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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To wonder why people who appear to dislike religion enjoy Christian celebrations

508 replies

Cupcake1985 · 03/11/2013 11:08

I know that most people enjoy Christmas, Easter etc with no regard for the actual Christian basis and meaning of the celebration, but aibu to think that those people should then not get all offended by the religious aspects and sometimes be downright rude about it?? The nativity play, spreading the word of god through carol singing etc..... Dare I mention operation Christmas child?! If you enjoy Christmas then at least try to accept it is actually about the birth of Christ or at least respect that others will celebrate this fact and may try to share that with those around them with the best intentions.

Basically cheer up, be accepting, be kind.

OP posts:
Beastofburden · 09/11/2013 10:34

I would say that there is widespread persecution of gay people from religious motives - Christianity in African countries and Islam in Arab countries, to generalise.

I see this as different from the persecution that undoubtedly happens between religious groups, where one is dominant. So, Christians are persecuted in countries where other faiths, often but not always Islam are dominant. Christians today do a lot less persecuting of other faiths than they did, but it isn't unknown. Faiths will always forget over territory and kill the opposite side.

Not to say that both aren't bad- they are. But they are a different phenomenon.

And agree, there is not persecution in this country on faith grounds, thankfully, apart from individual islamaphobic attacks, like that poor grandfather who was recently killed by a Christian white supremacist.

Beastofburden · 09/11/2013 10:35

Forget= fight

HolofernesesHead · 09/11/2013 11:09

SGB - yes I do find it more than uncomfortable when people hijack the word 'persecution' in the privileged west. It makes me very angry, tbh, and lose respect for them as people, and I do challenge this thinking wherever I encounter it. It seems obscene to me.

And yes, I know that homophobia is a real thing.

Beastofburden · 09/11/2013 11:15

holo I guess my point is, people sometimes bring up persecution of Christians in the context of a discussion about atheism. But it's not atheists who persecute Christians. It's members of other faith groups. I'm afraid that persecution of this kind is a result of someone else's religious fervour. Terrible for the individuals. But not a consequence of atheism.

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 11:19

Holofern

You are confusing "source" with "evidence".

That there are sources suggesting an existent Jesus is without doubt. Proper, methodological evaluation of those sources (which includes possible bias and lots and lots of other things besides) is what determines the credibility it is given & whether it's presented and accepted as "evidence".

I would say Paul is a better source than Tacitus - since Tacitus is too far removed from the events, whereas Paul is speaking for himself. But Paul doesn't tell us much about a physical Jesus either since he never met him.

HolofernesesHead · 09/11/2013 11:56

True re Paul.

Did 1st c Greco Roman Jews think of evidence in the same way as you, do you think? If not, why not? And how does answering this question then affect how we understand how to read ancient texts? (now there's an undergrad exam question for you!) :)

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 12:14

Do you actually mean 1st C? We have no indication at all that 1st C Greco Roman Jews had even heard of Jesus. Nobody says anything about him.

In terms of whether people in antiquity used the same methods we do, of course not. But you are talking about a different time, and entirely different thought processes. Yes, this does have to be taken into account, I quite agree but it leaves us none the wiser, in the here and now, as to whether Jesus objectively existed or not. If anything, it muddies the waters even further.

Look at a source like Seutonius - a tremendously important historian who furnishes us with a wealth of information about the period. And his, supposedly, neutral accounts are completely infested with portents and omens, and all sorts of supernatural woo-hoo which would have excited absolutely no raised eyebrows back then - it was considered a reflection of the reality they thought they occupied.

We are talking about extremely primitive, extremely superstitious people.

If you're asking me whether the bulk of people doubted Jesus's existence, then no, they mostly didn't. Most followers of Mithras didn't doubt his existence either. What does that tell you?

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 12:27

Sorry, just to add - except Josephus, of course. Forgot about him.

AnyBagsofOxfordFuckers · 09/11/2013 15:27

I am fuming at the accusation of hypocritically celebrating Xmas in order to stuff myself with mince pies. Mince pies are fucking disgusting, how dare you link my Atheism to those monstrosities?!

Look, here's the thing: Jesus didn't exist. It's ALL a load of bollocks. No-one can prove it, and they never will, because he's a character in book. And a shittily-written, bizarre, irrelevant, nasty book at that. The Bible is just a book of random stories, archaic laws that have no place or sense in our modern world, hearsay, cobbled together bits of WTF from oral stories, scaremongering, fairy stories, bonkers explanations of why things are the way they are because they had no scientific way of explaining them, unsubtle morality tales, all created and packaged and repackaged and reformulated SOOO many times, by people by various agendas and mental illnesses and political reasoning, all to scare, and control, and put people in their place, full of misogyny, racism, anti-humanitarian stuff, sickening stuff, aggression, warmongering, condoning of slavery and so much more. all the good stuff, like love thy neighbour, or charity, has fuck-all to do with relgion, anyone who isn't a sociopath works those things out for themselves at an early age. And believers know it too, deep down. Come on now, people, no sane, rational adult genuinely, in their heart, believes that an invisible beardy giant lives in the sky, watching and controlling everyone and everything at all times, and he made an entire planet in 6 days, do they? I mean, SERIOUSLY.

