Updated! Which religion (or lack of) is the right one for me (or you)?

Today there was a confluence of events that had to do with spirituality and religion. The first was one of those stupid on-line polls and the other was the release (Washington Times story) of a report on Generation Y and faith sponsored by Reboot, a non-profit to encourage the traditions of Judaism for a modern age.

As is often the case when I read these types of reports, I find myself going, "Oh, I knew that," and "How interesting."

"This study is informed by three goals:

1. To ascertain how young people are coming to understand
   their religious identity;
2. To describe what their religious practices look like in
   this era of customization and change; and
3. To explore the ways religious identity informs the civic
   participation of today's youth. Throughout, we were careful to note that
   religious life does not operate in a vacuum and we embed the role religion in
   the context of their other concerns, such as finding a job or getting good
   grades in school."

The breakdown is that in Gen Y (18-25 year olds) 27% are Godly, 27% God-less, and 46% are undecided.

The Godly are becoming less focused on denomination though. They are more interested in expressing faith in more personal ways. They are diverse, only 7% reported friends being the same faith.

Gen Y members are more liberal that previous generational groups. They are not as engaged in politics though. But the Godly are more involved than the God-less or undecided.

It's an interesting report.

The results of my on-line survey are no surprise. I define myself as a searcher. I'm not happy as an agnostic, or atheist, or one of the saved. I'm like the teaser for the X-Files; I want to believe.

I am not sure what "Gen" I am. Depending on time and place I'm a Boomer, an X-er and a touch of Y. Religiously, I am a agnostic theist. I look at the world and say to myself, "Self, something wonderful had to have put all this in motion." Followed by, "Self, this place is a mess. Who would do a thing like this?"

---

You scored as agnosticism. You are an agnostic. Though it is generally taken that agnostics neither believe nor disbelieve in God, it is possible to be a theist or atheist in addition to an agnostic. Agnostics don't believe it is possible to prove the existence of God (nor lack thereof). Agnosticism is a philosophy that God's existence cannot be proven. Some say it is possible to be agnostic and follow a religion; however, one cannot be a devout believer if he or she does not truly believe. Which religion is the right one for you? (new version)

Update: UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute released another survey Wednesday. Their report expresses a view that young people are looking for spirituality but not religion. [Executive Summary]

Thank Goodness my kids are good looking

Researchers show parents give unattractive children less attention

A researcher at the University of Alberta has shown that parents are more likely to give better care and pay closer attention to good-looking children compared to unattractive ones. Dr. Andrew Harrell presented his findings recently at the Warren E. Kalbach Population Conference in Edmonton, Alberta.

Harrell's findings are based on an observational study of children and shopping cart safety. With the approval of management at 14 different supermarkets, Harrell's team of researchers observed parents and their two to five-year-old children for 10 minutes each, noting if the child was buckled into the grocery-cart seat, and how often the child wandered more than 10 feet away. The researchers independently graded each child on a scale of one to 10 on attractiveness.

Findings showed that 1.2 per cent of the least attractive children were buckled in, compared with 13.3 per cent of the most attractive youngsters. The observers also noticed the less attractive children were allowed to wander further away and more often from their parents. In total, there were 426 observations at the 14 supermarkets.

Harrell, who has been researching shopping cart safety since 1990 and has published a total of 13 articles on the topic, figures his latest results are based on a parent's instinctive Darwinian response: we're unconsciously more likely to lavish attention on attractive children simply because they're our best genetic material.

"Attractiveness as a predictor of behaviour, especially parenting behaviour, has been around a long time," said Harrell, a father of five and a grandfather of three. "Most parents will react to these results with shock and dismay. They'll say, 'I love all my kids, and I don't discriminate on the basis of attractiveness.' The whole point of our research is that people do."

###

Dr. Harrell is the executive director of the Population Research Lab at the University of Alberta. He can be reached at 780-492-4659 or aharrell@ualberta.ca.

---

See?

Social Security and you

I don't expect social security to be there for me in any significant way. And I believe that it's a bad thing as a whole. It's not the role of the government to make people save.

The thought process is that since Americans don't save voluntarily, if the feds don't make us save now, they'll have to pay for our upkeep after we have stopped earning an income.

My uncle John sent me the text of the following link. It contains an editorial originally in the Wall Street Journal. I have read it a few times now and, in all honesty, I need to read it a few more times. He thinks I'm much smarter than I am.

I'll let him introduce it:

"Below is an article in last weeks Wall Street Journal. I thought it was an idea that was likely to start getting some air time in Washington and appears to be a reasonable compromise on solving social security issues.

Like you, I'd like to have them pay what was promised. We all know that is mathematically impossible. This seems to be a workable solution. You should know about it.

Here's the deal, you are getting this email because you are likely to be asked one more time to solve a problem. Why? Because you are or will be successful. Hence, you are most likely to receive less from social security while others receive their promised benefits. The article below uses the term "progressive indexing". A fancy term for means testing. However, it takes from you in a way that is likely more palatable than raising taxes, currently or in the future, doesn't require the income limit to be raised beyond how Congress already changes the base, provides a workable solution to solvency, allows individual specific accounts and has much less effect on current deficits.
Enjoy.

Hope all of you are well. "

"When the late Democratic Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan was asked why he favored personal Social Security accounts, he liked to answer in two words: "wealth inequality." That insight is also driving a useful idea now being tossed into the reform debate -- "progressive indexing." More

The other link concerns "designer social security." The gist of it comes down to options.

• Pick when you want to retire.
• Pick how much you want as a benefit when you retire.
• Pick how much you want to invest now.
• Pick where you want to invest your money.

New York Post article.

I like the idea of choices. It makes the concept of paying for people that didn't think of the future more palatable.

"Today is a good day"

How many times have you heard this conversation?

"How's it going?"
"It's Monday."
Or "Thank God it's Friday."
Or "At least it's payday"

For years I heard people answer that question with those answers or not even pay attention to the question and respond with an "OK" in passing. I actually found myself doing the same thing more often than not.

One day I realized that I was tired of the life I was leading myself into. Part of it was probably related to hearing the Dave Ramsey radio program. When asked by a caller how he was doing he answered "Better than I deserve." He thought about his response.

So I decided to start doing the same thing and answering questions with real thought.

I decided to be positive. I started out by thinking about the things that were making my life less than it should have been. I found that my life was pretty good. I have an awesome family. A job I love. Friends. Leisure time. Hobbies. I have a good life. The things in my days that were negative were fleeting.

After some introspection, I found that amongst time with family, time working, time sleeping, and general crappy-ness, most of my day was good. Very little was THAT bad. Most days are good days.

Then I made an internal scale of days. A great day is a day that has a child's birth. Another great day was my wife accepting my marriage proposal. The terrible day on my scale is the death of my little sister. She was born on my birthday and was the best gift I ever got or will ever get.

I know it's possible to have worse days. I'm sure mine can't compare with some. But that's my current scale.

So now, when people ask me how I am doing or a related question, I stop and think about the day so far. I think about my expectations for the rest of the day. I think about my scale. And I answer, "Today is a good day."

It's amazing how many people stop after hearing that response. Then they ask me why. It's easy to find something that made today good. Some days it may be that I woke up alive again. I have days like that too.

I've been doing this for a few months now. And I am hearing other people say it now. And I am seeing people smile when they say it; when they hear it.

The real point is that I am reminded by my own response every time I say it.

I believe that today is a good day.