I Still Social Network Manually

My religious background is well known to most of you. I posted the story on my blog back in 2009. But if you don't know it, here is the abbreviated version: I was born Jewish, then my parents converted to Mormonism when I was two years old, which is the only religion I knew growing up. I stuck with it until I was not allowed to go on my mission at age 19. I didn't attend any church for a while after that, until I felt compelled to join a Pentecostal church. I felt extremely out of place, but ended up meeting my first wife. We moved to Virginia in 2000, and didn't attend any church after relocating. Then I got divorced in 2005 and remarried to my current wife in 2007. When she got pregnant with our first child in 2009, we decided to go back to church to raise our kids in religion. She was raised Catholic but had a 'been there, done that' mentality about Catholicism so we decide to attend an Episcopal church, The Church of the Good Shepherd in Burke, VA. I didn't really care, as I was disillusioned with religion anyway. We've been attending ever since. At the same time I started my study of Dudeism and I became an ordained Dudeist priest.

I remember my days of going to Mormon services and trying to figure out why people diligently went to church. There were a handful of people who believed in the Mormon dogma and was the reason they attended, but I felt most were there to socialize with like-minded people. There was an air of artificial credence. The kids were there mostly there because their parents made them go, but the social aspect also compelled them to return a couple times a week as many had church friends. I grew to despise the social aspect of church attendance. I felt people should go because they believe in the doctrine and not to hang out with their friends. I felt it was disrespectful to the institution and the leaders, like those socializing were wasting the true believers time and using up the church's resources. I felt it gave the church a bad name.

It took me a long time to get over my negative feelings about the social aspect of religion. The turning point was when I realized why I eagerly go to church now-I want to see my friends! I've made some great friends through the Young Family Ministries group (YFM) at Good Shepherd. If the social aspect of church is what gets a dude like me to go to church, not to mention the primary reason why many go to church, then I say more power to it. It's better for me and my family to embrace the social aspect then to demonize it.

The Dude Abides.

Reverend Shock

The Dudeist Bible: Just Take It Easy, Man

This is about as religious as it gets for me: Cathleen Falsani: The Dudeist Bible: Just Take It Easy, Man.

If you didn't know, I'm an ordained Dudeist priest. I'm available for weddings and other official ceremonies.

The Day of the Dude holiday

March 6th is Dudeism's high holy day: The Day of the Dude. It commemorates the day The Big Lebowksi was first released, back in 1998 A.D. (Anno Dudeni - The Year of the Dude).

Hey Dudes!
Would you like a free copy of Adam Bertocci’s far out Shakespearean reworking of Two Gentlemen of Lebowski? Enter our giveaway and you could win one! We’re doing this to help celebrate our annual high holiday, The Day of the Dude. It’s coming up soon – Sunday, March 6^th. Just take it easy, mankind!
Some other news you might want to become privy to:

1. Our new Dudeist self-help book The Abide Guide will be published in the spring by Ulysses Press and is already available for pre-order. It’s a team effort from Dudely Lama Oliver Benjamin and Arch Dudeship Dwayne Eutsey, and it’s going to be far out indeed.
2. Our highly-commended holy book, The Dude De Ching is now available as a downloadable Kindle ebook. Don’t have an Amazon Kindle? You can still read it on your phone, Blackberry, iPad, Mac, PC and more with the free Kindle application. All profits still go to our Dudeism Kiva Lending Fund. Or get a printed copy instead.
3. UK residents take note: There’s going to be a Dudeist music festival in York on June 18. It’s called Dudestock, and it’ll be raising money for charity. They’re also running a campaign to get Dudeism recognized as an official religion in the UK (or at least, on the annual census). Find out more from this BBC broadcast.
4. If you’re planning to celebrate The Day of the Dude on March 6^th, please send us photos of you and your compeers takin’ er easy, or going bowling, or what-have-you, so we can post it afterwards at The Dudespaper.
5. New shirts have come to light! And now some posters too. Why not quickly pick up a Day of the Dude 2011 tee shirt for this year’s festivities? It will help us feed the monkey. Thankee.
6. Bloggers and journalists--do you want to draw a flood of attention to your writing, or give a great pitch to your editor? Why not write about Dudeism? Whenever someone writes about us it draws massive traffic. For instance: this awesome article at CNN received 6000 Facebook likes, hundreds of times more than any other article in the same section. Small blogs who write about us also receive a ton of attention and a flood of Facebook likes. Thanks for helping spread the Dude word.
7. If you want to interact with other Dudeists, please visit the Dudeism Facebook Page, the forum, and our official publication, The Dudespaper. We plan to have a Dudeist social network (like Facebook, but more mellow) set up soon as well.
8. We now have over 100,000 ordained Dudeist Priests worldwide. Far out.

