| Author | Message | ||
     Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20100910/twl-protesters-shot-dead-in-koran-burnin-3fd 0ae9.html | ||
| Skip (Wolfnoma) Username: Wolfnoma Registered: 07-2010 Posted From: 216.54.20.98 |
I don't get it, this may or may not happen and they are already killing people? I need a drink. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.237.21 |
Hurling rocks at troops is always a dangerous thing to do. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.55 |
for Dangerous read fucking stupid. Especially American troops who are well known for shooting anything that stands in front of them. (I do believe that in the first Iraq war at least, there were more British soldiers killed by the Americans in "Friendly fire" than by the Iraqi troops) | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Anyone else sense us slipping back into a new dark age of intolerant barbarism and religious crusades? Just a thought... | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Had we ever left it? | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 82.38.75.85 |
Oh no, this is just what I feared.  | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
What waking up and discovering you'd glued your husband's head to the bedside cabinet...or...that you really had left the oven on?????  | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 89.19.83.225 |
Is there any way to begin tabulating the energy wasted and and grief caused by these magic books over the millennia? | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
My thoughts exactly, Proto. At times like these we need a Lister or a Rimmer to remind us of how inanely bizarre it all is. (No offense to those who are religiously inclined) | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.177.241 |
Sorry, but I do take a little bit of offence at calling hundreds of years of religious thought magic books. I know you probably don't intend the offence but I do take issue with religious belief, faith, practice etc being equated with just believing in magic or the supernatural. For me, that's not what spirituality is about at all. However, I've been drinking some wine. So apologies if this comes across as a rant. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.58.100 |
I'm not directing scorn on people who hold religious opinions, just those opinions themselves. I don't understand your separation of religious belief from a belief in the supernatural. Can you explain what religion is if it doesn't involve the supernatural (i.e., magic)? And if, as you suggest, longevity is enough to make beliefs venerable then magic and a belief in the supernatural should be more esteemed than any of the big three recent monotheistic religions, not less. | ||
| Seanmcd (Seanmcd) Username: Seanmcd Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 86.153.167.201 |
The sad fact is that all 3 apparently separate religions/books are actually 3 versions of the same basic truth told from and tailored to 3 different cultural backgrounds. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.135.209.40 |
Well, the Abramahic religions are all about holding to the eternal principles of the decalogue really, in their essence. And a bit of disco fun, too, i.e. this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4Ij0sU-p4M The Xtian mystics, the funky rabbis, the sufis, the far-out hindus and the rest can't resist the beat... Mark S. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.135.209.40 |
Arrrgh. And this too, which I absolutely love to bits! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI1xxPB0FGU Mark S. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.5.6.211 |
I think too, along with Jonathan, that boiling down religions to the supernatural and "magic" is oversimplifying things. There is an entire moral code contained in religions - and yes, you can have moral codes outside a religion, too; but you have them always within every religion. These amalgamations of religious "opinions" wrestle, often, with unanswerable questions - of life, death, evil, etc. Again, you can of course have these outside a religion too... but, they are found within the teachings of every great religion. And, to discard the religious works - so much of it is great literature, and art. The Book of Genesis is a wonderfully rich soap-opera. The King James Bible puts even secular expressions and sentiments, into beautiful language. The cathedrals of Europe are amazing to behold. One can experience this outside religion, no question... but it's found within religions, too. One can have then a non-supernatural/"magic" religious belief - one can believe in a moral code, one can wrestle with the greatest questions of life, one can love the beauty within a religion, and one can give unswerving sacrifice to a God that one never even expects to experience, see, know, etc. That is (as it has been in Judaism and Confucianism and others), one can have a religion of duty, of service without question: it precludes, it actually renders moot - or unimportant, or 101-ish - issues of supernaturalism or "magic." | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.237.21 |
If they start hurling rocks at me or at people I love I'm going to politely ask them to do their hurling elsewhere. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.145.132 |
