BS: Secularity vs Religion

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Metchosin
Date: 13 Mar 04 - 02:38 PM

Come to think of it, what a concept! I am a septic system in the wonder of the universe....I tank therefore I am.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Metchosin
Date: 13 Mar 04 - 02:19 PM

Nah, I think I'll just stick a hepa filter on my mouth and a seive on my ass and just carry on.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 13 Mar 04 - 01:26 PM

Holy Moly, I will worship you from afar, because I don't know too many people who got what you got.

You are gonna be a salmonella system of pedagogical bitters. Do you need help? We're here for you!

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Metchosin
Date: 13 Mar 04 - 12:37 PM

brucie, you got it! but its cooks day off, so at least for today, I think I'll just be a coelomatic system of biological filters, sustained by solar and cosmic energy, until my filters finally get all gummed up and I die. For today at least, I will not bother to try to contemplate or comprehend from whence the infinite sustaining source of energy arose.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Big Mick
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 08:57 PM

Same old troll. Same old tactic. Ask loaded questions. Pounce on the responder. I am glad you get your kicks doing this. Perfect example up towards the top. S/he lays the predicate. Poster asks if this philosophy allows something and s/he pounces. ALLOWED???

Give it up. This isn't about a discussion. It is about a bitter person who poisons every thread they are in.

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 08:48 PM

Thanks, Jerry -- I wasn't being gracious; I was being a curmudgeon. For good and sufficient reason, but still.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 08:27 PM

Ah, but Amos:

You are always gracious..

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: pdq
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 08:24 PM

My invisible buddy is better than your invisible buddy! Na na na nuh na na!! **sticking tongue out**

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 08:11 PM

Metchosin: "cosmic pantheist"

A space cadet that believes in cooking utensils?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Metchosin
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 02:32 AM

Today I think I'll be a cosmic pantheist......I don't know what I'll be tomorrow.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 12 Mar 04 - 01:05 AM

Well, I am sorry to have contributed to argumentation. I'll try to do better -- I am a bit sourminded these days. This too shall pass.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 10:07 PM

Hey, Strick:

I've bowed out of this, and the faith thread as they've just become arguments between three or four people. But, I thought I'd stick my head in for a minute. Guest also claimed that he/she had not referred to Christians, and that I was trying to make this a Christian issue. I went back and quoted three references to Christians in a single post of his/hers, with no acknowledgment.

An old debating ploy... say stuff, and then criticize people who respond to it by denying that you ever said it.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 08:52 PM

"I believe strongly in the separation of religion and state, and believe we need to go to the next level, which to me is to ban religion from participation in the public square."

Your exact words, Guest, cut and pasted here, no twisting possible. Please re-read your own first post.

I've never supported any amendment to the Constitution, only reacted to an absurd proposition. Likewise, I have no religious agenda and you'd be incredibly hard pressed to ever prove I'm a fundamentalist (of course, I know what the word means where you probably don't).

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 01:51 PM

"I'm addressing the plain words of the proposal Guest put forward: ban religion from participation in the public square."

I never used the word participation, and you keep twisting my words to suit your agenda. Which is why I quit participating in the conversation.

You have a religious agenda Strick, you just keep claiming it isn't religious.

We aren't that stupid. When you keep arguing for the same agenda fundamentalist Christians are arguing for, and using their very same arguments, people won't accept your claim that you aren't religious or religiously motivated.

Period.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 12:26 PM

Oh, I see your point. For some reason the logic that a Constitutional Amendment reserving the grace of civil recognition of marriage to heterosexuals only being linked to religious grounds seemed obvious to me, but your right -- it COULD conceivably be something else, even though it very likely isn't...well, it's not health, and it's not universal tradition, so I assume it is a cultural bias. But anyway, your point is well taken; I was jumping to a conclusion. Sorry.

And if your argument truly is that you want to make a Consittutional amendment just to preserve the tradition of heterosexual marriage, why bother? As a tradition it seems to have held its own fairly well, rampant serial divorce notwithstanding. Should we further encourage vanilla marriage by porposing a Consittutional amendment forbidding divorce? It would certainly reinforce tradition as it stood back in the 1600's.

A



A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 12:19 PM

"It's a matter for a court to decide whether the boundary line gets crossed or not, Strick. I think your batting at a straw man here."

No Amos, I'm addressing the plain words of the proposal Guest put forward: ban religion from participation in the public square. Then Guest says: "I believe, just as a current example, that the proposed constitutional amendment to outlaw gay marriage, would be an instance of Congress making a law respecting estalishment of religion." Clearly this is the kind of thing Guest wants to ban, even prevent society from considering (even ignoring the fact that his example would be a Constitutional amendment, not a law, would have to be ratified by the states and as such not solely an act of Contress, and would not be subject to restiction by other clauses of the Constitution even if the 1st Amendment said what Guest wishes it did).

What if there's a diffence of opinion on why someone supports a given issue? I say I'm not suporting an issue for religious reasons, and Guest, who knows my mind better than I do, disagrees? The courts decide what's religious and what isn't and what I can support and what I can't? Anyone who doesn't like an issue can try to have it declared religous? How far would that be allowed to go?

For example, if I'm for making it illegal for bars to serve alcohol after 2 AM, am I just responding to the problems we've seen in my community or am I a Methodist who is against drinking and, not being able to prohibit drinking all the time, just looking to cut the number of hours people are allowed to? If religious arguments are prohibited from the public square as Guest says and we use your approach to deciding what is and isn't religious, all it takes is one judge to prevent the issue from even coming to a vote.

I realize that's not what Guest thought he was saying, but when you paint with a broadbrush, don't be offended when someone notices the problems with the fine lines.

BTW, you can take the Masonic trappings off the money anytime you want.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Kim C
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 01:31 PM

Well........... how do they do it in Turkey? There's a religious Muslim country with a secular goverment.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 12:44 PM

Could be...

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 12:21 PM

well! I am honored and pleased to be complimented by you and several other 'believers' of various descriptions. I also enjoy the discussions and trading of ideas....and, it behooves me to stay tolerant and reasonable, hmmm? Who knows, I might need several of you to vouch for me in the next life/incarnation/level of consciousness/ if I prove to be wrong...*grin*... "Awww...he's a good guy, he just had his higher consciousness disconnected when he was 9 by not eating his vegetables."
(That sounds a bit like Pascal's Wager, where he argues that it is 'safer' to believe in God, 'cause if God exists, you'll be MUCH better off....but 'ol Pascal missed a whole bunch of possibilities, and 'God' might be a cosmic pratical joker who is giggling at all our wild guesses.)

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 10:40 AM

Caught me trying to change the subject again, eh Bill? :-)

Yeah, I give the word "God" my own definition. And so does everybody else. People's usual error is that they assume someone else saying "God" means the same thing they mean when they say "God".

So, a "fundamentalist atheist" (my term for a certain mindset which is stridently opposed to religion or spirituality) who says "God" may mean by it:

God - that totally fictional and mythical entity imagined by some poor, deluded people to have created the Universe.

or

God - that fictional being made up by the churches in order to dominate and fleece the public

or

God - a fictional old guy with a long beard who sits in a fictional place called heaven and judges people's souls and casts people into a fictional hell

or

whatever...

Then the fundamentalist atheist says to me, "I don't believe in that God."

Well...duh! I don't either. But I do believe in God. The atheist's mistake is in assuming that "God" must necessarilly fall within the idiotic parameters that the atheist imagines other people must have assigned to the concept in the first place. He figures if they don't see it his way they must be very stupid. He is often wrong about that.

I'm not talking about you here, Bill. You're a tolerant and intelligent man, and not what I would call a fundamentalist atheist at all. I enjoy reading your comments.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 10:33 AM

That opens up another aspect of the argument. In Canada, when Queen Elizabeth visits, she does so as the Queen of Canada. When our Parliament opens, it does so with ceremony involving a Mace and various rites that are meant to demonstrate and 'fix' the great importance and solemnity of the occasion. (Afetr Parliament opens, it's often little better than a disorganized house of ill repute filled with lots of people who should rightly be elsewhere doing something useful. Organizing the hoir would be useful, but that would require thinking, and that ability is not a legal requirement to either vote or get elected in this country.) We have vestiges of older days around us. We incorporate that into our lives to greater or lesser degrees. That also includes religious stuff, rightly or wrongly.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 10:30 AM

It's a matter for a court to decide whether the boundary line gets crossed or not, Strick. I think your batting at a straw man here. I agree that the proposal seems silly in contrast with the power of inertia and keeping things as they are, but I believe it might be very clarifying to the nature of the nation. There's a certain hypocrisy in claiming to forbid government bias in support of one or another religion, while sprinkling the day-to-day scene with Christian arcana (one-eyed pyramids and Gott Mitt Uns bumoper stickers).

