Religion...and Fortay

{split from previous topic}


and by ideas JT, I presume he means Christianity...... that makes me think; what is the name for a person who dismisses all religions but doesn't dissmiss a God.... you evangelical bastards may well say "prey", but seriously.... I think theist sounds too religious, although agnostic is just a way of saying atheist without actually saying atheist.... then again, spiritual just sounds bent......

I come to you, as you are our resident papal ajudicator, so you're the perfect person for the question!

kemp- what are you rambling on about?

jeez.... so much for ruining your future priesthood - if you can't even answer that, then you'll never have a chance!!!

i dont understand what the question is, thats the problem.

Ok look....



you have religions right?..... the whole idea of christianity, judaism, islam et.c etc.

then you have belief in things such as existence, reasoning for being, whether there is life after death, and whether there is a god.


Now naturally if you are a religious person, which of course you are, the second factor is very much intertwined with the prior

However should the religious variable not be present - i.e. you disbelieve of any religions; yet the secondary ideologies comply with those that are religious - i.e. are open to a god, an afterlife etc. etc.

I would classify it as human, simply because all people seek this sort of comforting within their life, and the knowledge that there is more to their existence than just the meagre meaningless years which they spend on this lonesome floating ball of rock.... that there is something better, and that an end is never in sight; that they will never have to say goodbye.....

Well that is one of the man reason that people become religious; simply to get this feeling of belonging, and comfort; yet personally I still find that all religions themselves are not only contradicting, but all also incredibly arrogant and simply scientifically wrong.

At the same time, I too need the feeling of a safety blanket, and the concept of time simply beggining without somebody or something there to create it I cannot bear to fathom. Similarly, despite being fully aware that all human beings are created from regular atoms, which were once in stars, before their supernova, and plenty of other organisms before myself, I find it difficult to understand what it is that essentially creates life. Now this of course could be a future scientific discovery of some super unknown thing which exists only in living things, and ruins the entire world of chemistry and all of which we know as a civilisation in it, upon the discovery of what actually causes life; yet without actually knowing this, the only other thinkable option is that indeed there is a mind, a soul, and an individual occupying the otherwise useless corpse. Now this then must be immortal, and thus an afterlife must surely be a reality.... Now like I say; I'm quite a scientifically minded person, and so disagree with everything I believe in from a conceptual perspective, yet like I say; without any miricle discovery, there seem very little other possibility....


now we had this sort of discussion in Religious Studies, where all that my teacher could come up with were the terms atheist, agnostic, and "spiritual", all of which I feel are wrong, wrong, and rubbish respectively......


I was wondering; as you're papal, wether there was a better official term.........?

kempo - science and religion rarely see eye to eye.

Some religions try to combine the two (scientologists anyone? tom cruise?) while others simplify and idealise a utopian world, of years gone by. Others wonder if there still is or can be a utopia, while others simply are a vessel for crazy man made ideas.

One fact remains - ALL religions are man made, and therefore cannot be treated as fact, as there is no proof of the existence of the 'gods' to which each religion subscribes.

Surely if one religion were to be right, then it would mean all the others were wrong?


Religion is a belief system; made up of faith, ideals and a code of conduct. How those are all interpreted is up to the individual involved.


Put another way, not all of us drive VW Golfs. Some of us dont even drive. Some drive Pontiac GTOs, some drive Ferraris, some drive Minis. Either way they all get you from A to B. Religion does that - gets you from one place to another, either metaphorically or emotionally. Sad to Happy. Happy to Sad. Life to Death. Whatever makes YOUR journey easier.


(how fitting my emblem is "God", when making a social comment about religion!!!!)

kemp- so you're asking what the best term for someone who disbelieves religion, but believes there is some higher power that got the universe set in motion and now just watches us? just a simple yes or no, please. if no then explain farther, but if you explain any more with a yes, you'll just confuse me more.

gnu- i was thinking the same thing about your emblem. but yes, religion is how you interpret it. there is a Christian church in California that found some verse in Revelations talking about a plant for the healing of all nations and they claim it to be marijuana. thus the church can sell marijuana to any members of the church to be smoked inside the church (i dont know if they can outside of the church). but in my church we just see marijuana as a distraction from God. get addicted to it and it will become higher priority than God and thus be an idol and a sin.

i think he means an agnostic jt....

well no, not neccessarily.....