"I'm not directing scorn on people who hold religious opinions, just those opinions themselves." But how can you seperate that from the people who hold them? It sounds to me like you're scornful of people who hold religious belief. I may be completely misreading that so I apologise. RE, the supernatural. What I was objecting to was the thought that all religious thought and belief boiled down to simply believing in magic. That seemed to be suggesting that there was all there was to it and that people of faith are blindly and ignorantly following some mystical thing, rather than haven given it serious thought. This ignores practical applications of faith such as charity, how you approac the world, your relationships with others etc. It's not just a case of 'pie in the sky when you die' as my Dad would put it. For me faith is about an understanding of the universe from both a spiritual and practical level. I believe that you can have an empirical universe and faith. It's really hard to describe what faith excactly means to me as spirituality and my dialogue with god is complex, ever evolving. Believe me, faith is not just a comforting panacea to worries about mortality and morality. Faith is full of conflict and doubt, but it's working through these in dialogue with the realities of the world that enriches my spiritual life and gives me a closer understanding of what god, the universe and eternity means to me. I suppose what I'm really objecting to is a sort of lazy atheism that is just instantly dismissive of religious thought and religion itself, without opening a dialogue with it. It's just 'well they believe in an imaginary friend who dispenses magic tricks when they ask' attitude that I find really infuriating. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.145.132 |
Sorry, just one other thing now I've had my coffee. I also think reducing religious thought to a blind belief in the supernatural reduces the very human experience of faith. The problem with the media is that whenever they depict any faith group it's usual the sister fucking, koran burning nut jobs and not the balanced, sane Christians that I encounter every day. However, also whenever they have religious debate on the TV they'll usually put some rabid atheist (like Dawkins or Hitchens) up against some excerable hate filled supposed 'Christian' like Stephen Green. They're not interested in a dialogue on faith and rationalism. They want to see fireworks. If you want to see a sensitive and brilliant treatment on faith and its everyday application I can highly highly recommend Rev, starring Tom Hollander. This wasn't even written by practising Christians but it treated faith with respect while investigating what it really means to people. A beautiful, funny and moving series. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.202.20 |
"...to discard the religious works - so much of it is great literature, and art." I rather think they'd exist anyway as their root is in spirituality. It would only be extraordinary if religion, which has dominated history for millennia hadn't influenced art. "One can have then a non-supernatural/"magic" religious belief" Really? So the books on which they're based are just metaphors, then? Novels. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.202.20 |
"I'm not directing scorn on people who hold religious opinions, just those opinions themselves." >> It sounds to me like you're scornful of people who hold religious belief. I really couldn't have been clearer. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.202.20 |
"RE, the supernatural. What I was objecting to was the thought that all religious thought and belief boiled down to simply believing in magic. That seemed to be suggesting that there was all there was to it" I'm not suggesting that religion is only a belief in magic. But it does contain it. Otherwise, it's just philosophy based on bad fiction. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
The more books I read on cosmology - right now I'm on John Gribbin's excellent In Search of the Multiverse - the less room there is for what I'd see as any reasoned belief in the voracity of any of the religions. If they were brought to the table as new ideas today, would anyone look at them twice? Does this mean anyone who believes in them is a nutter? Nope. Denial is the status quo approach to our existence of us all, i'd say. When confronted with the impossibilty of our situation, denial is clearly the smart option. Otherwise we'd just go to sleep and never wake up, save the effort of living. In fact, in my bleaker moments, I do sometimes wonder if truly smart civilisations all across the sky decide the only honourable course of action is a form of gentrified suicide. The other morning on the Today Programme, the point was being argued that science - by which I mean the classical sciences of physics and biochemistry - is not only making religious thought obsolete but also philosophy as well. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
I have no desire to see religion, but more importantly, philosophy rendered obsolete, even though I have no interest in religion. BUT, I have extreme difficulty in understanding the reasoning behind religion of any description. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.74 |
