the absurdity of denominational religion

[randall patrick]

First and foremost, God is, of course, about acculturation, indoctrination...about brainwashing children. After all, we don't exactly pop out of the womb shouting, "Praise Jesus!" or "Allah is Great!"

We are, instead, socialized to internalize this or that God, this or that religious agenda. That, in fact, is why children in Muslim countries stand a far better chance of embracing Osama bid Laden's theocratic claptrap than, say, children growing up in an Orthodox Jewish community in Tel Aviv or a devout Mormon community in Utah.

Of course there are always going to be children who are raised in families or communities that profess no belief in God at all. Or they will be taught to worship and adore
A God, THE God...but it will be the WRONG God. Depending, of course, on who gets to decide who the RIGHT God is.

Think about how that works. You are raised to believe in, say, the Catholic God or the Presbyterian God or the Methodist God or the Evangical God or the Jewish God or the Shinto God or the Islamic God or the Hindu God. Again, from the day you were first able to form a conception of God as a child dozens and dozens and dozens of people are there to cram THEIR God into your brain. And they will always have some sort of SCRIPTure to fall back on so as to enable them to inculate the Right Way To Live. Their way. Yet each of these denominations all claim that their own The Right Way is THE The Right Way--even though their litugy is in many ways, hopelessly conflicting and contradictory. Yet you would think, with so much at stake [like going to Heaven or Hell, for example] that, if there was A God, He would be very, very careful to make sure that His Way was unequivocaly promulgated throughout the planet. But He fails utterly in doing so. Instead, you have all these children being brainwashed to believe in all these countervailing dieties.

The whole thing is absurd from the perspective of salvation. Consider the following scenario respecting the Christian religion as an example of this.

Suppose hypothetically evangical missionaries go down into the Amazon Basin to witness for Christ. They are trying to infiltrate three different tribes. The first one they are able to successfully convince most of the members to accept Jesus Christ as their savior. In the second one, however, they fail miserably. The third one they are not even able to find at all. Now suppose someone from each tribe dies on the next day. What is to be their fate on Judgement Day? Will the disceased who converted in the first tribe get into Heaven? Will the man who resisted the missionaries in the second tribe go to Hell? If so, is it not the missionaries themselves who are responsible for putting him in a situation where, upon being apprised of Christ, he rejected him? And what of the third man to die---the one from the tribe that was never visited? How could a merciful, just and loving God send him to Hell when he had never even heard of Jesus Christ or the Christian God? Yet if his ignorance permits him access to Heaven then it would be truly reprehensible to send the man from the second tribe to Hell, right?

Or think of those folks who believe that a just, merciful and loving Chirst will soon return. And, upon doing so, will commense the great "Left Behind" chapter in Christianity. Those who have accepted Jesus Christ as their savior will be whisked up to Glory and those who did not will remain to suffer God's trials and tribulations. Think how morally despicable a point of view like that is. Here you have a planet with literally billions of people who were brainwashed from birth to believe in a God other than the Christian God. You have millions of folks who literally have never heard of Jesus Christ. You have babies and infants who are not even capable of grasping anything relating to religion at all. You have the autistic and the retarded and the schizophrenic. Yet we are expected to believe that the Jesus Christ of the New Testament will come back to Earth and orchestrate this moral travesty---in the name of God!!!

The intellectual farce that is denominational religion. What is it if not the mother of all psychological defense mechanisms? It is certainly not something to take seriously in a philsophy venue.

rp

[Starboy]

Well put Randall. You could say that the only way all of this could be going on is if those involved were being very dishonest.

Starboy

[Samildanach]

The worst bit is you can point this out again and again and again but the brainwashed will never listen. They are too busy reinforcing their own insidious indoctrination by denial of what is real.
Effectively if you threaten their world view with something that may disprove or even bring god into question then that must obviously be wrong. Same way the old sun used to be the center of the universe.

