BS: Another View of Religion

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: ollaimh
Date: 21 Mar 11 - 01:07 AM

i won't state my religion, but i had both catholics and protestants back a generation or two. i am gratefull that the battles betwen them made my parents atheists or agnostics. my mother was a doctrinaire atheist and my father an agnostic who thought religion does restrain the lawless tendencies of the masses.

i was therefrore free to chose. i do not beleve that faith leads to anything but ignorance unless accompanied by real meditative experience and real insight thus garnered. otherwise it leads to detusion and bigotry. and i believe most people need at least several ears of meditation all day or decades for several hours a day to get this insight. prayer and and hope and faith is all fine and good but you are fooling yourself and cheating your true nature if you think there is any short cut.

as a person who was involved in unon, enviornmental and native battles i also believe thaty the anglcan, catholic and mainsteam protestant churches are so sullied by their association with the genocide of the native residential school in canada america and australia. killing so many innocents, that they should be disbanded and start over . that are tainted by vile anti christian criminality and abuse so badly they can never be saved. further more i have very limited respect for the ethics and morals of anyone who voluntarily assocuiates them selves with these criminal genocidal churches. i understand those who were brought in when young and need the religion to deal with the vagaries of lfe, but to voluntarily participate in groups that have done these terribe things,other than to seek religious solace is despicable to me. sorry joe but the murder of these innocents and the endless coverups are just too too much. these are wicked and worldly churches mascarading as holy. again i understand the need for religious solace.,but really, we are living in a barbaricworld and these wicked churches are the soul of that barbarism.

i note that the lttle group of canadian natives--and one american native, that goes to the vatican every year to exorcise the demons who tortured their children didn't get arrested this year. the vatican usually jails them summirraly but this year they were too afraid of another media debacle and they ignored them--not that many notice them. the murdered of history trouble few conscoinses--sadly.

so if people think that too cinfrontational well get a consconce.
how many have to die for these churches before they make amends?

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 21 Mar 11 - 12:56 AM

Curses!! Discovered!!!

Exit·in·Confusion

YNIFTAFSM

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 21 Mar 11 - 12:44 AM

Until I directly experience you, old sport, I am not going to give much concern to that... ;-) Go ahead. Threaten me with meatballs and antipasto! Do your worst.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 21 Mar 11 - 12:38 AM

Well you had all better KNOW that I am here if you don't all want to wake up one morning with your eyes all full of Bolognese sauce ...

Your Noway Imaginary Friend The Almighty Flying Spaghetti Monster

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:15 PM

The article about "the Other People" is marvelous! It does a good job at pointing out the conflicts between what are clearly 2 separate creation stories in the Bible about the origions of Man, from 2 separate cultural sources, and which do not tell the same story at all. Verrrry interesting! I know some J.W.'s, and I don't know how they would get around this particular problem, but I'm sure they would...somehow...because they've got an answer for everything. ;-) I don't think they've got the right answer, mind you, but I don't particularly care, because what they believe doesn't hurt me in any way at all...nor does what I consider likely or unlikely (I don't speak in terms of "belief") hurt them.

Belief is always an act of faith, in my opinion, whether it's belief in religions, scientific theories, political theories, medical theories, or philosophical theories. Knowledge is knowledge, not belief. Belief is faith. It is the assumption that something must be true, rather than the direct knowledge that it is true.

I don't believe that 1 + 2 = 3 for instance. I KNOW it does. I don't believe that water exists and flows to the lowest available level (in a gravitational field). I KNOW it does. I KNOW these things by direct observation.

I neither believe nor disbelieve in a theory like Global Warming...one that a vast number of people now believe in...because I don't have enough direct knowledge about it to know for certain if it is a correct theory. I look at it on a basis of probabilities, therefore...and we can argue about those till the cows come home! No thanks. ;-D

I try to work with knowledge, direct observation, and assessing probabilities....not with holding "beliefs". Beliefs are a statment of faith, and I am not much interested in being dogmatic about faith...nor suffering other's dogmatic assertions of faith either.

If you aren't 100% sure of something...and you have no basis for 100% surety...then don't pretend you are by saying, "I believe that...."

Just say, "I think it's very probable." Then you're being honest about it, and admitting that you still might not know everything there is to know about it.

I consider reincarnation probable. I consider evolution probable. I consider life after death probable. I consider it probable that Lee Harvey Oswald was not "a lone assassin" and that other people were involved in killing JFK. That doesn't mean I believe in any of those things, though, because I don't KNOW them beyond any shadow of a doubt. They remain under question in my mind. The only things I utterly 100% believe in are the things I know beyond any shadow of a doubt. And I can only know them by direct experience, proven over and over again. Thus, I know that water is wet, it flows downhill, it boils at a certain temperature, etc...and I know I'm getting older. That's not belief. It's not faith. It's knowledge.

