| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/19/2008 3:24:38 PM | science my dear friend has proofen so much through the last 100 years or so it has brought insite and also taught us what happend thousands of years ago it has been the back bone to dicover new thing's such as the earth is not much differnt then are moon infact are rock's are very close to the same as the moon.
So in faith people where taught that god exsist but has it ever been proofen he exsist or has it ever been proofen that god him self is here on earth now of course not there has been no proof what so ever that thy god ever exsist but only in teaching's through the church.
Wich still carrys in todays world in iraq i was there back in 1991 in near baghdad during the gulf war and to fight on that land wich christ him self according to the believe's and teaching's there's terorist's there who will defend and kill for there god to see death all around you is not a pretty site .
religion it self carrys a bad history to death it was used to show what would happend if you where a non believer or went against the laws of the church you would be be staked on a cross and left there to die and you can inmaging the smell of dead body's all around you rotten away.
i believe that christains are afraied of the truth or what science will tell us in the future .
Science has now shown us how old the earth is and it has also demostraited many times why we had floods and now under water citys wich at one time where above water and it show's us how the world has revolved sense the beging of the Dinosaur it has proofen over and over again fact's of truth and now mans biggest mystry is there a god .
that has been a question sense time began and all we know whats written in a book and as i said befor in that time period they didnt have the Technology or the resourse's so if you where in that time period you seen lets say a comet flying over in your mind it was a revolation from a god but in the Scientific point of few we have learn that a comet is nothing but is an icy body that releases gas or dust. Most of the comets that can be seen from Earth travel around the sun in long, oval orbits. A comet consists of a solid nucleus (core) surrounded by a cloudy atmosphere called the coma and one or two tails. but that is because science has once again proofen it.
but you have to realy look back in those days and inmagine your self in that time period its the same as believing in a god or god's but every nation around the word has the theory that it was a revolation from god or god's in that time period .
back then there was a lot of killing and torture in the church the Spanish Inquisition used thease ways to make people confess for there sins .
where talking in 1492
Christopher Columbus set sail in 1492 looking for a shorter route in India. That's where Columbus was going because the Muslim powers of the day had blocked the overland routes from Europe.
Columbus went west. He had the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria. He never did find India, but he called the people he met Indians, and we call them that to this day. He came home and told his wife, honey, I've accidentally discovered the world is round
so it was a fact the earth was round not flat but some people stilled believed that it was flat.
war has began over power to concure another land to domanate another like with japan in pearl harbor or even the world trade center ,so if u look at religion theres always going to be one religion going to try to domanate the other.
so there for some wars have been holy wars such as the Crusades,French Wars of Religion ,Jihad,
Jihad of the hand (Jihad al-yad), and Jihad of the sword (Jihad as-sayf). Islamic jurisprudence focuses on regulating the conditions and practice of Jihad as-sayf, the only form of warfare permissible under Islamic law, and thus the term Jihad is usually used in fiqh manuals in reference to military combat.
In spite of the many differences among Christians, Jews, and Muslims, they share a fundamental belief in God as compassionate and just. As a result, those communities have often nurtured people of extraordinary kindness and courageous commitment to justice. In contrast to the deep hatred that obviously inspired the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the vast majority of Muslims, like their Jewish and Christian counterparts, are appalled and sickened by terrorism, and utterly repudiate the mass murder of innocent people.
Why then do some members of those same communities believe that it is their moral obligation to wage aggressive holy war, even to annihilate innocent people in God's name? What aspects of their scriptures and traditions tend to support violence against "infidels"? What ethical principles--religious and non-religious--can we affirm in response to those ideas and the atrocities that they sometimes engender?
Religion is clearly not the only catalyst of total war and other forms of indiscriminate violence. People seem to be able to invent all sorts of rationales for mass killing without feeling the need to cite the will of God. For example, just a few days prior to the September 11 attacks, two young men from the Sacramento area each killed half a dozen people, apparently out of personal revenge. And some of the most appalling atrocities in history have been rooted not in religion per se but rather in racial or class hatred. There may even be a genetic tendency in our species, like that of our chimpanzee relatives, to attack and kill others for no reason except that they aren't "one of us." (Wrangham and Peterson)
But religious violence can take on a particularly intense and ruthless character, if the objects of that violence are seen as blaspheming or insulting God, as the enemies of God or God's way narrowly conceived. The problem of indiscriminate holy war is particularly difficult for Judaism, Christianity, and Islam to eliminate from within because it's so deeply rooted in their scriptures and traditions. The same religious traditions that affirm God to be compassionate, merciful, and just, also include more disturbing claims that promote religious hatred and intolerance, and sadly have provided a rationale for aggressive holy war. We need to face these things head-on. Questioning the moral justification of holy war leads, moreover, to troubling questions about the legitimacy of some basic theological claims and the authority of foundational religious scripture.
Most of my comments will be about Christianity, but I'll start with the Hebrew Bible, since it is considered sacred by all three traditions.
One of the Mosaic commandments prohibits murder (Exodus 20:13). Why is murder wrong, other than its obvious conflict with love of neighbor (Leviticus 19:17-18, 33-34)? Essentially because people are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27, 9:6). One might infer from that idea that no killing of persons would be allowed at all, that the concept of human beings as made in God's image would entail strict pacifism, an absolute duty not to kill people. But that is not what the ancient Hebrews concluded, since many offenses were subject to capital punishment, a form of killing (see examples in Exodus 21-22). So perhaps we might interpret the image-of-God idea to mean, All persons have a basic right not to be killed, but they can forfeit that right if they commit a serious enough crime. This would also be consistent with punishing only those guilty of crimes (Deuteronomy 24:16) and limiting the use of deadly force to the defense of innocent others or oneself. This is probably what most Jewish people would affirm today.
as u can see a lot of wars where caused by religion so you may have to go back and study a bit more not that im knocking you down or anything but religion has a lot behind it to. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/19/2008 7:59:16 PM | RE msg 570 by crazylilting:
Hi, crazylilting. Long time no speak. I hope that you will not take this as a personal attack, just some observations.
I think a common theme that comes up over and over again is values. If a person needs religion to instil these values and keep them in line what is that really saying? If a person is just behaving well because they fear going to hell we need to be afraid of this kind of person. I find that most people only keep the laws of the country, because they are afraid of punishment. We can see this most often during riots, because police are unable to enforce the law during riots, and it is during this time that normally law-abiding citizens will commit robbery against most shops. We see this all the time on the road, because so many people will speed on the road, and so often dangerously, yet when a police car is in sight, or a speed camera is present, people will immediately slow down to the speed limit. I've even seen traffic jams because so many cars were speeding and they all slowed down when they met a speed camera entering a tunnel, that they almost jammed the roads.
Prisons don't exactly look like they are unpleasant to live in anymore, with TV, holidays and even conjugal visits. So I don't think it's prison that scares people. What really terrifies people about going to prison, is the stories about prison rape, beatings, and the fact that as an ex-con, there are many jobs that you will be refused from, and how it will negatively affect your life because of people's attitudes to ex-convicts.
So if we ask this question about religion, how much more so must we ask this question about anyone in our country. If a person needs police and a fear of imprisonment to instil these values and keep them in line, what is that really saying about everyone in our country? If a person is just not killing people or raping women because they fear imprisonment and the difficulties of life as an ex-con, we need to be seriously afraid of this kind of person, because as soon as that person believes they won't get caught, they will kill and rape at the first opportunity. Sadly, there are many people in the UK and I believe in the US, who are like this, and who appear to be nice and pleasant in public, but rape dates because they know the law will find it difficult to convict them.
So I don't believe that keeping values in order to avoid Hell is necessarily a bad thing. After all, G-d is everywhere, so someone who genuinely fears Hell is likely to never do wrong.
The danger of this type of thinking is precisely those people who are told by others that G-d is merciless, or unfair, or capricious, or violent, or promotes infanticide, or promotes genocide. These people cannot understand how it would be against G-d's Will to treat a child badly, and cannot understand how G-d would never want anyone to treat anyone unfairly, just because they cannot comprehend why the Bible might speak against some people's sexual leanings. These type of people are extremists, because they are told that the G-d of the Old Testament is violent, and vengeful, irrational and unfair, so if they believe they must follow G-d, they must do what they believe the Bible says, even if it seems irrational and unfair. They are told they are not making sense by following G-d, so their mind must seek consistency and follow suit.
Ironically, it was you and other posters who have led me to this conclusion. Ever since you or another poster quoted Carl Rogers, I've begun to see how the mind looks for consistency above all else, even the will to live. If we tell anyone that G-d is merciless, and they follow G-d, their mind may come to believe us. But their mind would crave consistency, about anything else. So they would become merciless. They would only keep being good to others, if they refused to believe us.
So I believe that we are more dangerous to society, than religious followers. As someone once told me, there are sheep, there are sheepdogs, and there are shepherds. But anyone who's seen sheep trials, sees that a sheep will follow any sheepdog, even the sheepdogs that are not their normal sheepdogs. Those religious followers who are sheep, will see us as sheepdogs, and they will listen to what we say. But they will follow it to their conclusion, that we didn't want to happen.
So I don't think it's a good idea to criticise G-d. Mind you, if I'm right, then I shouldn't be criticising any political leader who people follow, which means I'm going to have to change. Oh well. More things I've done wrong. But then again, I can now do far less wrong in the future, because I choose to learn from my mistakes.
If we are to be moral, we must consider the consequences of our actions. Sartre said that the atheist must make the entire world his responsibility, as he has no reason to claim that he has not done wrong. I see more that Existentialist Philosophy has in common with religion, than the common philosophy of many atheists.