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 10:26 AM

"What you believe is your business. The secular argument offered here is that the drapes and tokens of those beliefs which are religous have no place in the public corridors espoused or erected by government -- courthouses, congresses, government buildings, currency, national rituals such as the Pledge of ALlegiance, and so on."

Amos, however silly I think what you suggest is, I'm not that offended by it. Look at the original proposal put forward in this thread:

I believe strongly in the separation of religion and state, and believe we need to go to the next level, which to me is to ban religion from participation in the public square.

Have I misunderstood the word participation? Combined with multiple assertions that it's improper for me to support position X or Y because someone else has determined that the only reason to support it is religious (or, worse, as Guest suggests, someone is conservative), what else am I to thinnk? Not only will I be able to acknowledge that my faith (or lack of it) is the reason for my support of a proposition, other people will be able to veto it because THEY conclude I support it for the wrong reason.

Someone is uncomfortable with mentioning what is a relevant factor for 70-80% of the population and wants it removed as a result? There's a word for attitudes like that.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 10:05 AM

Strick:

What you believe is your business. The secular argument offered here is that the drapes and tokens of those beliefs which are religous have no place in the public corridors espoused or erected by government -- courthouses, congresses, government buildings, currency, national rituals such as the Pledge of ALlegiance, and so on.

Whether your actions or political arguments stem from ytour religious beliefs, or they stem from Dr Atkins, or beatings from your grandmother, is irrelevant, so you are absolutely right that WHY you support a given law is irrelevant. However, if you support a law that infringes on others' rights and freedoms, or favors one or another religion, then there's a problem.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 08:42 AM

"'The Constitution is now where near so specific about religion that it forbids passing laws that I support as a result of my religious beliefs, Amos.'

"Actually, that is exactly what it prohibits. And the Supreme Court, in it's decisions down through the years, has broadly and narrowly interpreted the 1st, but it has never waivered on the use of religion, even the religion and religious based traditions of the country's founders and framers of the constitution."

Poppycock.

"'At that the Supreme Court of California just ruled a Catholic charity was not a religious organization for the purpose of exempting it from hiring laws. If it isn't a religious organization for that, it isn't one for the purposes of withholding Federal funding either.'

That wasn't what the ruling said. The ruling said that religious organizations can't discriminate in hiring in ways that violate the constitution, which simply holds them to the same standards as every other employer."

On the contrary, the court acknowledged the law allowed churches and other related religious institutions to hire as their religious beliefs dictate. The ruling was based on the notion that the charities weren't religious instititions.


"Why can't we have JUST ONE LOUSY THREAD where we can discuss the extremely negative aspects of religion in politics and public life, from a secular perspective, without being beaten down by the Mudcat religious?"

I'm sorry, Guest, you should have told us you were just looking for validation for your views and didn't want an exchange that involved the people whose views you were trying to exclude from the public debate. Next time tell us when you start the thread. We assumed that when you included religion in the thread subject we were entitled to an opinion. As it was, you were no more beaten down that I would have been for posting a thread about the extremely positive apsects of religion. I didn't set the tone for the general conversation at Mudcat, I adapted to it.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 09:03 PM

There ya go. Why should it? A classic example. The reason is they wanted, in the Eisenhower years, to clearly differentiate themselves as tyhe US Gummint from them damned Godless Commies, who thought the answer was to suppress ALL religions.

A bad answer, actually, to a thorny problem that fortunately is no longer relevant. People I know who have been there say that the Russians are some of the most spiritual, but not necessarily rewligous, people anywhere, but I can't speak to that. Point is it is a classic example of mixing up the secular with the religous in ays that they might be better left apart.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 08:36 PM

awww..c'mon, Little Hawk...you're changing the use of the word "God" to suit YOU, then creating a little rant about one of your favotite topics..*grin*

Even though I can agree that "... religious mottos on coins is not as serious a matter...etc..", the important word there is "as"...Religious mottos on money is still 'serious' as part of a pervasive attempt by some to make religion the default idea, and make folks work hard to see any other possibility. (I grew up with the Pledge of Allegiance NOT having "under God" in it...I NEVER understood why they had to add it)

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 08:03 PM

Why would an atheist object to the phrase "In God We Trust" being on American money? The $$$$ IS itself THE reigning god in America, so the statement is entirely accurate and fits the whole sad and sorry situation, and is basically pretty atheistic at the same time as far as I can see...as atheism is generally understood, I mean. Worship of legal tender is not the same of worship of a supreme being, but it can be even more powerful when it comes to motivating people's actions. Anyone noticed that?

Just don't interpret those words in a way that offends YOU and it works for you. But some people are so eager to be offended...

It is the fact that people worship money that offends me, not the fact that a quasi-religious, patently misleading, and largely insincere motto is inscribed on that money.

Once again, I believe it's a matter of obsessing about the cover while not reading the book that is consuming Guest's attention. The existence of some old engraved religious mottos on coins is not as serious a matter as the complete domination of people's lives by greed for money and material success...at the cost of personal integrity, honesty, and sanity.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:17 PM

To return to the thread -- assume for a moment that all citizens of the country have strongly felt religous beliefs, with the usual attachments (icons, moral guidelines, judgements of goodness and badness and so on). Assume further that you want to develop a country which promotes individual freedoms to the greatest extent possible.

Given those premises, I submit that Guest's proposal of taking all religous icons of any kind out of the public arena (such as dollar bills, public ceremonies, and so on) would be better for the country than it would be to have one or another of those many religions favored by some aspect of the establishment. Because to do otherwise automatically tends to minimize or trivialize the citizenship of those who have other beliefs. And doing that is counter to the goal.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:10 PM

You got it, John: The term "fundamentalist" Christian seems to imply that if we don't want to have that label sewn to our baseball cap, we don't believe in the fundamentals of the Christian faith. It's kinda like being called a "liberal." Or a "conservative." The term Fundamentalist Christian has become a part of our language, for better or worse and applies to a particular group of Christians.

Like most labels, "Fundamentalist" Christian elicits all sorts of negative (and if you consider that you're a Fundamentalist Christian, positive) images. I'm a Christian. Brucie is a Christian. We don't think alike. But, we have some basic beliefs in common. And Guest, if you think we're high-jacking your thread, then don't sprinkle terms like fundamentalist christian in your postings.

Any thread worth it's salt is worth high-jacking for awhile. Mine usually are, and they are more interesting for it..

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:10 PM

It's just a semantic corruption, John -- you could describe yourself as a "basic" Christian and be understood, but "fundamentyalist" has come to mean someone who is actually a literalist, and often a moral dogmatic, rather than one who believes in the fundamentals. For example, I would argue that "The kingdom of heaven is within you" and "Greather things than I have done, ye shall do" and "Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these..." are fundamental teachings of the Christian faith.

The funny thing is that someone who insists that "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live" is a more important policy is more likely to be called a fundamentalist!

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: John Hardly
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:00 PM

...on second thought, don't answer that, Jerry.

It's just a personal peave of mine that "fundamentalist" should be at the most a neutral word -- meaning one who believes in the fundamentals of a belief system. Ground is ceded when we allow others to define what we believe, and meaning is lost when one can no longer refer to themselves as a "fundamentalist" because those who are not fundamentalists now wear the wrong moniker.

But it's not your fault. I understand your desire to distance yourself. It's just that in doing it as you felt you had to, you necessarily imply that you do not believe the fundamentals of the Christian faith.......and that necessary leaves one to wonder why you would consider yourself a christian if you do not believe in its fundamentals.

complicated, no?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:59 PM

Dear GUEST:

The closing argument is somewhat abrupt. I will start a thread entitled, "The negative aspects of orthodox religions."

You start a thread entitled "The positive aspects of orthodox religions."

