Religion has caused more

chopitdown

angelica wrote:

Okay, I sort of agree with your first part. It looks like you think questioning and learning is enough, and the spirit will meet us. I believe we need to consciously intend to learn in the spirit of uncovering God's truth. If we do not, we are learning as our base, fallible human nature. The spirit will not overrule our choice to do so (free will) so we must consciously decide to align with this "Higher Self" or "Spirit". Looking to uncover Truth is different than learning what science, for example, knows at this time. I mean this in the sense that what we've uncovered is awesome, but it's by no means the full truth.

I agree that we need to learn in the spirit and the spirit uses questioning and learning at times. I also agree that with science we have some facts but it doesn't nec mean it is full truth... it's the best info we have at this point but it's not nec the full truth...which begs the discussion...can we ever know full truth (but that is also where I'm checking out)

angelica wrote:

In the second part, it looks like we part ways here (and please correct me if I assume wrong of you): you believe that the men who wrote the bible did not taint any idea with their humanness one iota. You believe that through time, the men who held the power over God's word in the bible were not just acting on God's behalf as fallible humans but that they were actually infallible while doing God's work?

That is correct, my presupposition, is that the men who wrote the Bible didn't taint (meaning corrupt) it with humanness. It is rife with lessons for humanness. I guess it also depends on what you mean by power of God's word and acting as falliable humans (if someone acts in a way contrary to the Bible they are not truly working on Gods behalf, imo). I believe that through time people have truly worked on Gods behalf and a great deal also believed they were acting on Gods behalf, but their actions reveal true motive and true character (flaws)

angelica wrote:

I believe they were human, and therefore as honourable as their intent was, or as enlightened as they were, they were still human, meaning they made mistakes based on who they were. Also I believe many others through time, with good intent, but with personal agendas (maybe unconscious) also tainted the Word. I also believe that we can interpret the bible and hear the truth at any time. Just like I can listen to you and hear the truth, or I can listen to a two year old and hear the truth, when I've got ears to hear. (meaning, when I am aligned to God and the Holy Spirit within me)

I take a different approach. I believe they were in contact with the spirit and the spirit guided the decisions; therefore making the decisions correct b/c they were in touch with God and God was guiding it. I don't believe it came down to human knowledge for the Bible being put together, rather divine intervention/ guidance.

angelica wrote:

In the end, you agree that the distortion done in the name of God has been due to human nature. It's been plenty. It's been real, and it's been obscene. The atrocities humans do fall very short of God, whether God's name is invoked or not.

we agree wholeheartedly here.

chopitdown

IndianSummer wrote:

i didnt write that.

having said that, i have no love for missionaries or any other people who proselytyse in any way, causing social-cultural-religious genocide. missionaries are the reason that all pagan religions, cultures, values, traditions have almost disappeared from the earth.

are you trying to get me to believe that proselytysing is bad?

chopitdown

IndianSummer wrote:

interesting review of the book on the amazon website -



Missionaries and colonialism go hand in hand. There is are many accounts of missionaries paving the road for colonial powers. Some of the teaching was that the kingdom of Africans was to be set up in heaven if and only if they would be slaves to whiles. Many twisted ideas. Missionaries are truly evil because they knew what they were doing. Many many missionaries were caught for pedophilia in Philippines and Thailand and other areas of the world. Two years ago, a child prostitution ring conducted by missionaries was broken in Peru...there are many examples of atrocities committed by missionaries around the world.

there are also accounts of missionaries doing good things...but focus on what you wish.

angelica

IndianSummer wrote:

i didnt write that.

having said that, i have no love for missionaries or any other people who proselytyse in any way, causing social-cultural-religious genocide. missionaries are the reason that all pagan religions, cultures, values, traditions have almost disappeared from the earth.

Fair enough.

I personally don't have a problem with people who feel love in their hearts and choose to share it with others. There is a fine line one must walk doing so in order to not abuse power.