I mean I think I'd be right in saying that the large majority of England (at least my sort of area - south east anglian counties) are primarily agnostic and atheist areas.....

now I wouldn't class myself as atheist in the slightest bit. Similarly I wouldn't class myself as theist. However I wouldn't class myself as agnostic either.

I think that at some point in time, simply due to the lack of current evidence against it, there must have been something, or someone who started everything, since there's no other explanation.... Then there's the old "but who made him?" question, which of course again is just unanswerable.... Even so, I like the idea that there could be somebody out there somewhere watching over me, and that comfort has helped me out personally on a couple of particularly difficult points in the past, and for that reason, I do feel somewhat spiritual I guess; just what I'm saying is that the basis of this is just simply because I'm human, and it's merely basic human instinct to look out for your own personal interest, and safety, in the comfort of knowing that you'll be fine no matter what happens - it's just simply built into the natural brain - when faced with a situation which is unfamiliar or dicomforting, which you don't particularly want to tackle, you like knowing that somebody is there to help you and make you feel better - hence when dissapointed people often hold the back of their head; reminiscing the foetal position which of course is the most comforting position a human ever creates; inside the womb - the natural physical bond between mother and child....

It's weird, because I'm aware that one of the main reasons for being open to these theist views is simply because of this human instinct for protection, and when added to my certainty in advancing science, soon to find answers to these sort of questions; both of which are huge reasons to go against it, this idea that somebody is looking over you is just so comforting that it has almost adopted itself within me.... This almost knowledge that everything is ok, so long as you don't do anything particularly stupid is quite a warm feeling.

Now like I say, I am fully aware that this is exactly why people joined religions in the very beggining; the almost automatist feeling of needing protection wedged right into the infrastructure of the human brain was exploited by the churches of the early middle-ages, when they would exclaim that without doing only good, and donating LOADS of money to the church, they would end up in hell; however if they were only good, and donated as much as they could to the church, they would be alright in the end, as God has enough room for anybody who is open to him.... This of course made a HUGE fluxuation in those attending church, as of course nobody wanted to go to hell, and with all the horrendously gruesome stories which the church would tell, and the images which they'd show of hell, everybody was willing to go out of their way to appease the church. Now it's quite easy to see that they were indeed taking advantage, which leads the MAJOR question as to whether the whole philosophy of religion was actually made for purification of humanity, or simply their pockets....

but yeah; despite knowing all of this, I STILL have this mindset built into me, which I find incredibly difficult to go against, and for that reason I can't possibly call myself agnostic, let alone atheist....

The only problem which I have with the word theist is simply that I know that everything to which makes me an individual tells me that it is wrong, and that atheism is the only correct faith. Yet nonetheless, I couldn't ever say that, simply as like I keep saying; this search for comfort and meaning of existence will always be there so long as the human conscience exists, can currently only be filled so fully by a God of some kind....



hmm......



I think what I'm basically saying is what is the term for somebody who feels theist, but acts atheistically (any such word?)



I don't go to church (although why would I? - I'm not religious, especially not Christian.... oh please don't let me begin my work on how much I dislike the Christian church and what it stands for.... If I had to follow any religion it would CERTAINLY be buddhism, since its open-mindedness to practically everything, which almost any other religion doesn't even BEGIN to co-operate with....), nor pray particularly often (although as I've said before, when in an incredibly difficult situation, the large majority of people will indeed pray for comfort, to help them through, no matter whether they're religious or not), or anything like that.... hell I don't even like songs of praise on BBC2 sunday lunchtimes....


but I don't think that's what it's all about.....


I think having this spiritual assurance is simply a safety net to a lot of people, and a knowledge that somewhere out there, there's someone looking out for them, who will help them out eventually, no matter how difficult their situation is..... (hence why the black African slaves of the 1800s were so religious)


yuh.....






food for thought I guess.......

i still have NO idea what the question was.

i see it as, you're just like every other Christian that doesn't attend church, but claims to be a Christian because they give gifts on Christmas and eat chocolate on Easter, but dont actually have the faith side of it all down. they pray for comfort and for winning lottery ticket numbers to make it all better, but during good times they dont praise the Lord. quite frankly i dont think those people will make it to Heaven at all. the Bible says that we are saved by grace through faith, meaning we believe in God and accept Jesus into our heart and repent, we will get to Heaven. it isnt works or tithes that get a person to Heaven. we do works because that is what Jesus (our example for how we should attempt to live life) did and we give tithes because God instructs us to do so, not to get into Heaven, but to show appreciation for what He has give us. we praise God because, well He is all powerful, same reasoning behind praising a king, he has all power over his people like God has all power over the universe.