I think there may be something spiritual, some factor in existence, which many people have, in their effort to explain it or label it, called "God" or some other term like that. But I don't know for sure. Therefore I stay open to the possibility that it could be, and I don't get my jollies by either denying what I haven't been able to confirm...or by insisting it's true either. Why would I when I do either when I don't KNOW??? If I did deny it, I'd be making a statement of faith, based on my own preferences. If I insisted on believing in it, I'd be doing the same thing, making a statement of faith, but from the opposite perspective.....pretending certainty on the basis of faith, not knowledge.

I know there are ants and spiders. I know there are dreams (having dreamt them). I know there is anger. I have felt it. I don't know if there is a "God" and I don't know if there isn't a "God", and I won't know unless I have a direct, conscious encounter of an undeniable sort with..."God". If I do, then I'll know. If I don't, it remains hypothetical...it has been neither proven nor disproven.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 08:48 PM

Thank you Bill, I had an interesting discussion with a Texan Fundy Lutheran friend a while ago - that idea IS quite old in Theology... before the author picked it up ...

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 08:41 PM

Oh my... The Other People must confuse the J.W.s terribly..... but IF one accepts the Bible, one must come to term with it....and Cain's linage is important..

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 07:30 PM

We Are the Other People

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 02:08 PM

since there is absolutely NO doubt about who the mother of the child is???

My point exactly; the way of ensuring that is by enslaving women - hence the current moral entrenchments & double standards, most of which are enshrined the twisted theology of the RCC. As I keep saying though procreation is little more than a VERY random by-product of Sexual Intercourse the immediate function of of which is pure animal lust assuagement - something else the RCC can't quite handle. In its denial of contraception as being somehow Un-Nastural & Un-Godly it places people into the hands of ignorance, folklore and hearsay - and back street abortionists, naturally.

Nature! Well we've seen Mother Nature at work in Japan and I suppose there isn't anyone here whose lives haven't been torn apart by illness. I'm not to sentimental about it personally and look forward to the day when we suss Nature out and really get creative. The next stage of evolution will be engineered by Humanity - the Transfiguring Alchemists of Nature, as we have been all along. Shame things get messed up the way they do, but the alternative is quite unthinkable really.

God is a human concept though; as human as Myth, Music, Magic and Language. We twist the facts into folklore / superstition on one hand to fill in the gaps, on another for purposes of mind control. Take away humanity and God vanishes too; take away God on the other hand, and we might all breathe a huge sigh of relief. But can we do that I wonder? Overnight?

Keep watching the skies, LH - out there I reckon there's a race of ETs that will make the Borg look like the Eden-bound followers of Dr Sevrin (Star Trek Episode #75 / 21 February 1969), like Giger's Alien with technology. Talking of which - isn't there a prequel on the way?

(quick search on Google)

No! Ridley Scott has morphed it into something called Prometheus due for release next year... Still, something to look forward to, eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Lighter
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 01:54 PM

Any religion worthy of belief has to promote humanitarian principles that ultimately benefit everyone. That includes unbelievers.

To be an actual "religion," it would help if it claimed a "believable" divine sanction. And it would have to promise to reward good deeds and punish bad ones, just to keep people on the straight and narrow. Obviously this would have to happen in an afterlife because it doesn't seem to happen here.

Many popular (though technically often heretical) interpretations of the monotheistic faiths approach this condition. However, they are often ridiculed as "New Age Nonsense." Sometimes your very religious neighbors will go further than mere ridicule.

But this ideal faith would have to be founded on that "believable" divine sanction. Otherwise, no go. Because not everyone wants to love his or her neighbor. Unless the neighbor is really good-lookin'.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 01:07 PM

Have just read through all the postings on this thread, and isn't it excellent to see so many different viewpoints expressed and discussed in a mature and genuinely courteous fashion? No nastiness, some robust disagreement, but no insults and no abuse. This is how it should always be!

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 12:50 PM

"I think we're just as natural as can be, but we have complicated minds and those minds lead us into all kinds of unwise situations regarding Nature...and regarding our general behaviour. Is our behaviour unnatural? Yeah, you could say that...but it has its origins in Nature, it's just gotten stretched out of context by our complex minds which have invented money, sophisticated weaponry, machinery, politics, and all kinds of strange ideas that we pursue toward various objectives we've decided are important."

A brilliant summation, LH, if I may say so!

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 12:22 PM

A lot of difficulties have arisen from the tendency of some people to base their religion on the assumption that the Bible was written in English in the 17th century...

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 11:52 AM

Maybe ants are capable of more than we give them credit for. ;-)

I think we're just as natural as can be, but we have complicated minds and those minds lead us into all kinds of unwise situations regarding Nature...and regarding our general behaviour. Is our behaviour unnatural? Yeah, you could say that...but it has its origins in Nature, it's just gotten stretched out of context by our complex minds which have invented money, sophisticated weaponry, machinery, politics, and all kinds of strange ideas that we pursue toward various objectives we've decided are important.