[tman_ndsu08]

You are raised to believe in, say, the Catholic God or the Presbyterian God or the Methodist God or the Evangical God or the Jewish God or the Shinto God or the Islamic God or the Hindu God. Again, from the day you were first able to form a conception of God as a child dozens and dozens and dozens of people are there to cram THEIR God into your brain. And they will always have some sort of SCRIPTure to fall back on so as to enable them to inculate the Right Way To Live. Their way. Yet each of these denominations all claim that their own The Right Way is THE The Right Way--even though their litugy is in many ways, hopelessly conflicting and contradictory. Yet you would think, with so much at stake [like going to Heaven or Hell, for example] that, if there was A God, He would be very, very careful to make sure that His Way was unequivocaly promulgated throughout the planet. But He fails utterly in doing so. Instead, you have all these children being brainwashed to believe in all these countervailing dieties.

If I were Satan, it would be hard to think of a better plan to get God's people to hate each other and kill each other.

[tman_ndsu08]

If so, is it not the missionaries themselves who are responsible for putting him in a situation where, upon being apprised of Christ, he rejected him? And what of the third man to die---the one from the tribe that was never visited? How could a merciful, just and loving God send him to Hell when he had never even heard of Jesus Christ or the Christian God? Yet if his ignorance permits him access to Heaven then it would be truly reprehensible to send the man from the second tribe to Hell, right?

Maybe God is stupid. Perhaps it is possible that we've simply out evolved him in our complexity of thinking.

[Rave7pt0]

Let me start by saying, yeah -- you're totally right. People have silly. self-serving, contradictory notions of the supernatural.

But let me ask this: how many people have a solid understanding of the field of chemistry?

I'd venture to say not many... most everyone who's heard of it knows it has to do with chemicals, a few have studied it and knows the basics... fewer still are at the cutting edge of the field. The majority don't have a clue. So far, it's just like religion.

The difference is that in our society, science is emphasized, so much more work is done in the sciences (academically) than in religion. Still, so many people are woefully uneducated about it... that being the case, how could you expect any more than a handful of people to understand and be able to defend a religious position?

Their lack of knowledge no more speaks to the validity of religion, than my lack of chemistry knowledge speaks to the validity of chemistry.

I think that in practice, one of the primary differences between science and religion is that people can just make shit up more readily with religion -- but a serious religious scholar can separate the wheat from the chafe, just as a chemist can spot bogus research, whereas I wouldn't know the difference.

The problem is that valence shells don't affect the everyday life of the everyday person, but religion can -- so people get fired up about it, and they use it in ignorant ways. That adds fuel to the fire for atheists who look at the unwashed masses and think that represents all religion has to offer... well if the majority of people who dabbled with chemicals were alchemists, chemistry might have a bad name too.

[Samildanach]

Actually valence shells affect everyone and everything on the planet every second of every day.
Well if you are going to compare religion to science that way. Religion has been around a lot longer than science...fact. There are more religious people on the planet than scientists...fact. Then why ..as you claim.... are there less people who 'truely understand' religion than there are scientists who understand science, usually what happen is the greater mass of people you have who understand something about a subjet the further it advances and if they want to understand religion surely there is the church on sundays and the bible to read if they have quetions about the lessons in it. Academic bible studies are just not needed. Its one book...albeit a long book but you wouldnt need a years study on it to understand the main themes in it to a sufficent level where you might be considered competent to be a christian and get your diploma......ahhh...baptism...or whatever..
Yet science is prevalent...why you might ask...because its demonstrably useful....something religion these days is not....except for politicians who need the deluded for votes.

[Starboy]

Quote by: Rave7pt0 Their lack of knowledge no more speaks to the validity of religion, than my lack of chemistry knowledge speaks to the validity of chemistry.

You would have a point if there was only one kind of religion. It is not the ignorance that is the problem it is all that ignorance parading as knowledge and thus created hundreds of thousands of different religions. You are right people are ignorant of chemistry but very few would be stupid enough to insist that organic chemistry is somehow a better chemistry than inorganic or that alchemy is as good an explanations than explanations based on chemistry. That is the root difference between religious ignorance and most other kinds. People are complete blind to it even though just about everyone knows that there is more than one kind of religion.