If they were not in touch with the part of themselves that naturally acts with the moral code of religions then in part we can be thankful they have found religion but if religion does nothing to help these people get in touch with this part of themselves they are in a co-dependent relationship with their religion, trying to appear to have the same values. This assumes that these people WANT to get in touch with their internal morality. That requires taking responsibility for everything they do, including common social values. Most people don't want to think about what they should and shouldn't do. Most people don't want to think at all, if they don't have to, because thinking takes up far more effort than anything else. You can chop wood all day, and it won't hurt nearly as bad as an hour of solid thinking about something in a way you are aren't used to. So you are expecting people to WANT to think, and get in touch with themselves, when they probably want to do anything but that.
Often people cannot live up to imposed values not because they are incapable but because they are not well. Religion is a breading ground for mental illness because they are given a set of behaviours they can mimic and like parents the church is not their all the time to impose these value sets so on Sunday they can pretend to adhere to them as long as those who know what they are really like keep quiet. Religion is a breeding ground for mental illness, but mostly I see this amongst people whose grandfathers and great-grandparents were religious and knowledgeable about religion, and whose parents were religious but knew very little about religion, and who grew up with a good secular education. The mind craves consistency, so when those people learn about science, they seek to have the same level of knowledge and understanding about their religion. Their teachers teach them about the whys of science, but NOT about the whys of religion. So they turn to the people who showed them religion, their parents, and their friends' parents. Their parents don't know the answers to these questions. But they feel they should, because their grandparents and their great-grandparents did. So they feel like they SHOULD have the answers, and they DON'T. This infuriates them, so they try to silence their children. But that makes their children confused, because they understand the science they follow, but not the religion they follow. That confusion rips their minds apart.
If they learn about religion for themselves, their minds start to integrate that information in all parts of their lives, in order to achieve consistency. In the process, all forms of morality that they absorbed as children becomes integrated with every part of their knowledge of the world. So their subconscious starts to see that the moral codes that society has taught them is completely at odds with 90% of what actually happens. But a fundamental part of their moral code is to fit in, and follow with society's practices and conventions. That shows them that their moral codes, that they learned as children, from their parents, and society in general, is completely flawed, and so they cannot trust even the moral codes of society. When they examine society, they see so much selfishness, that rebels against their natural moral codes, they are left with a stark choice: to accept the selfish behaviour of society, that selfishness is the right way to live, and that they should be as selfish as possible, or that if they choose to live with any level of integrity, they are fighting society, and they are therefore the enemy of society, and society outnumbers them in the millions. That causes paranoia, persecution complexes, superiority complexes, inferiority complexes, saviour complexes, anti-social complexes, anxiety, depression, BPD, and all the common forms of mental illness.
It's more common among people who examine religion, because the conflict between learning about science and not learning about religion but still practising religion can motivate the mind to start the integration process. So can anyone who goes through traumatic events or bereavement, because the intense emotions push the mind to seek answers and in order to make sense of those answer, the mind seeks to integrate itself. But it's the integration process that starts off the spiral towards the realisation that we are living in a very unpleasant, unfair and dangerous world that pretends to be the opposite, and ultimately it is that realisation that causes the mental breakdown, because once you realise that everything you were taught was a lie, and that we are living in a world where it is dog-eat-dog, kill or be killed, it's too much to absorb at one point, and the harsh reality means that you are in danger until you do absorb it, so there is a continual pressure to have the answers NOW, and this is impossible. That is just so much to cope with, that the brain shuts down. Some people survive for a time by escaping into drugs, drink, dangerous behaviour, and extreme sex, in order to overload the brain with as much physical sensation that you are distracted from the truth.
The only way to avoid this overload, is to reassure the person that that life won't kill them at any moment, that life is fair, there ARE answers why, that there ARE ways to deal with life successfully, and that patience is needed to absorb and integrate these answers. Without this reassurance, the mind has just had the rug pulled under it, and it will fall until someone reassures it, or it reassures itself, because the mind craves consistency, and so, once the mind believes that there are no answers, it will self-invalidate any answers it finds.
It may seem strange, but breaking off religion is no different than anything you rely on. Assure a youngster than what they grew up believing is a lie, and you will give them the same effect as pulling out an IV to a patient in intensive care. The body will go into shock, and can send them into a coma. The mind will go into shock, and can send them into a breakdown. You have to break it to them gradually, over several months. If you aren;t going to train as a professional deprogrammer and work with them for several months, you'll do far more damage to them by breaking the truth to them.
You can still speak to people and correct their beliefs without harm. You just have to follow the same rule of doctors: "First do no harm". So you have to figure out HOW to explain things to them, without disrespecting their beliefs.
Their is no accountability for breaking the code other then the fear of being judged by god when they die, however they are taught that their sins are forgiven so no matter what they do there is no earthly accountability for anything unless it breaks the law of the land and they happen to be caught and prosecuted. I agree that forgiveness without restitution makes for a very dangerous system, as it frees you of the consequences. I don't believe that is the intent of the Church, as even in Judaism, forgiveness is absolute, but if one intends to sin and then go to confession, the confession is not valid. But the priest cannot know that, because no-one would admit to it. Only the people concerned can know if they intended that their confession would absolve their future sins. So a priest cannot really start giving conditional absolution. The issue is that simplistic and selfish people will make this assumption, and it is the responsibility of the Church to regularly make it clear that intentionally acting in this way cannot bring absolution, no matter what the priest says. It is very sad that this is rarely voiced.
The whole idea of religion creates a split between the natural consequences of behaviour and replaces it with an unnatural consequence that may or may not be true (god's judgement/forgiveness) Actually, the whole idea of religion restores the idea that there are consequences for our behaviour way beyond what we can see or imagine. It's something we learn in the wild, because in the wild reality of nature, what you can see is very little, compared to what is out there. Something as simple as opening a bag of chips, and not sealing them well, can leave your food covered with ants, and make them inedible, leaving you with almost nothing to eat, which I've done. In North America, you can attract bears with food if you aren't careful. If you aren't careful with fire, someone car seriously burn their arm, and trying to find a doctor on a Friday night, when you're in the middle of the outback in Spain, can be very difficult, which happened to a fellow camper. So if you live with nature, you learn to respect it, and you learn to respect all things, and think about what will happen not just today, but long into the future. However, our society seeks to cushion us from most of those dangers. So it is very easy to grow up in society with little or no respect about the consequences of our actions. Religion addresses that issue, and reminds us that we are a part of a much bigger entity than we are shown by our society, and we have to respect nature, and the world, and others, not because society wishes it, but because it is necessary for our survival in the long run.
Evil is a broad term used to indicate a negative moral or ethical judgement, often used to describe intentional acts that are cruel, unjust, or selfish. Evil is usually contrasted with good, which describes intentional acts that are kind, just, or unselfish. from wikipedia by this definition religion is evil. It is replacing man's natural moral and ethical mechanism of consequences to profit directly from it's followers and to use that financial power and popularity for it's own agenda. The Catholic church being the biggest offender of all.
I eventually realised that evil is not really doing bad things, because no-one would do bad things, if they knew they were bad. Evil is negligence, because it's through a lack of awareness of the consequences of our actions that 99% of bad things happen. The girl who was kept in a basement for 24 years was not kept there because one man stood guard. She was kept there because no-one else ever considered that such a thing might happen. Her father brought 3 children up from the basement, and claimed she left them on the doorstep, and went away, 3 times without even saying hello to her mother, and yet no-one asked why. A young mother might drop a baby off at her parents or a church once, in desperation, and run away. But almost every time, the mother does go back, and would never do this twice. No-one but him saw the basement, despite numerous fittings. No-one said that they would help him clear out the basement and refused to take no for an answer. If this atrocity happened for any reason, it was because we turned our eyes and said "It is not happening to us, we will not seek to find out if it is happening to someone else".
Evil is negligence. As Edmund Burke said:
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. This should be that "All that is necessary for the triumph of atrocity is that good men do nothing, and that to sit idly by, doing nothing, while atrocities and horrors rear their ugly heads and grow to abominations, is evil in itself." For us to call ourselves good people, it is not enough to personally abstain from committing gross injustice. We must be conscious of ensuring that no-one else commits gross injustice as well. We cannot leave it to our police, as our police are not enough. We see that already.
I don't know the origin of the word evil but i rarely hear it outside of religious context. Unless some act is committed that is so far outside of the realm of acceptable human behaviour. Evil is a strong word that conjures up much in the mind, non of which are natural to us as humans. Evil to me would be taking away what is natural to us all. Try going to a forest fire where someone forgot to make sure their camp fire wasn't out correctly. Try going to a funeral of children who burned to death in a fire started by a mother's cigaretter. Try living on a road which is badly designed, because it is a 2-lane single carriageway that comes out of a bottleneck, where everyone speeds along it at 60mph, and there isn't anything to control the traffic, and you see cars who try to turn left, or do a U-Turn, and you see them get smashed to pieces by the cars doing 60, who are too fast to stop, and you see the victims bleeding all over the road, clutching their guts. You watch the islands extend a little bit further after each accident, but no-one thinks to just put islands all the way along, and so the accidents continue where there are no islands to stop people turning. Try living with abuse for years, and wondering why social services never step in. Try watching your father get cancer, get radiotherapy, have them mess it up and miss, so his bladder shrinks and he has to wear a colostomy bag, and no-one has the decency to apologise to you for not doing a decent job of the treatment, because had they just actually aimed the thing a little better, he'd still be alive. If all that isn't evil, I don't know what is.
Evil implies 2 things:
1) That something needs to be avoided
2) That it CAN be avoided.
Drinking and driving is generally evil, because no-one has a good reason to do both. If you drive, you don't drink. Few people can say they are not aware of the dangers. Most people will not drink at all if they are driving. We see it as foul if you do drink and drive, because we expect people to control their drinking habits.
The problems with what is called evil, is that people are told they are evil, because they are told they cannot stop themselves from doing evil. This is just claiming that we are not in control of our behaviour. But being able to control our behaviour is one of the 3 signs of good self-esteem. So we are being told that we are incapable of self-restraint, and that in turn destroys our self-esteem and self-worth. That itself is a tool of control, that is common with some factions of religion.