Religion usually seems to start out as an effort (by some spiritual teacher) to return people to a balanced and wise way of living. Then it soon gets established as a hierarchy, a power system, a tradition...and then the trouble begins...as it does with all human hierarchies and power systems. Their primary objective becomes to enlarge and extend themselves. That's the problem in politics, it's the problem with nations, it's the problem with our economy, and it's the problem with organized religions...but they all started out with some positive objectives in mind too.

So which part will one choose to focus on? The positive or the negative aspect?

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 11:51 AM

There is a strand of Jewish tradition which regards God as being hermaphroditic, so that when Adam was first created, he had both physical attributes. It was only later when Adam desired a companion that the original being was divided into two sexes.

The description is also "in his own image and likeness" translating two different Hebrew concepts. The implication of "likeness" is that God left creation uncompleted, and passed the responsibility to mankind, as also stewardship.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 11:24 AM

"The expression translated as "dominion" in this context is perhaps better translated as "stewardship"."

So, McGrath does ths mean that the fate of our environment and our species may hang on the inexact translation of a single word?

"If humans were in any way Natural, we'd still be living in the woods ..."

Hmmm! Possibly. But I think that our intelligence gives us a responsibility to exercise our "stewardship" in as non-damaging a way as possible - something that we are currently failing at rather badly. And don't forget our species will ultimately pay the price for its own folly, while 'Nature' will just carry on until the Sun becomes a red giant.

I can't help thinking of a phrase I heard, a few days ago, in connection with the tragedy in Japan. It went something like this: "As far as Nature is concerned humans are just 'ants with cars'" (!)

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 10:12 AM

I don't think of God as "looking like" anything, Sweeney. ;-) And I don't see why anyone else would either, but I guess that's up to them, isn't it? Yeah, sure, Jehovah was made in the image of a bunch of old Hebrew patriarchs. That is bloody obvious. But Jehovah's not the only idea of "God" that is out there, and they don't all involve something being made in man's image...some of them involve observing the powers of Nature, for instance. Others involve still more subtle concepts than that.

As for male bloodline...doesn't it make more sense to trace bloodline through the females, since there is absolutely NO doubt about who the mother of the child is???

There have been some civilizations who have traced bloodline and family name through the females, and it seems like a wise and eminently practical system to me. It works. It allows for no mistakes. It is definitely the way to go! ;-) Who the heck cares who the father is anyway? Men are like bees pollinating flowers, many bees can pass by, but the flower is the source of the next generation.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:55 AM

...had figured out that sexual intercourse had something to do with procreation

I've always though that was a remarkably clever bit of figuring out.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:44 AM

If humans were in any way Natural, we'd still be living in the woods howling at the moon and dying of diseases you can knock on the head with a simple prescription these days. Can we have it all ways? I doubt it. Our Unnaturalness is interal to our humanity, and I for one would have been dead long ago were it not for drugs, music, technology and other aspects on our Non-Natural culture.

And I doubt it has anything to do with innate sexism which seems all too Natural a thing to me, at least it does once Man had figured out that sexual intercourse had something to do with procreation, then we got hung up male bloodlines, which (out of necessity) meant controlling the sexual behavior of women. Sad but true.

God looks like us because we made him in our image; it took a while to get there, from basic animism and pagan pantheons, to the sort of Rock 'n' Roll Duality of the Western Tradition (much Atheism included) which afflicts us to this day.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:30 AM

That aspect of the Christian/Jewish/Muslim religions bothers me too, Shimrod. It seems that the writers of the books which comprise the Old Testament had a particularly man-centered view of things (not only in the sense of placing man above Nature, but also in placing men above women). That has had many unfortunate after-effects on both Nature and women over the last few millenia.

It's an attitude, however, which is changing. The old ideas of man's supremacy over nature and the supremacy of males over females are now being challenged and rejected by many people within those 3 religions.

It's an odd notion to think that "God created Man in his own image". Several odd assumptions there! Why does God have to look like anything? Or does "image" mean inner self rather than outer body? Or why might not everything be said to be created in God's image if anything is? And why is God assumed to be male when God might be a principle that is completely beyond gender...or might comprise both genders? It seems very unlikely that an exclusively male deity would create a world divided into male and female beings in approximately equal numbers! If "He" didn't already have a female aspect within "Himself", then how could "He" bring it forth in others? ;-) Odd that that didn't occur to the patriarchs of the Children of Israel, isn't it?

