opinions please...

[greendog]

...does religion cause more harm in the world than good?

[mibn2cweus]

The answer, as frightening as it is to many of us, is that we must find it individually, each of us for ourselves and find a way to come to a mutual agreement with each other on the rules we use to interact in partnerships and as a society. This task of developing and constructing a working cohesive moral and ethical system can only be accomplished based on a philosophical system grounded in reality that recognizes the essential needs of individuals, among these the need to establish the means for entering into and maintaining mutually beneficial interpersonal relationships. A successful outcome presupposes the willingness of each of us to acknowledge the responsibility we can not escape for maintaining our own lives and freedom, for finding happiness in the process of living and for defending each other from those who are unwilling to acknowledge and fulfill this responsibility. Sweet Mother of God, help us all!

atheist charity

[jake-the-peg]

I know we've been around this before Clanad but any religion has a set of beliefs which identify them and which if challenged they will defend to the hilt because these beliefs challange their very identity

In Gallileo's day the solar system was the battle ground, The church threatened, imprisoned and banned.

Next it was evolution, that battle has been mostly won only now the church does not hold the reigns of power so it must fight in the media and in the courts.

In the next century I predict it will be the soul. We will understand more and more about how our brains work and the idea of a soul will in time seem as outdated as that of Adam and Eve.

I wonder how far we are from a concious machine and how the religions of the world will react to that?

<looks into crstal ball> I see politicians banning their creation with hysterical newspaper headlines and lots of showings of The Matrix and Terminator on the TV

[spk]

I think its impossible to imagine our world without religion, so I find it difficult to have an opinion on whether it does "more harm than good" If we didnt have religion how else would people try to explain the world we live in? Society need to try and make sense, and the truth is we know frighteningly little about life, whats been before and why and how the world is really here. We are a tiny drop in the ocean of the world as its unfolding. Religion to me is mans way of trying to understand something its not meant to and never really will

[Quizmonster]

Dear Zacsmaster, I took a few minutes to look back over my 100 most recent posts and found that 5 of them referred to dictionary definitions. 5%...majority?..vast?
Using a dictionary doesn't seem to me to be an unreasonable approach when one is discussing a word's meaning!
However, I am more than happy to worship at the shrine of Timothy Taylor's Landlord...or Deuchar's IPA...or Oakham JHB...so, with such a toast in mind, let's just leave it at that.

[bigmalc]

Jake the Peg, there was a fascinating Horizon programme on BBC2 on Tuesday about the very subject of 'thinking' computers and technology. Quite mind-blowing stuff. Some top boffins suggest that a thinking supercomputer, many trillion times more powerful than a human brain may be possible within twenty years.
I think, however, that this advance in technology will force us to delve even further into our own conciousness and sub-conciousness, as we will then have to face the question of whether machines are capable of having a soul. And by creating these 'thinking' machines do we inevitably assume a God-like status ourselves, thus giving rise to a new form of religion?

[noxlumos]

I'm sure that Clannad's thousands of starving and struggling people who gain assistance from the Church, would have preferred it if the kind Sisters who dole out food to their dying babies had not taught them that contraception was a sin. It's preferable every time to have good common sense contraceptive advice rather than thousands of starving aids ridden babies who will shortly become orphans because vital info was kept from their parents by the Catholic church. Likewise we have the Magdalane Laundries, active in Ireland until frighteningly recently. The hard right reborn Christian pro-life brigade in the US are causing untold damage and harm to girls who find themselves in need of an abortion and curtailing human rights left , right and centreetc etc etc.To imply there was no religious motive in WWII is so laughable that I'll not even bother responding personally, just have a look at any decent history websites for the concensus on that.
Muslim fundamentalism is increasiongly behind terrorist attcks both on non-Muslims but also against fellow Muslims who happen to be the wrong kind of Muslim.
There was a hanging in India not so long ago of a couple who were committed to marrying outside of the Hindu caste system and Sikhs violently boycotted the staging of a play by a Sikh lady who implied that child abuse and sexual assault was rife within that community.
Israel is the thug of the Middle East.
I am a Catholic raised man with a Jewish wife and friends of all religions and I do recognise the good done by people all over the world but I am hard pressed to find many instances where the good religious people do outweighs the bad done by other religious people.

