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It has been a WHILE since I’ve been on here. I was knocked out with a medical issue on 3/15/19 so that initial Dudeism Service didn’t happen. However! Our next scheduled service is on June 2nd. We are expecting at least 6 people in attendance, possibly up to 10. I’m both nervous and excited for this adventure.
The preliminary idea is:
- Scope out the bowling alley, if it’s packed, get on the waiting list and head to the bar, if it’s empty go right to the bar.
- Grab some oat sodas and a table
- I’ll do a little welcome (most of the congregation is from my network of people)
- I’ll introduce fellow Dude, John.
- John does a short reading from the Abide Guide and does a homily of sorts
- I then do a short reading from the Dude de Ching that correspondes to Johns reading and do a little homily of sorts
- Then we will have an open forum discussion/jam on the topic of the week.
- If we are waiting for a lane, we’ll start in the bar and continue when we bowl
- If we waited to get a lane, we will get a lane and start the conversation there.
- Bowl a couple games while talking about the week’s topic.
I’d LOVE to start the Welcome part with lighting a small white birthday candle, symbolizing the ceremonial ‘sparking of the jay’ and end with scattering wood ash in the parking lot taken from a Folger’s can. But that’s something we may add later.
Again, I’ll post a recap of how it goes.
Morning!
Don’t worry, it didn’t feel preachy or pompous to me. I actually love this idea. A more focused sect of Dudeism, that’s what I read. Maybe a little less quoting for the quick jokes and little more meaningful conversations. I agree that monks are not better, priests are not better, your every day Jeffrey is not better. What works for you is best. In the end, we are all Dudes, and we all on our own paths.
I look forward to many great conversations with you! Don’t ever feel like you need to censor yourself. Life’s too short to worry about how written words will come across. People’s moods can greatly affect how they read things. We tend to add our own emotions to what we are reading. And me…I’m usually a pretty happy dude!
Take care now!
JoeFor me it was in college. I decided that traditional religion wasn’t for me. I was into reiki (not that, pay $2000 to get anointed with the magical powers type. The whoa, this is crazy and works type) and I had read The Cosmic Serpent (great book, will try to write up a blurb for the knowledge section). I felt a connection to nature and the way energy seemed to flow from the plants around me into me and back out to the world around me. Yes, pot was heavily involved during this time. . I decided to start my own religion in 2010. I called it “Kenyonism” and I had a devote follower. We hashed out a bunch of the details and then I realized I was just re-creating Taoism. So I scrapped the whole starting a religion thing and started looking into Taoism. When I discovered Dudeism I was blown away. It was EXACTLY what I needed. I was ordained in 2011 and performed my first marriage in 2017. I’m all-in and proud of it.
I would love to get to a monk-like level of devotion, but for now, simply being a priest is good enough for me. Maybe a little further down the trail, but right now…I still abide.
Our first (preliminary, not open to public yet) Dudeism Service will be next Wednesday the 20th. Going to keep it small 6 max (one lane) to ensure we can get a lane. I’ll add a recap after.
Felt great jamming with John. A couple times during our talks we got side tracked with concepts and starting discussing various dudeist topics and it was very nice conversation. I can only hope that the Dudeism Services conversations go the same way.
My favorite topic we talked about, which I really want to turn into an article for this site, was the uproar over the Dude being in the Stella commercial. This lead to the topic of the ‘Canonized Dude’. Great stuff came out of that convo.
Howdy! I finally have an update!!!
I met with my friend to discuss the idea of a Buffalo Church of Dudeism. We have come up with a preliminary plan to get the ball rolling.
- To start, we are going to try for a once a month gathering/service.
- Over the summer months it is going to just be us, our special ladies and a few other dudes.
- We will hold our first ‘public’ service in September
- It’s going to act as a ministry for now, until we can get a strong and regular congregation.
- We are currently aiming for a 5 year goal of becoming a true church, 501(3)(c) and all.