I'm glad you came to this conversation Kempo I think the only reason that people and scientists says that there is no God is because they don't want to confess their sins to someone and they cant accept their something superior than them or some people feel auto-sufficient or however you say it. They think they are too good and having a great life and don't need something such as 'a personal saviour'. But you can see some proof that makes God real. In ancient times He talked to people like you talk to someone else. You could actually here His voice. There were a lot of witnesses of it. Some prooves we can see in the present: miracles, heealings... Things that I have experienced and my family too. My family started being atheists and then they fell to God's knees!

Gnu: Its true. Religion is a man-made system. God says in the Bible that He doesnt want us to be religious. What He wants is a relationship with us. Isn't that amazing? That we can actually talk to Him? The creator of everything on this Universe!

He has the power to do whateverythnig He wants to! And if we live in His path or at least REALLY try to He will give to us whatever we want to if we ask Him for it I'm telling you cause He has touched my life in some beautiful ways and manifestations. I have one that happened 2 months ago. Message me if you want to know more about it but I was in a room praising and something unbelievable happened!

and this is exactly my point about christianity and how it is so bigotted.....



I do not in the slightest bit claim to be christian.

I in actual fact resent the idea that you class me as a christian because by jingo I'm not.


I think that the bible as a whole is a contradictory, missinterpretted, and TOTALLY edited peice of manuscript from various different languages over huge amounts of time, which have equated to a HUGE difference from its begginings. Even so, when first written, it was still hugely contradictory, and all that it was designed to do was to give some sort of humanly rules to live by - i.e. don't kill, don't fuck your wife's sister etc. etc. most of which have only gone on to be laws - proving that they are there merely to be civil denominators rather than anything else.

That being said, I think the same of ALL religions and there religious books. Fair enough, what morals the religion stand for are good things - peace, inner wealth, and kindness; yet the journey which they use to get there are simply wrong.

And then I find it rather comical, and if anything discriminative that people of these faiths then go on to say; and I shall use your direct quotation of:

JT wrote:

quite frankly i dont think those people will make it to Heaven at all.

which is the typical argument which many fairly right winged christians will use.

I find it ironic that such an argument can be used, despite other religions using exactly the same against them. For instance, the Quaran teaches that only muslims will enter the afterlife, similarly Sikhism. Now I see no reasoning as to how you can be so adamant that you are the one who is correct, and that everybody else is wrong. That you are the only group who are due this harmoneous wellbeing after death, whereas those who so firmly believe that they too are correct will not. This just highlights the rediculous hypocrisy within religion, and why I can not, and will not ever take up the practise of a religion - that three brothering religions; Christianity, Islam, and Judaism - of whom all supposedly share family ties within their formation; cannot allow the idea that they too could be correct, and that everybody who does good cannot be rewarded, rather than this essentially fascist religious isolationism.


This is too why I despise the entire concept of religion, as this conflict, about such a rediculously important subject matter can cause HUGE conflict between individuals, and lead to many becoming DEEPLY upset. How this conflict of religion; what is simply meant to be a way of making people acknowledge how to treat their fellow man fairly and with respect; can cause such catostrophic disaster, with many millions of deaths coming from wars throughout the centuries; even continuing in the modern day, with Catholic IRA bombings in Britian in the 1980s, and extremist Islam bombings throughout the 00's....


This is exactly why; as I said - if I were to follow a religion, it would be Buddhism. The reason being that they are the only one out of the major 5 religions, who believe in equality through humanity; that all religions, faiths, and ethnic backgrounds are all equal; and most importantly, that no matter who you are, or what you believe in - so long as you are a peaceful, hardworking, and spiritual being, there is a place in the afterlife for you.


This in my mind is a beautiful example of how religion can bring a community together as one, as it fails to regulate, segregate, and interogate; it is free, and open to your personal interpretation of what you want it to be. It allows you to express yourself as an individual, whilst being able to appreciate that others too have their own cultures and ideologies; yet unlike all others, allows you to encourage them rather than attempting them to suppress them, to convert to your way of thinking.