Unfortunately, there are some factions of religion that appear to still hold with this notion of inescapable evil.
I've tracked it myself, but not being a Christian scholar, I am unsure that I am right, and would beg your indulgence to hear my line of discoveries, so that people may understand where I am coming from, and may correct me if I am wrong.
One of these factions appears to be Calvinism in the form of the Five Doctrines of Grace, which argues that forgiveness is purely a result of G-d's grace. The other side of Protestant theology is Arminianism, which holds that forgiveness is purely a result of faith in G-d. Either way, both sides of the Calvinist-Arminian Debate both seem to follow the ideology that we are unable to do anything to prevent being damned, so it seems that Protestantism is fundamentally founded on the principle of inescapable evil, except by G-d's grace and faith in G-d, showing that our actions cannot benefit us in any way. I believe that it is rather telling that both the UK and the USA are both countries where Protestantism is the main religion. Both the advocates of Calvinism and Arminianism believe they are representing the truth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvinist
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arminianism
However, this is not the whole story. When we look further into the debate, we find that the source of both Calvinist and Arminianist views, are from interpretations of the works of Saint Augustine, and are very likely due to the fact that one of the principal founders of Protestantism, Martin Luther, was an Augustinian Monk before he broke with the Catholic Church.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Calvinist-Arminian_debate
It was Saint Augustine who believed in several things, such as: literal interpretations of the Bible, that one must follow such literal interpretations even when they conflict with Science, that the Original Sin of Adam and Eve was in having sex, that there is such a thing as a "Just War" and that war can be acceptable if it is for a good and just purpose (One is reminded of a Holy War). He did believe that a just war must require a proper authority, such as a state, but anyone can declare the state as unjust and themselves fighting for the real values of the state, like the Bolsheviks did. So you can justify insurrections as well, according to Saint Augustine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo
Other views held by him were of predestination, limited atonement, and irresistable grace, all found in both sides of Protestantism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Calvinist-Arminian_debate#Augustine_and_Pelagius
It appears that there was a huge debate between followers of Saint Augustine, and Pelagius the monk, because Pelagius claimed that salvation began with faith alone, but could only be completed through good deeds. It was Saint Augustine who said "There is no salvation outside the Church". It appears that the Church mostly sided with Saint Augustine, and this makes sense, because he was one of the smartest men in his day, having won the most visible academic position, in civilised Europe, that of Professor of Rhetoric at the Imperial Court of Milan, at age 30. Some Italian bishops still defended Pelagianism, but Augustine became the touchstone of the Church for the Middle Ages. Nevertheless, Church theologians still debated Augustine's beliefs, until the arrival of Thomas Aquinas, who reconciled the issue of faith vs good deeds, and concluded that although man has no self-control, G-d's grace grants him the restraint to accomplish good deeds, and G-d judges man worthy of eternal life, on the basis of those good deeds.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Calvinist-Arminian_debate#The_Middle_Ages
It appears that from then on, the Roman Catholic Church went with Aquinas, and so Catholics get into heaven as a result of the good deeds they do. But maybe someone who is a practising Catholic can make the Roman Catholic position clear.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_Church#Final_judgment_and_afterlife
However, Martin Luther was an Augustinian monk, and it appears that Protestantism followed suit. So a lot of the conflicted people who grew up in Protestant communities could have been conflicted because Protestantism follows Saint Augustine and not Pelagius or St Thomas of Aquinas.
Judaism follows the maxim that everyone has the choice of how to live their life, and that everyone chooses how to live. If you didn't choose how to live, then you are only responsible for those things the you do understand are a better way to live. Everyone will do something wrong at some point, simply because of the number of opportunities. But as long as you keep working on changing yourself to do better, and making restitution and apologising for what you did wrong to your fellow man, then G-d will forgive your past sins.
So Judaism doesn't have the problem in the first place, but mainly because Jews already debated the issue and concluded that inescapable evil was unfair, and it would be irrational to suggest that G-d was that capricious.
However, now we have to ask ourselves how Saint Augustine could have come to these conclusions in the first place, and if he could believe it, then how could there be something wrong with this?
I ask your indulgence to suggest a hypothesis.
I noticed that Saint Augustine was a Berber, from Algeria, and I was immediately struck the ideological split that has run right throughout modern Judaism, between the Jews of Europe, the Ashkenazim, and the Jews of North Africa and the Middle East, and Spain when it was held by Moors, the Sephardim, and might apply here.
Life in North Africa is very, very different from life in Europe, for many reasons, but principally because of the massive difference in climate. This difference is so pronounced, that one cannot take the same attitude to life, and must adopt a different method of faith, to survive in each climate. It was so pronounced that it even led to a difference in approach to religion, faith and practise, that resulted in books from both regions being so different in approach, that each seemed fundamentally opposed to the other, when in reality both resulted in the same theology and extremely similar practises, but from entirely different angles.
One book, "The Guide to the Perplexed", which was written to explain how Judaism was not at odds with Aristotelian Philosophy, was hailed as the saviour of Jews in North Africa and Moorish Spain, but was burned en masse and banned by European Jews. The resolution of the conflict was when Nachmanides declared that "The Guide to the Perplexed" could only be read by people 25 and over, when they were a bit older, and not liable to jump to conclusions. It then became clear that Aristotelian Philosophy was very popular in Moorish Spain, so many Sephardi Jews had read Aristotelian Philosophy and were very perplexed at seeming contradictions between Aristotelian Philosophy and Judaism, and "The Guide to the Perplexed" answered these apparent contradictions, easing the confusion of so many Sephardi Jews. In Europe, Aristotelian Philosophy was just not that well-read, hardly at all by most people, and European Jews simply didn't read it at all. So just by reading the answers contained in "The Guide to the Perplexed", European Jews were boggled, because it was answering questions they didn't even have, and it just made them completely non-plussed and confused, and made them question if they understood their own beliefs. But that was because they didn't need to read it in the first place.
It would be like you reading a book written to answer why 1+ 1 = 2, to Mathematicians who've read previous mathematical papers that show that you cannot assume that 1+ 1 = 2. Those Mathemicians have been confused by those earlier papers, and hence their problems will be resolved by this book. But it would just do your head in, and make you wonder if you know anything about Mathematics at all.
I bring this up, only to show just how differently the modes of thinking can be between Moorish and European thought.
Saint Augustine was a Moor. He studied in Carthage, and in the best schools in North Africa. It would be no surprise to me that he had a very austere view on Christianity, because of the type of thinking found in his back yard. Pelagius was a British monk and Britain was a very calm climate with plenty of grain. Likewise, it would be no surprise to me that he had a very moderate, work-oriented view on Christianity, because of the type of thinking found in his back yard. Both modes of thought would have been the best approach to each climate. Britain was an area where the weather was moderate and the food aplenty, so the food in Britain fed people in countries far beyond itself. What was needed in Britain was, hard work, a charitable nature, and a desire to eat well, so that you could work hard to bring in the harvest. Algeria was a desert land. Food was far and few between. What you needed in Algerian and North Africa in general, was to live on as little as possible, and carry faith with you that you would find food for you and your family through famine and lean times. Even when I visited Morocco in the early 1990s, even rich people would save water by showering with only a bucket of hot water and a jug, in ways that we would consider insane by comparison. But their extremely lacsadaisical attitude to life, which was a practical necessity there, would be almost dangerous in Britain, because nothing would get done. You cannot live the same way in both places. You cannot think the same way in both places. You cannot have the same attitude to faith in both places, because it would be grossly inappropriate.
It also strikes me how Aquinas' conclusions seem to be very close to Pelagius' conclusions, but for very different reasons. I therefore conclude that it is entirely possible that Augustinianism was the best choice for Algeria, and Pelagianism was the best choice for Britain. Aquinas' theology was probably best for Italy and France, which are still in Europe, but have a much hotter climate like Algeria, so they lean a little more towards Algerian attitudes, but still remain firmly European.
The confusion may have lied in that scholars did not take cultural differences into account, when considering each system of theology. So each theology may have been seen as conflicting, even though they were really in agreement, just for different cultures.
This was the greatest problem for Europe, because Saint Augustine's austere philosophy was so taken on in Europe, where it might have conflicted vastly with the moderate culture, and that may have led to a serious inconsistency with the values that had to be held due to the moderate climate. That could have been a massive driving force for war, as such an austere philosophy would require strong efforts, which is necessary in a desert land, and there was no way to make such strong efforts in a pleasant climate like Europe. Effectively, Augustine would have been claiming that you have to have strong faith in G-d, because you'd never make it living in the Algerian desert otherwise, and remember, he was a Berber, who live in the desert, and you show your faith to G-d, just by surviving. But for someone living in Europe, there is no way to show that strong faith, except by extreme acts, such as by taking on a war that you would be extremely unlikely to win. It might be that this was the source of such fervent efforts to take Jerusalem by European Christians. They believed they needed to prove themselves and they had no way to do it in Europe.
But if that was true, the Crusades would ultimately have been unsuccessful, because although a war would have been a strong show of faith in pleasant Europe, Israel was a desert land too, at least back then, so just managing to survive in Israel was tough enough, let alone a war against the people who were used to living in such a harsh climate.
This might have been Luther's problem with the Roman Catholic Church. He was an Augustinian, so he would have been educated to have austere tastes and to show a strong faith in G-d. But Aquinas' theology had been around for 250 years, which promoted a more moderate view. Europe was quieting down by then, and was becoming far more organised. The Dark Ages were over, and Europe was in the blossoming of the Renaissance. So Europe had little room for austerity. So Luther's calls for a Puritan Christianity, that was very austere, actually fits more in line with his education, than the excesses of the Church.
