Mao, Stalin and also Pol Pot were not Atheist's, they may have tried to exterminate Religion, but I never have read that they killed in the name of Religion, I have read though, that alot of Christians like to say they were into Social Darwinism.
Then do you see the error in attributing the actions of individuals to religion? Catholic priests didn't molest children in the name of Christianity. They were messed up people who happened to be priests.
Dammit man, I already have a list of books I need to read from a Christian friend who says the books will change my life.
Thats not a book that will "change your life." (I don't think.) Its a book by a world renowned sociologist about the resurgence of religions around the world, contrary to the previously held idea by most sociologists that religion would continue to decline due to a more logical and scientific understanding of the world.
And as you cannot prove it is gods word. So we can just stop it there.
You may think the burden of proof is set on me, but he who makes the root claim, has the burden of proof.(and BTW, the root claim is that the bible is gods word)
I don't think you understand what religion is, and you don't seem to know much about Christian theology.
wubbie075 said:
This is an extraordinarily naive and misinformed statement. Yes, an individual can make an individual choice. But, by and large, people take the religion of their family or culture or region. It is fact borne out by every statistical examination.
But again, I'll play. Please describe the path you took to choose your religion. Please list each religion you considered before making your choise. Please explain in detail how you compared each one to make this choice. Did you make "Pro vs Con" lists? Did you attend services for each of these religions? Observe their respective holy days and ceremonies?
Finally, answer one more question. Is the religion you finally settled on the same one of your parents?
This is not unique to religion. Do you have a moral understanding similar to your parents? You were born into Western culture, and have been "brainwashed" if you want to put it like that to accept the moral system of that culture.
Do you think women should have rights equal to a man, or should they be protected and sheltered from the outside world? Do you think a government controlled by the people is "right" or should societies be ruled by individuals with divine rights?
The morals you have, weather you believe in some mystical spirit or not, have been implanted in you in just they way you fault religion for. Have you reviewed, studied and analyzed all the various morals and value systems of all cultures to determine which one is "correct?" What did you use as a standard? How did you judge one against the other?
Its the way human civilizations work, religion has just always been a convenient way to pass along the traditions and moral understandings of a civilization.
wubbie075 said:
I'll admit it is slightly easier to do this in the US than in many other places, but you simply cannot dismiss the social pressures with something like this. How many times were potential friendships nipped in the bud due to religious differences.
Have you lost friendships due to moral differences? If you had a friend that, refused all cultural pressures and programing and freely determined African Americans are inferior a women's place is in the home and a man has the right to enforce his will on his family through violence, would you continue to be his friend?
What your talking about isn't something inherent in religion, but inherent in human civilization. If every individual formulation their own moral code from scratch, with no input or influence from any of their fellow citizens, it would be chaos. There would be no such thing as a distinguishable culture anywhere.
wubbie075 said:
Back to the topic at hand, I personally lost a woman I loved, who claimed to love me, who admitted that we did not disagree on any significant issue of morality or lifestyle, except for the fact that she is catholic and I do not believe in god. I am certainly not the only person this has happened to. I also will not claim that it has never been the atheist who was the one to end similar relationships. I am sure that happens too, and in those cases, the atheist is just as wrong to do so.
Again, how is this some fault of religion? It could have easily been over strongly held beliefs about secular politics, animal rights, musical preferences, career choices, or any number of things. If a women left a man because he wouldn't go vegan, and she couldn't accept living with a man who slaughtered cows for food, would that be the fault of animal rights? Or would it be her fault for not being able to get past some issue?
wubbie075 said:
However, I do believe it is much more likely that a religious family would forbid a child to marry someone because of a different religion or lack thereof, than an atheistic family would forbid their child to marry a religious person.
I can easily see an atheist family not approving of their daughter marrying a bible thumping missionary... again, this has more to do with humans than anything intrinsic to a belief or lack of, in a higher spirit.
bbrosen said:
There never was an original Bible. Ever. anywhere. The modern day bible as we know it is a collection of writings spanning a wide swath of time from an eclectic bunch of writers and scholars and followers
Yes, the Christian bible is a collection of religious texts from various times. But the first time the texts were compiled into the "bible" that was the original bible.
The Christian bible, didn't just fall out of the sky one day, in its current form. It wasn't dictated word for word by God himself, like Islamic theology believes about the Koran. Its a collection of stories that impart a moral understanding of the world... and if your a faithful adherent to Christianity, you believe these man written stories and ideas were divinely inspired by God.
wubbie075 said:
My opinion is that regardless of how it started, whether the intention was benign or not, religion is used more as a means of control (both on an individual level and on a larger scale with political). They have a long history of stifling progressive thought of any kind. The catholic church is pretty much the prime example of that, but most smaller churches, parishes, congregations, etc. do the same thing, whether it is in social areas, education or politics.
You do realize that most scientists and philosophers for the last few thousand years were doing their research and adding to the knowledge of mankind in the name of religion right?
