EVOLUTION'S STORYLINE, a Conversation

"Habits of right reason and moral consciousness can be acquired very early in life if learning focus attends to these in primary teaching"

And who determines or defines what is "right" and what is "moral"?

If it can be taught what textbook do we use and who teaches and who is the authority on the subject.

"Conscience is experiential judgment and action committed to personal/ social interest/ betterment." 

What is "betterment"?  Would you not agree a person could judge or act in a way they know is not for his or her own betterment or societies bettterment?

"In the ideologies and fixations of religion/ culture, humankind creates obstacles that distract and blind consciousness/ conscience to the lessons of history, to sustainable relationships/ actions and the moral working of joined faith/ reason in symbiotic evolution."

I do believe ideologies, religions, and cultures do create distractions and blinds people.  And their is a symbiotic relationship between faith and reason.  However, the relationship does not
evolve.  A person's faith or understanding of the truth may increase, but truth is the truth.  Absolute truths don't evolve.  With out truth, reason and logic are not possible.  Without reason and logic faith is meaningless.

About "absolute truth": where does it exist? I know of no human person or collective of them who possesses detailed and complete knowledge of "absolute truth". Don't we understand God as "Absolute Truth"? People and institutions possess "subjective" truth, partial truth, which is open to testing, to clarification and deeper understanding over time.

Subjective truth evolves with the engagement of faith/reason together. If personal reason isn't challenged to increase knowledge of truth and to deepen faith, knowledge becomes fixated and faith is "left behind," and the potentials of faith, hope and love become lost in later times.

The "method of evolution" keeps symbioses, in all physical/psychical aspects, refreshed and vital. What is "right" and "moral" is an ongoing process of authentic living and learning. Learning (conscience) is personal and collective (communal), by way of continued "trustful communication, informed consciousness and committed conscience."

Evolution is a process of growing in knowledge of Godlikelikeness, Truth, and of strivng to live, to be, more Godlike. The certitude of open faith is the nexus of subjective truth, by way of reason, to Absolute Truth — which is an evolved and evolving certitude. The transmission of faith begins in family and continues for a lifetime through immediate and extended families, again, by ongoing communication, consciousness and conscience. Reason continually engages faith, for it too is subjective (not fully developed) in indiividual consciousness. Yes, "without reason and logic, faith is (becomes) meaningless."

"Evolution is a process of growing in knowledge of Godlikelikeness, Truth, and of strivng to live, to be, more Godlike."

I personally don't like using the term evolution to describe growing in knowledge of anything.  The term is over used so much it is almost meaningless.  Evolution is often used to describe a process by which material things, knowledge, or even thoughts change or improve.  The problem I see is that most assume the result of "evolution" is "good", "better", "improvement", or in this thread "Godlikeness."  However these terms are rarely defined making discussion non-sensical.

"What is "right" and "moral" is an ongoing process of authentic living and learning."

  I don't view morality as an ongoing process of any sort.  In fact, I believe in moral absolutes.  I believe that rape for the purpose of pleasure is wrong at all times.  Always has been wrong and always will be wrong.  No "evolution" needed here.

Your definitions of "right" and "moral" make it possible to change or ease a person's conscience when they no longer abide by their own convictions or standards.  So I see it as a way to change what is "right" and what is "wrong" based on a person's feelings at that time.  Meaning that there are no real absolute morals.  Anything goes.

"About "absolute truth": where does it exist? I know of no human person or collective of them who possesses detailed and complete knowledge of "absolute truth"."

Just because no one "possesses" complete knowledge of absolute truth does not mean absolute truth does not exist.

We can both agree on the above statement because the above statement is an absolute truth.  So absolute truth does exist.

Saying that our growth in knowlege of this absolute truth is evolution does nothing but cause confusion.  Increase knowledge in something that has always existed does not change absolute truth in anyway.

"Evolution is a process...of strivng to live, to be, more Godlike."

Can you give a definition of "Godlike?" 

Do you think mankind is becoming more "evolved" today or less "Godlike?"

It's true evolution is confusing, not least because it is nonsensically dismissed by authoritarian culture — which is even more confused and confusing. The word "absolute" is overloaded with dead weight because of abuse and overreach by imperial/ patriarchal culture from times immemorial.