When I read such a passage, what immediately seems obvious to me is that it sprang from a rather primitive tribal culture where older men ran everything and had authority over everything...therefore they assumed that anything godly would closely resemble themselves, only with some improvements. ;-D So they worked up an idea of God which looked a lot like them, only "He" was bigger and better than they were. I shake my head in wonder that billions of people thousands of years later would let the self-promoting fantasies of a bunch of old Hebrew patriarchs rule their minds, but it has no bearing whatsoever on whatever idea I might have about "God", spirituality, life after death or other interesting subjects along that line. I do not regard the Judeo-Christian religious heritage as being the origin of spiritual ideas about God...it's just one old set of opinions about it, that's all. I'm sure there were many other ideas about God around long before the Jewish tribes had anything to say about the matter. They are Johnny-come-latelys in that field, not the inventors of it. It is the nature of human beings to theorize about a higher purpose, life after death, and all forms of spiritual inquiry, and it did not begin with the writers of the old Jewish holy books.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:24 AM

One aspect of (Christian) religion which bothers me is that it elevates humanity over the rest of Nature

That's the only bit I like; those Gnostic undercurrents that filter through RC Theology in implication of a far darker & more substantial mythos that the unsuall guff. There's your Green Man too by the way, Shimrod; Nature afflicting Humanity with animal urges, sin, lust, desire, instinct, disease and ultimately death which is why pre-Reformation Catholic churches & cathedrals are bending down with them...

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:19 AM

The expression translated as "dominion" in this context is perhaps better translated as "stewardship".

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 09:01 AM

One aspect of (Christian) religion which bothers me is that it elevates humanity over the rest of Nature. God was supposed to have created Man in His own image and given him dominion over the beasts of the field (or something like that). I think that this is a highly dangerous outlook and, eventually, will lead to the extinction of our own species. In the end an unhealthy, and profoundly damaged environment, will be the death of us.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 08:15 AM

"...the Spanish Republicans were hostile to the Catholic Church."

Not just a matter of abstract hatred of the Catholic Church - about 7,000 Catholic clergy, bishops, priests, seminarians and nuns, were killed by Republicans. And that leaves the laity out of the picture. (Plus a number of Basque Catholic clergy etc on the other side, killed by Franco's people.)

Civil Wars are filthy affairs. Massacres of innocent people typically get carried out by both sides, and that certainly happened in Spain.

People tend to concentrate their attention on what "the other side" does - and use it as a way to justify what "their side" does, insofar as it can't be ignored.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 07:36 AM

I wasn't insinuating in any way that you somehow supported the fascists, LH. Thank you for that more balanced view.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Joe Offer
Date: 20 Mar 11 - 04:00 AM

The Spanish Catholic Church has always been an interesting and confusing situation. It's no coincidence that Ferdinand and Isabella and the Spanish Pope Alexander VI Borgia and the Spanish Inquisition all happened at the same time. 1492 is another "date that will live in infamy" - it's when Ferdinand and Isabella expelled the Jews and Moors from Spain. Alexander VI, the father of Lucretia and Cesare Borgia, is generally thought to have been the worst pope of all time.
Spain is the center of Opus Dei (the work of God), the ultraconservative sect that found favor with Pope John Paul II. There are differing opinions about the involvement of Opus Dei with the Franco regime. For a discussion of this, see Wikipedia. I can't find it within myself to trust anyone associated with Opus Dei, but it does appear that Opus Dei has tried to stay out of politics. Some Opus Dei members supported Franco, and some opposed him.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 10:29 PM

Steve, I am a very enthusiastic fan of the Spanish Republican forces, and I wish that they had kicked Franco and the Fascists out of Spain and defeated them utterly.

I was simply observing that a good many of the Spanish Republicans were hostile to the Catholic Church (which was very inclined to ally itself with the Fascist cause)...because they were, that's all. That was the case. And many of them did, indeed, hate the Catholic Church, and many were avowed atheists. That doesn't mean I think their political cause was evil or that I support the Fascists in any way whatsoever, and I am frankly a bit flabbergasted that you would interpret it in that fashion.

It's not ALL-OR-NOTHING with me, Steve. I can be on someone's side politically and still observe that they are not absolutely perfect, pure as the driven snow, and sprung from the throne of God. ;-D

I share your admiration for the Spanish Republicans and their heroic fight against Franco, the Germans (Condor Legion), and the Italian Fascist forces. And, yes, the Catholic Church did much to aid the Fascist cause, and I would have opposed them too for doing so.

I wasn't slandering the Spanish Republican cause in any way in my remarks, just observing that a good many of them hated the church...which is a fact. That doesn't make them evil. It doesn't make them good. It's just a fact, period. I think their political cause was a good one.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 09:15 PM

even the Spanish Republicans (in the Spanish Civil War) used hatred OF organized religion to motivate their soldiers to fight harder.