If that offends people, then I am sorry that you choose to feel offended. But it is so fucking annoying to be told that, as an Atheist, your opinions should not be aired, when I can prove everything I believe in, and religious people cannot prove one single percent of theirs, and yet their beliefs are privileged.

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 15:27

Did 1st c Greco Roman Jews think of evidence in the same way as you, do you think?

Actually, thinking about it - yes they did.

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 15:29

I am fuming at the accusation of hypocritically celebrating Xmas in order to stuff myself with mince pies. Mince pies are fucking disgusting, how dare you link my Atheism to those monstrosities?!

Now look here, diss Jesus all you like - but leave mince pies out of it. Mine are wonderful Wink

MurderOfGoths · 09/11/2013 16:36

I want mince pies now..

BlingBang · 09/11/2013 16:42

How can you not love the magnificence that is mince pies! I hold off and off to make the pleasure all the more so.

Think Jesus was real, was he miraculous and the son of god - no.

MurderOfGoths · 09/11/2013 16:46

See, good thing about Christmas being so commercial, I could pop out and buy mince pies already! What's not to love?

HolofernesesHead · 09/11/2013 16:54

Hettie - yes, the waters are muddy. Have you read much about the various 'quests got the historical Jesus'? It is a really complex and fascinating area.

I love mince pies! The Heston from Waitrose ones are the best.

Oxford, of course you can air your views! We don't live in a theocracy!

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 17:09

Holofern

Yes, quite a lot. And yes, it's exceedingly complex. But, agreed, fascinating.

I've fallen in love with those puff pastry mince pie things that fall apart when you bite into them.

I would eat some now if I hadn't just eaten a packet of orange Halloween French Fancies Blush

HolofernesesHead · 09/11/2013 17:26

The Halloween trick or treat cinder toffee cakes were a hit in our house. We bought a load half price the other day! :)

The historical anyone in the 1st and 2nd cs is pretty elusive, IMO. Have you been most swayed by any particular approach? I think I'm with Schweitzer in his later years and the person who wrote 'The Shadow of the Galilean' (I think it was Gerd Theissen but could well be wrong on that.)

SolidGoldBrass · 09/11/2013 17:28

I used not to like mince pices but since discovering the lattice-type once I have SEEN THE LIGHT, HALLELUJAH AND EUREKA! (see, do not confine pisstaking to a single myth system and feel free to insert the correct joyous whoop from any of the others, if you like.)

Onesleeptillwembley · 09/11/2013 17:40

I actually would quite LIKE to believe in someone who could change water into wine wistful especially at Christmas. Wink

HettiePetal · 09/11/2013 17:47

Nah - I go for the dumbed down, layman stuff you can find in Waterstones. Best sources at the moment are blog debates between academics - can get very rowdy at times Wink. But I've learned absolutely loads from them.

BackOnlyBriefly · 09/11/2013 18:04

I can't prove jesus didn't exist as a man, but the master plan to bring the world to jesus by telling a dozen people in the middle east - at a time when there was no mass communication - is just daft isn't it. It's an insult to any self-respecting god to suggest he would do it that way.

Christians have never really worked out the plot holes in that and you all know what they are.

If you need to know about Jesus to be saved then that's unfair on anyone who was born before Jesus and anyone born too far away to have met him.

If you make some kind of special arrangement for those people that is unfair on the ones who did live at the right time, but didn't realise Jesus was genuine. How was anyone supposed to know? Given that there were lots of messiahs before and after.

If you don't need to know about Jesus to be saved then what was the point?

Missionaries are a dead giveaway that the plan has gone wrong. If you're out the day one visits then you could end up in hell.

If you die young there have to be endless twists and turns to try and make that fit the plot.

Some christians are still claiming Jesus had to die because of what Adam & Eve did while most other christians now admit Adam & Eve didn't exist - oops!.

Not that that story ever made sense, but rewriting the start of the first season has made the later seasons look ludicrous.

So we don't need to point to the lack of evidence that he even existed. We can simply demolish the claim that he was divine.

BackOnlyBriefly · 09/11/2013 18:07

Let's deify whoever invented the mince pie. At least we know he/she created something.

Beastofburden · 09/11/2013 20:09

But we can't. We don't know who invented the mince pie.

Onesleeptillwembley · 09/11/2013 20:20

Exactly! We don't. And that's why some fictional bod who allegedly turns water into wine gets all the glory!

Beastofburden · 09/11/2013 20:28

Iinvented the mince pie.

Kneel when you address me, peasant.