And considering that you live in a country that fought for its right to be "the land of the free", shouldn't that be promoted, rather than angrily shunned, with the almighty condemnation of racial and religious hatred?.....




I am all for the belief of either creators, or guardians of some kind, to which you refer to as a God; others various Gods, simply because NOTHING bad can come from this idea. ONLY good. As I said before; I like the thought that somewhere out there, there's a big ol' guy watching me type and thinking "wow..... Bloodi's right.... he really does have great legs.....", or what have you; but do I need a book, or a particular building, or a Jewish Saviour, or anything else for that matter, just to feel that warmth?

Of course not.


As Gnu said; religion is just a means to an end.

It let's you recognise that there is someone or something out there, respect that, and tries to make you a morally righteous person.


Now so long as you achieve that; I see no reason as to why anybody isn't deserving of an afterlife in one way or another......





Thanks,
Kempo.

2 things RaM doesn't get involved with is Religion & Politics...

He's just one of those Christian that doesn't attend church, but claims to be a Christian because they give gifts on Christmas and eat chocolate on Easter : )

Thats silly...

I have stonger belivefs than that, but... I got a real chuckle when I read that.

C´mmon Ram! Don't let Kempo change your believes! Stay firm! thats the problem Kempo! People that dont know what religion they have to choose choose the easiest ones. Like you said you would choose buhdism because no matter who you are you will have after life. People try to get the easiest religion so they dont have to change who they are because they dont want to feel bad and have that feeling that you have when you did something bad.

All religions have different thoughts about things and rules. Whats the only way to know which religion is true? My parents told me that I could be whatever I wanted to. I looked information about each one. Why did I choose christianity? Because it was the ONLY religion that people have experienced miracles, unbelivable things happening, and things like that. At the beginning I didn't believe it... But I choose to give it a try. I started going to a evangelic baptist church and a youth group. Learning a lot about God. Months later, my family and I started experiencing miracles and unbelievable things happening... including health and things appearing. (message me for more) Why only christianity experiences all of that? Think about it. Maybe its right. The right God, the right things to do, the right rules. I don't know but it sounds logical to me.

God has touched and moved my life in a lot of amazing ways and He has made me love Him like I have loved anyone else <3

i see everyone ignored my car analogy...

Joker - it may be amazing for you to have such a relationship with a higher being, but not for me. Like i said, without telling you what belief system i subscribe to (and playing devil's advocate) there could be one god, 2 gods, 3, 5 10...who knows?

As you rightly acknowledge, because religion is man made, there is no right or wrong, depending on which viewpoint you take. So if christianity cant be right, neither can any of the other religions. if you are susceptible to finding "comfort" or "protection" or "salvation" from a man-made belief system thats fine; thats your prerogative. it becomes wrong or immoral to want to save another's spirituality by imposition - which is my personal experience of nearly every single religion i have come in to contact with. as soon as you DARE express a minor interest in religion (whether out of politeness or otherwise), it is virtually rammed down your throat by the BELIEVER, as they wish to bring you peace and closer to the ideals they hold to their heart. this more than often has the opposite effect.

Ok, so religion can help people, by making them believe in miracles and peace and salvation.

Religion however doesnt account for those that interpret the teachings in an extremist way. throughout history religion has proved to be a passage of power, manipulation and greed. so it is no surprise that we find ourselves in a 21st century where naive young radicals place their extremist views and ideals higher than the value of human life. Religion is abused in all sorts of ways, and for that reason i decide to take no part in it.

Kempo - being a non-orthodox Sikh myself, that bit where you say:

Quote :

For instance, the Quaran teaches that only muslims will enter the afterlife, similarly Sikhism.

is incorrect.
Sikhism doesnt teach that, instead it suggests that those within the faith will have a more peaceful journey to their afterlife than those outside of it. The principal beliefs of Sikhism are faith and justice. It does not exclude non-sikhs, just encourages tolerance of those who have not found their correct path to perhaps follow that already laid out by Sikhism.

