posted
First there's the concept that one group of people or culture is superior to another that gets FED by a religion that initially taught peace, compassion, good values that people needed that got co-opted by the sort of people who just want power and use religion or any other thing like it as their tool. That's the problem. It's when you get people who believe that no matter what they do is good because a diety told them to do it even if they are hurting and destroying a ton of people in the progress and are in fact serving the devil they claim to hate and be against. That is where the evil comes from. I wish the positive aspects were highlighted more. Compassion, looking out for people, caring for them, but many times powerful mainstream people have painted those things as being a sign of weakness. I guess it depends on the perspective. *Rant*
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
I agree, perspective is key. Though, I think that it's the PEOPLE rather than the religion that teaches hate and intollerance. It's the extremists of ANY religion that take things out of proper context in the actual meaning of the scripture. I think it's very common for all religious people to misinterpret scripture and to distort what it really means, which is why I think we really can't read scripture without the Spirit's guidance. We have the same form of extremism in "Mormonism" though the lines drawn between extremists and the humble followers of said religion are clear and distinct. Now, having said that, I will say that one of the biggest problems facing religions today are the twisted teachings of those who passed before, who, by some reason, were able to pervert the purity of it at some point. Also, it's only natural for people to accept religious teachings that require no change for the better. It's the easier route to nowhere. We need to focus on the good parts of thos religions, so I agree with you completely. :-) We need more opem-minded religious people, not closed off haters that are convinced that everything THEY know and have been taught, is the truth. No matter our own beliefs, we can give an honest ear to other religions and say, "You know what? That's cool. Right on." :-)
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posted
And much like there are religious extremists (to varying degrees) in every faith that give their faith a bad name...there are just as many extremist atheists/agnostics who denounce all religion as a weakness, inferiority, figment of imagination (*cough*KoM*cough*) who give atheists/agnostics a bad name.
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posted
Indeed. Extreme athiest have a way of just... making life seem some bitter and cynical when it doesn't have to be. I think it leaks into the culture in the form of movies and books that are unbarely depressing due to their insistence that life has no meaning, but really it's just an excuse to do whatever one wants without consiquence, which is extremely depressing and untrue. But the conservative religious types are even scarier. I wish there was a balance. I do not have a religion myself, but a system of beliefs that is a bit hard to describe.
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posted
I'm just going to toss out a contrary arguement. I would say that religion is evil, while faith is good.
Now that I have upset and/or confused nearly everyone, let me explain how I mean that. By religion I mean the heirarchy, the structure, the mob mentality, the monolithic facade of uniformity that leads people to segregate themselves from others and to build walls in order to prevent understanding. By faith, I mean the purity of the belief, the calling to do noble, generous, and beautiful things in the name of that belief. Religion is based on the multitudes, while faith is innately personal. Religions are groups of people, faiths are collections of individuals. Religion is the collectivization of faith, while faith is the personalization of religion. Religions sponsor crusades and jihad; faith encourages art, literature, and architecture of breathtaking beauty.
These are not the traditional definitions. I'm a guy who always harps on definitions, and I think I'm right to, because there can be no communication without sticking with the definitions. I know this, which is why I'm trying to clarify what I mean. The problem is that I don't think the words really exist to fully express my position, so I have co-opted the two closest words, and now I have tried to explain the more specific meanings I have (arbitrarily) assigned to them. However, within my idiosyncratic definitions, how do you feel about my outrageous statement now?
Posts: 218 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
I totally agree. That's the problem I tend to have with some religious... The hierarchy, rules and structures. All the things designed to separate that don't make sense to me. But faith, the beliefs, the symbolism, compassion and self sacrifice. That's what I love and want more of... What I want is a religion in which what you believe and you become one thing, like an ideally married couple... like... two parts of a song joined together. It's had to explaine, but that's what I'd love to be like... In which me and my faith are just one thing...
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posted
So a "religion" would be organized solely for the negative, hateful, destructive purposes
Hmmm.
I believe God instituted an organized religion so that the Gospel could be spread as far and wide as possible.
Couldn't that be a valid purpose along with all the bad stuff?
People don't only organize for bad purposes in other areas of life. There are positive reasons for organziing together in the area of faith.
Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
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posted
Not really But you have all of the negative, hateful, destructive things that are already there that most religions attack and try to change until the sort of people who these things get a bit of power in their hands and corrupt religion and make it evil... Then all of the good people in these organizations work hard to change it back or to follow the rules and be as good as they can be despite it all. It's just too difficult to keep the greed and hatred from corrupting things, from distorting the messages. And I don't just mean Christianity. You get that with Islam a lot with practices like FGM or honour killings that might have existed in the culture that people, in the name of "purity" or whatever take up even though those acts were condemned.