This is a very unfair representation of what the Republicans were doing, along with the International Brigades. They were fighting fascism when other nations in Europe were wallowing in complacency, and that fascism came wrapped in a Roman Catholic flag, borne by that daily communicant Francisco Franco, aided by similarly Roman Catholic fascists from outside his own country. What a shame you decided to put this gloss on the battles of those valiant and brave people.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 09:08 PM

Great point, Joe....I think, from what I see, is that, its become 'trendy', at least for so-called liberals, to knock Christianity, as some sort of weirdness not to be tolerated, but to welcome Islam, as a show to others, how 'modernly hipply liberal' they are! Its almost taken a form of the ghetto 'poor', to show off their $300 Nikes...and of course, many 'liberals' have nothing but distaste for anyone who supports the Jews, in Israel. Let's just hope that it is, at best, a passing fad, on the way to maturity!.............Oh, and incidentally, they are also, the same 'open minded' clowns that jump up and down, almost in cartoon form, to scream, 'racist' or 'bigot', to anyone they wish to oppose...when racism or bigotry was NEVER the issue

There you go, Joe. With friends like this...

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 07:48 PM

It appeared in one message that Suibhne was taking me to task for something Catholics did "only" eight hundred years ago.

Catholicism is primarily concerned with the supposed death and ressurection of someone who lived "only" 2000 years ago. The Albigensian Crusades are still recent enough to be remembered - likewise the reasons why, which still rest at the very heart of Roman Catholic Theology.

Otherwise, been away from this thread too long - lost track of it entirely.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 06:52 PM

It is trendy to attack Christianity. It's also trendy to attack Islam. And it's trendy to attack both the Palestinians and Israel. But these trends are each followed by distinctly different trendy and rabid factions among both the liberal and the conservative crowd....and they're all quite proud of themselves, thank you very much! ;-D There's enough hatred out there for everyone to get a nice piece of the pie.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 06:46 PM

Great point, Joe....I think, from what I see, is that, its become 'trendy', at least for so-called liberals, to knock Christianity, as some sort of weirdness not to be tolerated, but to welcome Islam, as a show to others, how 'modernly hipply liberal' they are! Its almost taken a form of the ghetto 'poor', to show off their $300 Nikes...and of course, many 'liberals' have nothing but distaste for anyone who supports the Jews, in Israel. Let's just hope that it is, at best, a passing fad, on the way to maturity!.............Oh, and incidentally, they are also, the same 'open minded' clowns that jump up and down, almost in cartoon form, to scream, 'racist' or 'bigot', to anyone they wish to oppose...when racism or bigotry was NEVER the issue.
It's like they got stuck in a time warp, and are still trying to live out their 'youth'.....only, its gotten very old. I guess its for lack of creative imagination, that perhaps, that they can't distinguish a 'truth', and who is spinning it. If a policy is bad, or false, and someone disagrees, that person is not a bigot or racist, for simply disagreeing. If someone disagrees with the President, it does mean that person is automatically 'racist'...just because the liberal supporter can't think it through, to rebut the other person, on the merits, of the facts...so they resort to attaching some dis-likable tag, to that person. It is extremely immature...almost as if they are afraid of leaving some 'manufactured' comfort zone, and actually learning something. Growing old is not an option. Growing up is!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 05:43 PM

Yet another View of Religion            

Jesusbusters!


Gotta go now .... :-P

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Art Thieme
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 05:35 PM

My mistakes here in taking religious posts by some as a personal threat to me, personally. So I hit back. For that I am sincerely sorry. Now, I generally stay away from religious threads here at Mudcat. Maybe, at this late date, it's about time I was more mature about stuff.

Art

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Art Thieme
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 05:22 PM

Only when Carol's beliefs impacted actually with my life and functioning, as separate from her life, albeit within our marriage, was there any bad friction between us. It was an immature ego driven thing for me. I was too young to be philosophical and/or thoughtful about matters. Emotion was the top dog governing my reactions. Now, though, after all the years, it simply does not matter. --- I think we all must learn to enjoy the friction---knowing that it will generate some heat---and also a hell of a lot of light. The friction and the heat -- but the enlightenment is the payoff of this, yet another, paradox. -- And how we deal with it when it is backed by caring love is simply the name of the game. For this reason I can marvel at the chaotic times we are in now---even while abhorring the pain and suffering. It makes the old adage, "May you live in interesting times" both a curse and a real blessing.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: DMcG
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 05:14 PM

The problem with a phrase like "an all-loving god" is that most people I've heard use it has only a very narrow interpretation of it. For example I've never heard anyone claim that the god who loves a person might also love the bacteria that causes the final fatal illness of that person. The phrase implicitly carries the human-centric view of the universe that we very gradually dropped from astronomy and biology, for example. The same applies to some of the design faults: some things that are faults when thinking about people in isolation are in fact essential in the wider context. At the most trivial level without death there would be no 'space' for future generations. I am not being Panglossian here; simply saying that maybe the narrow focus will not give the full story and so is not in itself evidence for or against the existence of god (though it may be for some concepts of god)

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 04:20 PM

If people believe in something like the "concept of an all-loving, all-powerful Anybody of Nobodaddy", MtheGM, it's simply because they're already familiar with that concept. They probably grew up with it around them in family and community. Therefore it's become like home territory to them, and they derive comfort from its familiarity.

