Reply #14: I've known lapsed Irish Catholics that still wave the flag on St Paddy's day [View All]

[shaayecanaan]

and know one or two Irish rebel songs. What does it boil down to? Remembering the potato blight, Oliver Cromwell and believing in a united Ireland, for the most part. Not enough to really sustain a community spirit. The fact is that lapsed Catholicism, or secular Judaism, are really only concepts that can exist in opposition to actual, practising Catholicism or Judaism, respectively, without which they are really nonsensical concepts.

"And secular Judaism has MANY substantial underpinnings...a sense of solidarity with each other and with all oppressed peoples, a rigorous commitment to intellectual advancement, a deep personal commitment to compassion and social justice."

Tosh. The CEO of Goldman Sachs is a secular Jew. I can see him signing up to the intellectual advancement part but I'm not sure he gives a fig about social justice.

I am a lapsed Lebanese Catholic, myself - a Maronite. I identify as such largely as a consequence of Lebanese society which views religion largely as an affiliation rather than a statement of belief - I would hazard to guess that religious attendance is probably lower in Lebanon than anywhere else in the middle east.

I suppose fratricidal violence is one way to sustain community identity - pretty much the only place in Europe where people still identify primarily as Protestants is Northern Ireland. I wouldn't recommend it though.

Other than that, I think that a common language or a common religion are needed to sustain a community. I suppose you have African Americans, whose identity remains strong even in the absence of a particular language or religion, but I imagine that racism plays a large part there.