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posted
Religions aren't evil, they serve many purposes. They reasure the people that there is something beyond their current lives, they insure that there is a set of moral values that if followed can lead people to living good lives, and they insure that people follow orders of any degree as long as they are in the name of their faith (mind you, this is not always a good thing).
p.s. I am a devout atheiest (sorry if my spelling is bad).
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posted
Religion isn't evil. A slew of mindless followers of harmful dogma, that's evil, yes, but that definition cannot be applied to the majority of religions, or religious people.
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posted
I think we can have religious leadership without the hateful extremism. Religion, in whatever form it's in, still has a bit of truth in it although that truth may be so distorted that we'd have to dig for it quite deeply. Only a religious community that's completely devoted to God would we find complete wholeness and everlasting happiness. I don't think it's possible any other way. Without celestial laws there wouldn't be any punishment for sin, without sin there'd be no need for Christ to have died to atone for them and without that... well, you can follow that train of thought till there would be, really, no point to life. Without all of this there really can be no happiness, TRUE happiness, found. So, if there were no laws given from God to us then our conscience wouldn't be stung when we did something against those laws and we'd be much more decadant and decayed than we are now in the world without it. I don't think it's about control; without that celestial guide how do we obtain what we're striving for? I think laws and a higher moral life-style are necessary for the benefit of ALL human life, ALL religions. I don't support extremism at all. I completely disagree with hatred. It has no place in society at all. I'm speaking from an LDS perspective though and I'm well aware of what some people feel about our church. The wonderful thing about it (the "Mormon" church) is that our leaders AREN'T put in their position by voting, money or any type of intreigue. They're put there by divine insperation and nothing that comes from them will lead us away from happiness, but toward it, if we follow the direction given. That's just my belief though and I don't expect anyone to completely agree with me. I value the truth that ALL people have from whatever religious background they come from, unless they try to shove it down my throat. I think any extremism, violent or no, is totally unneeded. We CAN get along and find common ground. I think the LDS church has made some great leaps and bounds in getting along with other faiths.
Posts: 42 | Registered: Nov 2005
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quote:.there are just as many extremist atheists/agnostics who denounce all religion as a weakness, inferiority, figment of imagination
Partly in response to this:
Here's my view on religion, as an athiest.
Religion was developed by humanity as a way of explaining the unexplained things. We lived in a world where we couldn't explain much of anything around us. Why we died, why we lived, what that big bright light in the sky was and why it went away sometimes. Religion developed from our natural story telling instinct as a way of explaining the unexplained.
Of course, its transformed from that. Turns out the worlds a pretty rough and scary place. Folks don't like that idea. So nowadays people tend to use religion like a really big security blanket. It provides a view that, well, the world really isn't as big and scary as it looks. Theres a big nice guy/girl in the sky who looks after us, cares about every last one of us and as long as we're a 'good person'.
It also provides people with a group to which they belong. Its that second part that greats a problem. Anytime we have a group we belong to we tend to ostracise (sp?) people who aren't in that group and/or try to force them into it.
And when you combine the bad parts of them both it gets really bad. People get so amazingly forceful about their religion becuase if it proves wrong, well there goes their security blanket. There goes their comfortable afterlife and their version of 'good person' could be completely different from the other religion's/life view's 'good person'.
Most people today seem to still need religion. They need that comforting security blanket, complete with omnipresent father figure and afterlife. They need their sense of belonging. And I certainly don't grudge them that. Religion as a whole isn't evil. And as long as people surpress the bad parts, the forcing of other folk into it, the ganging up on them, the ostrasizing and keep religion out of science where it does not belong then as far as I'm concerned they can believe whatever they want. And if it better enables them to find happiness and deal with the harsh realities of this world, then more power to them.
*shrug* Atheists don't all have to be rough and cynical. Sure our over all world view may sometimes come across that way. But that doesn't mean we can't hold the same values (love, compassion, caring, equality) close to our hearts as everyone else. It just means we don't get those values from a book and we don't believe we get any reward for living them. We do it because its how we'd want to be treated and because well, it feels good to treat folks with love and compasion. And though the world can be made to appear brutal from the perspective of an atheist scientist, it is also very wonderful and beautiful. All the more so for not having been shaped by any omnipresent force.
So to summerize. I agree, religion as a whole isn't evil. It can be turned to evil, but that's the fault of the people doing the turning, not the religion.
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