In thinking that people with faith or religion are deluded?

[Alouiseg]

This stems from another couple of threads i'm on but until God can be proven isn't religion just an outdated patriachal method of control?

'Why should religion be respected?

Why?

Seriously.

I don't ecpect you to respect my beleifs, just my right to hold them

For me, God is more the Eastern form- an energy that we all hold a little bit of in ourseves that returns to the source when we die. I don't believe in a conscious God, though. Divine energy / atman / light etc

Alou can I ask what in my earlier post made it sopund unpleasant? It's anything but, asnd as I can't make meeting (not child friendly unless you drive to the nearest city) it's certainly not social either: it's just me, doing my best, trying to make sense of what I see

oojamaflip
I said underneath, that I was talking about one reason to join a religion, not the only reason. The question of whether god exists, what we mean by god, etc is a whole other question.

tinnitus, it is difficult to talk to you, past the insults. Several people who belong to a religion have said, and I have said several times on this thread that the religion helps us with our moral framework, and that we do NOT just pick up a set of beliefs that we are told to believe. But you persist in accusing religious people of simply picking up "what we are told to believe."
If you dont read my posts, its hard to discuss with you.

Did i say it sounded unpleasant? I don't think i responded to you at all.

Alouise

why thank you.

(although I think plenty of posters on here have shown their faith to be pleasant and reasonable. )

Yes it is so much more than a social thing but has been great for getting to know lots of different people too. But certainly in no way exclusively.

'yanbu to think it, OP. Tbh I am quite convinced that if I did not have the faith I have I would be utterly scornful towards those with faith, because from the outside it looks a load of bunkum.

'

Absolutely agree: even moreso I didn't have faith for a long while and that was how I felt, absolutely.

But nobody told me what to believe- I was raised atheist, married an agnostic, found my own way here. And I certainly wasn't handed a moral code by anyone either. That's developed over the years. I tried CofE in my twenties and it didn't work for me, it ws only once at Uni that I started to learn more about systems that amde sense to me, and fell in love with the writings of someone who was a primary thinker in the field of religious universalism which is the one that speaks loudest to me.

nighbynight - I can't accept joining a religon despite not believing in god as a method of self-improvement, but if it works for someone then what the hell.

Alou you said to another poster you are the only one to amke it sound pleasant...

tehrfore as I am on this I presume I amde it sound bad, not sure why?

Madhairday did make it sound pleasant. No one else's post quite grabbed me in the same way.

I didn't find your post unpleasant but I have a huge problem with organised religion as a whole. Which is probably why i posted originally. Fwiw Quakers are imho one of the least offensive groups. It's the extreme religions that use their faith as an excuse to commit atrocities and impose gender inequalities that make me wonder why people are so prepared to believe in them.

oojamaflip - we havent talked about belief in god, so I hope you dont think that that is my POV...

Yes, as a grad in world faiths I ccan quite understand your take on certain religions.

From what I have read / seen / come to think, most faiths start off from a fairly inocuous, even well emaning palce and then mankind gets hold of it and injects a fair amount of agenda then all sorts of horrid things happen.

Obviously if you actually beleive that (as an extreme) Sati is a psotive faiths tep rather than something required to reduce the burden of widowed tribeswomen on a village then you won't see it as separate: and it's not separate now. But i think the mind control / parriarchy / violence etc is the agenda of humanity.

Christianity after all, if you believe it, was founded to remember a wandering mendicant who preached something more akin to the peace faiths you encounter in Glastonbury: I think there are many now who try and follow that still, but the Church as an organisation IMO are far removed from that. Sadly.

OP have you ever prayed for anything?

nighbynight, when you describe how religion helps with the moral framework you seem to be just describing a discussion group

"I am not handed a moral framework on a plate merely by joining a religion"

So you are not saying the bible or the church supplies the morals?

"there is an incredibly broad spectrum of opinions within the C of E"

What is offered by other members is all different?

I'm sure it must be nice to chat to friends about these things, but it doesn't seem to require a god or indeed a religion to do so.

'it doesn't seem to require a god or indeed a religion to do so.
Nope you're right it doesn't

Church is just one place (or whatever religion one is) to get some dieas and if it makes people consider theiir values (and I know it doesn't some but there you go) that's a positive

pinkoliberal

My view is this: I may dissagree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it.