The same is true of their instinctive attachment to and affection for things like their national identity, their racial identity, the "home team" in sports events, their country's flag, their language, their accustomed style of dress, their friends, their accustomed ethics, their town, their political party, their family, and everything else that they are accustomed to.

And a great deal of the above is basically arbitrary (meaning someone made it up at some point)...it has only the temporary provisional meaning that people have arbitrarily given to it because others told them to...and it is justifiable and explicable mainly just within its own closed circuit of reality.

And so what? We're all different from one another, and we always will be, and yet the world keeps turning just fine, doesn't it? What's the point of disputing over the differences?

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 03:42 PM

Just as a point of interest, Steve, re your last remark to me ~~ I do not, in fact, drink at all: not for any ideological reason (I would probably sip the champagne to drink the toast at a wedding as a matter of courtesy), but just because i find I don't like it much any more, and prefer being clear-headed to being fuzzy (though should add that, post hoc, I feel much relief when I see how involved alcohol is in so much of the nastiness all around...).

Nor do I for that matter suffer very much from headaches, which I was just using as an example.

But I actually think my arguments better than yours; it's these petty design faults which, added up together, seem to me more than anything else to undermine the concept of any all-loving, all-powerful Anybody of Nobodaddy.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 03:28 PM

Joe Offer - "I think that religion is often a mask for financial, territorial, political, cultural, and racial agendas."

Exactly. Politicians will use any motivator they can to get people onside, and religion (or hostility toward religion) is among several powerful motivators in that regard...so they use it, naturally.

Maoists, the Soviets, and the Khymer Rouge, and even the Spanish Republicans (in the Spanish Civil War) used hatred OF organized religion to motivate their soldiers to fight harder. Every American president uses overt references to his own supposed religious faith to get public support and to get votes. That's because religion...or dislike OF religion...is something that goes very deep in a lot of people, so it's a powerful motivator that a politician can use to advance a cause.

Politicians are pragmatists. They use anything that works. What they are generally after, though, is: power, money, jurisdiction, territory, and resources...whether or not they posture under the banner of religion...or on a "holy" crusade against it (as was the case with Lenin, Mao, and Pol Pot).

What a powerful motivator religion is (whether you're for or against it) can easily be seen by the number of threads it has given birth to on Mudcat Cafe...and the length of those threads. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Ebbie
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 03:22 PM

Guest/lively, you say: "Topics such as Philosophy and World Mythology should be compulsory at Junior School to encourage imaginative exploration of all kinds of ideas, including those of our world religions."

Do you realize what would be the immediate reaction in the education system in the US? The religious - not necessarily, the religious right - would take their children out of public schools forthwith. They are already worried about what they perceive as the morally bankrupt state of our country as evidenced in our schools.

Courses such as 'World Mythology' would be offered in school on the same basis as 'Religous Education' is today, allowing parents to opt out.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Stringsinger
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 02:15 PM

Well said, Joe.

One of the problems is when there is a push, there is a push back. That is not always a rational response.

Intolerance is intolerable. Ad-hominem name calling is never a legitimate foundation for a rational discussion.

The Mudcatters that use insults to promote their views are "shooting themselves in the foot."

Intolerance is the enemy of Freethought.

I respect a rational discussion that may contain disagreement as a valid form of discourse but not insults, name-calling or verbal violence (that's what it is).

Views of religion must be very personal and not evidence to be defended in a court of law unless they transgress the Separation that Thomas Jefferson so brilliantly called for.

Fortunately, Americans have a legacy in our Constitution, The First Amendment, a brilliant idea that endures regardless of how some in the Wrong Wing spin it.

Regardless of whether it's a discussion of religion, politics,philosophy or whatever,
insults, intolerance and anger have little place in it.

You can have a sense of justice which may contain outrage, but ultimately the anger is not what prevails when justice has finally arrived. A strategic goal, well thought out,
peacefully articulated with clarity and conviction will win in the pages of history.

The Constitution, the First Amendment, has made Americans the beneficiary of a wise idea and we have inherited a sense of proportional justice that carries over today in our
nurturance of organized labor, the common good, equality and tolerance that defines us.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 02:04 PM

My atheism is based on less profound bases than, say, Aquinas's paradox as to the Problem of Evil: ~~ a God supposed to be both omnipotent and all-loving; but, as there is evil, either he could stop it if he wanted but doesn't, in which case he is not all-loving, or he would stop it if he could but can't, in which case he is not omnipotent. (I have always considered Aquinas a very lucky man ~~ if he had lived three centuries later they would certainly have burnt him instead of making him a saint, wouldn't they?)

But I find the concept of a God as postulated incredible for much more mundane reasons. Surely, if we are the summit of his creation, he could have designed us a hell of a lot better ~~ not having this peculiarly inconvenient necessity for constantly pissing & shitting, for instance. Or all the piddling, petty little disabilities that plague us incessantly. Never mind the problem of Serious Evil ~~ why headaches and toothaches? - that's what I want to know.