I'd always assumed that Luther came at the end of the Dark Ages, and the Protestant Reformation was what ushered in the Renaissance. But according to Wikipedia, it started in the 14th Century and began with the reintroduction of Greek and Roman philosophy, originally translated into Latin. However, the Protestant Reformation didn't occur until 1517, a full 100 years later.
So it may be that the drive for Protestant Theology was a result of a conflict for a philosophy that does not work well in places like Europe and North America. That drive may have been the force for a lot of what seems to be a problem with modern religions today.
The need for literal interpretation of the Bible, and the faith in it beyond modern Science, is found in traditional Sephardi Jews too. But there is a difference. The Sephardi Rabbi was traditionally paid for by the whole community to sit and study all day. Then he would give sermons, in ways that were so perfectly understood with the text, that upon hearing any such sermon, you would be completely sure that what you heard was what the text literally said. Because my father was Moroccan, I'm a Sephardi. So I've sat in on many sermons given by Sephardi Rabbis. Some bits I'd read already, and could see that he was giving a spin on it. Others I hadn't, and when I heard him speak, it was so fluid and so meshed with the text, I had trouble seeing it any other way.
The people would work all day. They didn't have time to sit and study the latest scientific studies in detail or the depth of the ramifications. So hearing from a friend about some new discovery would just confuse the local people no end. But the Rabbi had the time, so the Rabbi would study them in depth and mesh them perfectly with the next sermon. We find Responsa from Sephardi Rabbis on the subject of discoveries in electricity and how it might be of benefit, if it might have conflicts with Jewish Law, and how to resolve them so people can get the benefits of both.
I've heard real old-style Fire and Brimstone-style sermons from Sephardi Rabbis, on Rosh Hashanah. It's fantastic, because Sephardim will start prayer before dawn, at about 5am in the morning, and continue until 11. So you really need something sharp and fiery to wake you up. Plus, Sephardim eat hot and spicy food all the time. You have to really hammer an idea home with them to wake them up. You cannot just give a nice flowery sermon to them. They won't fall asleep. It's just they won't even notice. But these sermons are not all doom and gloom. They are just reminders of how serious things are, to people who are used to living on a knife's edge. These people get up every morning to pray before dawn. Every day. They don't sleep in. 9am isn't late for them. It's half the day gone. But for Ashkenazim, European Jews, it just doesn't work. They weren't worried about being bitten by a scorpion. They were worried about persecution. So the last thing they need is for someone to bring up a persecution complex.
The whole bit about sex being dangerous, is probably true in a desert environment. You need a safe environment from the ravages of the sun and the sand, and a good supply of food and water, before you engage in sex. But in a pleasant climate, the only worry you have is war. Doesn't make sense.
Fire and Brimstone sermons from Sephardi Rabbis amounts to: "Life is hard. You work hard. You pray hard. You have unquestioning faith. You don't worry about the latest theory. You have to be that way, because if you don't, you could die. Life could kill you." In those environments, it's totally true.
Actually, I HAVE heard Fire and Brimstone sermons from Ashkenazi Rabbis, but they come out completely different. Fire and Brimstone sermons from Ashkenazi Rabbis amounts to: "Life is good. Life is comfy. Food is plentiful. But watch out. You have to keep G-d's word, because life can turn on you in an instant." Coming from Europe, where food was plentiful, and wars were too, it made perfect sense. But for me, who always identified with the Sephardic way of life, it really scared me and confused me too.
The problem with all of these messages, is not the message itself. It's the context, the point you start from. In a desert context, anything else would be suicide. In a grassy context, it would bring depression and anxiety, because you are being stirred up, pumping your adrenaline with no way of expressing it.
I'd love to know what you and others think.
A sinister undermining of what it truly means to be human and i think that religion does do this. For now the church has enough power that even if the world stopped believing it could survive on it's investments and work behind the scenes. The Catholic church are not stupid they have invested in resources and technology that we have grown dependent on. What we aren't dependent on we are forced to change though cunning campaigns that bypass our logical and rational selves and prey's on our emotional attachments. I've found this in the Church, but also in governments too. I don't believe that ALL priests are corrupt. But certainly during the Middle Ages, it was a choice between that and back-breaking work and starvation for many people. In some extremely poor towns in South America, it's a choice of the Church, crime, or poverty and deprivation. But we see the same problems in government. Governments set us up to be afraid of them, and try to scare us into doing their will. Check out the adverts against welfare cheats and road tax avoiders on UK TV. It's truly terrifying. Meanwhile, when the government did make a mistake a few years ago, and overpaid lots of people the money they were due from tax credits, the UK government ran a campaign telling people that they would have to pay the money back or face consequences. However, the Daily Politics show, which is a very detailed and expert show on politics, finance and law, but is not very popular, and usually shown at times when most people who can watch at that time, would never watch it, reported that there was no requirement whatsoever to pay the money back, as it was the government's fault. So millions of people were put out of pocket, thanks to a threatening series of advertisements by the government which were completely illegal.
One poster mentioned (that i haven't forgotten) on another thread that if we wanted to find out the truth follow the money. Interesting that if we do this we find the church with their paws in the cookie pot as well... When they say, "follow the money", they mean that if you stop half-way, you only get half-way to the truth. Ask yourself: who will make the most money if most Americans don't ban religion, but don't follow religion? The one thing that is consistent with people who don't call Protestantism bunk but don't practise it, is that most of them want sex outside of marriage, but feel guilty for everything they do, especially about sex. That kind of conflict about sex means that everyone wants sex, but hardly anyone is getting it, because no-one is getting married, or staying married, and everyone feels too guilty to have sex most of the time. If you are interested in something that you aren't prepared to go through with, you talk about it all the time, you flirt with it all the time, you do everything you can to make it possible, but you never go through with it, so you spend all your time with all the preparations. So you talk about it all the time with your friends and run up a huge phone bill. You buy all the magazines that tell you about sex, in case you ever have it, but you never have it, so you keep buying them. You buy all the make-up and beauty products for the same reasons. You buy flashy and expensive cars at crippling interest rates, that you cannot afford, just so you can be impressive to the opposite sex. You buy expensive clothes. You have expensive cosmetic surgery. You have thousands of hours of expensive therapy and buy hundreds of self-help books, for things you already know, just because you're so conflicted. Then there is porn to satisfy the sexual desires that you feel too conflicted and guilty to satisfy with a real woman or a man. All this, just because you want sex, but feel too guilty to have it.
An entire world of industries has been built on this single conflict, on people who all believe in Protestantism but don't practise it. The crooked ministers love this conflict, because it guilts people into giving loads of money to the Church. But the main beneficiaries are not the church. They're the cosmetics industry, the cosmetic surgery industry, the automotive industry, the advertising industry, the media, and the people who own major shares in these companies.
Open your eyes. Even the conflict between atheists and Christians is being fuelled, because there is no publicity as good as conflict, and there is nothing like conflict to stop people banding together and fighting the real enemy. Remember the old military maxim of Divide and Conquer? We're living proof. We've been divided and the Corporations are conquering. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/19/2008 10:44:47 PM | In response to post/msg 576 ,
I think it would be cool to show when material provided is a word for word,cut and paste or at least provide the links you used,like for example;
http://www.imf.org/external/np/tr/2005/tr050408bf.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jihad
http://www.astronomy-now.com/index2.php?option=com_content&do_pdf=1&id=33
And when you did a word for word ,cut and paste from this link,
http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/submitted/Perry/holywar.html,
then you should have possibly discovered the following as well on the same page;
Copyright for the preceding article is held by the author, David Perry. Please do not quote from or reproduce it without his permission. None of the views expressed here should be construed necessarily to reflect those of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics or Santa Clara University
And to remain on topic,I should add that I believe that logic itself is more than just a way of reasoning but also that being which meaning and language is a foundation for one's logical framework as well and therefore,notwithstanding any possible logical fallacies /cause and effect/stolen concept, and/or other logical errors that may possibly make itself present within a post,and also in consideration that imo,in the absence of empirical evidence,and/or verifiable analysis/studies where one must consider ALL the variables and factors along with positive and negative correlations along the way,and with that being said,I remain of the opinion and belief that the title to this thread along with it's original premise is logically flawed and imo,logical fallacies/absurdities will follow.
edit/as always,enjoyed the read scorpiomover / | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/19/2008 11:55:26 PM | Seven Words that can Change the World
http://www.naturalnews.com/Report_Seven_Words_0.html
Very insightful.................................................. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 12:15:24 AM | Scorpiomover, that's quite a mammoth post you've got there. Very admirable, I have to say. Anyway, you asked me for an input on the Christianity-related points, so let me see what I can add.... for the most part, I think it's an impressive overview over western society's attitudes toward sin and guilt, although I think there are a couple of things about Saint Augustine which are entirely wrong. Anyway....
I agree that forgiveness without restitution makes for a very dangerous system, as it frees you of the consequences. I don't believe that is the intent of the Church, as even in Judaism, forgiveness is absolute, but if one intends to sin and then go to confession, the confession is not valid. But the priest cannot know that, because no-one would admit to it. Only the people concerned can know if they intended that their confession would absolve their future sins. So a priest cannot really start giving conditional absolution. The issue is that simplistic and selfish people will make this assumption, and it is the responsibility of the Church to regularly make it clear that intentionally acting in this way cannot bring absolution, no matter what the priest says.
Yep. In Catholic and Orthodox Christianity, a confession is only valid if there's true contrition, meaning a solemn vow to, as Christ said to the woman accused of adultery, "sin no more". The penitent is required to, before or after confessing his sins, pray an "act of contrition". There is no required set of words for it, but the most traditional prayer, which in Latin begins with Deus meus, is a good reflection of what contrition entails. The English translation reads (and it may sound familiar from some movies):
"O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins, because of Thy just punishment, but most of all because they offend Thee, my God, Who are all-good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of Thy grace to confess my sins, to do penance and to amend my life. Amen."
