Loyalty and religion

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Not said, not agreed with, not implied. I've previously explained why your logic in attributing every statement in the Bible to every Christian is flawed, but I guess you have too much fun with it to drop it.

It's always like that here, I'm afraid. Its rare that I will post here for that reason. No one listens to each other; they just look for sound bites they can twist. I'm probably learning to play that game, too, when I come here, unfortunately.

Aside from the fact that there are all sorts of gods there are also all sorts of concepts about the Christian God and so many people who have individual ideas about what that God thinks and does and did and intended and why and why not that it is virtually impossible not to talk past each other. The Bible itself, a compendium of imaginative unlikely creation theories, lists of people who may or may not have existed, histories of hair-raising temper tantrums of a God who continually is misunderstood and betrayed and ill considered attempts to put things right by blood curdling vengeances, fantasies about rewards and punishments for improper behaviors, demands upon believers that totally ignore or misunderstand basic human psychology and traditions, etc. is the source of much of this confusion. Anyone can pick and choose throughout this literary mish-mash to justify almost anything. That the King James version is frequently one of the most beautifully written historic texts only complicates the mess. Of course, if God really exists He could only have a very ironic sense of humor to have seen to it that the Bible is proclaimed as His official text.His laughter, if nothing else, echoes down the halls of time to mock the confused thinking of this most extraordinary comic and tragic (and probably very temporary) variation of the primate line.

Sand, at times you really are a wonderfully descriptive writer. Even if I don't agree with you

Whatever I write, I cannot but be in sympathy with your optimistic motives of the religiously inclined. If the wonderful generosity and compassion of the faithful were all that were to be contended with I could only be happy that so many people were happily deluded. But the dark side of religion so frequently rises up out of the sea of swirling self righteousness like some mythical Kraken to smash and destroy innocents and madmen alike that I can only view these violent misunderstandings with total horror.

I attributed every statement in the bible to christianity and the other abrahamic religions for the OT.

By being a christian you are supporting the bible, by supporting the bible you perpetuate its contents.

Its contents include various personal and direct insults to me.

You support these insults whether you agree with them or not and are responsible for your actions whether you like it or not.

"I'm not insulting you! I'm just expressing my love for and undying faith in the literature and people who do!"

I don't know about you, but I think condoning and supporting bullying is as bad as bullying.

You are insulting me by proxy.

Particularly strengthened by your statements that you come under the same umbrella as other christians... What umbrella would that be? The christian umbrella of rejecting the bible or....?

Also, seriously please note, your feelings don't matter in this. They are nothing to do with it.

Why is there so much absolutism - amongst both believers and non-believers alike? Is it not possible to embrace certain aspects of the bible whilst rejecting or being indifferent to other parts? Although I have no education in Christianity I don't see how this could be a problem, particularly for those who don't believe in its value/validity at all. Why not make allowances for people to have mixed views, be in states of doubt etc? If the world is to have any semblance of peace it's going to require tolerance and acceptance of the differing of views. Whether you're a fanatical religious believer or a fanatical non-believer it could still result in extremist behaviour based on the belief that everyone else is wrong and you feel it necessary to take it upon yourself to set things right. We don't have to understand other views, but it's necessary to tolerate views provided they don't involve harming others. If harming others is endorsed in the bible then perhaps its just a matter of reinterpreting it so that it better fits with what is acceptable in our society. One thing I know is that I'm uncomfortable being in the presence of someone who thinks I'm going to hell. I really wish that sort of absolutism wasn't part of it. It makes it very difficult to get along in an equitable way. But anyhow - less absolutism and more tolerance is really the only solution IMO.

The bible is very offensive and I prefer not to read it.

