Should have him and his wife over for dinner the next time Ben is in Portland, so the three of us can decide if he's the right fit
Would like to do some low-grade movement toward a master plan for the eco-village
Est. $4-5000 to get inspiring concept plans drawn up
SpaceVision
They're discussing us tonight
We think we can get centrally located spots
We don't get to be on the sponsor list
We're committed to say yes if they do
Ryan can commit to 40 caricatures by middle of Saturday ... all others will have to be done after the event
Travel from/to Portland (next Thursday night and Sunday evening) is $550, lodging $300
Spiritual Practice
Shelley will do service next week
Ben will do the one after that, whenever it turns out to be
Church or NonProfit
How does Ben feel about this question?
I feel like it's good to have meaning in one's life, and religions are about that.
Not like I'm about to join anything that makes meaning from the supernatural.
It worries me that we might end up focusing too much on meditative enlightenment and the quest to find pure observership (spiritual narcissism?).
I would be fine with having a church as long as I was allowed to be qualificationalist enough about it. Something like:
We're like the Unitarian Universalists in that we don't make specific statements about a God or gods or anything supernatural. We welcome people with almost any kind of faith, though we discourage magical thinking and we won't take people who are opposed to science. The key criterion, instead, is whether people are inspired by the epic story of life thriving, growing, and spreading across the galaxy.
We encourage all members to pledge a significant portion of themselves and their resources to bringing life. This pledge does not say anything about which organizations and activities they should support (including SolSeed itself). We encourage each member to be an informed donor, and choose carefully where they put their time, effort, and money; we hope to be worthy of these contributions, and membership is the best way to find out if you believe we are.
Don't call it something that makes it sound like it encompasses the whole SolSeed Movement ... which is bigger than the three of us
Put something below the name to reassure people? (ex. "a branch of the religion of science" or "part of the church of reality")
A church can:
be more choosy about who's "in" than a nonprofit
but that's only if we're talking about the nonprofit's "members" who just get the fundraising mail; we can be very choosy about who we hire onto the staff
be more central to people's lives, as it is to Brandon's life
be a certain type of educational institution, with a set of values to teach that then certify students to teach those values themselves
but if we teach kids, is that a biased education?
serve as a filter so we don't have a bunch of people signing up who really only want to make a surface/ephemeral commitment
But a church can also:
be a revolting idea to lots of people interested in space (even those who feel that looking at Earth from space is a quasi-spiritual experience)
make people who've read the "SolSeed is not a religion" statements on the wiki feel betrayed
make it difficult for us to get respect for our other organizations ... tainting our businesses and nonprofits
In any case, it will take awhile to develop a fully coherent set of beliefs, so found the business and nonprofit first
WWWs
Brandon ... let Ben know about the SpaceVision people's decision ... by Tuesday
Brandon ... contact Jason about getting together for food some time in the next 3 months ... start coordinating with Shelley and Ben ... by Tuesday
Brandon ... fix MediaWiki search ... by next call
Brandon ... get together portraits/logos/company etc for sponsors and program committee ... by Thursday
Ben ... finish the banner (vector-graphics version of logo) ... by next call
Ben and Brandon ... write articles about the SpaceVision sponsors ... by next Thursday