I'm willin' to bet that the one you start will be addressed by many of the same people who have posted on this thread. They are thinking people.

I am willin' to bet that the one I start will be addressed by many of the same people who have posted on this thread. They are thinking people.

This is the best site on the 'net (IMO) BECAUSE of that. I would almost guarantee that folks will be back and forth between the two because they can see two sides of the issues.

I believe in God. Not one single person who posts with a name has ever called me an idiot for that belief. Maybe that's because I have never said I think THEY should believe in God. We can argue it, and we do. There are lots of way-far-smarter-than-me people on the 'cat. I have said I believe that prayer helps. Some people have written to say they don't think it does. We certainly don't fight about it. Threads here are a 'writing' in progress. I would be sadly disappointed if threads didn't get 'hijacked'. God, one thread that was posted got hijacked within four posts--and it was re-hijacked in three others. If any of us post a statement about our beliefs, there will be those who agree, others who disagree, and some who don't care--and will or will not say so.

Or. if you prefer, you can start BOTH threads.

Bruce M

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:58 PM

Good question, John: I can't think of a single "fundamental" I have a problem with (I know this isn't supposed to be about flavors of Christianity, so I'll be brief.) It's more a general mind-set of superiority and judgment that bothers me. Most of all, I don't cotton to people who are so constantly belittling others, rather than trying to get that 2x4 out of their own eye... whatever their beliefs. I have enough trouble trying to stay on track in my own life.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: John Hardly
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:53 PM

So what "fundamentals" of the faith do you take exception with, Jerry?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: John Hardly
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:45 PM

Well stated, Strick.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:45 PM

Guest: You're not talking about Christians?

I quote you from your 11:35 posting today:

"because of the fundamentalist Christian domination of mainstream politics."

"fundamentalist Christian political agenda."

"conservative protestantism"

I do stand corrected however. You seem to differentiate between conservative and fundamentalist Christians and the rest of us (who I suspect are the majority.) Sometimes the most vocal contingent is the smallest one.

I don't want to make this a thread about Christianity, and I do believe that you don't, either. I'm sure that I'm not as upset about fundamentalist Christians as you are, but believe me, I AM upset about what they are doing, too.

They give Christianity a bad name.

I wish you well, by the way..

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:38 PM

Another victory for the Christian bullies. You win. I'm done.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:02 PM

"No I wouldn't respond, because it is such an outrageously silly suggestion. I also tend to stay out of most the threads that have anything to do with religion, because of the tyranny of the religious majority in them."

Just as I consider this thread a silly suggestion. It's nothing but a thread about religion, however.

"I would never ask that a person leave their faith at home. I simply ask that you not attempt to impose your faith's values on me and the society we all live in. Just like our constitution says. I don't prohibit your practice of your faith/religion, and you don't impose your religion/faith on me by government mandates, programs, and preferences."

The problem is that in this you're trying to impose your values on society just like I am. You want to turn that debate into a one sided affair and re-interpret the Constitution to your liking (sorry, that's not what it says). Like Jerry, I've never tried to impose my religious views on anyone, just tried to see that my values are reasonably represented in the public debate. Those values can't exist without my faith. I don't generally put them forward as religious issues, but you seem intent on trying to determine which of my values are offensive to you because of what you assume to be their source.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 04:38 PM

Jerry, here is what you just don't seem to be willing or able (I don't know which) to get.

This thread isn't a conversation about different kinds of Christians, or what kind of Christian you yourself happen to be.

Nowhere in my opening post did I use the word 'Christian'. I said orthodox religion.

So why are we discussing all the different varieties of Christians and Christianity, and which hybrid you are? That isn't the subject of the thread, so why are you trying to turn the conversation into yet another Christian referendum?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 04:23 PM

Confusinger and confusinger. Man, if ever people were talking at angles to each other, this is the thread where it's happening. As to our Guest, I think that it's hard to have a discussion with someone who is so angry. Any comments that are made seem to be considered inflammatory.

One of the major falacies of any argument, from my admittedly un-scholarly perspective (although I did go two years toward a Doctorate) is that it's a major flaw in any discussion when people are lumped into the most negative judgment. Christians, who range from Mother Theresa and Albert Schweitzer to Pat Robertson and Jerry Fallwell are all characterized as trying to stuff their religion down the throats of the secular folks. Being one of them Christians you have such antagonism toward (or condescend to) I think that it's not all that important that there be prayer at school, or football games.
Same goes for a public display of the The Ten Commandments. I don't have a problem with banning that kind of public display. By the same token, if you want to get all wound up about something, why don't you get upset about the increasingly ugly music videos, or marketing of sex? I don't suggest censorship of videos, but when rap songs glorify being a Pimp, and clothing for little girls have messages to bite my booty on them, I wonder what's going on in this country. I feel that the values of a corporate driven music industry are being crammed down MY throat.

As I've stated, many of my friends in here, and in my daily life and family are Atheists. We get along just fine. Just as not every Christian is a narrow-minded, judgmental fool, not all Atheists feel that they are suffering under the tyranny of religion.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 04:22 PM

I would never ask that a person leave their faith at home. I simply ask that you not attempt to impose your faith's values on me and the society we all live in. Just like our constitution says. I don't prohibit your practice of your faith/religion, and you don't impose your religion/faith on me by government mandates, programs, and preferences.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST,MMario
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 04:17 PM

I try to stay out of most threads regarding religion because I inevitably either lose my temper or get extremely upset.

But I do want to say - that like many with faith - my faith and my life CANNOT be seperated - becuase my faith is part of every facet of my life. I can't "leave it at home".

I don't pretend that I always manage to live up to the tenets of my faith - but I do try.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 04:08 PM

"If I started a thread on why secular humanist should not be allowed to put forth views that are purely secular into the public debate you wouldn't respond?"

No I wouldn't respond, because it is such an outrageously silly suggestion. I also tend to stay out of most the threads that have anything to do with religion, because of the tyranny of the religious majority in them.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:56 PM

Guest, this is an open forum. If I started a thread on why secular humanist should not be allowed to put forth views that are purely secular into the public debate you wouldn't respond? How can you possible argue that anyone is too conservative and conventionally minded to hav an honest discussion? Aren't you really saying that since they disagree with you and use a "inferior" form of decision making, they aren't entitled to a voice? No two ways about it, that so bigoted it's hard to imagine.

The whole point of this thread has been that you expect a significant portion of the population to deny who they are why they think what they do so they can participate in the public debate. You want to start that now?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: artbrooks
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:47 PM

Sucular humanism has always seemed to me to be about as silly as any other organized religion, with its particular dogma and lack of interest in anyone else's opinion.

GUEST 3:22 PM, please state the point that you wish to discuss. Is it the same one suggested by GUEST 7 MAR 1:55 PM? That is, "ban religion from participation in the public square?" OK, I would agree with no large monuments, trees, etc., paid for with public funds or occupying space that belongs to the citizenry at large. Or are you suggesting, as later discussion by members and other GUESTS indicate, that no individual should allow his or her religious beliefs or upbringing to affect the way in which he or she interacts in the public sphere?

Now, GUEST 12:44 PM said that "what I mean when I say ban religion from the public square, I mean no more "In God We Trust". No more oath taking on bibles, or any other religious document. I mean no school vouchers for religious schools. I mean no federal funding to faith based charities. I mean removing any vestiges of references to the Judeo-Christian god, out of our public documents, and our public discourse. This would include the highest levels of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. Get it all out. Out, out, out. This is a pretty clear statement, and entirely reasonable, except for the part about oath taking. Some peoples' individual beliefs mandate that they use a bible or some other religious text when taking an oath for it to be valid. I'd argue that these people have a right to make what they consider to be a valid oath. Other than that, I don't think anyone here would disagree with this or with the ideas presented by any of the GUESTS present.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:34 PM

Actually, GUEST 3:27, I don't think that my anonymity is the issue in this one. Well, it is partially the issue for some people. But I think it really is more a question that people here are just too conservative and conventionally minded, to have an honest discussion about this subject. And that those who aren't, either don't want to agree with me for fear of appearing to be on the anon guest side of any question, or they just don't want to ruffle their friends feathers here, and so go along to get along.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:27 PM

happens a lot when you are faceless and invisible.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:22 PM

"Leave the secular humanists to decide who can and cannot speak, what they can say and what they said."

