religions Get in the way

I said in the Christanity for Morons: prophex said: I think 75% if not more of the world's Hatred is due to Religon

I'd have to say that, even if this wasn't a factoid, a correlation doesn't show cause. There seem to be a lot of ways for people to hate one another. It could be that they are predisposed to that (xenophobia keeping small tribal groups cohesive?). Religion is just one of a number of ways of separating "them" from "us". I'm not sure you can lay so much blame on one separating factor.However, I will offer up my suspicions that any viewpoint that discourages thinking is dangerous. Anything that takes something purely on authority is dangerous. There are, to me, dangers in religions by their very nature.

I'd have to say that that is high. I have also heard that 42% of all statistics are made up on the spot (but I don't have a reference to validate that ).From U.S. Public opinion polls on religion

• 65% believe that religion in general has either a "great deal" or "fair amount" to do with causing wars and civil conflict, and
• 47% believe that some religions encourage violence more than others, but
• 80% believe that religion in the world is beneficial.

Make of it what you will (a lot of people think wars and civil conflict are beneficial? ), this doesn't address hatred directly ...

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist

Religion is a tool not a cause for violence. It is a tool in the mind and hands of the deranged to support a quest for power. If the point of the religion/message is love, to do malice in its name is contradictory. To argue otherwise is absurd.

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Cactus and Scrub
and yellow grass

IF is a big wordIf the point of the religion/message is also to convert everyone else to the religion there is a confictIf there is any other point of the religion/message it is a conflictespecially when it washes over into the way government is run and what is taught in schools or even what other religions are "allowable" ... when religion gets in the way ... (= board topic)[This message has been edited by RAZD, 04-14-2004]

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

There is no other point to Christianity until it becomes distorted by any megalomaniac and has been throughout its applicable existence. The true Israelite is a spiritual approach to his fellow man, or he is not a true Israelite. There are no exceptions here. It is or it is not, anything gray is evil. What washes over into any place is done by those who do not understand the proper application of the message and there are many. The message becomes muddled and is muddled almost completely to barely recognize it for its intent. However, there are men of honor who have acquired honor through their beliefs. This virtue would naturally spill into every facet of their life.
To draw people to a message it must be lived intelligently. How rare is this? It is rare.
Thank you for your reply.

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Cactus and Scrub
and yellow grass

If I may add a little bit on the issue of religion....First off religion if anything started the advancement of science, however what is ironic is the findings later discovered challenged all of the ideas of the church, but still I think we should give it some credit. You know, the whole Enlightenment era of history, I have no idea if I spelled that correctly.Also, our education philosophy is based upon the renaissance mind, having to study multiple subjects. Once again, a very religious culture, and the church also valued that.Another interesting thing. The whole constitution is based upon a government described by the bible. (This is according to my father, a creationist) Jefferson was tutured by a lawer that was a creationist, and during the study of politics they came across the elders...uuhhh I forget the story.The point is, that system influenced the draft of the constitution, and the whole balace of power idea. Each branch can be correlated to a branch of power in a system described by the bible. I would research more details for you guys, but I got quite a bit of homework to do.My point is, I don't like it when people sort of bash on religion. YES there are wars over it, but there are also very good things that come about religion, but we kinda don't focus on it. There are many values on our society that came over the influence of religion.Just thought I would point that out. Take it easy guys.

I would have to disagree with this.I am not a big fan of religion, but I think that religion is only an excuse for people to hate one another.Hate has been around for a long time, and no matter what we do hate will always find some way to manifest itself.Although I think that taking religion completely out of the picture is not such a bad idea, educating people is the best approach toward fighting hate.Have you ever talked to racists before? I have (and I'm asian too). If you probe them enough, you will find that the majority of them are very uneducated and ignorant in many fields that we take for granted.