[mibn2cweus]

Zacsmaster, I have many theories on which I base my answers. Here is an example of how I responded to the question that generated this thread, �does religion cause more harm in the world than good?�

I first asked myself several related and specific questions, the answers of which are necessary to lay a foundation for answering the question raised, I.e., What is the origin and purpose of religion? By what means and how well does it (religion) perform a useful function? Is the function religion is intended to fulfill a necessary function and if so necessary for what and why? Is there or could there be a better alternative?
What does �the world� refer to in the context of this question? What is �harm�; �good�?

I have found that answering these questions is not only important but crucial to my own well-being as well as the welfare of humanity and have devoted a great deal of time to searching for those answers. I have tried to provide the simplest answers I can to shed some light on what is a complex and profoundly important issue. If you will enlighten me as to what you perceive as a theory of mine I will attempt to provide an example. Thank You for informing me of your interest.

[Clanad]

So, noxlumos, the children being cared for are taught a Church precept... you'd rather they starve than be taught something sincerely believed? Unique concept...
Another concept that boggles the mind is your belief that the nealry 40 million babies aborted since the inception of the Roe v. Wade decision some 25 years ago shouldn't be protested against... We've lost an entire generation due to the abortion industry. You fail to mention that there a thousands of caring people, mainly Christians, that either volunteer time or money to build facilities for unwed mothers. There is a waiting list of people wanting, desperately, to adopt babies form the facility, if the mother chooses to give them up. They are cared for, and by law, if they choose to abort their baby, they are still cared for and loved during recovery... which, by the way can take years once they come to grips with the enormity of their actions. Such after abortion care isn't available from the abortion industry, by the way.
We just concluded planning and attendance at an annual banquet to rasie funds for just such a facility. Doctors and nurses and trained counselors volunteer their time, and in our rather small population area, raised nearly $300,000 to fund it for the next year.
I won't even begin to describe the late term abortion procedure, which many still feel is necessary...
Tell me about the religious aspects of WWII... Hitler's attempted annihilation of the Jews was based on their race>/I> not their religion... So you must mean the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor out of religious fervor?

[mibn2cweus]

hitler�s religion

Please don�t ask me why you do not find more articles like this in a good x-tian country like the US?

[noxlumos]

Clannad , you and I never see eye to eye on anything, however this time your own personal religious fervour has really excelled itself in demonstrating what a truly self righteous individual you are. At no point did I say that starving children should not be cared for, I merely suggested that if the church was as truly benificent as you would have us believe, then they would do the people of that pillaged continent a favour and not tell them lies to make their situation worse by virtually ensuring that more children are bred who cannot be fed or cared for when simple contraceptive advice would have halted the birthrate and thus eased the misery for all of those involved.
Moving onto the hard right pro life mob, from a purely personal level I find abortion repugnant too oddly enough. I am however a compassionate man I like to think and I have seen first hand the great evils inflicted on women who are forced to continue with pregnancies that they cannot cope with.Strangely the USA is not the only country in the world and we do have, in the UK, a law preventing terminations after the 21st week, so yes I think here we have the balance about right between child's rights and mother's wellbeing, in a situation where there can be no happy outcome whether the child is "kept",adopted or aborted.
I cannot believe that you choose to show your ignorance of the Third Reich to such huge proportions and I am not going to clog up this forum spoon feeding you quotes from websites you are quite capable of googling for yourself.
I appreciate that you are American but there was slightly more to World War II than Pearl Harbour.
I notice also that you only attempt to defend any remarks about Christians I made. Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs or Jews apparently can be left to be the "bad religion" scapegoats then can they, whilst the shining Christian church spreads light and happiness wherever it goes a la Spanish Inquisition? Jolly bunch they were.

[Clanad]

So, mibn the fact that Hitler had some sort of religion makes the entire war one of religion? Unique concept. there is no discernible religious basis for WWII, even considering the individuals involve may have had religious beliefs...
The refuge for those with weak arguments, noxlumos is ad hominem attacks. If you can provide any shred of evidence that the Third Reich had a basis for it's action based in relifion, I will gladly capitulate the argument. As already shown, Hitler, et al saw the Jews as a despised race more than any religious component.