Weird thing, though. The multiverse suggests anything is possible. So somewhere in its possible infinite vastness, there exists a universe where there's a God. A Christian god in one, perhaps. ALlah in another. So on. We seem to have the misfortune to exist in a universe where any God seems notable by His/Her/Its absence. Anyway, I've decided the multiverse never existed as 'existed' means in the grander scheme. It didn't come about as a result of a designer firing it up. It came about as a result of complete nothingness resulting in infinite potential. So we're here, as we see here, as a notional notion among the unbound infinite notions of all that could be. I'm off for a Mars bar now. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Not a Marathon? You see, I'm from that other universe, the one where the heathens didn't name change the immortal Marathon for the lowly, despicable Snickers. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.171.129.71 |
Ah, Marathan Bars. Nope. Never liked them. In this universe. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
In the other universe I never at the tender age of 15 argued the inherent merits and magnificence of Jan Hammer against Morrisey...I never. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.253.131 |
Really? So the books on which they're based are just metaphors, then? Novels. I'm actually closer myself, Proto, to looking at religious texts as metaphors and "novels." I lack the ability to believe "faithfully" in the pure truth of these religious texts. My only point was, you could have religion, without "magic" and supernaturalism. It's entirely possible. Or maybe I should say, you could have religious belief, on a personal basis, without magic and supernaturalism. I'd have to agree (? - if this was a point you were making) that you couldn't have RELIGION itself, as a thing, without it - otherwise you'd have a code of conduct, a myth cycle, a body of ethics, etc. But religion is more than that as well. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.252.126 |
The Bible is without doubt the greatest epic of fantasy fiction the world has ever known, and one day I may even get round to reading it... Tolkien, Herbert, pah! | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.118.20 |
"you could have religious belief, on a personal basis, without magic and supernaturalism." I think so, and I'm fine with that. But, as you imply, that's not religion. Religion involves groups and not individual philosophies (which are relatively harmless to the greater good). | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.118.20 |
"Not a Marathon? You see, I'm from that other universe, the one where the heathens didn't name change the immortal Marathon for the lowly, despicable Snickers." No here's a real debate. Oh how we curse that black day for classicism. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.173.246.188 |
I remember my old agnostic friend Ray Russell was once impressed (well, I think he was) when I pointed out that religion isn't rational. Well, it isn't. And neither are human beings. We're just not made that way. Absolute rationality can be a tyranny too. Mark S. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.173.246.188 |
That should be "my old friend, Ray Russell, an agnostic". I think. Edit button please! Oh dear. Mark S. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.173.246.188 |
Viz that great SF film "Colossus: The Forbin Project" I recommended a while back. Mark S. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.118.20 |
"religion isn't rational." Good, so if we can agree that practical decisions of great import for society should be made rationally, then we can agree that religion should stay silent on such matters. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.173.246.188 |
Well, compassion isn't necessarily rational. Mark S. | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.173.246.188 |
It's what I was banging on about by referencing "Colossus: The Forbin Project". Absolute rationality can lead to tyranny too. Mark S. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.152.202.115 |
"Absolute rationality can lead to tyranny too." Nobody has said that they favour absolute rationality -- some of us are artists -- only that religion has been given more than its fair chance. Anyone fancy another few millennia of holy wars and prejudice? We might get a few nice cathedrals out of it... | ||
| Mark_samuels (Mark_samuels) Username: Mark_samuels Registered: 04-2010 Posted From: 86.173.246.188 |
Mass murder in the "rational" scientific 20th Century dwarfs that in any other individual century. Not much of a start to the brave new world, really, is it? Mark S. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.145.132 |
Erm, when it comes to wars and religion, I seem to remember that World Wars 1 and 2 weren't fought on religious grounds. There were some wars that religion wasn't responsible for surely? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.109.228 |
"There were some wars that religion wasn't responsible for surely?" And that, I think, is damning with faint praise. "Mass murder in the "rational" scientific 20th Century dwarfs that in any other individual century." Well I don't believe that invading other countries and exterminating civilians are rational acts. I didn't say that religion was the only source of irrationality, just one of the biggest throughout human history, probably #2 after the squabbles over resources. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.145.132 |
