Board index › Topical Discussion › Politics, Philosophy, and Religion

Got faith?

Page 3 of 9 [ 134 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 ... 9  Next

Previous topic | Next topic

ruveyn
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 21 Sep 2008
Age: 87
Gender: Male
Posts: 31,502
Location: New Jersey

22 May 2011, 1:01 pm

TeaEarlGreyHot wrote:
I've watched this topic from the beginning, and I have to say I'm saddened (but not surprised) by all the hostility here.

I'm not a fan of religion, but mocking people for having faith in something is just mean.


Having a faith or belief is a private matter. When people institutionalize their faith or belief it makes an impact on the public. Churches lobby for their own interests and get unjustifiable tax breaks from the government. Thus, the rest of us who have to pay for this foolishness haver every right to be contemptuous.

If believers would just keep still and keep their beliefs private we would all be better off.

ruveyn



leejosepho
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Sep 2009
Gender: Male
Posts: 9,011
Location: 200 miles south of Little Rock

22 May 2011, 1:02 pm

DW_a_mom wrote:
... I sincerely believe that either a person has been open to connecting to God, or they haven't ...
Connecting to faith requires being OPEN to ideas and experiences that make no sense, yet are real none-the-less. It means seeing and hearing and feeling beyond the tangible. And ... I totally accept that none of that is natural to many with AS, simply because of the AS, and I wonder what God's plan there is ...

Personally, I believe the idea of AS somehow being inherently resistant here is a deception ... and no, I certainly do not mean to be saying you are deceiving anyone. Rather, I have yet to ever see anything inherently incompatible between AS and "God" even though there surely are many things presently blocking that kind of connection.


_________________
I began looking for someone like me when I was five ...
My search ended at 59 ... right here on WrongPlanet.
==================================


leejosepho
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Sep 2009
Gender: Male
Posts: 9,011
Location: 200 miles south of Little Rock

22 May 2011, 1:07 pm

Philologos wrote:
... a gang of middle-schoolers in engineer boots?

Wow, does that ever brink back memories!

I had long ago forgotten all about Engineer Boots!

ruveyn wrote:
TeaEarlGreyHot wrote:
I've watched this topic from the beginning, and I have to say I'm saddened (but not surprised) by all the hostility here.

I'm not a fan of religion, but mocking people for having faith in something is just mean.

Having a faith or belief is a private matter ...

If believers would just keep still and keep their beliefs private we would all be better off.

... and the same could be said of/for/to non-believers, of course, eh?! :roll:


_________________
I began looking for someone like me when I was five ...
My search ended at 59 ... right here on WrongPlanet.
==================================


Last edited by leejosepho on 22 May 2011, 1:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.

TeaEarlGreyHot
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 4 Jul 2010
Age: 40
Gender: Female
Posts: 28,982
Location: California

22 May 2011, 1:09 pm

ruveyn wrote:
TeaEarlGreyHot wrote:
I've watched this topic from the beginning, and I have to say I'm saddened (but not surprised) by all the hostility here.

I'm not a fan of religion, but mocking people for having faith in something is just mean.


Having a faith or belief is a private matter. When people institutionalize their faith or belief it makes an impact on the public. Churches lobby for their own interests and get unjustifiable tax breaks from the government. Thus, the rest of us who have to pay for this foolishness haver every right to be contemptuous.

If believers would just keep still and keep their beliefs private we would all be better off.

ruveyn


I agree, but that doesn't make it okay to mock people for being religious. Calling them out on behaviors that affect society as a whole (the individual doing it and not just anyone of a particular religion) is perfectly acceptable. Mocking someone's religious beliefs just to be mean is not.


_________________
Still looking for that blue jean baby queen, prettiest girl I've ever seen.


DW_a_mom
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 22 Feb 2008
Gender: Female
Posts: 13,687
Location: Northern California

22 May 2011, 1:30 pm

ruveyn wrote:
.

If believers would just keep still and keep their beliefs private we would all be better off.

ruveyn


I could just as easily claim that if you kept all your opinions to yourself we'd be better off. Which I won't. But that your opinions are better than mine is entirely a matter of your unique perspective and, thus, no reason to try to silence my voice. So stop trying to, and stop treating faith as a free for all attack target.

