Understanding Religion Through Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle
The following is issued as a warning from the author
Kurt Vonnegut to the reader: "Any one unable to understand
how a useful religion can be founded on lies will not
understand this book either"(14). The latter quote is
typical of Vonnegut in his usage of creating a personal
narrative.
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. was born in Indianapolis, like many
of his characters, in 1922. His life from that point on
closely resembles the lives of the people in his satirical
novel Cat's Cradle. Vonnegut's mother committed suicide when
he was twenty two years old and in many of his novels the
character of the mother is dead. Vonnegut's "lifelong
pessimism clearly has its roots in his parents' despairing
response to the depression" (Allen 2). He was captured in
WWII and was present in Dresden, Germany when it was bombed
and set fire to, killing 135,000 citizens. This later became
the basis for Vonnegut's greatest success
Slaughterhouse-Five.
Cat's Cradle was published in 1963, and though it
wasn't as big a success as Slaughterhouse, it became widely
known as contributing to the "counter-culture" since it does
in fact question and counter almost every part of our
society's culture (Reed). One of the largest points of our
culture brought into question in Cat's Cradle is religion.
Vonnegut himself is a Humanist, meaning that he isn't sure
of the existence of a God, but values life above all else.
In his last novel Timequake, Vonnegut explains that he
understands that humans need religion as something to turn
to for comfort and suppo...
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Huber, Chris. The Vonnegut Web. 14 Feb. 2002. 25 Feb. 2002
http://www.duke.edu/~crh4/vonnegut/
Klinkowitz, Jerome. Vonnegut in Fact: The Public
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Reed, Peter J. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., Warner Books, 1972.
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http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/4953/vonn.html
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Publishing, 1988
Vonnegut, Kurt. Mother Night. New York: Fawcett, 1962.
Vonnegut, Kurt. Timequake. New York: Putnam, 1997
Religion is a pervasive theme in most of the literary works of the late Georgia writer Flannery O'Connor. Four of her short stories in particular deal with the relationship between Christianity and society in the Southern Bible Belt: "A Good Man Is Hard to Find," "The River," "Good Country People," and "Revelation." Louis D. Rubin, Jr. believes that the mixture of "the primitive fundamentalism of her region, [and] the Roman Catholicism of her faith . . ." makes her religious fiction both well-refined and entertaining (70-71). O'Connor's stories give a grotesque and often stark vision of the clash between traditional Southern Christian values and the ever-changing social scene of the twentieth century. Three of the main religious ingredients that lend to this effect are the presence of divine meanings, revelations of God, and the struggle between the powers of Satan and God.
In Stephen Prothero’s, Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know and Doesn’t (New York: HarperCollins Publishers Inc., 2007), 297 we discover the average American’s lack of religious knowledge. Prothero discusses religious illiteracy in three ways. How it exists, came to be, and just how to possibly solve this problem. Today religious illiteracy is at least as pervasive as cultural illiteracy, and certainly more dangerous. Religious illiteracy is more dangerous because religion is the most volatile constituent of culture, because religion has been, in addition to one of the greatest forces for good in world history, one of the greatest forces for evil. Religion has always been a major factor in US politics and international affairs.
Religion is a set of faiths or beliefs that is based around one or more central powers. Religion can take what is good and turn it to evil, especially in the case of the Taliban and crusades. Religion can be used for good as well, in the case of several modern day religions.
My father has always reminded me that religion plays a big role in one’s morals. Of course that only applies if a person is religious and has a religious background. There are a lot of religious people in this world, and if one were to ask them where their morals came from, they would say that it is based on their religion. So what is it that makes these two things so similar and distinct? Iris Murdoch, author of “Morality and Religion,” discusses how morals and religion need each other in order to work. Morals without religion is nearly impossible because; religion influences our morals, religion allows to set better morals for one’s self, and ideally morality is essentially religious.
Caregivers may often experience decreases in immune system functioning, as well as increases in blood pressure (Haley, 2003; Weitzner, Haley, & Chen, 2000). With patients in advanced stages of cancer, patients are more likely to exhibit signs of distress because of the ways in which advanced patients require increased care and support (McMillan, 2005). Overall, caregiving affects the physical health of caregivers because the consistency of providing self care to a family member can exhaust and strain the caregiver (Roberto & Jarrott, 2008; Schulz & Sherwood, 2008). Many predictors of the wellness of a caregiver depend upon the problems with the patients behavior, cognitive deterioration, and any disabilities the patient may have. The amount of time that a caregiver spends providing assistance, and the demands of watching the patient to make sure they are safe can also contribute to the overall wellness of the caregiver (Schulz & Sherwood, 2008). Although many have studied the ways in which caregiving can create stress for the caregiver, there have also been reported positive effects of this role that are worth
Informal caregiving is physically, emotionally, financially and socially demanding on ICs and has been associated with negative health consequences
Primary caregivers are given an opportunity to take care of their loved ones; however, this job comes with a lot of stress and its consequences (Tsai, 2003). Primary caregivers take care of those with a chronic illness such as a family member or friend, are given a task that is so immense that it induces a lot of stress. In the previous decades, many research articles have developed studies which focused on stressors that were associated with the task of being the primary caregiver; yet, a theory surrounding this topic has not been developed until the early 2000s. Tsai (2003) developed the Theory of Caregiver Stress based on the Roy Adaptation Model to identify the caregiver’s response, perceptions, and adaptations to the stress and burden that primary caregiver’s experience.