Well that’s it for now. But a lot of cool new stuff is coming up soon after all this!
Have a happy Day of the Dude, dudes. We know that you will.

Take er Easy,
Reverend Shock

The Day of the Dude

March 6th will be Dudeism's high holy day: The Day of the Dude. It commemorates the day The Big Lebowksi was first released, back in 1998 A.D. (Anno Dudeni - The Year of the Dude).

We welcome any and all suggestions for how people should observe this holiest Dudeist day of the year. And we hope that observant Dudes will post videos from their celebrations on You Tube. So stock up on festive supplies, get your bowling lanes reserved, and make a nice garden party of it for the whole world to see!

Please send any suggestions and ideas to the email address at the Dudeism contact page: http://dudeism.com/contact.
html.

Also, if you know anyone who works in the media, please tell them about Dudeism and the Day of the Dude. It'd be a great story to cover.

We considered several days but settled on March 6th. You can see the whole story in this forum thread: http://dudeism.com/smf/index.
php?topic=288.0
Take er easy,
Reverend Shock

News from Dudeism.com for all our Ordained Dudeist Priests

Howdy Dudes,

This is just another friendly hello to tell you about new stuff that's going on over at Dudeism.

1) First off, the Tao Dude Ching (http://dudeism.com/tao) has been renamed "The Dude De Ching" and is now available in print format for a low price. We renamed it to avoid confusing it with our upcoming book "The Tao of the Dude".
You can order The Dude De Ching here: http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/the-dude-de-ching/8059795

Note that the entire $2 royalty we earn will go into a fund that will be charitably donated via the website www.kiva.org. The print version is illustrated by award-winning mystery novelist and cartoonist Colin Cotterill (www.colincotterill.com).

2) We've engineered a free software program that helps you take it easy! The Dudeism Pop-Up Relaxation Reminder reminds you to take regular breaks while at the computer in order to keep your mind limber. You can download that here:
http://download.cnet.com/Pop-Up-Relaxation-Reminder/3000-2350_4-10977387.html

3) We've also come up with some cool new tee-shirt and sweatshirt designs. If you hurry you can still get some in time for Christmas. Give a Dudeist gift to someone you dig:
http://dudeism.spreadshirt.com/shop/designs

Note that there's other groovy Xmas ideas at our Prinfection and Cafepress stores - visit our store (http://dudeism.com/store.html) and scroll down for the links. The beer mugs at Printfection are especially nice.

4) A friendly bunch of Brits are going to be headed around the States starting in December putting together a documentary on Dudeism. If you'd like to be featured in the film or just know more about it, please visit them at their website: http://www.adudesodyssey.com

5) Lots of people have been asking us about the Ordained Minister ID cards shown in the famous Dudeism VW commercial (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYUD6vs0pg4). We plan to have those ready for order next month, along with some other cool new stuff. We'll let you know soon when it's all up and running.

Also, if you haven't checked out the Dudespaper (http://dudespaper.com) in a while, please do. There have been a lot of great contributions from die-hard Dudeists all over the world.

Take er easy,
Rev. Oliver Benjamin
The Dudely Lama of the Church of the Latter-Day Dude

A Message from The Dudely Lama of Dudeism to all Dudeist Priests

Hi Dudes,
This is just a note to let all our ordained Dudeist Priests know about some recent developments at Dudeism (The Church of the Latter-Day Dude).

First off, Dudeism was featured prominently in a funny Volkswagen ad campaign. You can read about it and watch the video here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/aug/12/volkswagen-dudeism-the-big-lebowski

We've also launched our first holy book: The Tao Dude Ching. It's a reworked version of the Tao Te Ching (the holy book of Taoism) using dialogue and story elements from The Big Lebowski.
You can read it here for free: http://www.dudeism.com/tao

If any of you are interested in appearing as a Dudeist Priest on TV, in a magazine article, or in an upcoming documentary, check out this article at the Dudespaper:
http://dudespaper.com/your-fifteen-marmots-of-fame.html/

That's it for now! But a there's a lot more new developments coming up soon.


Take er easy,
Oliver Benjamin
The Dudely Lama of Dudeism

I'm Available for Weddings

One thing that got lost in the shuffle of my son's birth was that I was ordained as a Dudeist Priest on July 19. Dudeism is an official religion based on the "The Dude" character from The Big Lebowski. As an ordained Dudeist Priest, I can perform my priestly duties and minister over religious ceremonies in most U.S. States (laws vary), and assorted other countries. So I can preside over a wedding, funeral, or any kind of celebration with pride and authority. My schedule is currently wide open. My fee is quite reasonable, it's FREE!