The word "universal" seems to me to be a better choice of words because it has a useful connotation of absolute in the sense of being generally purposeful and truthful. I don't think it puts people off like "absolute" does.

As a Roman Catholic, I believe that the life and teaching of Jesus Christ exemplify what being "Godlike" is. The way of becoming Godlike is a process of evolution and devolution; fixations in absolutism stymie faith and reason and progress toward Godlikeness. Institutional religion is devolving (because of absolutist fixations), while progress toward becoming Godlike, from-the-bottom-up, is evolving, notwithstanding the uphill fight against cultural fideism.

Institutional religions (Christianities) actively dismiss and fight evolution because if they admit it, it is tantamount to acknowledging past errors in fideism, absolutism. Confusion and schizophrenia (conflicted voices) come from contradictions of experience and authoritarian claims. Complexity is made more confusing by simplistic explanations that are off-point from the experience of reality.

Consider the confusion over human sexuality. The Genesis account of Creation has God saying that humankind is made to His Image and Likeness, male and female. The division of sex is simple, no inbetween, absolute truth.

Genetic science informs us much differently. Every person is male/ female characterized. The mixing of genes also mixes sexual charactersitcs, physical and psychological. Every person is not stereotypically either male or female, rather the mix of gender characteristics is across a spectrum that works ambivalently. Sexual difference and designation is not absolute. Church's fixation in belief of absolute distinction between male/ female sex is destructive to its own credibility and to behaving with openness "divinely" expressed in nature.

"Objective" truth (rightly understood relationship) resides in subjective consciousness. As an "object" in subjective consciousness, knowledge of truth is subjective, personal. Consciousness, rightly informed in authentic relationships, "owns" truth. When a tree falls, sound waves are emmitted even  if no one is there to hear; so, authentic relationships, person-to-person, have their consequences (sustainable wellbeing - betterment) even for others who do not witness them.

"The word "absolute" is overloaded with dead weight because of abuse and overreach by imperial/ patriarchal culture from times immemorial." 

I would not say this about the word "absolute."  I would say this about religion based on works in an attmept to gain "favor" with God, including Roman Catholicism. 

Godlikeness in not a process of evolution, but of sanctification.  It's when a person is set apart by God to fufuill God's purpose.  It is when believers in Christ allow themsleves to be filled with the Holy Spirit so that the fruits of the Spirit are manifested throught them (Galations 5). 

Gal. 5:5  For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.

"The Genesis account of Creation has God saying that humankind is made to His Image and Likeness, male and female." 

The account of Creation in the book of Genesis is telling us that both male and female are made in His Image.  This is not talking about the physical body.   God is a spirit. 

Joh 4:24 God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.

This differentiates us from other living creatures.  We are more than just physical animals because we have a spirit.  We are made in His Image or likeness in that we are eternal living spirits.  It has nothing to do with sexuality.  God places equal value on both genders because he gave both male and females a spirit.

"knowledge of truth is subjective, personal."

If this is true how then can truth be universal?

 "Truth has been subverted by agnosticism. We pride ourselves in the fact that we don't know. Skepticism is the hallmark of university education today." -Ravi Zacharius

I don't understand what you mean: "so, authentic relationships, person-to-person, have their consequences (sustainable wellbeing - betterment) even for others who do not witness them."

What person to person relationships are you describing and exactly what makes the sustainable wellbeing (better) conseqences.  And how do you define "betterment?"

 'knowledge of truth is subjective, personal'. If this is true how then can truth be universal?" Knowledge does not exist in collective humanity (universally) except it first exists in individual persons.

I mostly agree with you in what you say.

Quantum science (Einstein) identifies matter as energy. The energetic nature of all materiality corresponds to the complexity of matters qualification. We call the animation of human energy, "soul". The qualification  of soul, spirituality, consciousness in humankind is self-reflective and authentic by way of faith, hope, love and reason seeking to be more Godlike, in purpose, harmony and authenticity.

"Betterment" is a process of authentic living based on decisions of conscience, that is, conscience informed (and committed) by faith, experience, reason, and ratified by trustful communications amongst and between people personally and civilizations collectively. When we individually behave authentically, in the way described here, in any and every relationship, others benefit because it is right and sustainable, even if others don't know we're doing it.

In reality, the spiritual and secular (physical/ psychical) are not separable except with violence to both.