In Chapter 1 of Keith Ward’s, The Case for Religion, Ward discusses Wilfred Cantwell Smith’s concept of the term “Religion” and his definition of the term and critically responds to it. In one of Smith’s own books, The Meaning and End of Religion, he discusses both his interpretation of the term “religion” and his opinion that the term should no longer be used. Smith’s skepticism of the term, together with his attempt at defining it, creates a contradiction that Ward critically unpicks and responds to.
Kierkegaard, a highly regarded philosopher of the 19th century, put to us the idea of living life in three different stages. He named these stages the Aesthetical, the Ethical and the Religious. He himself passed through each of the stages in his own lifetime and he adopted them as his own philosophy of human existence. The first two stages are characterized by a distinct set of beliefs and behaviors that are easily identified, whereas the last stage, the religious is characterized by a highly personal, subjective and non-rational ‘’leap of faith’’. The ideal is to progress from the aesthetical to the ethical, finally reaching the religious stage but as Kierkegaard himself realized, it is possible to regress or go back a stage. He said that he felt that he had never really left the first two, these stages were always there. He believed that one can move in and out and through all three stages within a lifetime. For the purpose of this essay I will explain each of the three stages in order to give an understanding of Kierkegaard’s philosophical theory of life. Also I will discuss why Kierkegaard considered the religious stage as the best kind of life for humanity and I will present to you some criticisms against Kierkegaard’s third stage.
Religion benefits our society in various ways. In this paper, I will be discussing the importance of religion to the society. Religion provides comfort and quells dissatisfaction, it strengthens human community, religion assures us of comic order, it managed conflict in society, and it teaches us morals that helps we the people in the community to follow.
Over the course of the caretaking role, it is important that the caregiver be surrounded by his/her own support system to provide the caregiver with encouragement and optimism (Haley, 2003). A high or low degree of social supports for the caregiver may also play a role in how well one copes with his/her new role, and one's ability to continue to fulfill it. Research has shown a positive correlation between increased levels of social support and caregiver health (Nijboer et al., 1998; Schulz & Sherwood, 2008). An increase in social supports is correlated to people that are happier, live healthier lives, and live longer than those who do not have support from others (Schulz & Sherwood, 2008). It's also important that caregivers be provided with support from healthcare professionals who are knowledgeable about the family member's sickness, and can also aid in making medical decisions. Professionals can help the caregiver cope, as well as decreasing the amount of stress he/she is facing (Haley, 2003). Just as essential is that the family members are able to support one another throughout the sickness. Depending upon the type of sickness, it can be viewed as a loss for families, and grief can often present itself. During this time, it is important that the family system is able to unite
The Theory of Caregiver Stress was a significant breakthrough for the reasoning of why caregivers are so deeply affected by this job. “The Theory of Caregiver Stress was derived from the Roy Adaptation Model to use as basis in understanding the relationships among caregivers and the stress faced when caring for a chronically ill relative” (Tsai, 2003). The Theory of Caregiver stress is a middle-range theory used to predict the outcome for stress and other various side effects (Dobratz, 2011). These adverse effects are predicted by: Demographic Characteristics, Burden in Caregiving, Stressful life events, Social Support and Social Roles. Also, because of the multitude of different scenarios and background for both the patient and the caregiver, these categories are necessary to compare and effectively use the results. The theory makes four main assumptions regarding adaption: “environmental change; the caregivers’ perceptions will determine how they will respond to the environmental stimuli; the caregivers’ adaptation is a function of their environmental stimuli and adaptation level, and lastly the caregivers’ effectors are results of chronic caregiving such examples include marital satisfaction and self-...
Religion as defined in, You May Ask Yourself, is a system of beliefs, traditions, and practices around sacred things, a set of shared stories that guide belief and action (Conley 613). Meaning, religion, is the way people can navigate their world and distinguish right from wrong, and good from bad. Everyone has their own belief system and often that belief system does not go with the norm of the rest of society but, what happens when a person 's belief system based off of that of the social norm? That is what society considers religion. Religion, not only in America but also the rest of the world is the basis of not only peoples beliefs but also the way they choose to live their lives. Majority of all people in the western world
Caregiving for older adults is no easy task. It is very complex as it requires the intersection between being a family member and taking on the responsibilities of a caregiver. Caregivers have to assume this new role that includes taking care of difficult medical procedures. This could include handling medical equipment, distributing medicine, or simply monitoring for adverse affects of sickness or medicine. Family caregiving can cause many problems in the caregiver’s life. Caregiving has negative impacts on multiple different aspects of life, including an impact on physical, emotional, health and financial issues. Caregiving can also take a large toll on the family of the older adult. These caregivers are more likely to experience emotional distress, depression, anxiety, or social isolation (Schulz, 2016). Schulz even reports that family caregivers tend to have worse physical health than those that are not burdened with the responsibility of caring for family members. Physical
Throughout the semester we learned that people have different opinions about religion and hold different beliefs about what really happened during the time of Christ. Many question whether he truly exists. We briefly discussed a famous individual named Sigmund Freud, who held a much different belief about religion than most. By comparing his views to catholic, Thomas a’ Kempis, we can see exactly how different his views were. Freud’s beliefs about our personality and our death drive are important to understand in order to know how he felt about religion. Some of Freud’s theories of religion relate to mastering the Oedipus complex, a reaction to infantile helplessness, and a universal obsessional ritual.