Again Strick, you are coming back at me hysterically, and attempting to put words in my mouth I clearly never said.

"No need for the people who are being silenced to have a point of view"

Christ, no one is silencing you. The Mudcat religious currently are preaching their views to the interested, the frustrated, and bored over in the "Faith" thread, the "Same Sex Marriage" thread, the "Anti-Semitism and the Left" thread, the "Just Saw Mel's Film" thread, the "Mel's Dad No Holocaust" thread...

I am merely voicing my frustration that the Mudcat religious constantly bully their way into every conversation like this.

Why can't we have JUST ONE LOUSY THREAD where we can discuss the extremely negative aspects of religion in politics and public life, from a secular perspective, without being beaten down by the Mudcat religious?

"Would you hesitate for a moment if the shoe were on the other foot and we were trying to force you to our way of thinking?"

I am not trying to force anyone to accept my way of thinking. I am asking for respect, and some space to have a discussion that you obviously don't want to take place, here or likely anywhere in your presence. I am tired of being bullied here.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 02:55 PM

"I am not trying to dictate what the conversation is, as all threads do drift. But this thread has become just another religion thread, with those usual suspects (no insult intended) here at Mudcat who identify themselves as Christians and/or conservative traditionalists, no matter how nice they are and how unlike the nasty "fundies" everyone loves to hate they are, attempting to hijack the conversation, and drag it down to the level of yet another thread full of religious diatribes.

I really don't understand why this forum finds it so difficult to allow secularist humanists to hold a conversation, without being beaten over the head by well-intentioned Christian members, who feel (compusively, apparently) that they MUST stand up for their religion here, whenever the discussion is about getting religion out of our public lives."

What amazing hypocracy! Leave the secular humanists to decide who can and cannot speak, what they can say and what they said. No need for the people who are being silenced to have a point of view, you'll tell us what point of view we're allowed to have.

How can you possibly be surprised that we won't just shut up and go away so you can decide our future for us?   Would you hesitate for a moment if the shoe were on the other foot and we were trying to force you to our way of thinking? What an ass.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 01:29 PM

What I am suggesting has never been done before in the US. Which is why the "how it will work" arguments are nothing more than conjecture, mine included.

I would like to see a movement towards this sort of break with the past, because it would make our public sphere consistent with the highest ideals as they are spelled out in the constitution, and in the Supreme Court's interpretations of the constitution.

It is my conjecture that having that sort of clarity and consistency would actually calm the conservatives, who seem to suffer most when the double standards are allowed to exist, yet feel they have no control over which standards are being imposed upon them personally.

I think if the conservatives felt the law and government were acting consistently, and that laws were made more clear through the application of that consistency in the behavior of government employees (especially elected politicians!) they would feel much less like their way of life was threatened by the chaos they feel.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 01:07 PM

Right.

Lovely idea -- put all them spirit-type items into the corridors of private activity, no God on the dollar, etc. Fine.

I do not believe this is a deep remmedy to important ills, but I do believe it would obviate the oppressive religous tyranny of which you speak. Unfortunately, the next tyrant would find some other button with which to induce mass knee-jerks. Big Brother doesn't need religion, he just needs enemies, real or invented.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Ringer
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 01:02 PM

Guest, your posts are patronising, shallow and mealy-mouthed. In lordly manner, you proclaim, "I do not use Western modes of logic and reasoning in my analytical and critical thinking." Why come and post here, then? These discussions are for those who can argue, and arguing involves use of logic and reasoning. No adjective is necessary to qualify "logic and reasoning", an argument is either logical or it is not. Nonsense is not suddenly sound argument because it doesn't follow "Western modes of logic". And I suspect there can be no "analytical and critical thinking" without logic -- but no doubt you will correct me if I'm wrong.

And you're nit-picking. In your post of 08 Mar 04, 01:08 PM (a reply to mine of 08 Mar 04, 10:17 AM) you don't answer my point (but then that would require "Western modes of logic", wouldn't it, so I don't know why I expect it, really), but carp that I'm responding to an agenda of my own, not to what you wrote. But I don't think that is the case. You don't mean to tell me that this diatribe of yours is disinterested? What you meant, and what I replied to, was, "One thing that bothers me a lot are the daily, real life repurcussions for secularists, atheists, and agnostics particularly[, myself included], of living in this age of religious tyranny".

And anyway, you do the same thing yourself (08 Mar 04, 01:08 PM), accusing me of implying that you personally are a victim of religious persecution or tyranny, when I only asked a question.

Of course I implied that, just as you implied what I inferred above. The difference is that I'm prepared to stand by what I write, while you appear to be able only to use persiflage to cover the tripe you write.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 01:00 PM

Somebody, I think it was Voltaire, said that if God had not existed, it would have been necessary to invent Him. Nietzsche then wrote ah, but if Voltaire [or whoever it was] had not existed, it would NOT have been necessary to invent HIM...

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 12:44 PM

Sigh.

Again, I didn't say ban religious believers from participating in public debates. I didn't say ban religion. I said ban religion from the public square.

What I mean when I say ban religion from the public square, I mean no more "In God We Trust". No more oath taking on bibles, or any other religious document. I mean no school vouchers for religious schools. I mean no federal funding to faith based charities. I mean removing any vestiges of references to the Judeo-Christian god, out of our public documents, and our public discourse. This would include the highest levels of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. Get it all out. Out, out, out.

That is what I am talking about.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 12:34 PM

I believe it would be a mistake to try to ban religion -- in other words to explicitly prohibit the exhibition or conduct of religous communication, practice, ritual, etc. -- from participation in the public square. Or, at least, that the policy should be more clearly worded. Prohibiting the use of religous arguments in any political discussion (in other owrds, limiting such discussion to entities which everyone involved cans ense, measure or experience) i srisky because there is too much intersection, both positive and negative. For example, assessing long-term good for others in funding, say, a freeway system or a health system involves a lot of confidence in certain kinds of good. And certain futures unfoilding from presents. And in the commonness of certain classes of good. It can be a truly sticky wicket.

There is probably some effective way to clearly state a more workable policy to keep religion out of secular decisions as much as possible, but it won't become a 100% clean boundary, I think.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 12:11 PM

It is also important to note that in the example of the current proposed constitutional amendment, there is an attempt to impose the religious standard of marriage upon the civil standard of marriage.

But I would like to suggest that any further discussion of the gay marriage issue be posted to the gay marriage thread, and the faith/religion issues posted to the faith thread.

My purpose for titling this thread secularity vs. religion is because I, and many other reasonable people, are opposed to religion in the public sphere. I had hoped we could have a discussion among secularists who either aren't religious believers, or who will not constantly keep injecting their personal religious beliefs into the discussion.

This is the essence of what I hoped the discussion would be about, from my original post:

"I believe strongly that no nation on earth should be governed using orthodox religion as the main tenet for governance or the rule of law. I believe strongly in the separation of religion and state, and believe we need to go to the next level, which to me is to ban religion from participation in the public square.

I fear society as we know it will be destroyed by religious fundamentalism."

I am not trying to dictate what the conversation is, as all threads do drift. But this thread has become just another religion thread, with those usual suspects (no insult intended) here at Mudcat who identify themselves as Christians and/or conservative traditionalists, no matter how nice they are and how unlike the nasty "fundies" everyone loves to hate they are, attempting to hijack the conversation, and drag it down to the level of yet another thread full of religious diatribes.

I really don't understand why this forum finds it so difficult to allow secularist humanists to hold a conversation, without being beaten over the head by well-intentioned Christian members, who feel (compusively, apparently) that they MUST stand up for their religion here, whenever the discussion is about getting religion out of our public lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 12:06 PM

PP:

LOL!!!

Met a li'l girl on the waterfront with a bucket of fish, and she said they were Christian Red Herrings. They were just fingerlings, couldn't even open their eyes, just swimming around bumping in to the sides of the bucket, each other, and generally thrashing about...

I saw her again a couple of weeks later and she still had that same bucket of fish with her! They had grown some, and were swimming in neat circles, avoiding obstacles. This time, though, she said they were Scientology Red Herrings. I asked her why she had changed from calling the Christian Red Herrings, and she explained that that was before they had their eyes open.