I suppose I'm the only one here that finds your contention that an aborted baby, tossed in a garbage can to be burned with the rest of the day's trash being at least as desirable an outcome to the baby being continued to term with full support and then being gladly, no... joyously welcomed into a waiting adoptive home... sad in the extreme... Again... unique concept... and finally, your retreat to historical abuses by individuals of any religion are rather meaningless. Anyone can abuse a great idea, but it doesn't change the ideals and sound premises on which the idea is based...

[noxlumos]

Right here we go then Clanad since you insist, and while we are at it lets clear up up this argumentum ad hominem of which I am accused. I have never agreed with a single thing you have said on this board ( opinion wise) and as far as I am aware you have never agreed with anything I have said either.Should you ever say anything which I believe,(opinion wise,you are often very concise with facts) to be right, I will hapily be the first person to admit it. ( I did actually say on a purely personal level that I regret any woman's decision to have an abortion, which to some small degree agrees with your own viewpoint) so your accusation of personal attack for it's own sake is null and void and actually quite offensive to me. If I believe you to be right I will say so, sadly our opinions differ widely on nearly everything, but i do liove in hope we might agree one day about something.

Right the Third Reich and it's religious war mongering.

"The anti-Semitism of the new movement [Christian Social movement] was based on religious ideas instead of racial knowledge". [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 3]

This quote preceeds the outbreak of WW2 considerably and refers to the establishment of the CS.

"the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew". [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 11, precisely echoing Martin Luther's teachings]

Evil is a purely religious concept as is the Devil, niether have any place in a racial stereotype, merely a religious one.
"The greatness of Christianity did not lie in attempted negotiations for compromise with any similar philosophical opinions in the ancient world, but in its inexorable fanaticism in preaching and fighting for its own doctrine". [Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 1 Chapter 12]
Mein Kampf is littered from beginning to end with religiously (not just racially) motivated anti-

[noxlumos]

cont
Mein Kampf is littered from beginning to end with religiously (not just racially) motivated anti-semitism calling for the violent extermination of all people of the Jewish faith.
"Berlin Churches Establish Bureau to Win Back Worshippers"
Wireless to the New York Times.
BERLIN, May 13. - In Freethinkers Hall, which before the Nazi resurgence was the national headquarters of the German Freethinkers League, the Berlin Protestant church authorities have opened a bureau for advice to the public in church matters. Its chief object is to win back former churchgoers and assist those who have not previously belonged to any religious congregation in obtaining church membership.
The German Freethinkers League, which was swept away by the national revolution, was the largest of such organizations in Germany. It had about 500,000 members ... [New York Times, May 14, 1993, page 2, on Hitler's outlawing of atheistic and freethinking groups in Germany in the Spring of 1933, after the Enabling Act authorizing Hitler to rule by decree]
Now as to the causes of WWII itself, these are indeed many fold and one would be hard pressed to blame religious fanatisism alone, however as is demonstarted above Hitler ruled by decree. His words, his ideas, his madness was taken as writ.Likewise his strange christian bias' and hatred of Jews and Jewish converts ( particularly important if we are discussing religion vs race as a reason for annihilation).
I am not going to prolong this argument, you are very capable of finding things out for yourself Clanad, and they are there to be found out, you just realise what a mammoth task it is to explain every detail of WWII on here in under 2000 characters.The leader of antagonist Nazi Germany was a fundamental Christian who believed that all Jews, racial and religious needed to be wiped out. It's a very simple thing to grasp, and not something any credible historians have a problem with.

[noxlumos]

Jehovah witness's were also targteted by Nazi Germany but equally targeted apparently in the US at the same time. See Judging Jehovah's Witnesses,Religious Persecution and the Dawn of the Rights Revolution by Shawn Francis Peters, please don't take my word for it ( mainly in the "Bible Belt" Southern States apparently).
In an ideal world there would be no abortion I agree, but a foetus at 21 weeks, in my humble opinion, and in the opinion of legislators in most civilsed countries, cannot take equal precedence to a girl or woman whose long term well being is going to be shattered by being forced by people like you to carry a child she does not want ( often because of rape, abuse, force, coercion) to term, then be compelled by her society or her social situation to give up her child to someone else.You cannot support a girl through that, some situations are far too wretched. I rather like your "unwed mothers" turn of phrase, it about sums up the whole problem with institutions like that. There were anonymous mass graves at the Magdalen Laundries, women who had died or been murdered with no death certificate, no Christian burial as such and no care or thought for them by the Church who did it to them.We in Ireland are still awaiting a satisfactory conclusion to this most disgusting display of church evil and arrogance.
http://www.netreach.net/~steed/magdalen.html
And finally, you can hardly describe the Spanish Inquisition as a few individuals. They were the instrument of the Mother Church, the official lynch mob, the strong arm of Christianity adhereing to Church in all they did, and butchering anyone whose views did not correspond.
Also can you manage to make a single post without using the phrase "unique concept" when actually it's anything but.

