to refuse to give religions and their resective gods capital letters?

[LoopyLoops]

Ever since I was in primary school I have hated giving religious words capital letters. It goes against proper grammar, and gives a heightened status that I feel is undeserved.

eg. God, Allah, Christianity, Him etc...

Jesus gets a capital letter as it is a proper name. Same with Mohammed.

I do, however, bow to this convention if I'm discussing religion with strongly religious people, so as not to offend.

Do others find this capitalisation all a bit strange?

ugh, respective, sorry for typo in title.

Yes, it is a bit odd, but I can't say I'd lose any sleep over it. It's just one of those old fashioned concepts which go hand in hand with religion generally.

Yes, I find it strange as well.

Isn't God a name too? Like Macapaca, or Captain Jack Sparrow? Names of fictional people get capitalised too.

Christianity... not sure... my grammar isn't up to that one. Is it a proper noun? No doubt someone has already answered this while I've been typing.

Him, His, Thy etc... I thought that was a mark of respect for people who do believe in their chosen deity, but surely non believers aren't expected to do it are we?

Not really - since it's not anti grammatical really, is it?

"Him" I agree is a religious thing. But God is a proper noun when used without an article, like "He looks like a dad", vs "He looks like Dad".

Allah is also a proper noun.

As for Christianity, Muslims etc, capitalising these is no different to capitalising other nouns/adjectives relating to organised groups such as a Labour politician, Conservative values, the Girl Guide pledge.

It's very normal/accepted to capitalise the names of organised groups in this way, and to capitalise the adjectives relating to them. This is particularly true if the noun/adjective derives from the name of the person. Cf Thatcherism and Christanity.

Leaving aside the religious point, I don't think your objection is grammatically correct at all. I am an atheist by the way.

Hmmm I guess 'God' is a funny one, as the christian god is the owner of a name, but is also a generic term, eg. Greek and Norse gods.

Maybe I'll capitalise Allah.

Any religious people mind either way?

If it is a name, like God, Allah, Jehovah etc, I would give it a capital letter just because that is the correct, grammatical way to treat them - it wouldn't cross my mind to do anything else. By consciously "demoting" these words to a small letter it seems like you are actively trying to reduce the status of the words to make a point, even to yourself. It just seems like overthinking it to me.
I am a lawyer and when we write about the Crown Court or High Court, it is supposed to be capitalised (because there is technically a single Crown Court based in many centres), but the magistrates' court is not (because each court is an individual entity). It would be a bit like me insisting on writing "crown court" to signify that I don't think it is any more important than the lower court.

Ah, but christianity isn't a discretely organised group, is it? RC and C of E get capitals, but christianity is a collective term, much the same as conservativism when not pertaining to the Conservative party, no?

God is not a funny one.

It's perfectly correct to write "I don't believe in a god" and also perfectly correct to write "I don't believe in God"

It's the same as the a dad/Dad point I was making earlier.

The only example in your OP which actually contradicts normal grammatical rules is the capitalisation of He and Him - and I agree with you on that and, as an atheist, I don't capitalise it because I feel it implies a belief which I don't share

Christianity is a collective term but it derives from a proper noun (Christ) so it gets a capital in the same way as Thatcherism and Shakespearean do.

tyv - I wrote that before you explained the very same point.

Ah yes, that makes sense tyv. So does islam not need a capital?

What if you write 'oh god'. I never capitalise that because it's not a name. God is a catch all term isn't it?

Plus I can't quite see what difference it being a "collective term" makes anyway.

Christians are still followers of a particular person and set of beliefs, so I can't see that they deserve a capital any less than Marxists, Catholics or any other group conventionally capitalised, whether religious or not.

I'm not sure that any deserve a capital, do they?

Islam still needs a capital because it's a proper noun!

there's no hard and fast rule about what we call proper nouns and capitalise accordingly - it's just based on collective agreement (and it changes from country to country).

But since we've decided that Islam is a proper noun in common with most other religions, you can't just decide to designate it a non-proper because you don't personally share that ideology.

It's a bit like saying "I'm not going to capitalise the word French any more because I don't like their politics." It doesn't matter. The rule in English is still that you have to capitalise it.

I always refer to gods in the plural (as I make no distinction in terms of 'respect' betweeen any of the myth systems), though a more accurate and indeed gramatically correct term is 'imaginary friends'.
I do use capital letters for proper names like Jesus, Buddha or Beelzebub though.

ah yes, of course. Does it still have a capital when used as an adjective? eg. Islamic?
How about muslim?

And catholic only needs a capital when talking about RC, rather than the general christian church? Or not? I'm confused now.

Proper nouns used as an adjective still need a capital - eg Mancunian, English breakfast.

Catholic needs a capital when talking about the religion to distinguish it from the word catholic which is an adjective meaning universal/all encompassing.

Eg: "I have a Catholic view of education, and believe in a strong religious basis for all lessons"

Vs "I have a catholic view of education, and believe you can get as much from a trip to the zoo as from a morning spent in a classroom"

Basically the convention in English is that religions, like political movements, countries and place names, significant events in history, trademarks, people's names and titles directly standing in for those names, days of the week, months, and some times of year, are all proper nouns. They should all be capitalised and any adjectives relating to those nouns should also be capitalised.

Whether you agree with that designation or not, it's not true to say it's improper grammar to capitalise them, any more than it's grammatically improper to capitalise countries, days of the week, or any other group.

sorry - this thread has brought out my not-so-hidden inner pedant

I am an atheist, true, but first and foremost I am a pedant!

And personally I think if you fail to capitalise Islam you don't look like someone making a protest against religious ideology, you just look like someone who doesn't have a grasp of English grammar.

It's all relative anyway - in German you capitalise all nouns, and in French you hardly capitalise anything - you don't capitalise days of the week for example, and you don't capitalise adjectives relating to proper nouns, so you would say "J'habite en France" but "Je suis francaise"

You will also be pleased to know that religions are generally not capitalised in French either - including Christianity - apart from a few exceptions including Islam?! Now THAT'S inconsistent

OK, fair enough.

He, Him etc. OK to continue in lower case then?

Yes, He/Him is the only one you could justify without looking illiterate (I am a pedant).

Mind you, it is also a pretty modern, suspect idea to capitalize 'He' when you mean 'God'.

I used to think it must be terribly important and someone would be furious if I forgot the capital ... that's what CofE schools run by silly people does to you. It's just diplomatics in a text.

As a christian, can I point out that I don't think God (yeah, I went there) cares about grammar very much?

I don't use 'he/him' when referring to gods, I use 'it/its' as necessary.

Cranmer would have thoroughly approved, SGB.