It is very sad that this is rarely voiced.
Not very many priests nowadays actually preach about the importance of confession, perhaps afraid of being seen as relics of the past. But among those who do, my experience has been that they emphasize that without true contrition, the priest's words are meaningless and that falsely confessing incurs yet more sin.
Also, I don't believe that traditional confession promotes "forgiveness without restitution". While it's true that for the sins against God, amends can be made only by prayer or spiritual works, and these are more for the penitent's benefit than for God's. But for sins against neighbor, they must be reconciled in some way, whether by apologizing, praying for the offended, or even turning oneself in to the authorities in cases of actual crime.
Furthermore, not everyone believes in the "it's either heaven or hell for you" thing. There's that classic teaching regarding the temporal punishment of sins in purgatory. That is to say, that even though the sin may be forgiven by salvation from hell, there's still a punishment incurred in purgatory. The best way to illustrate this would be to bring up ol' Adolf Hitler (him being our age's archetypal symbol of evil that almost everyone agrees on, I suppose). Assuming that Hitler expressed true contrition as the bullet traveled from the gun to his head and he really was sorry for all of his sins and cried out to God for mercy... according to God's infinite mercy taught in the Christian gospels, it seems that God would let him into the pearly gates. But, even so, Hitler would have to atone for all of his sins committed on earth via purgatory. It would also serve as like a "boot camp for heaven", where souls are trained in the ways of virtue so that they are ready to live eternal life while never sinning again. To simplify it, it suffices to say that between earth and heaven, there is a process by which souls are transformed so that they are prepared to partake in the glory of heaven.
One of these factions appears to be Calvinism in the form of the Five Doctrines of Grace, which argues that forgiveness is purely a result of G-d's grace. The other side of Protestant theology is Arminianism, which holds that forgiveness is purely a result of faith in G-d. Either way, both sides of the Calvinist-Arminian Debate both seem to follow the ideology that we are unable to do anything to prevent being damned, so it seems that Protestantism is fundamentally founded on the principle of inescapable evil, except by G-d's grace and faith in G-d, showing that our actions cannot benefit us in any way. I believe that it is rather telling that both the UK and the USA are both countries where Protestantism is the main religion. Both the advocates of Calvinism and Arminianism believe they are representing the truth.
Unfortunately, I can't say much about Calvinism or Arminianism (both are rather foreign belief systems to me), but I'd like to comment about Saint Augustine below:
It was Saint Augustine who believed in several things, such as: literal interpretations of the Bible, that one must follow such literal interpretations even when they conflict with Science,
This particular statement is probably as far as one could get from Augustine's actual teachings, although on the surface it might look correct. In fact, if you look at the very Wikipedia article you linked to, it states: "Augustine took the view that the Biblical text should not be interpreted literally if it contradicts what we know from science and our God-given reason."
Let's take the creation account of Genesis for example. Augustine wrote a book entitled The Literal Interpretation of Genesis. In it, he believes that Creation did not take place in six literal days, but rather, that all of Creation happened simultaneously and that the order of creation in Genesis reflects various spiritual truths which I won't go into here. In his words, "we should not think of those days as solar days.... He made that which gave time its beginning, as He made all things together, disposing them in an order based not on intervals of time but on causal connections".
The confusion results from how Augustine still called that interpretation which I described above to be "literal". In other words, spiritual light is just as literal as physical light, and it represents something that happened in the past (history), rather than something in the future (prophecy). But we don't exactly think in those terms today.
It should also be said that Augustine was actually ahead of his times, in that he argued that Christian theologians must be willing to adapt their interpretations of Genesis as new information comes up. This is an especially relevant quotation from the man:
"in matters that are obscure and far beyond our vision ... we should not rush in headlong and so firmly take our stand on one side that, if further progress in the search of truth justly undermines this position, we too fall with it. That would be to battle not for the teaching of Holy Scripture but for our own, wishing its teaching to conform to ours, whereas we ought to wish ours to conform to that of Sacred Scripture"
Likewise, I would highly recommend reading this paragraph which Augustine wrote, warning theologians from making themselves into fools by unfounded assertions:
"Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of the faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men.... Reckless and incompetent expounders of Holy Scripture bring untold trouble and sorrow on their wiser brethren when they are caught in one of their mischievous false opinions and are taken to task by these who are not bound by the authority of our sacred books. For then, to defend their utterly foolish and obviously untrue statements, they will try to call upon Holy Scripture for proof and even recite from memory many passages which they think support their position, although they understand neither what they say nor the things about which they make assertion."
that the Original Sin of Adam and Eve was in having sex,
Augustine definitely adopted harsh views on sexual immorality, especially considering his own background as a major fornicator before his conversion. However, Augustine was probably a lot more moderate than today's critics give him credit for, especially in comparison with St. Jerome.
Along with original sin, Augustine taught the idea of "original blessing": that is, God's commandment to the first humans to "be fruitful and multiply". He taught that sex and procreation are both good things from God, but that they are not ends in themselves. rather, they are a means to greater human friendship or fellowship (the love between a husband and wife in the case of sex, or a parent and child in the case of procreation). You can compare it to food: tasty food is a gift from God, but eating is not an end in itself. Rather, it's a means to sustain and energize yourself. Those who live for the sake of eating become gluttons. Likewise, those who live merely for the sake of sex become consumed by lust.
For Augustine, what original sin did was (among other things) disorder the human body into craving things of the flesh in unnatural amounts. This doesn't mean just sex (although he wrote a lot about sex because his opponents debated it with him so intensely), but also encompasses food, wealth, and other worldly things.
that there is such a thing as a "Just War" and that war can be acceptable if it is for a good and just purpose (One is reminded of a Holy War). He did believe that a just war must require a proper authority, such as a state, but anyone can declare the state as unjust and themselves fighting for the real values of the state, like the Bolsheviks did. So you can justify insurrections as well, according to Saint Augustine.
Augustine did teach the just war theory, although I don't believe that revolutionaries fit into his schema of things, except perhaps in very, very specific conditions.
It appears that from then on, the Roman Catholic Church went with Aquinas, and so Catholics get into heaven as a result of the good deeds they do. But maybe someone who is a practising Catholic can make the Roman Catholic position clear.
As far as I know, the debate between Augustine and Aquinas on faith and good works is largely a matter of hair-splitting, although there are some (subtle) differences. However, what I do know is that the final say on the issue, defined at the Council of Trent in 1547, is that faith and works are both important in the lifelong process (not an instant step) of salvation. Justification begins by faith and is expressed by a lifetime of good works which spring forth from that faith. Or, as the epistle of James in the New Testament states extremely bluntly: "See how a man is justified by works and not by faith alone."
It should be noted that when Martin Luther produced his German translation of the Bible, he called the epistle of James a "book of straw" and placed it in an appendix (along with Jude, Apocalypse/Revelation, and the deuterocanon) because he didn't believe it was divinely inspired. When Luther was still a monk struggling with his scruples and fears of damnation for his works not being "good enough", his confessor told him to read St. Paul's letter to the Romans. Romans emphasizes the role of faith very highly, and it was this letter that caused Luther to develop the doctrine of sola fide (faith alone). However, because James seemed to stand strongly against sola fide, he just decided to remove it from the canon altogether!
This might have been Luther's problem with the Roman Catholic Church. He was an Augustinian, so he would have been educated to have austere tastes and to show a strong faith in G-d. But Aquinas' theology had been around for 250 years, which promoted a more moderate view. Europe was quieting down by then, and was becoming far more organised. The Dark Ages were over, and Europe was in the blossoming of the Renaissance. So Europe had little room for austerity. So Luther's calls for a Puritan Christianity, that was very austere, actually fits more in line with his education, than the excesses of the Church.
It's hard to say what exactly Luther's problem was. A convenient Protestant reply would be that "Luther was righteously outraged by the various corruptions and heresies of the Romish church". A similarly convenient Catholic reply would be that "Luther wanted to attack the Church so he could break out of his vow of celibacy, marry the hot nun next door, and declare himself pope of a new, independent German church".
My personal opinion is that Luther was a very confused individual, who just couldn't reconcile the spirituality of Renaissance-era Catholicism with his own ideas of what Christianity should be like. I'm not a big fan of Renaissance Catholicism myself, but I don't think it was anywhere near as bad as what some historians try to make us believe. Not every priest was a Johann Tetzel, and not every pope was an Alexander VI. It wasn't just a matter of alleged church corruption, since Luther debated with some of Christendom's most virtuous Catholic thinkers such as St. Thomas More, the Lord Chancellor of England under Henry VIII (so-called "the only honest man in England", and "a man for all seasons").
I've found this in the Church, but also in governments too. I don't believe that ALL priests are corrupt. But certainly during the Middle Ages, it was a choice between that and back-breaking work and starvation for many people. In some extremely poor towns in South America, it's a choice of the Church, crime, or poverty and deprivation.
That's an interesting thought. The medieval Church was practically the only outlet in medieval society for "upward mobility". An ordinary peasant could become a bishop or even a pope if he worked hard enough (it was actually the Church of the 17th and 18th centuries that was much more stratified, in having only nobles serve as bishops in many countries).
At any rate, there were certainly many priests in the past who became priests for purely secular reasons. It was much easier to become a priest in the Middle Ages than it is today, too, because the seminary system didn't exist until the Counter-Reformation.
Even in the recent past, I'd argue that many men in early 20th century America became priests merely because of the attitude among some parents that "one of my sons must be a priest", or because the pulpit was seen as the best place to start up social activism (perhaps from the example of Protestant minister-activists like Martin Luther King, Jr.). With the last one, I'm referring to how so many "baby boomer" priests in America seem to exist solely for the sake of preaching political liberalism. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 4:29:45 AM | Scorpiomover it probably took me longer to read your post then for you to right it arg....
