To ask my brother and family not to go to church when we visit

[Trifle]

I plan on visiting my brother, sil and their 2 children for a weekend in September with my 2 ds's. All the children get on fabulously and really enjoy eachothers company although, due to distance apart, we dont meet up as often as is liked.

My brother and sil are deeply religious to the point of fanaticism. They read the bible every day, pray religiously, attend church at least 2 if not 3 times a week, sometimes twice on a sunday (obviously the message doesnt get through first time).

Now, if we visit at the weekend and stay overnight, would IBU to ask them not to go to church on a sunday morning as the whole thing takes about 3 hours and we just end up hanging around waiting for them to come back. This defeats the object of the whole trip if we are there to see them plus I also think it is rude to abandon your guests.

Swanandduck.

She is challenging the basis of this principle that says boycotting National Lottery output is a morally virtuous thing to do.

The basis of that principle is up for debate. Do you have any thoughts on that?

If Pontius Pilate had thought that, we'd have nothing to talk about.

"There is a story int he bible about Jesus going to visit someone and one of them spends the whole time in the kitchen fussing (she is the baddie) and the other spends the whole time talking to him (she is the goodie). "

Luke 10:38-42. But it arguably makes the OP's brother's case, not the OP's, as she is listening to the word of Jesus. Mark 2:27 is a better move in scripture fencing: Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath."

"There is a story int he bible about Jesus going to visit someone and one of them spends the whole time in the kitchen fussing (she is the baddie) and the other spends the whole time talking to him (she is the goodie). Maybe you could refer your brother to this story - Jesus would rather we all sat round and chatted to each other I think. But then, I am a militant atheist so waddoino?"

Yeah, sorry but that's the opposite interpretation to what was intended. Jesus' judgement on that was that Mary (your "goodie") was right to sit there quietly listening to his wise words, and Martha (your "baddie"), was wrong to be busying about in the kitchen trying to be a good hostess. So actually, the moral of that story is that religious duty should come before your social and domestic duties.

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My point is that if people believe things she doesn't believe in, or think certain things are morally wrong, but they are not interfering with her in any way then she should as MollyChambers put it 'live and let live' instead of constantly putting down other's beliefs, or quoting one or two extreme examples of religious fanaticism and using them to deride the whole concept of religion. She is entitled to say that she wouldn't agree with certain views or finds them hard to understand, but not to belittle them.

Swanandduck. Are you saying that the principles behind a 'belief' or 'thought' should not be challenged?

In my opinion a lot of religious people don't seem to think things through or question why they do things.

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If someone is going about their business, practising their religion, not infringing on you in any way, why do you want to 'challenge' their belief? Lots of my friends don't practice any religion but they don't sit down and 'challenge' my convictions. They respect the fact that my faith is important to me.

State the fact that you don't believe in religious practice if you want. But people on this thread going around talking about 'fairy belivers' and 'fanatics' and 'silly hobbies' are totally ignorant, in my view.

swanandduck - I was not commenting on whether or not tokyonambu was sneering (although I do disagree with you on that) but on your statement that "a lot of [her]posts show a complete lack of understanding of religion in any case and to those of us who practise religion some of them sound totally idiotic" and asked you whether you could justify that statement with references to the posts to which you refer. If not, I think you should withdraw it.

Swanandduck.

I want to challenge why some religious people will openly boycott some outputs from the National Lottery and not others.

If you openly say you are making a choice based on a religious principle - then you are accountable to explain what that principle is about.

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She has said it is impolite to attend a religious service when you have guests, it is hypocritical to go on holidays where no service is available, that people dedicated to their faith are the same as football fans. To a religious person these are some of the comments that show a complete lack of understanding of what is behind people's religious conviction.

And I have no intention of withdrawing my remarks, thank you.

Why is she 'accountable'. She would be 'accountable' if she said you shouldn't avail of the funding. She didn't so she is not accountable to you.

MollysChambers - "The level of ... plain old ignorance displayed on this thread is astounding."

I'm not sure who you are directing that at and it would be nice to know what you consider is being said by whom that shows ignorance.

Certainly, many of the atheists on this thread seem to show a greater knowledge of the Bible than some of the Christians who, presumably, profess to believe the Bible to be the Word of God and therefore "True". But I somehow doubt that is what you were referring to.

Swanandduck

So you're saying that religious folk can boycott and moralise all they like, but that they are not accountable for their stance, and therefore do not need to explain themselves.

Is it or is it not a free country?

Boycotting free fruit on religious principle irresistibly reminds of John O'Farrell's account of the man who was boycotting the Jubilee line out of republican principle, and therefore had to change at Tottenham Court Road to get from Bond Street to Charing Cross.

The free fruit thing is related to the Garden of Eden perhaps?

"Is it or is it not a free country?"

It isn't, in general, but in this case no-one is suggesting employing the repressive machinery of the state to deal with Lottery refuseniks. I think, anyway. I'm not expecting the door to be kicked in by a man from Camelot with a list of people who have never bought a lottery ticket.

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Yes, if they're not interfering with you. What's your problem.

"The free fruit thing is related to the Garden of Eden perhaps?"

www.cartoonbank.com/2010/no-one-said-we-couldnt-eat-the-snake/invt/135563/

Swanandduck.

Seems like a cop out to me if on the one hand we're passing moral judgements (like with the fruit,) and on the other hand we don't explain why, and won't talk about it.

Like folding arms across chests and saying - it's religious choice and looking down noses on the 'sinners' who partake of the fruit.

It's like whoa!! - wait a minute, not SO fast buddy...

Who's making moral judgments or looking down their noses at you? All people are saying is 'this is what I believe and because I have this belief I understand why OP's family can't just casually miss their Sunday Service'. The people making judgments here are the ones dismissing these people as 'fanatics' 'silly' etc.

Yes YABU. You could always organise to visit on a Friday night and leave on the Saturday afternoon.

You may be surprised to find out that your friends religion is probably more important to them than the fact that you get bored for a few hours on a sunday morning.

You could go for a walk or cook them a meal for when they come back from church.

Come on Swanandduck - work with me. :)

I'm talking about the free fruit scheme - the basis of Tokyo argument that you were offended by. I understand that the women who refused the free fruit scheme were very aggressive. I took that to mean moralistic.

But they didn't explain the basis of their high principles did they. And they should have, because they conducted themselves with a moralistic superior air. That in itself is intrusive on everyone else. Having read Tokyo's argument I suspect their principles were probably flawed and hypocritical.

swanandduck - No, that isn't quite it.

To be fair judgments are being made on all sides but the religious people are saying in a very judgemental way to the OP that she is being unreasonable (in some cases very unreasonable) because (and I paraphrase), despite her prior experiences, and her belief that family life is more important than church life, that (a) she shouldn't even discuss this with ther brother because his views are more important than hers because they are based on religion and hers aren't and (b) that she should go to church with him.