I sort of walked into that one! No, what I meant was that religion was not at the root of all wars. I'm not saying that's what you're arguing, but I've heard that plenty of times from other people and it always gets my goat. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Jonathan - In all fairness, mate, whenever the topic of religion comes up, those of us who aren't believers, and those of us who speak rationally, are just as much 'jumped on' as you feel rational believers in faith are. Not everybody is able to approach it as intelligently as you do, or as sincere as you do, and I find this is more common than we would like to admit. My question to you is simplified because it's that hoary old question: What do you personally get from your faith. At the end of the day, what is at the core of your religion. I'm afraid my viewpoint is rather cynical (I do not mean you any disrespect), because I believe when all religions are stripped down, when all the defining elements have been laid bare, scrutinized and sifted through methodically and accordingly, the end result is still the same; faith = an after-life, a guarantee of there being something more. To challenge the faith of one person is to probe too deeply, to make them question what they have been told not to question. Or maybe that's my 'asinine' interpretation, and I have it all wrong. Don't take it this the wrong, mate, you know I respect and like you a lot. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.145.132 |
Hi Frank Indeed, totally understand that it works both ways. No doubt about that at all. I know that this is a lot of people's experience with religion as outsiders, just that being from a liberal Christian background and going to a liberal Christian church etc, these aren't generally my experiences. But I do know what you mean, Ali and I left our last church in Reading because of their rather woeful attitudes concerning gay marriage. What I personally get from my faith requires a fairly complex answer, one I'm not sure I'm up to after the DIY hell of today (wee one on the way, got to start converting the study to a nursery), but I'll have a go. For memy faith has got me through some tough times, helped me to approach people I usually may not get in with more compassionately, helped me be even more awed by the wonder of the universe, in tandem with appreciating science etc, its certainly helped my creativity no end, it keeps me constantly questioning, constantly pushing the boundaries and thinking over metaphysical and moral questions, it's community and discovering new friendships, some of them quite profound, it's the quiet, silent moments when hope is revealed to you, it's the quiet moments in the midst of choas, noise and hatred, it's understanding hatred and trying to work through it, the practical application of love, the acceptance of your own limits. See this is already getting very vague! But, what it certainly doesn't boil down to me is that if I be good, then I get to heaven. It's about enriching my life, rather than making me prepare for some abstract reward after death. I do believe that at our core we are eternal, and my thoughts on the afterlife, death etc sort of get more complex with age. At the end of the day at the core of my religion, is being human, expressing the best of humanity and trying to share that love with others. I think challenging faith, both from the outside and within, is a deeply healthy and helpful approach. We have to grow in our faith. If you just accept it all as an absolute then you aren't growing spiritually in my opinion. I think my views of the church (rather than as faith per se) have been shaped by my father, who is a liberal Christian, Anglican Rector. He's a deeply warm, funny, and wonderfully human man and he's shown me that for all its flaws, the church is capable of great things. Anyway, as I say, all this is going to come across as very vague, as it's quite a complex and wide discussion. But I'm enjoying it very much. I respect you too Frank. Don't you worry, you haven't upset me in the slightest. As I said, a lot of my friends are atheists and we enjoy such dialogues. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
To be honest, Jon, yours is the brand of Christianity I grew up with. The anti-apartheid activist Albie Sachs read the Bible for the first time in prison (as a secular Jew, he'd never encountered it before); it didn't convert him, but it made him very strongly aware that Christianity has certain core values (as expressed in the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount) that share vast amounts of common ground with humanism, and indeed with socialism. That, to me, is what Christianity is truly about, and what I respect in that faith even though I don't share it. It wasn't until later in life that I discovered there are other forms of Christianity which are very different, and exactly the kind of hateful rubbish that most other atheists have in mind- what Bernard Shaw referred to as 'Crosstians'- epitomised by the likes of Westboro Baptist Church and the loathsome Richard Carvath, the rabidly (to the point of 'methinks he doth protest too much') homophobic bigot who stood for MP in Salford this year. I was explaining this to a lapsed Catholic friend of mine, and how I'd assumed for most of my life that most forms of Christianity, at root, shared that overlap with humanism- certainly that Catholicism did. 'No,' she said emphatically. 'It's not like that at all.' I guess it's like any other belief system or system of values; it depends on what it means to you and how you use it. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.109.145.132 |