First of it should be noted that my posts are my opinions and those are made from what i read, however i don't run around saving every nugget i read in case they may need to be citations for threads. I think people take this far to seriously I see threads more of a way to interact and share ideas instead of debate or argue a point.
to your first point however that people need law to keep them in line i don't think this is the case. I believe we are conditioned to think in this way to keep us dependent on the powers that be. And of course because we see such causes and effect in place it is easy to come to your conclusion. But this is a narrow view of mankind based on the system we find ourselves in. This point in itself would require so much research but if your hypothesis was right our society would get better with more laws in place but this is not the case. Not to mention that there are more religious people in the world right now then ever before yet crime is on a rise.
The point i was making is more of a state of mind observation of instilled virtues verses internally directed. We all have lines we won't cross regardless of external laws or religious doctrinated beliefs. So to me law and religion are not the issue the issue is a personal sense of right and wrong that is in question. If we need law and religion we as a human race have gone wrong. It has been proven that internal resources are far stronger in any therapy then externally imposed motivational techniques. So both law and religion are only adding to the problem in my mind.
It must also be said that i don't subscribe to the idea or word evil but only use it and its definition because that is the thread title. I don't disagree that there are some good people in religious organizations but I would think that they were good to begin with or were merely in coping instead of living free before they found meaning in religion. Some people do benefit from the structure of religion but it is arguable whether god has anything to do with that, I would think it has more to do with a sense of community and oneness that comes with any religion however this is a micro solution instead of a macro as the nature of religion is that it is limited to the group they are within and the behaviour to those that do not belong is different.
I don't think the fear of hell can prevent people from doing wrong. For instance many religious people eat meat, compete for livelihoods, and use others in less fortunate circumstances for their own gain. I see all these things as moral issues that for my own personal reasons, but are not covered by law or by all religions. I'm not saying all religious people fear hell or that that fear is the only motivating factor. But If you look at Christianity for instance without hell there is no need to subject yourself to their religion. Without hell there is only one place to go after death unless there is nothing at all... I guess my point is more in the argument of self determined from a centred place or outside determined from an uncentred place. I could not be as immoral as the god of the Christian bible it simply isn't in me, not saying i'm the most moral person because that is far from the case.
It would be like you reading a book written to answer why 1+ 1 = 2, to Mathematicians who've read previous mathematical papers that show that you cannot assume that 1+ 1 = 2. Those Mathemicians have been confused by those earlier papers, and hence their problems will be resolved by this book. But it would just do your head in, and make you wonder if you know anything about Mathematics at all.
This is an interesting quote and is how i see religion. It is all based on faulty information. and can be interpreted to such a spectrum understanding that we see what the Christians call evil within its own ranks. I think it is arguable that such religious texts are the source of their own evil because of the lack of accountability and responsibility for the message they themselves propagate especially to the mentally unfit people they indoctrinate that commit their crimes thinking they are sanctioned by god. There is evidence enough that god himself killed and ordered others to kill in his name right in the holy scriptures that are meant to keep us in line as you put it.
The need for literal interpretation of the Bible, and the faith in it beyond modern Science, is found in traditional Sephardi Jews too. But there is a difference. The Sephardi Rabbi was traditionally paid for by the whole community to sit and study all day. Then he would give sermons, in ways that were so perfectly understood with the text, that upon hearing any such sermon, you would be completely sure that what you heard was what the text literally said. Because my father was Moroccan, I'm a Sephardi. So I've sat in on many sermons given by Sephardi Rabbis. Some bits I'd read already, and could see that he was giving a spin on it. Others I hadn't, and when I heard him speak, it was so fluid and so meshed with the text, I had trouble seeing it any other way.
If only all religions would take responsibility for the word they spread perhaps there would be less violence perpetrated in the name of god? who knows... The fact is that very few religions are strict in their dispensing of so called gods word. So few correct their followers when it is clear that they have run off the rails and even worse they distance themselves when a member does the unthinkable in the name of god. It's disturbing when a president of a country can utter the words in our day that god told him to go to war.... absolutely terrifying.
Which brings me to your next point about Government being partly to blame. Well this wasn't the scope of the thread but i definitely agree. They could put an end to any religion that infringes on the free will of every man, but they don't. They do nothing about religions that indoctrinate their children stripping them of their free will before they are mentally developed and like you say if people are busy arguing they can get away with almost anything they want so they have a vested interest in not tackling the moral issues that religion infringes upon.
On the follow the money trail i think you need to dig a little deeper on the investment portfolio of the Catholic Church and the sex thing.... um I don't think people have a problem with having sex outside of marriage i hate to break it to you but i don't think it is a moral issue at all. The moral issue is marriage itself, or at least the way it is now. However i do agree that arguing is pointless and it divides not only our focus but human beings. That is never a good thing.
One more request please make smaller posts  | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 12:08:24 PM | RE msg 581 by Jacobus101:
Everything you've said about Catholicism is incredibly reasonable.
1) That confession requires true contrition, the intent to change your ways.
2) That those priests who speak about confession, also speak about the need for contrition.
3) That Augustine said that the Bible must agree with Science and reasonable sense. I thank you for correcting me on that. It also follows that Catholics would be in favour of Evolution if proof was strong enough, say as strong as Newton's proofs of Heliocentrism.
4) That sex is not wrong, only sex used purely to satisfy selfish desires, and that sex for the expression of love and for bringing children into the world is generally a good thing in Catholicism.
5) That the need to control sexual urges, is no different than other urges, like the urge to not eat to excess, or to drink alcohol to excess, which doctors speak out against all the time.
6) That Augustine was probably opposed to insurrections. I thought so too. But I could see how some might twist his words unfairly and out of context.
7) That Catholicism requires good works to get into Heaven. This is very important, because it is the attitude of "you'll always get into heaven whatever you do, as long as you believe" that most people seem to see as the reason for so much evil in so much of the last thousand years.
It seems to me that were I to choose a faith, I would consider Catholicism on this basis, because it seems rational, logical and fair to all.
This still brings up a few problems for me:
1) Where did so many Protestants who interpret the Bible literally in all places got their ideas from, which seems to be many people's problem with the Bible?
2) Why does there seem to be so much injustice in so much of the time when most Europeans were Catholics?
3) Why does there seem to be so much religious persecution in so much of the time when most Europeans were Catholics?
4) Why was I and so many others taught in history that Protestantism was a reaction to the collection of so much wealth by the Catholic Church, at a time when people were starving to death?
4) Why did I and so many others grow up with these oh-so-common misconceptions about the Catholic Church?
I am not assuming these answers will reflect negatively on the Church, but I need to find answers anyway, to gain a better picture of history. Hopefully I will find these answers at some point. But if you have some light on these questions, I would appreciate them.
RE msg 582 by crazylilting:
In respect of your request, I'll try and keep your section short.
It took me a long time to write, as I looked up lots of this on the net. More than 4 hours. So I just want to reassure you it was more taxing on me than on you.
I also agree that people will never do the extremes and that most people know that killing and similar things are wrong. But they are never the cause of horrific crimes. It's everything that leads up to it. It's those little things, like being lax in diagnosing exactly what is wrong with someone's mental health, and what therapy they need, like being lax in checking what laws will be good and bad for society in the long run, and just using the law to get more votes, like making sure you're not driving too fast, but then taking your eyes off the road, and not seeing the little boy far enough ahead to give your car enough time to stop. Things don't happen in a vacuum. What you do today, will affect hardly anyone today, but will affect many people in a year's time. So my definition of evil is the the little things we ignore, that will hurt society far on into the future, because they are preventable, and they will most likely happen, and the longer it takes before they do, the nastier and more dangerous the problems they seem to cause.
However, I don't see this as an issue of religion or law. It's just a case that most people won't think that far ahead, and so religion, law and medicine must do so for them. If ministers, scientists, government and doctors don't think that far ahead either, then it's a case of the blind leading the blind off a very steep cliff. If they do think far ahead, then the sighted will lead the blind to safety.
As far as the money trail goes, I don't doubt that the Church makes some good investments, as it's been around for over a thousand years, and it's got to have learned more than us in 10 times our lifetime. What shows intent to me, is to practise insider trading, to invest in something, and then to publicise ideas that are bound to increase those shares, that would never have increased if you never opened your mouth. I've worked for a PR company, and I know that even the news is funded to be cleverly organised to suit the corporations who would benefit from it. From what I watch on TV, people keep saying a lot of nasty things about religion, and the Church, but when it comes to the money trail, it always leads back to corporations involved in the leisure industries. I used to look a lot of things up on the net with my sister. She found that every time she found a scientific experiments on skin cancer, it was performed through an organisation that was funded from the organisation of manufacturers of sun tan lotions. She found the same situation with scientific experiments on sugar, that it was indirectly funded by the sugar manufacturers. That is how I find most things to be nowadays.
I am concerned because I am seeing a trend to blame religion in areas where a few years ago, crime syndicates and indictments against corporations were reported in great detail and yet these have been ignored by the justice system, and suddenly people are blaming religion. It makes me think of the words "Scapegoat", and "Distract them from the truth". Some of these things have happened to me. I would like it if they didn't happen to anyone else. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 2:15:40 PM | The small things you talk about don't need to be religiously enforced either. However i don't see it as a bad thing for someone to say be kind to others if you know what i mean. But Religion is not the things they are trying to instil in their members. Let me rephrase that the religions i've encountered are not the things they try to instil in their members.
You can't manipulate people to believe something and then teach them good morals that just doesn't work. I firmly believe that people are simply out of touch with their own inner selves. And i see societal influences as partly to blame for the lack of connection that makes law and religion as necessary inventions to keep people in the catch 22.
I understand your concerns of religion being a scapegoat but I don't see it that way at all. The crimes religion are responsible for are their own. I don't blame them for how man is I blame religion for what they do to man making them a contributor to the dysfunction. They are not the only problem we have as far as being in touch with our innate human side but that is not in the scope of this thread perhaps it would make for an interesting thread?