Starboy

[Rave7pt0]

Sam:

You're right, it's been around a lot longer, and there are lots of "religious" people. The fact is, however, that religion can be less intellectually rigorous than a hard science. People can believe whatever they want, no matter how much of a load it is. The strength in science is that it fortifies itself with evidence that can change people's minds, whereas religion is sort of a vague feeling for most, so that ignorant dogmas are pounded into generation after generation of believers, without any validity checks.

That means that it's much more difficult to make progress in the serious exploration of spirituality than it is in, say, chemistry.


Further, because it's not as rigorous, many people don't realize how complex it really is. We explain to our first graders that once a very happy cartoon character named Newton was hit on the head with an apple and he said "what goes up must come down!" They find out later about the equations, and gravity insofar as we know what it is. Well, what if no one realized there was anything more? What if people continued thinking, in their adulthood, that what goes up must really come down, and that's all there is to it?

Smart people would say "hang on a minute... that sounds wrong." It isn't until you get a broader understanding of physics that the pieces come together -- the cynical among us would say that what we told the children was just plain wrong, but most would agree that it was an appropriate simplification for a younger audience.

Well look at this: we tell the same first graders in Sunday school, that an Anglo Jesus Christ died on a cross for our sins, so that we could be with his Dad in heaven, while angels surrounded his throne. Of course this, taken alone, is nonsense, and begs so many questions that I couldn't even begin to dissect it here. Fast forward 30 years, and that same kid, now an adult, believes exactly the same thing, verbatim. That is a sign that people just have no idea what they're dealing with.

So when you say that with so many people interested in it, they should make progress, I just point out that if they don't realize there's progress to be made, why would they push? We can imagine what chemistry might do for us if we understood this or that aspect just a little better, but when you have a catch-all "believe in Jebus, go to Heaven" solution, why would the average person look further, or explore it?

I don't know exactly how a TV works, from the studio to the camera, to whatever, to my screen, and most people don't -- why should the masses look into the functioning of a TV when it works without them exerting the effort to learn? It only a takes a few interested individuals who know to make it work for everyone (yaef, science). Religion is far more personal, and so those same few interested individuals, aren't enough to educate the uncaring masses.



Starboy:

I sort of covered this above, but you're right. It's ignorance parading as knowledge, because the study of religion tends to be far less rigorous, and far more elementary than other fields. Just know that dishonesty doesn't necessarily follow religion, even though I admit it is an epidemic. I am honest in my ignorance, and others can be too, if they realize that's how one progresses.

[FIFI]

Quote by: Samildanach The worst bit is you can point this out again and again and again but the brainwashed will never listen. They are too busy reinforcing their own insidious indoctrination by denial of what is real...

Yes, but if you turn this around, cannot you not state that those who believe in ANYTHING at all are brainwashed? There are children whom grow up in an atheist house holds, or non-denominational ones. Does that mean that they were brainwashed too, or is it only because they believe in a higher being, then they must be brainwashed??

[Starboy]

Quote by: Rave7pt0 It's ignorance parading as knowledge, because the study of religion tends to be far less rigorous, and far more elementary than other fields. Just know that dishonesty doesn't necessarily follow religion, even though I admit it is an epidemic. I am honest in my ignorance, and others can be too, if they realize that's how one progresses.

The study of religion tends to be far less rigorous because it is dishonest. It is not as if mankind has not demonstrated what an honest, rigorous attempt at exploring reality can accomplish. The magical thinkers must know, deep down inside their beady little dishonest brains that a rigorous treatment of their supernatural beliefs would cause them to evaporate as completely as the supernatural beliefs they already know to be vapor.

Starboy

[FIFI]

But why the demand that those on a religious path or beliefe system are dishonest for their ways?
The worse you could acuse them of is being incorrect, as believing in "God" might not be the most logical way to live, but accusing them of being liars is like yelling at a child for spelling incorrectly ; just because they don't know, doesn't make them purposly bad people.