Exactly. Agree with you there. I do think, at least in this country, that the Stephen Greens, are in the minority when it comes to the Christian Faith. That Terry Jones chap had a congregation of only 50. Westborough is very tiny, and limited to only their own family. Yes, Christianity shares a lot of values with humanism. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.254.144 |
Well I don't believe that invading other countries and exterminating civilians are rational acts. Here's the problem right here: who is to determine who gets to get the ultimate trumping "I believe"/"I don't believe"? Others might very well deem it rational to do this, and have, fully justifying their actions "rationally," with facts to support them. It is a mistake to think the "rational" is closest to "truth," understood completely objectively. Subjectivism is rife in determining present ultimate "rationality"... so who gets to have the final say on it?... Doesn't the very phrase "I don't believe" hollow out the idea that what's rational, is anything but yet one more opinion on a given matter?... Would we want the highly rational Supreme Court that decided Dred Scott vs. Sandford having the final say in all matters? Or would we want the fiery religious preacher Martin Luther King having no say in any matters that touch upon society at large; because he comes from a religious perspective, and uses a religious model to fashion his views on society? | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.18.163 |
"Doesn't the very phrase "I don't believe" hollow out the idea that what's rational, is anything but yet one more opinion on a given matter?" No. Starting with just a few a priori goals (e.g., we desire the human race to survive, happiness is preferable to unhappiness) we can define a rational act as one that furthers those goals. You can refuse to accept any assumptions if you like, but I'm not sure where that leaves you in relation to, well, anything. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.233.166 |
The problem is, those a priori goals are necessarily vague, because the more specific they become, the more tyrannical - hence, the less they should be those "few a priori goals." But being necessarily vague, "rationality" then becomes a mere map to get there. Thomas Jefferson's rational map, and Thomas Aquinas's rational map, would be vastly different - but neither could hardly be accused of irrationality, whatever one thinks of their undergirding belief systems. So, "rationality" must necessarily be pre-defined, as - in this overarching example - excluding all religious "mumbo-jumbo" in effecting the map to the goal. But we're left with no "rational" reason for excluding such mumbo-jumbo. Except, results, I guess. And religion has led to every lofty goal: preserving the human race, elevating happiness over unhappiness, etc. It's been abused? Sure, and so has secularism, we don't need to belabor the point. But it all boils down to: the only way to exclude religion, even its mumbo-jumbo, from such arguments, is to "irrationally" exclude it... right?... | ||
| Chris_morris (Chris_morris) Username: Chris_morris Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 98.220.97.79 |
Jonathan, I'm an atheist, of course, but I much admire your position and your beliefs. Wish there were more like you, mate, especially in America. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.63.145 |
"And religion has led to every lofty goal" [belief mode on] Oh, dear God, now I know you're taking the piss. [belief mode off] "But it all boils down to: the only way to exclude religion, even its mumbo-jumbo, from such arguments, is to "irrationally" exclude it... right?..." Most people agree that survival and happiness are good things. If you need to abandon those in order to defend religion, then you've got some serious questions to ask yourself about why you're happy to settle for such a pyrrhic victory. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 75.4.247.79 |
And religion has led to every lofty goal I must admit, I was wondering who in the hell wrote that when I read it quoted, and then realized... it was me!  | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.148 |
I'll do one: science is the root of all evil. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Jonathan - I respect what you say, essentially as you make no bones about the vagueness of your belief, your faith. I even admire how eloquently you put it, even if it doesn't bring me any closer to understanding. I suppose I have had too many encounters with people who state categorically that I am absolutely foolish not to believe, and that it is up to me and others to prove that 'something' doesn't exist. I think you described to me what I had hoped more believers would demonstrate. Thanks, mate, it's not every day that I come away from this NOT disappointed. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Hi Frank I think we all have to find our own way, spiritually, rationally... whatever path you want to tread really. I'm not going to force anyone into a different mindset just because I don't agree with them on certain things. Instead, I take from it what I can. Open dialogue where possible. Absolutely, it's up to you to decide what to believe or not to at the end of the day. Cheers J | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 82.38.75.85 |