Not to mention the agony of childbirth, to which I am grateful that I have never had to be subject. One of the few sensible aspects of the religion in which I was brought up ~~ not that it's particularly less sensible than the rest of them ~~ is that it requires men of certain orthodoxies within it to thank God daily "that I was not born a woman". The reason given in Genesis for this excessive disadvantage to which half of us are subject, that it is a punishment for Man's First Disobedience and Eve's Original Sin, seems, within the parameters of all these beliefs that we over this side just can't accept, the best possible explanation ~~ which, returning to my original postulation that it is the smaller things rather than the greater that seem to me to make the concept of an Intelligently Designing Being (as some of them over there tried to put it recently), to be, to express it with all possible moderation, so excessively unlikely as to be for all practical purposes entirely incredible. And, indeed, undesirable ~~ why would anyone want to believe in such a vengeful, vindictive entity as the source of all being!

Intelligent Design, forsooth. Unintelligent Design, more like... Now, I ask you, who can seriously believe in a deity so crassly inefficient?

This lot could indeed be seen as an argument against the existence of God, but there are much better ones. The points you make actually add up to a strong argument for evolution. There is no goal in evolution so there is no end-point, no perfect being. It has to be that way or natural selection will not have done its job. Life on Earth must keep adapting and changing as the environment changes, and we know that never stops happening. Evolution is thus excused from the criticism you might level at a supernatural being for not making you perfect. Your play areas are going to remain very close to your sewage outfall for the foreseeable future. And drink less and the headaches might go away.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: GUEST,lively
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 02:01 PM

"The only recourse is 'somehow' managing to affect schools and the curriculum so as to gradually educate people about 'how to think'. (NOT tell them what to believe or disbelieve....just what clear thinking is.)"

Topics such as Philosophy and World Mythology should be compulsory at Junior School to encourage imaginative exploration of all kinds of ideas, including those of our world religions. I wish I'd had them instead of "Religious Education", which IMO aught to be banned - though Comparative Religion might be an alternative to World Mythology, I'd take World Mythology.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 01:55 PM

Let me be clear... I use "those who can't or won't think" to mean just that... there are plenty of clear thinking, sane, reasonable people whom *I* just happen to disagree with.... about basic principles, presuppositions, logical processes, semantics...etc.
I just have too many years (in Kansas, mostly) dealing with those who blindly take what they were spoon-fed as....ummmm... gospel.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Bill D
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 01:46 PM

"Keep religion out of nationalism, politics, money and violence."

Yep...indeed. But when masses of people who either can't think or won't think keep inserting it...what do you do?
You can write strict, clear laws saying "Religion shall not be considered when choosing candidates or in election campaigns!" ... and they will STILL figure out how to proclaim their religious preferences and 'moral' beliefs and get those non-thinkers to vote on that basis.

The only recourse is 'somehow' managing to affect schools and the curriculum so as to gradually educate people about 'how to think'. (NOT tell them what to believe or disbelieve....just what clear thinking is.)
Accomplish this and you eventually get the point across....(you know...in a hundred years or so... ;>(

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Joe Offer
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 01:41 PM

Well, Little Hawk, I think that religion is often a mask for financial, territorial, political, cultural, and racial agendas. The idea that "God is on our side" covers a multitude of evils.

---

Hi, Frank. I guess I've never been much for ideology. I suppose everybody has an ideology, but I've never stuck to mine very well. I tend to go with the flow, to react to what I encounter. I acknowledge that people can have very strong political and religious ideologies. I tend to view my political and religious views as context rather than ideology.

I, too, believe in separation of church and state. I see evangelical Christianity as the dominant religious ideology in the U.S. - even many Catholics seem to think in evangelical terms. I certainly wouldn't want that kind of thinking to be imposed on me, to have my kids say evangelical prayers in school or be taught "creationism."

---

On the other hand, I'm still disappointed by the intolerance many Mudcatters express, and I still don't understand it. I find that certain Mudcatters constantly use terms that are intentionally insulting, denigrating, or demeaning to people of religious faith. I see constant generalizations that lump all members of a group with the misconduct of a few. I see religious groups blamed for the misdeeds of their members from hundreds of years ago. All of this seems unfair to me. It sounds very much like what I hear from anti-Muslim bigots, and anti-black and anti-Jew and anti-Japanese bigots. I think we need to look at each other as individuals, not by the groups we belong to.

And yes, I know very well that many people who call themselves religious, seem to have the condemnation of others as a primary aspect of their religion. I don't think it's right to pass judgment on others that way.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Stringsinger
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 01:33 PM

Yes, and at the basis of territory, money or politics, the specter of religion is there.

I'm not advocating the abolition of religion, but as far as the impact of religion on war, as the cliche goes these days "I'm just sayin'".