Unforuntely those with an abundance of power connect up with those with a lack of power and these cycles are perpetuated on many levels beyond religion. I see it as where humans are at this point in evolution, in general.

angelica

chopitdown wrote:

I agree that we need to learn in the spirit and the spirit uses questioning and learning at times. I also agree that with science we have some facts but it doesn't nec mean it is full truth... it's the best info we have at this point but it's not nec the full truth...which begs the discussion...can we ever know full truth (but that is also where I'm checking out)




That is correct, my presupposition, is that the men who wrote the Bible didn't taint (meaning corrupt) it with humanness. It is rife with lessons for humanness. I guess it also depends on what you mean by power of God's word and acting as falliable humans (if someone acts in a way contrary to the Bible they are not truly working on Gods behalf, imo). I believe that through time people have truly worked on Gods behalf and a great deal also believed they were acting on Gods behalf, but their actions reveal true motive and true character (flaws)



I take a different approach. I believe they were in contact with the spirit and the spirit guided the decisions; therefore making the decisions correct b/c they were in touch with God and God was guiding it. I don't believe it came down to human knowledge for the Bible being put together, rather divine intervention/ guidance.




we agree wholeheartedly here.

Okay, thanks for your view.

I do believe divine intervention happens all the time, to this day, when we create the circumstances that allow it. And I do believe enlightened people are enlightened and see truth. However, humans are human at all levels and make mistakes even when enlightened, and my only understanding of truth comes from the spirit in me. For me personally, to give anyone or any source blanket approval is to give up my most precious tool: the voice of spirit in me.

I see God working through people around me all the time. People allow intervention by their own ignorance. Other times they allow divine intervention consciously, and it shines through them.

IndianSummer

chopitdown wrote:

are you trying to get me to believe that proselytysing is bad?

yes its plain evil.

the world's cultural and religious heritage is the much worse for it (proselytisation). and wars have been fought, kids kidnapped and made to grow up with different parents (in australia for example, aboroginal kids were made to grow up in white-christian households so that they would grow up forgetting all their heritage, culturally religiousl etc etc), entire civilizations razed (latin america), and entire peoples genocided because of proselytisation.

IndianSummer

chopitdown wrote:

there are also accounts of missionaries doing good things...but focus on what you wish.

sure there are.

but whether a certain bunch of missionaries does or not have its fair share of paedophilles, racists (as in the africa example of the quotation) etc, the end result is always the same.

social-religious genocide and the permanent depletion of the culture, values, traditions and religious believes of the people at the receiving end (pun intended) of the missionaries, the "hardsellers" of their religion.

IndianSummer

angelica wrote:

Fair enough.

I personally don't have a problem with people who feel love in their hearts and choose to share it with others. There is a fine line one must walk doing so in order to not abuse power.

Unforuntely those with an abundance of power connect up with those with a lack of power and these cycles are perpetuated on many levels beyond religion. I see it as where humans are at this point in evolution, in general.

i always saw and will see all acts of proseletysation as acts of intolerance for another's beliefs. i like red shirts, so i am going to make sure the next guy also takes to red shirts, chucking his blue ones for good.

El_Kabong

know1 wrote:

Those things have stopped, right? Who stopped them?

If that's your logic, what did the NON-RELIGIOUS people do to stop them?

usually things like get burned at the stake or imprisoned or stoned to death or something else...so, again...where were the 'real' christians? easier to just go along w/ things and not rock the boat and be next on the bar-b, eh?

as for who stopped them, see my reply to chop it down below

chopitdown wrote:

in re: to the witch trials, it was also a minister who caused them to stop. And the judge who started the trials confessed his own guilt.

yes....but;
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_701701818/Salem_Witch_Trials.html

Trials of women and men for witchcraft were common in Europe from the 1300s to the end of the 1600s. Most of these trials were of women, and most of these women were poor.

Hundreds of thousands of innocent women and men were executed during this 300-year period in what historians have called a “witchcraft craze.”


so a religious person finally had the balls to stop it...too bad it only took 'hundreds of thousands of deaths' and '300 years' to accomplish this feat

El_Kabong

know1 wrote:

That was my point as well. I'm sure it will be roundly ignored. The truth doesn't matter as long as you can persecute religion.

sorry, but a religion that takes 300 years to have someone realize executing hundreds of thousands of ppl for being a witch was wrong deserves to be persecuted a bit.

