Not with the use of a dictionary and don't refer to one either before responding. Be honest....what does it mean to you? What does the word: "Religion" entail in your word bank? And are you a follower of a Religion under "your" definition?
Religion means organized spirituality. That is, religion is the social aspect of spirituality, with common shared beliefs and rituals, and usually with a leadership aspect, though it may not be centralized all of the time (the Pope would be central authority, a Muslim cleric would be decentralized authority). Religion is what people do rather than to have any meaningful spiritual quest of their own. It's sort of the easy way out. I am not a follower of a religion by this definiton. Though many beliefs I have are shared with other people, I have no community, no leader, no rituals, no sacred scriptures. My practices are my own in as much as I consider myself independant, even if I didn't invent every belief myself. Basically, I'm into personal spirituality (which is the only kind of spirituality there is, if you ask me).
In my opinion, a religion is any belief system based on an ulitmate value (or set of ultimate values) that is (are) unquestionable. I don't believe that I'm a follower under this definition, but I could be wrong.
Religion is the relationship between all living beings and the ultimate reality. Regardless of whether or not one is conscious of it (and regardless of whether one: 1- Personifies the ultimate reality and calls him/her God, Allah, Adonai, YHWH, Vishnu, Shiva, etc. or 2 - refers to it, impersonally, as the Tao, the Universe, the great ground of being, etc. or 3 - isn't sure or 4 - doesn't believe this ultimate reality exists at all) by this definition, everyone has a religion, wherein one is a living being who lives according to one's relationship to this ultimate reality. Simple, Yes? Peace and Love
Religion - A uniform method of community responsibility to give people hope and allow them to live as one and work toward a common goal.
religeon or organized religeon? these are very different biesties. religeon, also called faith, belief and spirituality; one's personal, private, individual relationtionship between oneself and whatever one personaly happens to believe in. organzied religeon; a lot of people getting togather, often though not always, led by a priesthood of some sort, in the name of belief, often a named belief, they may or may not personaly feel, more often then not as a resault of a sort of momentum of the familiar, about which little if any honest thought has actualy been given. generaly well intended in oregin. and nearly as often unfortunate in consiquence. in personal 'religeon' there may well be something like a god or gods. in organized religeon it is more like a picture of a cat. not even a real picture. though it may be of a real cat. i'm definately not saying there can't be exceptions, it's just that any sort of real spiritual experience is a totaly personal thing. people togather sometimes 'get high' on the idea of god. people alone with their beliefs, sometimes, 'get high' WITH their 'god' or gods'. with the whatever is really there that does not begin and end with what they or anyone else thinks they know about it. people who 'get high' WITH their 'god's', don't HAVE to tell anyone else how to get high ABOUT their god or gods. =^^= .../\...
Religion is a way of life, thinking, doing, acting, and behaving. My religion/philosophy is rationalism and goodness.
Religion is documentation of the disease that "MAN" truly is to the human species and every other form of LIFE on this Earth. Religion = Man = Disease
For me it is the way some very paranoid or very evil people pretend to be in contact with god or to be his envoy and to hold the truth in order to gain authority over the rest of the population and political and economical power by taking advantage of their ignorance and fears, and the way this people deceive themselves prefering to believe to to think rationally and critically. It is obvious that no one god has ever contacted with the humankind. All the "envoies" were just lunatics or very devious men. We've seen many examples of them in the recent years. If Jesus lived today nobody would believe him and he would be rightly in a lunatic hospital. All what people have said and written about god is just their invention. If God wanted us to believe in Him or to contact us He would show Himself to all us in an absolutely distinctive and convincing way.