Posters on this board regularly go too far in promoting their atheism. And I use the word promote intentionally. While I sympathize that anyone who believes religion is the root of evil will feel a duty to root out and destroy faith in all it's versions, there is no difference between that and Christians who feel a duty to tell you that you will go to Hell unless you believe as they do (which I do not believe and will never say). BOTH are prohibited here, regardless of the uneven (in favor of atheists) enforcement.

Earlier in this thread a different poster used words that can only be said to have had the intention to incite. That also is prohibited here.

It is far too easy to attack the minority when one is part of the majority, and non-belief is the majority here. But that does not and never will make it right for that majority to hurt those who happen to differ. It IS the same as every other dominant group think you've encountered and been on the wrong end of in your life.


_________________
Mom to an amazing young adult AS son, plus an also amazing non-AS daughter. Most likely part of the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (some traits).


ruveyn
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 21 Sep 2008
Age: 87
Gender: Male
Posts: 31,502
Location: New Jersey

22 May 2011, 4:00 pm

DW_a_mom wrote:

I could just as easily claim that if you kept all your opinions to yourself we'd be better off. Which I won't. But that your opinions are better than mine is entirely a matter of your unique perspective and, thus, no reason to try to silence my voice. So stop trying to, and stop treating faith as a free for all attack target.



When faith and belief are institutionalized and become instruments and motives for public actions, then they become a danger to others. My opinions are of no danger to anyone. Why? There is no force behind them. The good Christian folk take their religion to politics then they become a hazard to me and mine. Likewise when Muslim extremists target Jews they are a danger to me and mine. If a Muslim wishes to hate Jews in the privacy of his home that is one thing. When he incites or commits violence against Jews, that is another.

I think Christianity is a religion for idiots (that is my personal opinion) but not in one million years would I attempt to curtail the right of a Christian to hold his private beliefs.

ruveyn



dionysian
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 May 2011
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 921
Location: Germantown, MD

22 May 2011, 4:16 pm

ruveyn wrote:
When faith and belief are institutionalized and become instruments and motives for public actions, then they become a danger to others. My opinions are of no danger to anyone. Why? There is no force behind them. The good Christian folk take their religion to politics then they become a hazard to me and mine. Likewise when Muslim extremists target Jews they are a danger to me and mine. If a Muslim wishes to hate Jews in the privacy of his home that is one thing. When he incites or commits violence against Jews, that is another.

I think Christianity is a religion for idiots (that is my personal opinion) but not in one million years would I attempt to curtail the right of a Christian to hold his private beliefs.

ruveyn

Yeah, this much is true. Most people that don't already agree with you won't find much compelling in your expressions of bitterness, resentment, fear and bigotry.



leejosepho
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Sep 2009
Gender: Male
Posts: 9,011
Location: 200 miles south of Little Rock

22 May 2011, 4:19 pm

ruveyn wrote:
... I think Christianity is a religion for idiots (that is my personal opinion) but not in one million years would I attempt to curtail the right of a Christian to hold his private beliefs.

... and of course, neither would anyone here complain if the "strident (aka 'militant') atheists" held their beliefs private! :wink:

The issues here are not matters of social governance beyond WP, of course, but them guys with Engineer Boots are now learning they just do not have the bully-run of this place any longer!


_________________
I began looking for someone like me when I was five ...
My search ended at 59 ... right here on WrongPlanet.
==================================


Philologos
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 21 Jan 2010
Age: 81
Gender: Male
Posts: 6,987

22 May 2011, 5:55 pm

leejosepho - picture it.

8th grade. A bunch of us are at the park [about three blocks from school]. John McGuire - BIG guy, and I am not small - asks I should go over, ask his momma to give me his Engineer Boots to take to him. So I did.

THAT was another universe!



leejosepho
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 14 Sep 2009
Gender: Male
Posts: 9,011
Location: 200 miles south of Little Rock

22 May 2011, 7:00 pm

Yes, been there ... and do not wish to ever return!


_________________
I began looking for someone like me when I was five ...
My search ended at 59 ... right here on WrongPlanet.
==================================


DW_a_mom
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 22 Feb 2008
Gender: Female
Posts: 13,687
Location: Northern California

22 May 2011, 11:47 pm

ruveyn wrote:
DW_a_mom wrote:

I could just as easily claim that if you kept all your opinions to yourself we'd be better off. Which I won't. But that your opinions are better than mine is entirely a matter of your unique perspective and, thus, no reason to try to silence my voice. So stop trying to, and stop treating faith as a free for all attack target.