But shortly after that, they all died.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Pied Piper
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:53 AM

A good writhing catch of Christian Red Herrings.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:49 AM

"It's none of you business why anyone thinks gay marriage should not be allowed."

Actually, that is exactly what the justices look to when the Supreme Court considers 1st Amendment cases involving religion. While you Strick say you are opposed to gay marriage because it goes against tradition, the tradition of which you speak is rooted in religion. When you factor in who the proponents of the gay marriage constitutional amendment are (religious groups), then it does rise to the standard of the 1st.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:45 AM

"Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Descartes, Rousseau, Bacon, Pascal, James, Mill, etc., concluded that God exists and openly confessed their belief in a Supreme Being.

The above is a cut and paste from a site on the web. "

brucie, I appreciate and have acknowledged that there are critical thinkers and secularists who believe in a supreme being (I find it odd that those last two words are capitalized, BTW. That tells me the site you cut and pasted from has a religious agenda, not a secular one.

I had hoped that we could actually hold a conversation without the religionists dominating the conversation and making it yet another thread about religion. It is just pathetic that people here can't tolerate those sorts of conversations here.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:41 AM

"At that the Supreme Court of California just ruled a Catholic charity was not a religious organization for the purpose of exempting it from hiring laws. If it isn't a religious organization for that, it isn't one for the purposes of withholding Federal funding either."

That wasn't what the ruling said. The ruling said that religious organizations can't discriminate in hiring in ways that violate the constitution, which simply holds them to the same standards as every other employer.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:35 AM

"The Constitution is now where near so specific about religion that it forbids passing laws that I support as a result of my religious beliefs, Amos."

Actually, that is exactly what it prohibits. And the Supreme Court, in it's decisions down through the years, has broadly and narrowly interpreted the 1st, but it has never waivered on the use of religion, even the religion and religious based traditions of the country's founders and framers of the constitution.

The problems that we are now facing regarding the intepretation of religion in public life stems from the fact that conservative Protestantism has been the default dominant religion in the US since it's inception. That is why we see "In God We Trust" and swearing religious oaths on bibles (no longer done in courts of law, BTW, even though it was once a long standing tradition) unless you are being sworn in to public office. So there are vestiges of Protestant religion all over the public sphere that need to be taken out the public sphere.

However, as we saw in Alabama, the opposite is actually happening, because of the fundamentalist Christian domination of mainstream politics right now, which conservative Catholics, conservative Jews, conservative "traditionalists" (which can include anybody from people like Strick, who say they wish to uphold "tradition" to Native Americans who practice a contemporary form of their traditional religion, to pagans and wiccans), conservative Buddhists, conservative Muslims, conservative Hindus, and people who are just plain conservative, support. They support most of the fundamentalist Christian political agenda, because they support conservative values.

But their time will soon, thankfully, be in the past.

I actually put the First Amendment in a post up the line there.

Here again is the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Strick said "It prohibits establishing a religion and nothing more."

That is simply not true. There have been many cases the Supreme Court has weighed in on. The constitution is a living document, open to interpretation (that is why we have the Supreme Court) and changes in our society over time. That is it's value today. Eventually, it too will become obsolete, and will be replaced with something that serves the nation better, or the nation will change and no longer appear as it does today.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:12 AM

"Guest ,you write:
"I do not use Western modes of logic and reasoning in my analytical and critical thinking .I believe in a high standard of ethics and integrity.............."
And yet you use words like logic, reason, critical ,ethics and integrity."

I use the words as common parlance, because I am in dialogue with people who are linguistically trained to use those words. However, very few people, even today, receive formal education and/or training in the western modes of logic, and therefore don't always use those words according to their definition and context within formal logic.

"Don't you think that the development and use of such concepts are closely linked to the development of "western modes of logic" ?"

Those words have their roots in formal logic, but have long since taken on additional meanings. Language changes a great deal over time.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 11:00 AM

Because there's a long tradition and a set of laws for what constitute marriage and how it should work under different circumstances. Those things weren't spontaneous. They exist for a reason. There's a process by which society decides how things like this should work. You have the freedom to do many things. Organize a basketball team if you want. But how ever hard you try, a basketball team is not a marriage.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 12:01 AM

Right, Strick -- but if we take cross interference down to the lowest possible point we are left with two people wishing to decide themselves married. Why should anyone else gainsay them that freedom?

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:12 PM

Then I apologize, Amos, I over reacted based on my sense of the trend of the thread. As to impeachment over "violating" the Constitution? Come on, you know how many executive orders and laws initiated by by Presidents have been overturned by the Supreme Court as unconstituional? Not a single impeachment as a result. At that the Supreme Court of California just ruled a Catholic charity was not a religious organization for the purpose of exempting it from hiring laws. If it isn't a religious organization for that, it isn't one for the purposes of withholding Federal funding either.

Bobert, bless you, Jesus went to what His society considered the worst sinners and criminals and accepted them as God's children. Where the religious leaders of his time considered them ruined, irredeemable, Jesus taught that God loved them and would forgive them if they would only give themselves to Him and repent, literally change their ways. His last words to the woman caught in adultry in the passage you quote were "Go and sin no more", not "have a nice day". Hate the sin, love the sinner, right? He was tolerant of human weakness, but not the acceptance of sin. Sorry the message got to you so garbled.

All that's neither here nor there. It's none of you business why anyone thinks gay marriage should not be allowed. You can't tell other people what to think anymore than you want to be told what to think. You don't have to agree, just get enough people to agree with you so you can change the law.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 10:35 PM

Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Descartes, Rousseau, Bacon, Pascal, James, Mill, etc., concluded that God exists and openly confessed their belief in a Supreme Being.

The above is a cut and paste from a site on the web.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Bobert
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 10:35 PM

Well, this may be relevant to some and not to others but Christianity ain't like this one big happy group o' folks. Might o' fact, I suspect that there are less Christains 'round than those willing to take to a soap box in the name of Christ. But those issues will get sorted out at some point in time somewhere in the vacinity of the Pearly Gates...

That ain't my beef...

What is my beef is intolerance. Chrsiatins who fully understand what Jesus was teaching have no room in their hearts for it. "Let you who has not sinned cast the first stone", He said.

But beyond that, where in his teachings did Jesus say that love, no make that LOVE, is something that God created for women and man or vice versa? He didn't... Sure, you can make inferences in the Old Testament back to Adam and Eve, which I think are rather childish, but Jesus didn't differentiate...

SO, hey, hows about a little tolerance?

Don't hurt, won't make ya' fat and won't insure your soul an eternity of damnation either...

What a bargain....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 09:48 PM

I wasn't suggesting any such thing, Strick!! I am surprised at the interpretation that has been put on my words. I simply suggested that no law should be made regarding any establishment of religion -- that means injecting any support of a religious establishment into the law. People can have whatever reasons they choose for their preferences. Some use religion and some use reasons and sonmetimes the two are intersecting sets! Point is that religous matters have no place at law and never should have.

The President has opened himself to impeachment for a violation of his oath to defend the Consittution, by suggesting it should be modified on religous grounds.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 09:44 PM

All moral and ethical positions are matters of opinion and wide open. Why do you limit yourself to those based on religion?

The Constitution is now where near so specific about religion that it forbids passing laws that I support as a result of my religious beliefs, Amos. It prohibits establishing a religion and nothing more. The Founding Fathers, even those traditionally considered anti-religious would be astounded at the suggestion that the dictates of someone's conscience had to be excluded from public debate. It denies me my 1st Amendment right to free expression. Argue against what you will in the public forum, but don't try to exclude anything from it.

Even if you could convince a judge to construe the Constitution they way you say (since the public would never agree to it any other way), where do you draw the line? "Thou shalt not steal" is one of the Ten Commandments. Should we throw out a law against theft because it has a religious origin? Who will decided what is religiously based and what is not? You talk about forcing society to adopt "creeds and moral dogma" of some sect. All you want to do is replace them with some politically correct creeds and moral dogma that's consistent with your secular religion.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 09:41 PM

Thanks Mack: Believe me, I ain't nowhere nears the best of the lot. Not all Christians are conservative, right-wing Bushbabies.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 08:55 PM

Strick:

The simple answer is that the Consittution says NO law. Whether about one religion or a few the bottom line is that a religous issue has no place at law. Religions, being wide open on matters of opinion and 99 percent made of it, of course are not similarly constraind about legal matters -- they can issue any fatwah they please and people can follow along or not as they please.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 06:59 PM

"1. 'Some critical thinkers have determined that religion is necessary'."

