"Party Boy" AndrewWK Explains Prayer to the Readers of the Village Voice

This is... well, it's thoughtful. Let me say that, it is another thoughtful essay from the Philosopher of Party.

But it's more than that. It's... and I don't want to say this, exactly, because in certain quarters, this is an insult, but it's cunning as hell.

The trick is here that he celebrates the power of prayer without mentioning God. He sells prayer to a secular audience claiming a secular rational for it, or, if not secular per se, a sort of gauzy Einsteinian/Deist rationale, a sort of Buddhist sort of view of the universe which an atheist would not be particularly frightened by.

You know: Foreign people are allowed to worship gods. It's their culture!

Now you might say, "What is the point of discussing prayer without mentioning God? That's not cunning; that's cowardice."

But, if his point is to evangelize, what he's actually doing is enabling the circumstances for a spiritual awakening while not unduly alerting his readers that that's his game. He's leading horses to water and letting them do what they will as far as thirst.

This guy is pretty smart.

He may be dangerous.

Thanks to @EsotericCD/JeffB and many other commenters and twitterers who've mentioned it.

posted by Ace at 04:15 PM

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