When faith and belief are institutionalized and become instruments and motives for public actions, then they become a danger to others. My opinions are of no danger to anyone. Why? There is no force behind them. The good Christian folk take their religion to politics then they become a hazard to me and mine. Likewise when Muslim extremists target Jews they are a danger to me and mine. If a Muslim wishes to hate Jews in the privacy of his home that is one thing. When he incites or commits violence against Jews, that is another.

I think Christianity is a religion for idiots (that is my personal opinion) but not in one million years would I attempt to curtail the right of a Christian to hold his private beliefs.

ruveyn


The problem with your first paragraph is that it assumes all those people actually share ideas not only on faith and belief, but how those should be played out as public actions. That simply is not what exists. There is every bit as much dialogue and debate among Catholics, for example, as there is between members on this forum. I know for a fact that disagreement is rampant. What you fear as a danger does not exist in any large scale form, only in small pockets.

It's not like the Pope can raise his pinky finger and get all the world's Catholics to vote a certain way, or even support one specific opinion. That may be the perception of some outsiders, but it is not the truth.

So, unfortunately you hold opinions based on inaccurate assumptions.

THAT is what makes me so frustrated. People making judgements that show a very incomplete understanding of how people act and what they believe. If you don't understand it, then your judgement of it is worthless.


_________________
Mom to an amazing young adult AS son, plus an also amazing non-AS daughter. Most likely part of the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (some traits).


ValentineWiggin
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 15 May 2011
Age: 36
Gender: Female
Posts: 4,907
Location: Beneath my cat's paw

23 May 2011, 1:18 am

dionysian wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
When faith and belief are institutionalized and become instruments and motives for public actions, then they become a danger to others. My opinions are of no danger to anyone. Why? There is no force behind them. The good Christian folk take their religion to politics then they become a hazard to me and mine. Likewise when Muslim extremists target Jews they are a danger to me and mine. If a Muslim wishes to hate Jews in the privacy of his home that is one thing. When he incites or commits violence against Jews, that is another.

I think Christianity is a religion for idiots (that is my personal opinion) but not in one million years would I attempt to curtail the right of a Christian to hold his private beliefs.

ruveyn

Yeah, this much is true. Most people that don't already agree with you won't find much compelling in your expressions of bitterness, resentment, fear and bigotry.


It is "bigotry" to observe from a holistic world and historical perspective that religion is a far from benign institution?



dionysian
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 May 2011
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 921
Location: Germantown, MD

23 May 2011, 1:24 am

ValentineWiggin wrote:
It is "bigotry" to observe from a holistic world and historical perspective that religion is a far from benign institution?

That's a far cry from "Christianity is a religion for idiots."



ValentineWiggin
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 15 May 2011
Age: 36
Gender: Female
Posts: 4,907
Location: Beneath my cat's paw

23 May 2011, 1:48 am

dionysian wrote:
ValentineWiggin wrote:
It is "bigotry" to observe from a holistic world and historical perspective that religion is a far from benign institution?

That's a far cry from "Christianity is a religion for idiots."

Would you prefer "psychotics"?



dionysian
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 12 May 2011
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 921
Location: Germantown, MD

23 May 2011, 1:54 am

ValentineWiggin wrote:
dionysian wrote:
ValentineWiggin wrote:
It is "bigotry" to observe from a holistic world and historical perspective that religion is a far from benign institution?

That's a far cry from "Christianity is a religion for idiots."

Would you prefer "psychotics"?

Yes. I could relate to them better. ;)



Sand
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 15 Sep 2007
Age: 98
Gender: Male
Posts: 11,484
Location: Finland

23 May 2011, 2:37 am

Perhaps it might be better to note that the standards in accepting religion and the presence of a deity that controls the universe are obviously radically different from those based on rational observation. As someone who is aware of a good deal of rational outlook on the universe and is totally puzzled by the standards accepted by the faithful in examining the nature of reality I am very wary of and frequently horrified by many of the absolutes proclaimed by the religious in determining behavior in confronting the forces of nature and dealing with human social problems. History has overwhelmingly provided numerous examples of religious misunderstanding of how to deal with the forces of nature and a very large number of traditional religious social interactions have resulted in a huge amount of unnecessary misery and unwarranted fears. To sit idly by and declare, for a person distressed by this suffering, that it is best to do nothing seems to me to be a basic dereliction of responsibility for the general welfare of humanity.