I will also say what the hell I want to say, and that is that religion is a delusion.

"Some people who follow religion are deluded, some aren't"

I've never heard anything so ridiculous in my life.

Does that sort of comment come from the sort of person who thinks that a devotion to their own particular favoured sky pixie is valid?

Religion is to reason what stone axes are to a chainsaw.

I know which one I'm using to chop my wood.

And Amber I have never asked you to do otherwise.

I don't care what anyone thinks about my beleifs: I know theya re illogical. Doesn't change the way I feel though- absolutely get ,y own faith is the triumph of hope over reasoon

Equally it has given me some form of comfort over a few rough years (2 disabled children) and if long term that's the only purpose it serves then for me at least that's a valid one.

I know you did not pinko, I'm just setting out my stall here.

The comfort purpose I can understand, however I still hope one day for a truly secular world.

A secular world would not worry me as l;ong as people are allowed their personal faiths ad to follow them without comeback (I dont mean garmful or cruelpractices, just the core fasiths)

My boys attend a state faith school as it is the only one ehre and TBH it is a nightmare; I would prefer secualr education myself. I'd keep religious education of the Islam means / Christianity means version as I beleive that works towards tolerance but that's it I thibk. A very religious head has actively harmed our school and it's a shame

Indeed I refused the Catholic Teachers Cert qual at Uni as I was so sure I would never work in such a school.

Personally, I haven't got a problem with anyone believing in anything they want to - be that Father Christmas, the Easter Bunny, fairies at the bottom of the garden, God or whatever it may be. If a belief in whatever they chose to believe in gives them comfort or hope and helps them through rough times etc then hey, that's great.

But..... what I do have a problem with is when such people come over all sanctimonious and judgemental and look down at people who close not to believe in the things that they believe in. Pity them and blame them for all the world's ills. People like Jehova's bloody Witnesses who refuse to stay out of other people's faces and intrude into their lives by knocking on their doors and spreading the nonsense they believe in and presenting it as if it some universal truth. To them maybe it is but to anyone else of sound mind it most certainly is not.

Religion is a private thing in my book and not something which should be presented to anyone, who does not choose to seek it out for themselves, as some sort of universally acknowledged truth.

Yanbu, definitely patriarchal, most of them. In some cases, very outdated, and yes pretty good at controlling people.

Don't think they necessarily always started out like that - good intentions and all that, but they seem to have become so.

Here is my take on this and this is close to my heart right now as I am working on my faith to be baptised.

My child attends a Faith school. If he was naughty (in reception) , the teacher would say that his behaviour wasn't good. Probably add some punishment like not playing at playtime. As they go up the years, they use the bible and various stories to get children to understand why they might be wrong and how God might see it.

My niece attends a non faith school and to be honest when she does something wrong, they say it's wrong and she says 'who says?'.Then you have the teacher after several TA's have tried, saying, 'well I do'. Since respect has gone away in this country my niece obvious answer is 'why?'

I think that faith gives a mystery, why is it so, it cannot be answered so it's magic type of thing.

Obviously, it does control people as the children from the faith school are left not knowing if they did something wrong, God might strike. Whereas the children from the non faith school would perhaps worry about their parents punishing them. Equaly, the children have both their God and their parents punishing them.

This probably makes not a modicum of sense but I thought I would add my bit.

Maybe that's why the faith schools do so well?

Genevieve Jehovah's witnesses believe they have to do that to be saved so they are a complex bunch

Generally though I agree about evangelism: maybe in year 120CE but most people know about religiojns and where to get info by now i think.

Although its important not to confuse evngelism with some of the good community work done by some: selling in a high pressutre way i dont like but neither should people hide their faiths.

And of courrse as you say Genevieve: the base issue is that someoone with a faith usually thinks they have the key to then universal truth. AS in fact do many non beleivers.And I gues if you;r thatb sure in yourr faith it would be odd not to want to share it.

I don't believe in God and feel that believers are deluded, but most christians follow a good moral code and if the idea of God gives them comfort then why not?

I still struggle to understand how intelligent and seemingly sane people continue to have faith in this age of technology.

It makes me shudder to think that my child would be educated in such an environment and under such a regime and so thankful that he is not.