How to tell if you are religious

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The title is more an invitation to definitions than it is a setup for my own definition.

But to be one of the responders to it, let me say that I believe that any deeply-held and followed ideology rises to the level of being religious devotion. (This is obvious, even if offensive.) Whether a religion is officially recognized is beside the point to whether the ideological beliefs held are held to a religious degree. To atheists and agnostics: do not necessarily assume you are not religious, just because you do not worship a god who is a person, rather than a thing or a concept as a god. I believe that anything a person is devoted to beyond all else functions as that person's god, or at least one of their gods. Worship does not have to be directed toward a being in order to be worship. People who are immeasurably fanatic about anything, that is worship. The reasonableness of anything called "fanaticism" is greater or lessor only in regard to the nature of the object of that "fanaticism". In other words, my "fanaticism" about God is logical IF God is the alpha and the omega, the creator of the universe, the author of righteousness and all other laws both natural and moral, and is Himself good. In that case, worship of God is reasonable.

Whereas, I saw yesterday on the show Dog Whisperer a woman who has something like 400 pictures and stuffed animals of beagles, meticulously placed on display throughout her entire house. There is effectively a "wall of beagles" in every direction. Whether this is in a moral sense right, wrong, or neither, I will not discuss, for the question of this thread, is: Is that worship? And I don't personally see how setting up such a shrine can be truly said to be something less than worship.

Whether or not you agree with my assessment of the act mentioned in the previous paragraph, a separate issue is that, I believe that it is equally possible to worship a thing or an idea as it is to worship a person or a god. The presence of the act of worship is in the worshipper, and does not involve the target of the worship. I believe that if you worship something -- anything -- you are religious. And I do not believe a religious sentiment has to have an official name in order to exist.

Any extremely passionate belief about anything is a religious sentiment. It is even possible to revere the human intellect beyond that which is reasonably deserved -- and thus to worship it, in making it the determiner of all truth. Self-worship is thus as much worship as outwardly-directed worship.

Also, one could be the ultimate skeptic, worshipping nothing, and yet worship his own skepticism (worship meaning to hold above all else).

So if you think you are not religious -- don't be so sure.

a. Religion is the socio-political expression of faith.
b. Faith is the belief in unprovable things.
: : Religion is the socio-political expression of the belief in unprovable things.

You may be religious if:

• You complain when people of your religion aren't allowed to practice your religion in other countries, but you go berserk when someone tries to erect a structure to a different religion in your neighborhood.
• You consider the one single single prayer that was 'answered' during your life time as absolute proof of the 'power of prayer'.
• You constantly challenge the work of respected scientists who established the age of the Earth as billions of years old through sound scientific practices, but have no problem believing the word of ancient, ignorant, and illiterate cave-people who think it's only several generations old.
• You believe followers of every other religion will spend an eternity in Hell, but still consider your religion the most tolerant and understanding.
• You believe ancient old debunked myths like Witchcraft are still relevant today and will therefore avoid Harry Potter movies just to be safe.
• You are insulted when scientists say we evolved from other life forms, but have no problem believing we were created from dirt.
• You believe we were created from dirt.
• You think it quite reasonable that your religion should be made the official State religion, so that any who do not follow your religion should be arrested and put in jail.
• You hastily deny the existence of other Gods, but become outraged when someone denies the existence of yours.
• You are arrogant enough to think the Earth and its inhabitants are the center of and only life in the entire universe, despite it being statistically impossible.
• You believe that any atrocity - be it murder, rape, slavery, theft, et cetera - is not a sin if it is committed in the name of your god.
• You dismiss the scientifically proven explanation of any event because you don't understand it, but are happy to just say "God did it" without proof.
• You think AIDS is Gods punishment for homosexuality.
• You think homosexuality is a reversible choice.
• You deplore homosexuality, but will vigorously defend your own religious leader when he or she is 'outed'.
• You believe that someone claiming to speak for your God is all the 'evidence' you need to prove that your God exists.
• You know less about your 'Holy' scriptures than Agnostics, Atheists, and people of other religions.
• You dismiss all explanations of events that can't be answered with 'God did it' as nonsense.
• You think anyone with an open mind has been influenced by the Devil.
• You think that anyone who is not immediately converted to your religion is closed-minded.
• You share common points of view with the same types of people who thought the Earth was flat.

The need to revere something is part of human psychology. I agree with you on this.

I think worshipping beagles is more logical than worshipping God, though. Firstly, beagles can be proven to exist. Secondly, beagles are cute and not as morally problematical as God.

How many actual Beagles did she have?

I find that the number of stuffed Beagle toys is inverse to the number of Beagles.

How To Tell If You Are Religious?

When you know you are a God.

It was Hamlet that had an unknowable disdain for messengers, wasn't it???

Tadzio

Redacted

I think you're taking "religion" to mean "organized [and/or official] religion". But why would religious sentiment have to be official and/or recognized in order to be religious sentiment? Worship is a state of mind and of emotion, not a methodical step-by-step process that must be followed in order to occur -- though the latter often does accompany the former in organized religion. But a man can worship a woman. A woman can worship a man. We've all been there.

Don't you think you're reasoning in a circular pattern, when you reason that worship is part of religion and religion is part of worship -- 100% mutual overlap of the two, as if they are basically the same thing? And did you really need to attempt dissection of the word "worship" to answer the basic premise of the thread, which is that a person worships something they revere beyond a certain point? Yes, we can argue about where that point is, but that's a separate argument to whether a lady who is utterly manical about beagles has indeed passed that point. You are free to call that particular worship right, or you can call it wrong, but that's a separate argument as well. Worship is extreme reverence. The dictionary will tell you what words are commonly believed to mean -- that's all. But I'm not talking about "the word worship" per se; I'm talking about the state of mind a person is in when extreme reverence is present.

The truth is, worship is ubiquitous in society -- so much so, that you're having trouble deciding where it does not exist. Men drooling at a strip club are experiencing worship. We can argue as to the exact object of that worship (sex? breasts? women? beauty?), but that is a separate point from whether or not worship is present. Don't let feelings -- connotations of the word "worship" -- influence your decision to admit when and where worship is most likely happening.

Having a lot of beagle stuff COULD indicate beagle worship, but not necessarily.
Everyone likes to have a hobby, and many people collect things. It doesn't mean they worship the things they collect. Although one might say they are worshipping consumerism or capitalism. At any rate, I would be very surprised if this woman self-identified as a beagle-worshipper. But hey, you never know.

Redacted

How To Tell If You Are christian?

1.you are homophobic
2.you are hypocritical