radio advertising. Additionally I used radio advertising to stop two sales tax issues in Springfield Missouri. So it's something that I know works.
For those of you who want some amusement - my old radio spots can be accessed from this link:
http://www.ctyme.com/ctymeads
In the next few weeks I'm going to write some spots and and have them produced. I hope to get several of them cut. The idea is to introduce Realism as a religion to the general public and point them to the web site where people cam make a donation. I'm thinking about starting off in the San Francisco and San Jose markets because I hope to reach more donors there. The idea is to be able to get enough donations to sustain the radio ad budget and have a permanent presence in the bay area and hopefully expand into other areas that really need it.
Once the ads are on the air it will hopefully grab the attention of the talk show hosts and the news media. here is this new church with a radical idea for a religion - like believing in what's real. The idea here is to get people to discuss it. I plan to design my spots to be sufficiently challenging to the religious community - to position Reality as competitive - and to get people to ask the Sacred Question - What is real?
There is a critical mass point where this makes it into the thought processes and takes on a life of it's own. The idea is to get everyone talking about reality - what is real - how do we know it? All I have to do - I think - is to break reality out of its shell and get it out there in a way that will spread in a self sustaining way.
I have done this plan twice before and it worked both times. In 1987 and 1992 in Springfield Missouri I was the opposition to a sales tax increase and I won both elections. What I did was to produce and buy a small amount of radio - then after running a few spots I called the three local TV stations to see if I was news. One of them interviewed me - and the next day the other two did as well. After being on 3 television stations the opposition felt threatened and they raised a bunch of money to oppose me. And ultimately it was their money and effort that informed the public that there was a controversial tax on the ballot and got people out to oppose it.
I think the same trick will work here. The idea is to get them talking about us - get them to oppose us - get them talking about how they relate to reality. And every time the word reality is said it ingrains itself into the group mind. I think the name Reality will act as an anti-cult message And I believe that we need to undermine the cults before they control the world.
Just today I signed up for a merchant account so people can now donate with a credit card. The donation page can be found at:
http://www.churchofreality.org/donate.htm
Someone give it a try and see if the Church of Reality can take a donation. I just sold a car and donated the money to the Church of Reality so I have a little stash of money to start this out with. We have $13,750 in the bank which isn't going to go far unless I am extremely efficient with it. So - if any of you like my radio plan and want to kick in some $$$ to help fund this project - I'd really appreciate it.
So - who likes this plan? And - who has some ideas for radio ads? Anyone want to get involved with this?
Marc Perkel
First One
Church of Reality