I think that if you managed to banish all religion from the earth (at least religion in the sense I mean it), humanity would reinvent it in a generation. Look at China. They got so close and suddenly there's a resurgence of religion and not just through foreign evangelism (Christian or otherwise). Quite a bit of it is domestic and spontaneous.

"2. Forms of marriage: let's not forget polyandry."

I at least mean plyandry when you say polygamy. I tend to thing most mean anything but monogamy when you say polygamy. Certainly it should be included.

"3. Gay Marriage could be resolved in an instant if we were all willing to call it something else."

The most interesting thing about the events of the past month is that they almost assure that some form of civil union will become the rule fairly shortly.

"4. I have had some very bad experiences with Christians. As a group, I fear and distrust them."

I have had some very bad experiences with People. As a group, I fear and distrust them. Treat them with caution and only trust when trust has been earned.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 06:54 PM

Yeah, okay, Strick, I understand. You're supporting a traditional viewpoint as you see it. I guess a change in this particular tradition just doesn't bother me too much. The main point to me is...no one is getting hurt here. I don't believe in victimless crimes as being crimes at all. For the same reason I do not support prosecuting people for simple possession of a drug (for personal use) or for its use...only for selling the drug or committing a crime under its influence...in which case the crime is what I would prosecute them for.

A crime is something that harms someone else, not just something that is unusual or non-traditional. But we all have our favorite traditions to defend, I suppose.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: mack/misophist
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 06:46 PM

1. "Some critical thinkers have determined that religion is necessary". I think that's what was said. The only such I'm aware of is Jefferson, who thought churches were necessary to keep the lower classes in line with the threat of hell. Even a Jefferson can have faults.

   2. Forms of marriage: let's not forget polyandry.

   3. Gay Marriage could be resolved in an instant if we were all willing to call it something else. Marriage is, after all, a religious institution (the civil marriage license is only a century old in this country) so let's give gays a form of legal commitment with rights and responsibilities equal to those of marriage. The fact is that gay and lesbian partnerships are often descriminated against in subtle and cruel ways, such as a gay being barred from a partner's deathbed because they're not the next of kin. Cruel.

   3. The Spanish Inquisition was mentioned in jest. It wasn't funny. Think a minute. All it takes is the granting of a handful of premises to turn the Inquisition into the greatest act of Christian charity in history. That's the threat of religion. Another Calvin, another Kramer, another Sprenger and the fires will be lit again.

   4. I have had some very bad experiences with Christians. As a group, I fear and distrust them. Having said that, I have to say that, although I've never met him, I must have read thousands of Mr Rasmussen's words, even had a few personal exchanges with him. On that basis, I think it would be safe to give him the key to my house and a power of attorney while I went away for a while. Pity there aren't more like him.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 04:48 PM

To correct a small point of fact: The Ten Commandments are from the Old Testament, therefore they are not Christian, strictly speaking.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 04:14 PM

Amos,I think you'll find that homosexuality may have formed long relationships, but that those relationships were never considered marriage in any of the Greek city states or any other culture I'm aware of. Mormans, of course, are no longer free to practice polygamy in the US by Federal law. Things conducted in private that don't require a marriage license really aren't relevant here. People have practiced a lot of things in private you probably wouldn't like me mentioning.

Oddly enough, Little Hawk, I haven't said I do except on traditional grounds. I object to wholesale restructuring of the social order outside the public debate. If you want to lobby the legislature to make changes, go right ahead. People aren't doing that because for the most part public opinion, majority rule, elections, all those things you find so sacred in another thread, are clearly against them. Some courts and Heaven knows some mayors have bypassed the normal process and exceeded their powers.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 03:36 PM

Why do you oppose same-sex marriage, Strick? Are you worried that your children might someday be affected or something? I'm honestly asking this, not just trying to bug you.

What I mean is...I'm not gay and I have no wish to get married to someon of the same gender, but why should I care if someone else does? How does that hurt or threaten me?

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 03:28 PM

I was thinking of Sparta and Greece, Mormans (poly-, not homo-)and plenty of others where harems and multi-mate arrangements were the mainstream. But in addition to that there have always been non-mainstream arrangements that were legitimized in fact because they were conducted in privacy. I haven't researched the track, but I'd bet there are plenty of documents out there on it that have.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST,Guest mick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 02:31 PM

Guest ,you write:
"I do not use Western modes of logic and reasoning in my analytical and critical thinking .I believe in a high standard of ethics and integrity.............."
And yet you use words like logic, reason, critical ,ethics and integrity.Don't you think that the development and use of such concepts are closely linked to the development of "western modes of logic" ?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 01:54 PM

"I'm afraid you're not quite right about that one. There have been alternatively structured marriages throughout recorded history."

Enlighten me. I'm aware of santioned homosexual behavior in cultures such as Sparta in Greece, but even there the participants were expected to marry hetrosexually.

"If the gay marriage amendment ever does surface, which it never should, it could be legitimately argued that it is an imposition of one sect's moral values on others, and based entirely on the creeds and moral dogma of that sect."

Ah, but there's the rub. Why any of the 60% or so of the US population is against gay marriage is none of your business. For that matter, I'm aware of 3 distinct religions (i.e., I don't mean just Christians) that oppose redefining marriage. Which sect were you refering to? If several often violently opposing religions agree, how is that establishing one religion? And what about those like me who oppose it on purely traditional grounds? I'm not entitled to a voice?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 01:43 PM

On the contrary, it merely formalized the definition of marriage that goes back to the beginning of recorded history

I'm afraid you're not quite right about that one. There have been alternatively structured marriages throughout recorded history.

If the gay marriage amendment ever does surface, which it never should, it could be legitimately argued that it is an imposition of one sect's moral values on others, and based entirely on the creeds and moral dogma of that sect.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 01:33 PM

"What you're proposing is merely replacing existing religions in the public debate with secular ones, isn't it?"

"No, that isn't what I'm proposing.

As a student of both history and comparative religion, I respectfully disagree. Human nature is such that it will occur regardless of your intentions.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..."

I believe, just as a current example, that the proposed constitutional amendment to outlaw gay marriage, would be an instance of Congress making a law respecting estalishment of religion.

On the contrary, it merely formalized the definition of marriage that goes back to the beginning of recorded history and then only when the courts short-circuited the public debate on the definition of marriage. Since when is it your place to question why I do or not support any particular initiative in the public debate?

BTW, the last Constitutional scholar I spoke to, a liberal Democrat, admitted that the establishment clause doesn't go anywhere near this question. Anymore than the Federal law against polygamy establishs religion despite the fact it favors the religious practices of one group over others.

When I say I want religion out of the public square, I don't mean I don't want religious believers to participate in the debate, because that would be a violation of their 1st Amendment rights. What I mean is, Christians shouldn't be allowed to impose and implement their personal religious beliefs in the public sphere, such as in the halls of government, through government funded and supported initiatives, etc.

I'm confused. I can participate, but I'm not supposed to base my decisions on issues in public debate on my most basic beliefs? Or I can participate, but any issue in public debate should not be allowed to be settled in any way that you consider religiously based? How else could we decide what's allowed and what isn't except to make you an "impartial" judge? Gives you a lot of power doesn't it?

How would you settle the death penalty debate then? Aren't a significant percentage of those opposed to the death penalty opposed on purely religious grounds? Should this only apply only to certain "politically incorrect" issues? Wouldn't that simply impose some other basis for "diktats, and coerced conformity"?

Or is all what you want is for me to be silent on my religious beliefs? Then I can push for anything I want so long as I don't mention why? After all, how would you know what I believe if I'm silent. Or what my reasons are. That's sort of a backdoor violation of my 1st Amendment rights, isn't? A form of legal coercion that requires my silence while pretending to let me speak?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 01:08 PM

Apparently, most of you love to respond to your own buttons, biases, and assumptions, and not to what is written.

"Just what religious tyranny are you subject to, Guest? Good grief: 400 years ago people could have been (many were!) burned at the stake for their belief, and you talk of religious tyranny in America in 2004? Get a sense of proportion, do."