Jonathan, I think if all Christians were like you, I'd be one too! Your attitude/belief system/morals are truly wonderful. I guess I'm like Frank - the so-called Christians I've come across have been the self-righteous brainwashing types. Hence, I've been totally disillusioned by the idea of religion and I've long since been an atheist too. But if I'd known people like you when I was a kid, instead of the way religion was "forced" on us at school (and poo-pooed by my parents at home), I'd have probably embraced it. | ||
| Giancarlo (Giancarlo) Username: Giancarlo Registered: 11-2008 Posted From: 85.116.228.5 |
About this "religious" thread, a nice light is shed by Michael Largo's (from HWA) non-fiction "GOD'S LUNATICS" (Harper).  | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 78.22.237.21 |
I've been totally disillusioned by the idea of religion and I've long since been an atheist too. Same here. And yet - I wonder. More than ten years ago an old school friend asked me to join a powerful society which will remain unnamed but which is very anti-clerical and all that. After a few talks they said that there was too much 'God' left in me and they referred me to a lesser branch which accepts the existence of God. I never joined either society. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Hi Giancarlo. That book does sound very entertaining. I always like relics because some of them are hilariously obscure. In Italy there was just museum after museum of random saint bits. Some of them looked disturbingly like moldy pork scratchings. Hmm, powerful societies mysterious societies? Danger Will Robinson! Danger! Carolinec - Thank you, that's very kind of you. Indeed, humility is the key really. Fervent people who believe they have things 100% are often very scary. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.55 |
On both sides of the argument... | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
The logical stance is one of accepting what has been proven within the limits of our senses and admitting all possibilities outside the limits of our knowledge as valid but unproveable i.e. acceptance that paranormal phenomena, and states of being beyond our ken, actually exist. Agnosticism coupled with Forteanism and the application of the scientific method while allowing for the freedoms of philosophical speculation = logical rationalism imo. Atheism is just as irrational as faith. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.163.91 |
Jonathan, I want to change my position a bit. I shouldn't mock the opinions of people even if they're scientifically proven to be incorrect. Everyone has a peronal philosophy that works for them. We all have canine teeth and we all dream - none of us are completely rational. But nobody really has the same irrational beliefs as anyone else. My objection is to religion, which I define as organising people together with such beliefs. When people start to apply these beliefs onto the rest of society (including their children), that's when I object. When important decisions have to be made which involve other people, science and rationality must take precedence, I feel. One's personal beliefs should remain just that - personal. Your life and your head are yours to do with as you please. But one's beliefs shouldn't influence anyone any decisions made on public matters. People with strong opinions at odds with logic and rational proof should remain apolitical. The Archbishop of Cantebury should not be on Question Time (at least until he returns to Earth). | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.163.91 |
Ack. "One's" should of course be "Ones". | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
Proto - I have a sort of semi-interesting, half-humourous story about imposing one's beliefs on children. About seven years ago my friends had a little boy. The father of the boy is English, his wife is Polish. Now in Poland, even those who don't go to church or are lapsed in some way, usually baptize their children. It's probably less problematic for the child in an education system in which religious classes (Catholic in 95% of cases) occur. I asked my friend if he would baptize his son. He said that his wife wanted him to be baptized. His wife is not religious, but decided it was for the best (as described above). I asked my friend if he thought it was a good idea, especially since he was a fervent atheist like me. He looked at me and said: 'You were brought up Catholic, weren't you?' I replied that I was, and that I abhorred the religion. He then pointed out that 'you Catholics' always end up rebelling and enjoying life in the most depraved, but pleasurable ways possible,and usually have an open mind on all manner of subjects. He said calmly, 'don't worry, he'll be fine.' |