Tolerance is oversold. I have very little tolerance for poverty, for stupidity, for ignorance, for cruelty, for overwhelming callous behavior justified by religion, politics, for rote subservience to idiotic tradition, for lack of curiosity, for intolerance of acceptable and unavoidable differences in taste, race, sexual orientation, and lots of other things. The Bible is too full of contradictions,nonsense, ignorance, intolerances that I have noted to be acceptable as any kind of guide to decent human behaviour. Almost anything reprehensible can be justified by any holy literature. I don't need it.

lol I guess I'm not really that qualified in my opinion because I've never read the bible. I have actually been in some Christian education classes but I never paid any attention - I just read my own stuff during the classes. Once the religious teacher grabbed my book from me and violently threw it across the room! lol But anyhow, I guess what I'm saying is that there must be some good aspects in the bible. I've met a few Christians in my life and was impressed with the way they helped other people who were in need - and it seemed like they were doing this because of their faith. I realise it's not necessary for everyone to do virtuous actions in reliance on a faith - but for some people it might be.

Well, the help they give is very symbiotic so it really doesn't amount to that much. I have my issues with it but don't have the capacity to delve into it. Sand has covered it though very well.

Large parts of that book are a history, or very direct speech between specific parties reflective of the time that speech took place. I can read and tolerate many things written 100 years ago that I would hope never come out of my mouth or enter my thoughts, and the same is true for the Bible. There is much that I am not comfortable with, and it usually can be set aside when put in historical context. Have I read everything? No. Do I condon all the events even in historical context? No. These are issues that I have to deal with as a member of a Christian faith, that I look at within when I cross them. I don't consider my faith family, as I think of it, as perfect. It is, instead, the family I was born into, and it comes complete with crazy uncles and intolerant cousins and the lot of it. You don't discard your family; you work with them, and hope to bring better understanding, and maybe learn on occassion that the crazy uncle really did know something you hadn't considered. The warts and the lot of it become part of your journey, and part of the value of the experience is in figuring out what to do with them. There is a world of difference between allowing your interolerant cousins to come to your Christmas party, and supporting their intolerance. While you have every right to be upset by certain passages in the Bible, you can't extent that thought proces to every person who sees value in the book; it is not fair. I don't buy that type of argument as others try to tell me Islam is violent, and I won't buy it as you try to make it against all religions that you consider Abrahamic. Warts don't make the person, they don't make the book, and they don't make the faith. They just, "are." No different than when they appear on your hands. It is possible to live with their pressence while acknowledging their ugliness, and doing your best to stop the spread.

Everything has a dark side, and I've seen it within religion and faith far more than I would like. But I also know that most of the families working incredibly hard at our school and in our community, as volunteers, are inspired by faith. I've seen it work for the better more often than for the worse, but most of that "better" is quiet. The failures tend to blaze because they are often by those who were feeding their egos at the same time, and sadly they can do one monsterous amount of damage. I do believe that the weight is heavier on the "good," but I can't prove that. It's just personal experience and, I guess, your personal experience is different. For that, I am sad. Not because it leads you away from faith, but because it means your personal experience has been rather ugly, and no one should have that.

Edit out

Last edited by Meadow on 01 Jan 2010, 2:40 am, edited 2 times in total.

My personal experience with religion has not been either ugly nor good. I never have had any. Both my parents were atheists and never tried to convince me of religious nor non religious beliefs but merely showed me the facts of history and the monstrous behavior of religion when its power dominated the world until the Enlightenment. I grew up reading Bernard Shaw and Anatole France at the age of about 8 or 9 and Bertrand Russell and other people of great wit and huge skill in communicating their intelligence. I was questioning the extremely peculiar fantasies of the Catholic kids I played with at the age of 5 or 6 and they never made any sense to me and they still do not. The Catholic church may have very reluctantly accepted Galileo and Darwin but its behavior on birth control and the prevention of HIV is a worldwide disaster and its behavior towards its priestly pedophiles is an indication it has basically changed very little and totally disgusts me.

I have no doubt that many religious organizations do much good but I do not attribute this to religion which would claim all decency to itself but to an underlying decency in the social development of humanity which pervades people irrespective of religion. I do not see religion as necessary and it appears to me a terrible perversion of human intellect to have to deal with what appears to me as insane and unjustifiable fantasies that very often drive people to do unnecessary and terrible things to each other. The species deserves better.

Male coalitional bonding is genetically wired in. That is why we have had religions and wars since God invented dirt. It is very difficult to overcome and only a few have the strength of will and character to resist. Women are somewhat more sensible.

ruveyn