Where did I say I was personally a victim of religious persecution or tyranny? Nowhere. To talk of religious tyranny in America in 2004, with the take over of the public square in the US by fundamentalist Christians, is valid and legitimate.

What I actually said was we live in an era of religious tyranny. I put no geographical boundaries on it. I did not say "in the US" although I include the US, as I do many parts of the world where many people suffer profound religious persecution, particularly women.

Then there was this question:

"What you're proposing is merely replacing existing religions in the public debate with secular ones, isn't it?"

No, that isn't what I'm proposing.

"Post-modernists believe that either reason or faith alone is doomed to fail. There are questions that reason alone can't answer, things you can't prove as every pure mathematician or physicist knows. Faith is essential..."

I think this is more suited for posting to the faith thread. I[m interested in dialog about living life without religion, and moving beyond a society bound by authoritarian religious diktats, and coerced conformity to religious values.

"As to your suggestion that religious matters be removed completely form the public sphere, well that's a violation of the 1st Amendment, isn't it?"

Here is the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

I believe, just as a current example, that the proposed constitutional amendment to outlaw gay marriage, would be an instance of Congress making a law respecting estalishment of religion.

Another example. The display of the 10 commandments, or any other symbols and vestiges of the Christian religion in government buildings. Again, a violation of the 1st Amendment.

3rd example. The Bush administration Faith Based Initiatives. Private school vouchers for religious schools.

When I say I want religion out of the public square, I don't mean I don't want religious believers to participate in the debate, because that would be a violation of their 1st Amendment rights. What I mean is, Christians shouldn't be allowed to impose and implement their personal religious beliefs in the public sphere, such as in the halls of government, through government funded and supported initiatives, etc.

"Oh, that's right, you could skip that process."

I said no such thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Art Thieme
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 12:10 PM

Guest,

We agree.

Somehow I'm thinking about a definition Utah Phillips had for the word ANARCHIST:   "Someone who doesn't need a policeman to tell him what to do."

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 12:06 PM

Hey, good post, Strick.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST,Kaleb
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:58 AM

Put him in.............THE COMFY CHAIR!!

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:50 AM

Ah hah! Now I get what you're talking about with "religious tyranny". As to how it's being used to manipulate politics, yes, it is very disturbing indeed.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Strick
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:50 AM

Some people consider religion, what it is at it's deepest, so essential that the secular simply becomes yet another religion. The Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, The People's Republic of China, every purely secular society eventually adopted the trappings of religion. What you're proposing is merely replacing existing religions in the public debate with secular ones, isn't it?

Likewise, reason is not given over to the secular sphere alone. That's so "modern". Post-modernists believe that either reason or faith alone is doomed to fail. There are questions that reason alone can't answer, things you can't prove as every pure mathematician or physicist knows. Faith is essential, even if it's so simple as having faith that basic technology will work as you expect it (except for automobiles and computers which are entitled to stop working anytime they please), but faith can't, was never meant to be the answer to all things, just the important ones. Forcing us to live by one or the other just weakens us. Forcing us to deny that we are acting on our faith would be forcing us to lie and what do you gain by that?

As to your suggestion that religious matters be removed completely form the public sphere, well that's a violation of the 1st Amendment, isn't it? If I'm against murder for religious grounds, that's my business and it's perfectly acceptable for me to say so. If I organize with people of my faith to work to change the world as we think it should be, that's no different from any other organization doing the same. You may not like what the changes I want or my reasons for wanting them, but how is that different from any two opposing views in any other case. How would you propose this change without changing the 1st Amendment, then? Amend the Constitution? What change, what reduction in our right to free expression wouldn't eventually be turned against us in other ways?

Fortunately, that kind of change would never take place. It's too serious a reduction of civil liberties and it would be opposed to by too much of the population. It would never survive an open public debate. Oh, that's right, you could skip that process. Why have a public debate and use the Constitution to amend itself when you can just use the courts to do it? ;)

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:32 AM

The infiltration of religion into politics in the US, Arab states and various other countries is a scenario that needs to be monitored, although I don't know that I'd be buying guns just yet. The fundamentalist factions are scary, but that's because they're crazy, not because they exert all that much control. I think they are wined and dined by the White House, but mostly because it's a nice block of voters to get.

Our problems with NWO and multinationals is more pressing and scarier. That said, have a good day.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:15 AM

GUEST:

We have a common ground at last.

There is a religious tyranny beginning to develop in this world. If that is your concern, I see your point and agree with you. That is substantially different from where this 'argument' started out. Thanks. Nice not to have a contest.

Bruce M

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 11:14 AM

Ah, yes, but the Spanish Inquisition is just about to pounce on Guest, and subject him/her to the most hideous tortures...and remember...NO ONE EXPECTS THE SPANISH INQUISITION!!!   :-)

What I was saying "Hear! Hear!" to up there was Jerry Rasmussen's post, by the way.

Like Amos, I appear to be a secular mystic with an interest in all religious traditions, but bound to none of them. I appear to fit sections 1(b), 1(c>, and 2 in Guest's quote of Webster's definition of secular.

I believe in numerous tenets of various religions...such as the tenet of reincarnation, the tenet of an immortal soul, etc, etc, etc...and yet I am quite free of either engaging in or suffering religious oppression.

Methinks Guest is subconsciously reliving some kind of nasty experience from a previous life...perhaps being siezed by the Inquisition in 1540 or something. Either that or Guest is the angry child of a rigidly religious family. Preacher's sons are often the most vociferous of all atheists, in my experience.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Ringer
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 10:17 AM

"...living in this age of religious tyranny"

Just what religious tyranny are you subject to, Guest? Good grief: 400 years ago people could have been (many were!) burned at the stake for their belief, and you talk of religious tyranny in America in 2004? Get a sense of proportion, do.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 10:15 AM

I suspect I may be a purely secular mystic! :>)

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Mar 04 - 09:55 AM

"Some critical thinkers have arrived at the conclusion that religion is essential to humankind. Are they allowed in your philosophy?"

Well, here is the Webster's definition of secular:

Main Entry: 1sec·u·lar
Pronunciation: 'se-ky&-l&r
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from Old French seculer, from Late Latin saecularis, from saeculum the present world, from Latin, generation, age, century, world; akin to Welsh hoedl lifetime
1 a : of or relating to the worldly or temporal b : not overtly or specifically religious c : not ecclesiastical or clerical
2 : not bound by monastic vows or rules; specifically : of, relating to, or forming clergy not belonging to a religious order or congregation
3 a : occurring once in an age or a century b : existing or continuing through ages or centuries c : of or relating to a long term of indefinite duration
- sec·u·lar·i·ty /"se-ky&-'lar-&-tE/ noun
- sec·u·lar·ly /'se-ky&-l&r-lE/ adverb

That definition includes people who believe in tenets of the Christian religion (but apparently not Muslims, Buddhists, or Jews, if the examples they provide are anything to go by--pretty Xtian-centric!), but who are either not "overtly" religious, or who don't ascribe to any specific Christian denomination.

My answer of course, is yes.

The question is what raised concerns for me. One thing that bothers me a lot are the daily, real life repurcussions for secularists, atheists, and agnostics particularly, of living in this age of religious tyranny.

And I do view attempts by Christians to make secularism religious, when the contemporary meaning via usage and context means that it is NOT religious. Most secularists I know and have read do not ascribe to a belief that religion is essential to humankind. In fact, the secularists with whom I identify have the opposite opinion, ie that not only is religion not essential to humankind, but that it is holding humankind back in the Dark Ages.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Art Thieme
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 11:40 PM

Why do I feel like I'm being reeled in whenever I look into these threads?? Somebody is trolling for me out there I'm just about certain.

Don't think I'll bite.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 07:54 PM

Some people really do take offence remarkably easily, as if they are looking for it. It seems to me a good policy never to assume that offence is intended, unless it is so unambiguous and direct that it couldn't possibly be anything else. (And then the next thing generally is to ignore it.)

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Bobert
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 07:08 PM

Well, gol danged, GUEST. Lets not let intolernace = Chrisain. That ain't what Jesus taught and that ain't 'bout hwta a lot, I mean a lot, of Christains, think. Unfortunately, we gotta a bunch of folks with political agendas who ran most of the real Christains out of their own danged churches in the 60's and have just squatted in 'um as if that made them, ahhhh, like real Christains. Real Christains who take body of Jesus's stories and tried to fashion their lives after that "body" have either left those churches to the heathens, started new ones or found ones that held up the teachings of Jesus.