Pearl Jam and toast

cornnifer wrote:

Seriously, you are FOS on this one. Point to ONE passage of scripture, one tennnat or core teaching of ANY religion that justifies any of the "evil" you describe. ONE core teaching of ANY religion. Unless you can do this, there is no teeth to your statement that Religion causes evil. No teeth whatsoever.

nooo you are full of shit.

my point was not that the bible (or any scripture) said "go kill people who aren't your faith" but people choose religion to back up what they do!

Look at the fucking crusades if you want a perfect example.

I can't even believe you'd fucking argue that people kill in the name of their god, that's not even the issue we're debating here, really. Maybe that the violence is caused by lots of other things but very often led by the "killing in the name of" mentality for reasons we've been talking about..

Seriously, chill out you quack, you can talk about the bad sides of religion without attack anyone's beliefs.

El_Kabong

.......................

know1

El_Kabong wrote:

sorry, but a religion that takes 300 years to have someone realize executing hundreds of thousands of ppl for being a witch was wrong deserves to be persecuted a bit.

That is a broad, broad brush you're painting that generalization with...

El_Kabong

know1 wrote:

That is a broad, broad brush you're painting that generalization with...

not when you add the black plague, the crusades, the inquisitions, the rape, torture and burning at the stake of joan of arc...into the color palette...a couple hundred thousand here, a couple hundred thousand there...it kinda adds up after a bit

and as i've stated several times in the past, my view of organized religion does not translate towards someone who considers themself part of that religion just for being part of the religion.

know1

El_Kabong wrote:

not when you add the black plague, the crusades, the inquisitions, the rape, torture and burning at the stake of joan of arc...into the color palette...a couple hundred thousand here, a couple hundred thousand there...it kinda adds up after a bit

and as i've stated several times in the past, my view of organized religion does not translate towards someone who considers themself part of that religion just for being part of the religion.

Since I'm obviously not as enlightened as you, please explain to me how the religion caused or made the black plague worse...

IndianSummer

you will notice that in 9/10 religion related carnages, there was a secondary abrahamic religion (ie christianity and islam), on one if not both sides of it.

RockinInCanada

Its the whackos who use religion that cause strife not the religion iteself....in general religion should be good...its the greedy/unenlightened that give religion a bad name....such as Bush for Christians or bin Laden for Islam....both fools using a group to push an agenda...and like the previous post two religions one on each side....

IndianSummer

IndianSummer wrote:

you will notice that in 9/10 religion related carnages, there was a secondary abrahamic religion (ie christianity and islam), on one if not both sides of it.

for the last almost 2000 years i shoudl have added, not just the recent past .

Byrnzie

Rockin'InCanada wrote:

Its the whackos who use religion that cause strife not the religion iteself....in general religion should be good...its the greedy/unenlightened that give religion a bad name....such as Bush for Christians or bin Laden for Islam....both fools using a group to push an agenda...and like the previous post two religions one on each side....

That has some truth to it. The site of Bush, and Clinton before him, walking into a church to pray, as the consequences of his actions unfold under a blanket of bombs overseas, whilst being a great publicity stunt, surely makes anyone with an iota of sense wince. It really is quite sickening the depths to which these pigs will stoop.
As far as religion and conflict being intrinsically linked however, that's a tough one. Although as I said above, once you create any ideology, creed, or dogma, then you are courting danger. Any form of idealism will attract those who seek to create divisions and strife. Communism, for example, is on the surface a perfectly reasonable political ideology. But then human nature throws a spanner in the works - you get your Stalins and your Chairman Mao's. Perhaps the same historical impulses have applied in the case of the major religions?

IndianSummer

what christianity and islam are in the realm of religion, marxism and communism are in the realm of politics. both pairs, are means of fully controlling others lives - in one case religiously and in another politically, just cos someone/some ideology, said that thats the way a person's religious/political life and beliefs should be. and both pairs have stopped at little (or nothing) to propage their religious/political beliefs and exert their control over more people.