[greendog]

I can appreciate the many wonderful religious organisations out there that are doing a lot of good in some of the most poverty stricken places in the world, and the should be commended. But what about Band-Aid? A non-religious organisation that has contributed huge amounts of financial support to the cause, not to mention the widespread media coverage these areas received as a result.

Clanad�s banquet raised $300,000 for adoption facilities; again, highly commendable. But compare this to the Iraq War where the cost to the American people alone, is far in excess of $300,000,000,000 and counting. What�s the war in Iraq got to do with it I hear you ask. Well without Islamic (religious) extremists, the Bush administration would have no excuse to fight a war that is clearly motivated by oil.

Abortion � why do women have abortions? I suppose it must be that they feel they�re not financially or emotionally stable enough to have a child. Or maybe they have been raped and can�t bear the thought of the rapist�s seed growing inside of them. Perhaps their reason for aborting a child is borne out of shame, a shame instilled in them by their families, society, RELIGION!

[greendog]

Studies have been made of the affect of religion on society noting the correlation with higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator, and higher rates of crime such as: murder, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion.

To sift your way through every argument for and against religion would be an impossible task. So my solution is not to try to break it down into its component parts, but to try to simplify this most complex and multifaceted of questions�
If you tell someone that they cannot do something, will they want to do it all the more?

I think religion could be a much more effective sociological tool if there was only one true religion. But there isn�t. There are many different religions, all with slightly varying systems and beliefs and here in, as far as I�m concerned, lies the problem.

[Clanad]

The ad hominem reference was prompted by your remark, noxlumos by "... what a truly self-rightous person you are...". Seems personal to me, but I can handle that... Firstly, any indepth study of the personalities primary in WWII can reveal unsavory, violent and truly despicable ideals. Hitler said, in writing your referenced "Mein Kampf"...Their [the Freemasons] hierarchical organization and the initiation through symbolic rites, that is to say without bothering the brains but by working on the imagination through magic and the symbols of a cult - all this is the dangerous element and the element I have taken over. Don't you see that our party must be of this character?...An Order, that is what it has to be - an Order, the hierarchical Order of a secular priesthood."
The cultic nature of the leadership of the SS, especially Goebbels is well documented. So, unbelievably, on that aspect we agree. However, try as you might you can produce few if any slogans, banners or other accoutrements that we see today in the Islamo-Facists origins of the struggle in the middle east. The entire promotion of the Islamic Jihad originates with the Imams. No such "religious" leader existed in Germany, Italy or Japan. Source after source insists the most prominent, underlying cause of WW!! was nationalism coupled with a radical militarism that infected Germany, Italy and Japan...
Contd.

[Clanad]

We're certainly not going to solve anything to do with the abortion problem, and I can only address the facts here in the U.S. But one aspect you focus on is the woman faced with carrying a baby that's the result of rape or other traumatic cause. Fact is, according to the Alan Guttmacher Institute, 6 million American women become pregnant every year � almost half of them unmarried. The abortion rate for unmarried women is four times greater than that of married women. Obviously, these women engage in irresponsible and risky sexual behavior with men who are poor candidates for marriage and even worse candidates for fatherhood. Of those 3 million unmarried pregnant women, almost half have an abortion and almost half become single mothers. Very few of them marry the father of their child or give the child up for adoption.
Additionaly, and even more troubling, the same study indicates during the time that the number of repeat abortions has been increasing, the number of women who choose abortion for the first time has decreased very steadily. Women who had not previously had a live birth accounted for 90 percent of the decline in the number of abortions from 1990 to 2000 �� only 40 percent of all abortions. By the late 1990s, though, more than 45 percent of all abortions were being performed on women with previous abortions. By the year 2000, the share of abortions accounted for by women with children increased to 60 percent of the total. If you can defend this killing of babies for birth control reasons... have at it...

Contd.