Speaking of which, this neatly brings me back to my point earlier - Sikhism is the youngest religion in the world, at just 700 years old. Sikhism developed under a series of Army generals, who were trying to protect their asian territories from invasion from the Moguls (a band of thieves and pillagers and invaders who were kind of like the 15th century Nazis...). The generals just wanted to get their army to the end of the battle, alive and victorious. So apparently "God" came to them and spoke to them in their sleep and then they wrote it all down in a big book, called the guru granth sahib - kinda like a christian bible, or whatever other kind of book holds your religion of choice teachings.

idk, and to be frank i dont care - whatever happened, whoever founded it, whenever it took place, as long as you treat other humans with the respect they deserve, you should live a happy and prosperous life.

Joker wrote:

Like you said you would choose buhdism because no matter who you are you will have after life.

I didn't say that at all.......




I was saying that it is the most open-minded of all other belief systems, and allows for a harmonious multicultural society, thus in my mind is the best one, from a humanitarian point of view....


This doesn't mean though that I'm gonna rush off to start worshipping Buddha, as like I said; religion isn't at all something which I personally want to be a part of......


Discuss? Sure, why not; it's quite interesting to listen to other people's points of view, and understand why they think that, and I actually find it quite interesting to see how people respond when their viewpoints are questioned. As anger, aggression, or even passivity often show major flaws within their arguments as apposed to those who can easily and calmly give valid reasoning for their beliefs, which in effect gives the adverse mood - quite a positive, and solidly foundationed opinion.....


Naturally I don't know particularly much in terms of how the particular religions run; as Gnu decided to point out to me above with my slight misunderstanding; but what I lack in knowledge, I'll make up for in logic, thus'll be able to think of some way to carry on a discussion.....

We should just start are own religion

Fty|BloodyTears wrote:

We should just start are own religion

Power hungry corrupt leader....check
Mindless followers.....check

our 6 gosspls (the Book of Gnu, Book of Lookin, Book of JT, Book of Ram, Book of Fredd, Novel of Kempo)....check

all we need now is a marter (sp?!?!?) to die for our cause...im looking at you Brock

mayter
myater
myator

fluck...nvm cant spell today...martyer ok, how do you spell martydom? fluck

so much i dont even know what to reply to....

kemp- everyone has an afterlife in Christianity, Heaven or Hell. i wouldn't suggest Hell because it is eternal damnation and you won't enjoy that at all. i do apologize for how i worded that about you being just like any other Christian, i didn't mean it that way, just worded it terribly. also buddha didn't want people to worship him, he detested it during his life, but people didn't listen.

joker- im glad to see im not the only Christian one here. its people like you that help keep me in line.

gnu- scientology is much younger, founded in 1952.

bloodi- its a good get rich quick scheme (see reply to gnu)

lookin- martyr and martyrdom. and i will not partake in your religion. also, if you're going to call kempo's book a novel, it makes it fiction automatically. thats what a novel is, fiction. though, im sure people would believe it anyway.

Ahh creating our own religions..... that's sparked a memory of when I was in the bottom year of high school, in the first RS class, and I decided to exploit the atheism, and form "Kempoism", and persuaded about 60 people to follow it....... mehehehe.....


All it was, was that every day when people saw me, they had to say "Heil Kempo", and occasionally give up a bit of their lunch if they had something awesome which I fancied.......




good times......

goes to show that they would still believe the novel of kempo.

i dont know about other places, but people here have tried to get Harry Potter books banned from libraries because kids have started turning to witchcraft as a religion or something like that.

...yes yes, because kids can get their mother's brooms sticks to fly!

yeah i know. another downfall of the south is everything is witchcraft. "oh my gawd that tv image is coming toward me" "shut up ya dadgum witch" "no no im being serious, come see" *sees* "oh dear Lordy Jesus call the minister we need to get him to bless this witchcraft so it will not harm our family"

Jesus Christ. (Get the pun?) There's so much religious horseshit being spewed out here.

I created the earth.

I put 2 white people in the jungle, without sunscreen mind you. They fucked, and now we have: white people (of course ) , black people, chinese people, japanese people, african people, arab people etc.

And that's John Heavey-ism. We pray to Charlie Sheen every 3rd Friday of the month of every other month.

First you must snort your drug of choice off some hooker's ass then yell DUH, WINNING!

Then you have to drink a cup of Tiger Blood.

WALLAH. You're now part of John Heavey-ism, commonly referred to as WINNING.

Thats cause you're BI-WINNING, here and there...