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The Laminator

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IMHO, there is little doubt that Religion does not lead to violence, it is certainly used both as an excuse, and as a motivating factor to encourage violence.If you look at the various religous wars over the ages, very seldom was it really about religion. Even if you look at the horrors that were the Reformation, they were not as much about religion as about power and dominance.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Stipes, Really? Could you please elaborate on this? My feeling is that you are very wrong, so I would like to know how you justify a statement like this. Perhaps you mean this to be like saying that cancer started the advancement of cancer research. If that is so, I could buy into that.I think about things such as the fact that Greek scientists calculated the circumference of the earth to astounding accuracy more than a hundred years BCE. Yet, it was seriously doubted by Europeans that the earth was spherical until the crew of Magellan's ship finally sailed all the way around it more than 1500 years later.What, in your opinion, was responsible for this? It is my opinion that the Christian sacking of the library at Alexandria and burning of the books and scrolls is perhaps the most tragic loss that humanity has ever seen. That event, and many similar events all over the rest of that part of the world perhaps set back humanity more than a thousand years in the field of knowledge.I charge that Christian policies of book-burning, keeping the masses ignorant, intense fear of things sexual that kept people from practicing proper hygiene (contributing hugely to the magnitude of the Plague), and several other things were a large cause of the Dark Ages. Poppycock! Please back this up with chapter and verse references.Verzem

Actually, it was Julius Caesar's army that was responsible for the fire that ate up all the books and scrolls of ancient knowledge. It was an accident anyway.However, Christian Europe in the Middle Ages and Renaissance was indeed famous for its policy of book burnings and suppressions of almost all new scientific findings.

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The Laminator

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In the sense that the Christian worldview promoted a rational universe as the work of a rational God, this is true. Science and religion usually aren't at loggerheads, though you wouldn't know it from these debates. It's just that when one rejects the conclusions of science for no other reason than they don't like them, science-minded folks tend to get a little upset. Like most people I guess I'm curious how you come to claim that a document that says "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" came to be based on a document that says "I am the Lord thy God; you shall have no other gods before me." Religion can have a very positive, transformative effect on people. That's the good side of religion. The bad side is that people take religion so seriously that religious concerns begin to trump all consideration of life or liberty, particularly the lives and liberty of those who aren't in your religion.I mostly agree with you. I'm not one that is opposed to religion in principle; just, a lot of the time, in practice.

In truth, how many actually follow Christ's words, rather than their own paths?Christian - Follower of Christ
Christian policies = Christ's teachings --> Doing them.It doesn't matter how many people you bring to me, and say "these one million christians killed these people". It is not Christ's teachings that caused this --> It is if anything, failure to meet Christ's teachings. Those one million called christian will be without excuse on judgement day.As for religion disappearing, I am not talking about religion. Christ did not make a new commandment saying "start a new religion". The teachings therein is a message. The Apostles preached the Gospel. I am confident that I have no religion. By definition I am not allowed, because of the commandment Crashfrog quoted.So when you talk of religion, know this --> you must define christian before including a follower of Christ.The fact is, you would not be able to identify me as religious if you followed me for a month, there is no religious ritual whatsoever - involved in my life. Nor do I make any other "christian policies". Any addage to word of God is the word of man. The only christian policy is to love neighbour and adhere to Christ's words. It is an outrage that people have perverted God's word to suit their cause.So if the Pope would say "kiss my feet" - I will say "No, you being the greater, should wash my feet, for even Christ came to serve, who are you oh religious man, that I should kiss your feet". Or if a priest would say, "Say ten Our fathers, and then confess to me your sin". I shall say "No, Christ said not to make repetition of prayer, and I should confess to God - not man".So I ask you - is a follower of Christ religious - Do I have a religion?

Lam,While it is believed that the library at Alexandria was damaged by fire when Ceasar set fire to ships in the harbor, it was not destroyed then, nor were that many of the books, scrolls, etc.I was talking about the Christian riots of 391 CE where much more damage was done to the books and scrolls. Admittedly, this was not the final death-blow. That occurred in the 600's with an Islamic assault.It is important to not dwell on just the assault on books in Alexandria though. There was a concerted effort for several hundred years to get rid of academic information. Pope Gregory I had the library of Palatine Apollo burned "lest its secular literature distract the faithful from the contemplation of heaven". He condemned education "for all but the clergy as folly and wickedness". He also was responsible for the destruction of countless ancient Greek and Roman statues.Jerome, a Chruch Father and early monastic in the fourth century rejoiced that "the classical authors were being forgotten". Thankfully, he was wrong, and they didn't quite get it all.That is just from the Dark Ages. Acts that negatively affected mankind's body of knowledge in the Middle Ages were just as bad, if not worse.I realize that you only challenged me on the issue of destruction of the library at Alexandria Lam, but I just felt this was a good place to expand on what I said earlier and to show that it was but a link in a chain of behavior.Verzem

Thanx for the correction. I didn't know that not all the books and scrolls were destroyed by the Romans.

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The Laminator

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