Here's a solution. Keep religion out of nationalism, politics, money and violence.

Is there a Christian nation? A Jewish nation? A Muslim nation? A Buddhist nation?

See any problems with this?

Then there's Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs claiming he's doing "god's will",
and John Boehner's "So be it" translated to "amen".

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 01:09 PM

Another thing you'll find if you scratch any war is a financial issue. Or a territorial issue. Or a political issue. Or a cultural issue. Or a racial issue. Any and all of those.

Which issue you most tend to focus on among those may say as much or more about you than it does about the issue.

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Stringsinger
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 01:00 PM

Joe,

I, for one, have never accused you of being irrational but find your posts most human
in the good sense, full of tolerance, open to new ideas and discussions. I think you've done an excellent job here on Mudcat.

I like to separate the person from the ideology. That's how I deal with each person I meet.

Having an argument about the existence of a god is sort of fruitless, a merry-go-round of semantic nonsense, an unresolvedly empty argument, no parameters or definitions in the words, nor a resolution that makes anyone happy.

I firmly restate my adherence to the principle of Separation of Church and State, grossly distorted by the Wrong Wing, blind fundamentalists, and some odious political figures.

I personally don't care if you wear a fried egg on your head (though I don't eat 'em)
as long as you are a kind, perceptive and constructive human being. A person isn't what they wear or even what they profess, it's what they do that counts in my book.

I do take religious talk with a great deal of skepticism since I don't adhere to any of it,
but I accept that people have a right to discuss what they want, profess any belief that they have, but not crying "fire" in a crowded theater.

I also maintain that if you scratch a war, you will find religious doctrine at the bottom of it, whether about godless communism, Shia and Sunni, Papist and Proddie, Jew and Palestinian, Serb against Bosnian or Croation, and Coptic against Muslim (sad to say that about Egypt). Violence is of itself useless even when propagated by religion.

Keep up the good work Joe. Your posts are always interesting.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Another View of Religion
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Mar 11 - 12:53 PM

Most of the spiritual literature I've ever read about the "turn the other cheek" thing is that it was a metaphor about inner consciousness (attitude), not outer behaviour. I think that is also true about pretty much everything else Jesus taught. He was not teaching people about outer behaviour, he was teaching them about managing inner consciousness. If you can manage inner consciousness effectively, then you will be able to manage your outer behaviour in a harmonious and effective manner.

The metaphor did not mean literally that you offer your left cheek to someone who has just struck you on the right cheek. It means that if you encounter negative thinking, negative attitude from someone...you don't do what people usually do and immediately move into a negative response reaction. You maintain a positive inner consciousness and stay calm and constructive rather than flipping into negativity the moment something goes wrong.

In other words, instead of focusing on anger, hatred, hostility, revenge, payback, etc...whenever you encounter anger, hatred, hostility, revenge....you keep a positive focus. You work with constructive responses to stress, not the standard destructive reactions that occur most quickly to an immature personality. A constructive response in a situation demanding self-defence is to defend yourself with the minimum amount of force necessary...but it's not rational or helpful to follow that up with hating the other person for the next 20 years and constantly envisioning ways of getting even with them. If you do the latter, you are spectacularly failing to "turn the other cheek". ;-) Get it? If, on the other hand, you use the minimum force necessary to defend yourself at the moment, and don't carry any grudge about it afterward, then you have turned the other cheek, because you've stayed positive inside yourself.

That is what is meant by "turning the other cheek". It means doing that rare thing and NOT falling immediately into chronically negative thinking and chronically negative, hostile response the moment something doesn't go your way.

The longstanding vendettas that form on a forum like this between certain individuals, for instance, are a fine example of people signally failing to "turn the other cheek", because they won't let go of their old grievances. Most of us are guilty of this sort of thing to some extent. The more you indulge in it, the worse it gets. Jesus was advising people not to indulge in it at all, no matter what the provocation. That's quite a challenge, and one most people are unwilling to fully embrace, because they'd rather stay angry... ;-) They become addicted to it, in fact. It makes them feel righteous, and it's also a sort of adrenalin rush...adds a bit of excitement to their day. (but it's hard on your physical health as time goes by, because the body eventually gets damaged by holding a lot of internal stress, anger, etc...it catches up with you)

The thing that most distinguishes a spiritually advanced person is that he doesn't hang on to past emotional and mental negativity. He lets go of it entirely, and comes to each new moment fresh and unburdened, without carrying a load of heavy emotional baggage from the past. He has, thereby, turned the other cheek.

I have been around such people...but they are exceedingly rare. Most people, myself included, are a walking story of their past emotional issues and their present reactions based on those past issues. I'm less sucked in by that sort of thing than I used to be...because I watch for it, and I often succeed in avoiding getting hijacked by it now...but I still have a long way to go. To turn the other cheek is to avoid getting hijacked by negative thinking. It is NOT to become incapable of practical and legitimate self-defence.

(in my opinion)