It is understandable that you have benefited from your religious studies and if i'm honest the study part of my religious indoctrination was not the problem it was the abuse from church and family that revolved around the belief system. Religion has its place in the world but it needs to learn its place. To me it is like a spoiled dog that needs to be retrained to fit into a family. You can't have a guard dog as a family pet without their being a few problems or reprogramming the dog. Religion if it had it's way would infiltrate and try and take over every part of life in some way and this is a problem when there are to many of them competing for that space and dominance. If it was as simple a decision as believing in god or not i'd have no problem with people simply believing in a god. But this is not the case at all and why there is need to keep religion in it's rightful place. A personal belief and not a knowable truth. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 3:15:51 PM | casheyesblond,
it dont matter what is what is not i spend more time doing research on differnt sites and i been in a few athiest convention's and watching them speek very interestesting to understand what is truth and what is false and in science it has proven such things as flood's disaster's ect to be able to exsplaine what did happend in that time .
A for copy right what do u think people do in collage or in school the web is there as a tool to learn and use if a person would record a movie from tv or burn a song on a disk that to is copy written but people do it so there for if it was a major problem to do it why do some copy and paste bible verse's on here is that to copy written think about it .
Not tring to be mean about it but to study history and learn what's out there and to beable to do the reserch and beable to use some of it dont hurt at all but also as my opion in this matter it clearly shows that some wars have started over faith over religion to kill for there god that it self is nut's. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 3:32:19 PM | Scorpiomover, I actually preferred your last reply before it was edited and I was formulating some thoughts in my mind for it as I was driving home from school. But, this makes it easier to show a coherent stream of discussions. Anyway:
1) That confession requires true contrition, the intent to change your ways.
2) That those priests who speak about confession, also speak about the need for contrition.
Yep. And there is also a distinct that Catholics make between "perfect" and "imperfect" contrition. Perfect contrition means the type of repentance that's not motivated merely by fear of hell or God's retribution (that's "imperfect contrition"), but rather by a pure love of God and a desire to do His will. Perfect contrition was what I had in mind in the hypothetical Hitler scenario. From Wikipedia's definition: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_contrition
Perfect contrition in Catholic theology is a sorrow for sins which is motivated from the love of God. It contrasts with imperfect contrition, or attrition, a sorrow arising from a less pure motive, such as fear of Hell. It is the motive for sorrow rather than the intensity of feeling that distinguishes the two forms of contrition, and it is possible for perfect and imperfect contrition to be experienced simultaneously.
According to Catholic teaching, perfect contrition removes the guilt and eternal punishment due to mortal sin, even before the sinner has received absolution in the sacrament of penance. However, a Catholic is still bound, under Church law, to confess grave sins at the first opportunity.
Continuing...
3) That Augustine said that the Bible must agree with Science and reasonable sense. I thank you for correcting me on that. It also follows that Catholics would be in favour of Evolution if proof was strong enough, say as strong as Newton's proofs of Heliocentrism.
Yeah, I'd say so. In the scholasticism inspired by Thomism (St. Thomas Aquinas), there are two spheres of knowledge: faith and reason.
Some recommended reading on the relationship between Catholicism and these two spheres would be Pope John Paul II's encyclical to the bishops of the Church, entitled Fides et Ratio. It's really quite a mammoth of a treatise, beginning with an exploration of the phrase "know thyself" carved over Delphi. But first, the late Pontiff opens with this statement:
Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves (cf. Ex 33:18; Ps 27:8-9; 63:2-3; Jn 14:8; 1 Jn 3:2).
The whole text is available here, neatly divided in a table of contents: http://www.vatican.va/edocs/ENG0216/_INDEX.HTM
A big part of the whole thesis is that, according to JPII, faith and reason must co-exist together, for without faith, reason may lead to nihilism and without reason, faith may lead to superstition.
Note that Martin Luther firmly rejected St. Thomas Aquinas' harmony between faith and reason, and adopted a position called "fideism" instead. Basically, fideism argues that all attempts to come to know God through reason (like Aquinas' famous five proofs of God) are fallacious because if man could know God by reason, he would not need faith and thus faith would become unnecessary.
This, of course, stands against the doctrine of sola fide as Luther understood it. Unfortunately, I don't think anyone could argue with the fact that whether one likes him or not, Luther liked to take his views to the extreme, thus leading him to say such things as:
“Reason is the Devil’s greatest whore; by nature and manner of being she is a noxious whore; she is a prostitute, the Devil’s appointed whore; whore eaten by scab and leprosy who ought to be trodden under foot and destroyed, she and her wisdom… Throw dung in her face to make her ugly. She is and she ought to be drowned in baptism… She would deserve, the wretch, to be banished to the filthiest place in the house, to the closets.”
—Martin Luther, Works, Erlangen Edition v. 16, pp. 142-148.
“Reason is the greatest enemy that faith has; it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but—more frequently than not—struggles against the divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God.”
—Martin Luther, Table Talks in 1569.
“Heretics are not to be disputed with, but to be condemned unheard, and whilst they perish by fire, the faithful ought to pursue the evil to its source, and bathe their heads in the blood of the Catholic bishops, and of the Pope, who is the devil in disguise.”
—Martin Luther, Table Talks (as quoted in Religious History: An Inquiry by M. Searle Bates, p. 156).
Now, going back to Catholicism and evolution, it is acceptable for a Catholic to believe in evolution. While I'm not an evolutionist myself (or rather, I'm on the fence), the Catholic Church has not been a major player in the "intelligent design" issue.
In 1950, Pope Pius XII wrote in the encyclical Humani Generis:
"the teaching authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions . . . take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter—[but] the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God"
Pius XII likewise said:
"This [the theory of evolution] certainly would be praiseworthy in the case of clearly proved facts; but caution must be used when there is rather question of hypotheses, having some sort of scientific foundation, in which the doctrine contained in Sacred Scripture or in Tradition is involved."
Thus, it's not very far from what St. Augustine said about Genesis over a thousand years earlier.
Since then, Pope JPII referenced Pius XII's encyclical in a 1996 address he gave to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. In it, he stated that evolution is more than a hypothesis:
"In his encyclical Humani Generis (1950), my predecessor Pius XII has already affirmed that there is no conflict between evolution and the doctrine of the faith regarding man and his vocation, provided that we do not lose sight of certain fixed points....Today, more than a half-century after the appearance of that encyclical, some new findings lead us toward the recognition of evolution as more than an hypothesis. In fact it is remarkable that this theory has had progressively greater influence on the spirit of researchers, following a series of discoveries in different scholarly disciplines. The convergence in the results of these independent studies -- which was neither planned nor sought -- constitutes in itself a significant argument in favor of the theory."
Continuing.....
4) That sex is not wrong, only sex used purely to satisfy selfish desires, and that sex for the expression of love and for bringing children into the world is generally a good thing in Catholicism.
That's pretty much exactly what the "Catholic position" on sex is. One way of saying it would be that Catholics believe that sex is not only good, but holy. However, a holy thing must be performed only in a holy place (such as how the Mass may normally only be offered on a consecrated altar with the finest gold or silver vessels). In the case of sex, the "holy place" is the bond of matrimony.
Augustine was still quite austere in his views on sex by our 21st century standards. It comes up from time to time in his writings, especially in reference to his sinful past. But his own contemporaries would have seen him as a moderate.
There were two extremes at the time of Augustine represented by Jovinian and St. Jerome. Jovinian was an ex-monk (like Luther) who later argued against monasticism and asceticism, and that marriage and celibacy were equal in value. A Roman senator, St. Pammachius, read his tracts and passed them onto his friend, St. Jerome, for a rebuttal. St. Jerome, one of the most hardcore ascetics of the age, wrote a whole book which essentially praised virginity and condemned sexual relations, even in marriage.
In the end, both positions were condemned. Augustine reconciled the two opposite sides by writing that marriage and celibacy are both good in the eyes of God, but that celibacy is a higher calling because the celibate is preparing for heaven (based on Christ's teaching that "there are no marriages in heaven" and that "there are eunuchs who make themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake").
A really good web article which debunks many of the myths about Augustine are found here, entitled "Sex, Sin and Salvation: What Augustine Really Said": http://www.jknirp.com/aug3.htm
Some excellent contemporary source material on the Catholic position toward sex can be found in Pope JPII's Theology of the Body, a series of lectures that the Pope delivered on sex and love between 1979 and 1984. http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP2TBIND.HTM
5) That the need to control sexual urges, is no different than other urges, like the urge to not eat to excess, or to drink alcohol to excess, which doctors speak out against all the time.
Yep. I believe Augustine highlighted sexual sins as being related to original sin because, after the Fall, Adam and Eve were compelled to cover their bodies. Augustine read this as being a guard against intemperate lust.
7) That Catholicism requires good works to get into Heaven. This is very important, because it is the attitude of "you'll always get into heaven whatever you do, as long as you believe" that most people seem to see as the reason for so much evil in so much of the last thousand years.
The OSAS doctrine (once saved always saved) is really quite foreign to me.
1) Where did so many Protestants who interpret the Bible literally in all places got their ideas from, which seems to be many people's problem with the Bible?
Luther's second major doctrine after sola fide was sola Scriptura, or "Scripture alone" as a source of doctrine. Luther believed that the Catholic Church of his time was dominated by "unbiblical" practices or doctrines, and thus he saw the Bible as a way of getting straight to the root of things. He believed that by putting the Bible into the hands of individual believers to interpret for themselves, that they would naturally come to his conclusion and overthrow the papal Church.
Of course, history didn't work out that way. Instead, people interpreted the Bible into forming their own denominations and churches.