[Rave7pt0]

Quote by: Starboy The study of religion tends to be far less rigorous because it is dishonest. It is not as if mankind has not demonstrated what an honest, rigorous attempt at exploring reality can accomplish. The magical thinkers must know, deep down inside their beady little dishonest brains that a rigorous treatment of their supernatural beliefs would cause them to evaporate as completely as the supernatural beliefs they already know to be vapor. Starboy

I guess that's the kind of thinking I want to get you away from. In fact, in one of my first posts here I offered to defend my religious position to you, and I believe Gorgo, as long as I was treated respectfully. That didn't happen, so I left the thread, but if you'd like to try again, I'd be happy to.

[Starboy]

Quote by: FIFI But why the demand that those on a religious path or beliefe system are dishonest for their ways?

What is a religious path? Is that a path where you try to believe in a particular version of the supernatural?

The worse you could acuse them of is being incorrect, as believing in "God" might not be the most logical way to live, but accusing them of being liars is like yelling at a child for spelling incorrectly ; just because they don't know, doesn't make them purposly bad people.

If they do not know any better then you would have a point, but the vast majority have been taught to tell the difference between shit and shinola but when it comes to their pet religion the shit is shinola.

Starboy

[Starboy]

Quote by: Rave7pt0 I guess that's the kind of thinking I want to get you away from. In fact, in one of my first posts here I offered to defend my religious position to you, and I believe Gorgo, as long as I was treated respectfully. That didn't happen, so I left the thread, but if you'd like to try again, I'd be happy to.

No one is stopping you.

Starboy

[randall patrick]

Rave7:


I think that in practice, one of the primary differences between science and religion is that people can just make shit up more readily with religion -- but a serious religious scholar can separate the wheat from the chafe, just as a chemist can spot bogus research, whereas I wouldn't know the difference.


RP:


I challenge you or anyone reading this to introduce this exchange to a "serious religious scholar". I will deconstruct his or her arguments into oblivion. And that's before we get to the question of how this "loving, just and merciful" God [as most of them are described] is reconciled with the South Asian tsunami....or how human autonomy is reconciled with Devine omniscience.

Let's be honest, if there was any solid theological proof for the existence of a God it would have long since been brought forth. Instead we have this endless conceptual claptrap posing as proof...sheer conjecture in which certain abstract premises are proffered and then presumed to be true. It is purely speculative. And purely circular.

But don't get me wrong. Religion in its broadest sense is not irrational to me. All one need do is ask:

* why does anything exist at all?
* why this particular existence and not another?
* is existence infinite?
* if infinite, what can that possibly mean?
* or was existence created?
* if created, by what or by whom?
* if created, out of what?
* out of nothing at all?
* if out of nothing at all what can that possibly mean?
* is there a teleology "behind" existence?
* if so, where do you and I fit into it?

Once you go that far out on the ontological limb if you don't feel something analogous to a religious stirring you may as well be a brick. Existence is astondingly mysterious. But that sort of shock and awe is a far cry from positing, "there is a God and my God just happens to be the God." Denominational religion, in other words. That's just a load of crap. Believing in this or that actual God is synonomous with being intellectually challenged as far as I am concerned. You may as well be a brick philosophically for all intents and purposes. Unless, again, some "religous scholar" can in fact come in here and show me the error of my own propositions.

Either way ironically I can't lose. If he or she fails I get the satifaction of defending my point of view. If he or she succeeds I get the satisfaction of finally being able to believe in something beyond birth school work death.


rp

[tman_ndsu08]

Religion in its broadest sense is not irrational to me.

Philosphy is certain a very rational art. Lots of things that stem from it (Sociology, Psychology, Science, etc.) are also quite rational.

[Starboy]

Quote by: tman_ndsu08 Philosphy is certain a very rational art. Lots of things that stem from it (Sociology, Psychology, Science, etc.) are also quite rational.

Not that I am a big advocate of philosophy as it exists as a human tradition but if you go into just about any philosphy department not connected to a religious college or university you will find that they do not think much of supernaturalism.

Starboy

[tman_ndsu08]

And many scientists don't think much of alchemy. But that doesn't mean it isn't a science.