Hey, if you aren't "saved", I'll be the last one in the world to pass judgement. At least you have an open mind and that is imparative if you are evr to accept Christ as more than a prophet or good story teller. I'll take a 1000 of you's, GUEST, over one danged intolerant fundamentalist.

Peace.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 07:02 PM

Hear, hear!

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 07:01 PM

Secularity.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 06:52 PM

Hey, Guest: Some comments: If you even casually read the thread I started on faith, I believe(whoops... that word again) you'd see that I welcomed all comments, including those by people I consider friends in here who are Atheists, and don't consider that they have faith in anything. (Wolfgang is a friend who stated that point of view.)And I have a real respect for him.

I agree with brucie, too, that a sense of humor is always recommended. No one was putting down your opening statement. As a matter of fact, I was very complimentary about it (which apparently went unnoticed.) You also intermix faith and religion, while I made a patricular point of separating them in the thread on faith. There are people who have a strong faith, but do not hold to any particular religion. I respect them all.

And why is my comment that I see no conflict between an analytical mind and faith off-putting to you? I don't see that as "patronizing" people who don't accept my faith. On the contrary, I have given high praise to people like Bill D, who I find very intelligent and open, who does not believe in God. I have too many loved friends (and family members) who do not believe in God to belittle them or their lives.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 06:19 PM

I gotta get a TV. Are they holidays now?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST,Martin Gibson
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 06:18 PM

Guest, I order you to work on Christmas and Easter.

I don't care if who you work for is closed. You cannot have those days off.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 06:10 PM

"You said you are a secularist who values knowledge gained from critical thinking. Some critical thinkers have arrived at the conclusion that religion is essential to humankind. Are they allowed in your philosophy?"

Allowed? ALLOWED? (That's in answer to your capslock question).

What would be the point of denying the existence of people with a particular opinion, just because I don't agree with them?

OK GUEST, then answer the question. Are they allowed in your philosophy, or are critical thinkers only real critical thinkers when they agree with your definition of critical thinkers? I don't want to have a pissin' contest with you, but maybe that's where this has to go. Your call.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Amos
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 05:30 PM

Reckon he must be if you take all the assertions about his hobbies into account! :>) Either that or he is beiong projected by a lot o' WOMISTians...

A

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 05:07 PM

I'm a secularist who believes in God. Chew on that.

Remember, the "God" I say I believe in may be nothing like the God you imagine when you hear the word "God". God may well be a secularist too, you know. :-)

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 05:05 PM

Good rant, Bill.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 05:03 PM

Hello, Bill D. I'm gonna go read your rant. #big grin#. Ah, there it is over the 8. *big grin*. I would have been much too embarrassed to start a thread abot this one, because I don't know what it's called. "Hey, I have lost my whatchacallit"--well, you can see where that would lead.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 05:00 PM

"You said you are a secularist who values knowledge gained from critical thinking. Some critical thinkers have arrived at the conclusion that religion is essential to humankind. Are they allowed in your philosophy?"

Allowed? ALLOWED? (That's in answer to your capslock question).

What would be the point of denying the existence of people with a particular opinion, just because I don't agree with them?

"I have posted very un-Christian things a few times."

Everything I post is un-Christian, because I'm not a Christian. The world is not made up simply of Christian/un-Christian dichotomies, no matter how badly Christians wish the world were so.

Christianity isn't the global default, people.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 04:51 PM

weird...I find myself in basic agreement with the 'guest, yet vaguely uncomfortable with the attitude.

I just ranted a bit in the 'faith' thread...I don't think I'll get into this one right now...*grin*

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 04:45 PM

GUEST

I would posit very definitely that Jerry is not just a vocal Christian on the 'cat but also a real one in the world. I have posted very un-Christian things a few times, and Jerry has always responede the way a real Christian does. He tends to lead by example. I have learned from him.

Humour has a place in both the religious and secular world. So let me toss this one back. You said you are a secularist who values knowledge gained from critical thinking. Some critical thinkers have arrived at the conclusion that religion is essential to humankind. Are they allowed in your philosophy? (Don't mean that to sound snide.)

Also, you people gotta find a way to figure the difference between jokes and real questions. I'm askin' once more, politely: WHAT'S CAPSLOCK? Sounds like a really hot ingredient found in some sauces.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: pdq
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 04:40 PM

Jerry... If you are both a Christian and a geologist, you certainly will not take things for granite.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: artbrooks
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 04:37 PM

GUEST 4:28 PM: what discussion? You, that is if you are also GUEST 1;55 PM, made a number of statements. None of them are unreasonable or at all contradictory to what I see as the opinion of the vast majority of people, whether or not they are devout adherents of the Christain religion or any other religion. What is your question?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 04:28 PM

Jerry, you are a vocal Christian on this forum, as is Susan. The two of you constituted the majority opinion among the four responses so far. No disrespect is meant to any of you, but that sort of response leads me to suspect you and Susan feel threatened by non-Christians of any stripe, expressing their views in your presence.

Now, as to the discussion at hand. I would like to point out that just because you believe in religious faith (which, according to your contributions to the "Faith" thread you aren't eager to have labelled as religious or proselytizing, doesn't mean that I, or "many great, great thinkers" accept that position. So to keep insinuating that everyone actually is a believer in a religious faith, which is what I perceive you to be doing when you make statements like:

"I don't see any conflict between an analytical mind and faith."

is pretty patronizing and off-putting to me as a secularist. It seems to me that you are saying, in essence, that you don't accept that someone can function morally and philosophically in this world, without accepting your religious definitions of faith as a universal truth.

My purpose for starting this thread was to point out that not everyone accepts religious/proselytizing "faith" as a universal truth, or even as a positive value. Can you accept that?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 03:46 PM

Sorry, Guest: I couldn't resist. I thought that your opening post was excellent... not inflammatory. I didn't mean to be dismissive. I wonder though, why you assume that those who responded kiddingly were Christian? We'se outnumbered about 50 to one in here. That said, I think that fundamentalist religion of any flavor is potentially dangerous, whether it's Christian, Muslim (probably not Buddhist) or Jewish.

I don't see any conflict between an analytical mind and faith. Many great, great thinkers and scientists have been equally committed to their faith. Having gone two years toward a Doctorate in Geology, with a strong scientific background in several fields, I've seen plenty of shamans posing as scientists.

Tell ya what, Guest... look at the range of perceptions on faith in the thread I started, and I'll continue to monitor and contribute to this thread in a respectful way.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:42 PM

About the response I expected from the Mudcat Christians. It is painfully obvious they only take themselves seriously. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:37 PM

I THOUGHT CAPSLOCK HAD AN 'H' IN IT; CAPSHLOCK:

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:25 PM

WHAT'S CAPSLOCK?

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:25 PM

I think I am one too then. Nice to have a name for it.

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: wysiwyg
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:25 PM

aT LEAST YOU KNOW YOUR TENET FROM YOUR TENANT. Me, I'm satisfied just in the effort to leave the Cult of Capslock.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: Peace
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 02:19 PM

Good by me.

Subject: BS: Secularity vs Religion
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Mar 04 - 01:55 PM

I am a secularist, who values knowledge gained from critical thinking over "knowing" gained from religious faith, tradition, assumptions and beliefs.

Rather than accepting anything presented to me as truth or fact "on faith", I engage in the art of asking essential questions to arrive at what I believe to be a proximity of truth (not THE truth, just truth).

I do not use Western modes of logic and reasoning in my analytical and critical thinking. I believe in a high standard for ethics and integrity, and the need to see them evenly applied to all, regardless of status.

I deeply appreciate the great mysteries of life and the universe, without aligning myselt to any one particular religious or spiritual tradition to contemplate or study them. I include scientific knowledge in the realm of the spiritual, and spiritual knowledge in the realm of scientific reasoning.

I believe strongly that no nation on earth should be governed using orthodox religion as the main tenet for governance or the rule of law. I believe strongly in the separation of religion and state, and believe we need to go to the next level, which to me is to ban religion from participation in the public square.

I fear society as we know it will be destroyed by religious fundamentalism.