In my own opinion, I can see where Luther got sola fide based on the opinions of some obscure early Church fathers, but to me, sola Scriptura is a truly revolutionary break from traditional Christianity in all respects. I don't see any precedent for it in previous Christian history. However, to the sola Scriptura believer, this is completely irrelevant because the only thing that matters is what the Bible itself says, not what the Church believed afterward. The only explanation I have for where Luther got the idea may be from Islam, or from his own mind and conviction as to what Christianity should be like.
From my own experiences, my mom's church (the Seventh-day Adventist Church) teaches that the Church corrupted the teachings of Christ after the last Apostle died, and that "true Christianity" has been obscured by the darkness of Romanism ever since (until the founding of the SDA Church, of course). Similar attitudes may be found in all sorts of other denominations. At the root of each new denomination is an attempt to discard tradition and go back to the source text.
Traditional Christianity (Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and high-church factions of Anglicanism) teaches that Scripture is only one part of the entire revelation that God has given to man. In addition to Scripture, there is also the oral Tradition handed down from the Old Testament prophets and the New Testament Apostles. Thus, even if a thing isn't in Scripture, that doesn't mean it's not true. I believe Judaism has something similar to this in the form of the Talmud.
Furthermore, traditional Christianity teaches that "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing", meaning that the one who interprets Scripture for himself but knows little about it is most likely going to get burned. Thus, Catholics have a "supreme court" of interpreting Scripture and Tradition called the Magisterium: the Pope and the bishops in communion with him. Something similar exists in Orthodoxy among the patriarchs.
2) Why does there seem to be so much injustice in so much of the time when most Europeans were Catholics?
If you ask me, the so-called "dark ages" were not really dark at all, but it servedgood propaganda during the Reformation and Enlightenment for discrediting Catholicism. There's a good book by historian Regine Pernoud called "Those Terrible Middle Ages!: Debunking the Myths". Here it is: http://www.amazon.com/Those-Terrible-Middle-Ages-Debunking/dp/0898707811
3) Why does there seem to be so much religious persecution in so much of the time when most Europeans were Catholics?
Actually, the amount of religious persecution in the Middle Ages was incredibly low compared to that during the Reformation and Baroque period. Most of the western mind's imagination when it comes to witch-burning, heretic-hunting, and the like actually comes from the 16th and 17th centuries: the Spanish Inquisition, the English penal laws, and the Salem witch hunts.
As any medieval historian or enthusiast will tell you, there was a lot more going on in medieval Europe than just the Crusades. The modern world was forged not by ancient Greece or Rome, but by the medievals. The invention of paper, the printing press, Gothic architecture, the clock, etc. all came from the Middle Ages.
4) Why was I and so many others taught in history that Protestantism was a reaction to the collection of so much wealth by the Catholic Church, at a time when people were starving to death?
You should read more about the Dissolution of the Monasteries in England.
At the time of Henry VIII, the Church and the various monastic orders owned about 1/3rd of all the land in England, all tax-exempt. In order to get the land back, Henry sent out royal preachers to every church in England to convince the congregations that the monasteries were dens of sin, sodomy, iniquity, and every other horrible thing one could imagine. It should sound familiar to the end of the Knights Templar under Philip the Fair.
At any rate, it worked. Henry took over all the monasteries, plundered their riches (even stripping the gold off of books and burned the texts; the famous Book of Kells was found in a pit of mud thanks to the Dissolution), and sold the property to wealthy landowners.
What they don't tell you is that the monasteries served as England's social welfare network. When they were destroyed, thousands of England's poor found themselves without food, shelter, or charity. Queen Catherine of Aragon (Henry's first wife) was especially well-known for distributing alms to the poor, through the Church.
By far, the best book I've seen on the subject of the English Reformation is Eamon Duffy's mammoth tome, "The stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580". http://www.amazon.com/Stripping-Altars-Traditional-Religion-1400-1580/dp/0300108281/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1211322189&sr=1-1
It completely refutes the notions that Catholicism in England before the Reformation was corrupt and oppressive. In fact, Henry VIII squashed a period of religious revival, and until Elizabeth I's death, the Reformation in England was almost entirely imposed from above by the royalty and nobility. There's a reason why so many penal laws against Catholics existed, even until the 1800's.
An excerpt from one of the reviews on the site:
Catholic life was flourishing in the era, as parish records attest. A major social center of the time, attendance was high and community guilds furnished the physical building, assisting funerals and providing some paid employment to the poor. The belief in Purgatory was hardly questioned, and practices of remembering the dead in prayer continued in many areas until the 1700s--despite sustained Protestant attack on the doctrine. Though Duffy does not bring in this particular work, Catholic purgatorial beliefs are featured in Shakespeare's Hamlet, written a generation after the official break with Rome.
4) Why did I and so many others grow up with these oh-so-common misconceptions about the Catholic Church?
In short, the Catholic Church has crappy PR, even in Catholic countries.
In your individual case (and mine, America being a former British colony), the simple answer is that the English speaking people have inherited a long tradition of anti-Catholicism from Henry VIII's and Elizabeth I's time, and especially under Oliver Cromwell. Interestingly, Oliver Cromwell welcomed the Jews into England, but persecuted or exiled Catholics. One of his contemporaries, John Milton (author of Paradise Lost), wrote a tract in which argued that "popery" was the only real heresy, and all other forms of Christianity are acceptable and should unite to fight Catholicism.
I often wonder what "Catholic history" (the Reformation as taught in, say, schools in Spain or pre-revolutionary France) would read like. I imagine there are ridiculous notions in there too. | |
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| Religion is the True EVIL in the world
Posted: 5/20/2008 4:55:53 PM | RE msg 584 by crazylilting:
When I read the threads about abusive relationships, they all point out one thing, how they never start out very abusive, but that they build up the abuse slowly over time, insidiously. That's why I see the need to keep the small things. It's the slippery slide, and I see it everywhere. But when I talk to people, they see no reason to keep the small things. That's why I see a need for educating people that the small things need to be kept.
I grew up with a group that tried to indoctrinate me. But I went to a school with multiple religious factions and my father was a scholar who made his own mind up about things. So I got multiple opinions with a firm belief in establishing my own opinions. I found that there are many groups who educate. But they don't shout out about it. They just get on with it. It seems to be the indoctrinators who shout the loudest, because they want everyone to think they are wonderful.
I agree that the subject of what has disconnected man from his inner core nature would make an interesting thread. However, I have great trouble putting all religions in this category, as I was told at 22 that the foundation of Judaism is to trust your inner morals first, and that Judaism is just designed to get you more in touch with that. So many religions seem to go along with this, that I am no longer sure that the image I was given of most religions is true.
However, I feel the analogy of a family pet is inappropriate for religion, because pets are a form of entertainment and emotional good feeling. Pets cannot talk to you. Hippy communes might be like this. I see religion as the old grandfather, who teaches his wisdom. If he's full of wisdom, he's the best source of knowledge you have. If he's crabby and nasty, he's someone to avoid. If he's a perv, he needs to go to prison. The problem is that you cannot just call all grandfathers as pervs or mean and nasty, without "throwing the baby out with the bathwater". You have to check them all out, properly, to make sure which ones are evil. But the freedoms of our society are taken to an extreme, because even Muslim leaders who openly called for terrorism in Speakers' Corner lived here for several years, before being deported or put in prison. Our governments seem to be willing to let us condemn all religions, but they have no problem in letting really abusive cults go on for decades.
RE msg 586 by Jacobus101:
Thanks for the info. You've given me tons to read.
Also I'd agree that the Catholics are their worst enemies when it comes to PR. Even their attitudes to condoms would probably come out better if they explained their opinions. Ever thought of doing PR? You're doing a good job on me, and I'm as stubborn as they come.
I'd probably have to agree that British history has been re-written to suit the Anglican Church. It's a real shame, because it's warped things for everyone.
I can understand where Sola Scriptura came from. It seems to me that Luther and Henry VIII didn't like the Vatican telling the priests and the people what to do, and giving anyone the ability to interpret the Bible probably seemed a good way to do this. Everyone interprets everything, as it's how we understand things. But most people take it for granted they aren't interpreting things because they are so used to doing it, they aren't even aware they're doing it, like breathing. So I believe that Luther didn't realise that even his view of the Bible was an interpretation of sorts, so he believed that he was reading the Bible correctly, and expected everyone else to read it the same way too. What a shock that was.
Even my views are an interpretation, and I have to accept that I cannot speak for G-d, only my opinion. However, the issue I see is that most Protestant denominations seem to me to see their viewpoint as literally reading the Bible, and not an interpretation, and that leads them to believing they have THE truth, when they have A truth. If the Catholics can also say they have A truth, then they're way ahead of most Protestant denominations.
Jews also have a saying that "those who decide the Law based on the Mishnah, are confusers/destroyers of the world". The Mishnah is the summary of Jewish Law. The Gemara contains the explanation of the Mishnah and the differing opinions. So deciding the law based on a summary without understanding it, is liable to make a real hash of things, and in some cases, can cause some serious problems in the form of unforeseen consequences in the future.
If I may ask for one more question. I was always brought up to believe that Christians were basically against the Jews, from the pogroms, the blood libels, the restriction of the Jews from all the Guilds, the restriction of Jews to live in Ghettos, the numerous racial slurs against Jews, the Spanish Inquisition, the killing of the Jews of York, the Expulsion of the Jews from England, and the list goes on and on. Not that I ever thought all Christians were like this, as I'm good friends with loads, especially Catholics.
How does the Catholic Church deal with these events?
Does it believe that all the European Anti-Semitism was just a result of tribalism, because the Jews didn't fit in?
The whole "Jews killed Our Lord" thing certainly made the rounds too often, to just put it down to that.
Again. I don't presume that the Catholic Church is against the Jews. I'd just like to hear the other side of the argument, and see what info and views you've uncovered. It would be nice to educate myself to have a more open-minded view. Also, perhaps you have some links and a book reference, for me to peruse? | |
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