- We would like a solid 50 person congregation before involving the government and any money
- Long term would be to open a small, free standing church that is basically a private bowling alley.
- We talked some preliminary ideas for this which include:
- A possible monthly membership for unlimited bowling
- Free bowling as part of the regular services
- The actual service taking place at the bar, with the bartender being the facilitator of the talks.
- We talked some preliminary ideas for this which include:
We also discussed some preliminary outline ideas of how the services would go. Here’s what we liked most:
- Having 1-2 people facilitate a group discussion of a Dudeism related topic.
- Topics could also be Taoist/Buddhist/Confucian ideas that relate to Dudeism.
- Service takes place at the bar
- while in the ministry phase, setting up shop at tables in a corner
- Ultimately at our own bar of our own bowling alley.
- Bowling and further discussion after the discussion/jam sections.
- The facilitators will start the discussions with a small reading from their source info. Then they will give their ‘sermon/homily’ on it. Followed by a group discussion/jam on the topic.
- We will be playing with the idea of having a second topic, but will probably stay to 1 at the start.
- The service will take place while waiting for the lanes to open up
- The facilitators will rotate and be open to any member who has been ordained.
- The only rule is, if you preach any negativity or break any of the rules that the facebook groups have, you will get a warning and your privilege to preach will be revoked after a second offense.
- We will set up a board of directors once the group reaches a certain level of membership. We are thinking 20-25 for now, but that may end up happening sooner.
- The Board would have someone in charge of scheduling the facilitators, someone in charge of the facebook group/meet up group, and whatever else we realize we would need during our summer test phase.
Other random things we came up with:
- Free sessions where we set up a TV and Wii Bowling
- These can be at public parks where there are shelters with power
- typically first come first served
- Will operate as a ‘pop-up church’
- These can be at public parks where there are shelters with power
- Not limiting ourselves to just one bowling alley.
- Coffee shops, libraries, parks, anywhere!
Our next step is getting together at the lanes and seeing what happens!
I feel, as long as you say you have your “honorary” degree and not just your degree, that will suffice in most (if not all) cases. I personally wouldn’t put the title on anything official since it wasn’t earned. But in regards to friends and whatnot it’s perfectly fine.
I think we are on the same page here.
The main thing to remember is that it is an honorary degree from a non-accredited university and in non-traditional fields.
As for the legality of it, what are you planning on doing with your title? Calling yourself Doctor with your honorary phd from a non-accredited school seems perfectly fine to me. The only hang up I could see is if you, yourself, try to scam people using your title. But, then again, I didn’t go to law school so what do I know?
I have made the switch back to a “basic phone” I got me a flip phone! I still carry my smart phone with me as I own a small business and need to respond to those emails fairly quick. I have it set up so my business email only gets real emails. No spam. I have gmail forward me a copy of the emails as texts so I can see if it’s an email that actually needs my attention. If it is, I can get to a computer, or I can set up a quick hotspot with my flip phone and check my emails on my smartphone (usually stays in my bag/briefcase)
Before this switch I had gone in and turned off all notifications. Made sure I unsubscribed to all the junk that was coming into my emails. Another big thing would be to limit social media. If you use facebook at all, the greatest thing ever is being able to unfollow someone. I have done that with SO MANY PEOPLE. If you post anything that fucks with my groove…gone. Life’s too short to need that crap in it. Another thing would be to make sure you don’t keep it in your bedroom. Get a real alarm clock and keep your phone in the kitchen or living room (a close room where you can hear it if it does ring). That way, you won’t be tempted to check it in the middle of the night. And stop using it about a half hour before bed.
The light phone looks amazing, but a little out of my budget.
Good luck Dude!
I find great comfort in cruising. If I’m having a particularly trying day, I will just hop in my car and go. I live in the city so it’s harder to cruise without having to stop. Growing up in the country was great. I could drive for hours without having to stop. Now I just do a huge loop around my city and take in the lights. Helps calm me down.
