A lil’ side note about Religion-Why I am agnostic...

To Be Read by Open-Minded People Only

Just remember all you religious people-by the simple power of percentages you are most likely wrong! Seems the only safe way is to ride the fence-I dont know about a "god"-seems there is not enough if any to prove or disprove his extistence...

I find it hard to believe that an all loving and forgiving "god" will punish the poor souls, who for whatever reason, where not able to except him as the savior or people such as myself.



I just look at all the war and hate started in the name of religion or "god" and think its sad. Religion was started and continued by man, therefore it has and will always have evils.

Funny, that when both sides are going to war, they both pray to "god" to protect over them and help them become victorious. Does this mean that whoever "wins" said war had "god" on their side? Look at the Muslims and the Jews in the east-have been fighting since, well I don't think we really know, and are continuing to fight because they have always been fighting. Its sad when you can participate in killing, yet you really don't know what it is you are killing the other man for, except for the fact that he is trying to kill you, makes you think it would make a resolution simple and quick.




Not trying to pick on Christianity, but I think many of these can be applied to other monotheistic religions as well:




Top Ten Signs You're a Fundamentalist Christian


10 - You vigorously deny the existence of thousands of gods claimed by other religions, but feel outraged when someone denies the existence of yours.



9 - You feel insulted and "dehumanized" when scientists say that people evolved from other life forms, but you have no problem with the Biblical claim that we were created from dirt.



8 - You laugh at polytheists, but you have no problem believing in a Triune God.



7 - Your face turns purple when you hear of the "atrocities" attributed to Allah, but you don't even flinch when hearing about how God/Jehovah slaughtered all the babies of Egypt in "Exodus" and ordered the elimination of entire ethnic groups in "Joshua" including women, children, and trees!



6 - You laugh at Hindu beliefs that deify humans, and Greek claims about gods sleeping with women, but you have no problem believing that the Holy Spirit impregnated Mary, who then gave birth to a man-god who got killed, came back to life and then ascended into the sky.



5 - You are willing to spend your life looking for little loopholes in the scientifically established age of Earth (few billion years), but you find nothing wrong with believing dates recorded by Bronze Age tribesmen sitting in their tents and guessing that Earth is a few generations old.



4 - You believe that the entire population of this planet with the exception of those who share your beliefs -- though excluding those in all rival sects - will spend Eternity in an infinite Hell of Suffering. And yet consider your religion the most "tolerant" and "loving."



3 - While modern science, history, geology, biology, and physics have failed to convince you otherwise, some idiot rolling around on the floor speaking in "tongues" may be all the evidence you need to "prove" Christianity.



2 - You define 0.01% as a "high success rate" when it comes to answered prayers. You consider that to be evidence that prayer works. And you think that the remaining 99.99% FAILURE was simply the will of God.



1 - You actually know a lot less than many atheists and agnostics do about the Bible, Christianity, and church history - but still call yourself a Christian.




As far as the three questions(" a) What happens when you die. b) What are the origins of the world. c) who or what is responsible or governing this existance, if any?"-as put by Mr. Leo Kishore from Barefoot Manner), what makes modern religion any different than Greek mythology? Its all a bunch of folk lore written by man and passed down by man(which brings in the whole thought of translating a written document into many languages that are constantly changing over time and some how thinking that the end text will accurately represent the original-remember the childhood game "Telephone"?) which directly makes it fallible.

Not to mention Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are all based off the same religion. The Christian Bible includes the Hebrew Bible(many might know it as the "Old Testament") I love how in Islam both Jesus and Abraham are prophets!


I think people should stop worry about how to answer problems that we cant possibly conceive and start worry about all the evil and hate around the world! Only when we stop viewing people as "whatever label you can place here" and start seeing them as a person can we even start to address the problem.



I will end on a very relative quote:"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." -- Plato

 

what if its all true only satan created religion to divide and destroy us, i think if there is a god, its pretty vain of us to think we know what he would want for us, other then to live and learn

 

I do believe there is something that is much to great and complex to ever begin to graspe the concept of and I think it is foolish of people to make assumptions based on a book that was created and written by man. God did not write the bible-it says so in the bible, so it is the word on man. The bible also says that the bible is open for interpatation. I am not trying to slam on any one religion or the idea of religion. I believe people did have good intentions with religion, but when you give one man or a group of men the power over others the basic need to thrive and outlast will always make man inheritley do bad.

 

The Jews and Muslims have been fighting since 1947 btw.

 

They have been fighting over the Gaza strip since then, but have waged war on one another alot longer than that.

 

Jewish communities thrived in muslim countries until recently. Throughout the middle ages there were examples of (compared to the barbaric early catholic church) remarkable cooperation and tolerance (spain is probably the best example). Jews were allowed to own property, work in government, and teach, compared to christian nations where they were marginalized and systematically murdered/humiliated.
The conflict began in earnest (not that there wasn't regional conflicts between jewish settlers and muslim natives in the then ottoman empire) with the creation of israel.

it just goes to show you that religion is rarely the root cause of conflict (power, money, and land usually are), but is a good dividing line and recruiting tool.(like in ireland, where the issue is more about the long and absolutely brutal english occupation than the pope's views on artificial contraception.)

 

Exactly my point. Religion is nothing more than giving a handful of people power and say-so over others, which will inherently bring out the evil in those in control

 

alot of religious people i know claim to be like, "oh we love you and we accept you no matter what", but the minute i say i'm atheist, they're like, "oh no, you're going to hell, stay away from me..." and don't want to hang out anymore.
that's not what i'd call loving and accepting, hypocracy's more the word for it. that's why i'm atheist!

 

Its sad, but the most discriminating people are those who also happen to be the most religious!

 

The Ten Commanments are good intentioned, because there based on hammurabi's code of law, Religion was created as a means of control, its the santa clause myth on a larger scale, If ur Your Good, you get presents, except religions definition of good is to do as they say or else your a heathen

 

How so? Percentages of what? A great majority of the people in the world today are religious. If you mean that they're divided into different camps, what you say may be right. I regard them all as co-religionists.

I think you make a good case for being skeptical about the literal truths of the different religions and for being tolerant and loving toward all of our brothers and sisters across the planet. A healthy religion allows these views.[/QUOTE]

 

christianity, along with its predicessor judaism and its succesor islam, is one of the six blind men. if you know the story of the six blind men and the elephant. all of them were right, in a way, up to a point. about their own one little part of the puzzle. and completely somewhat humourously self deceived as to the larger whole. i think there might be more then six groupings of kinds of belief, but the general concept applies.

if you don't know the story, well it applies to just so many things. where people can have oppinions, even real objective evidence that they are understandably certain about, and still have, from it, a completely skewed misconception of how a greater whole fits togather, or often, even that there might even be one.

these six blind guys encountered an elephant. and the one who came in contact with it's trunk thought rather like a snake. the one who found its tail, like a rope. its side like a cement wall, and so on. and of course every one of them was absolutely right. and absolutely wrong at the same time.

and i really see that as being where people are with beliefs. and a lot of other things too.

=^^=
.../\...

 

I have to agree about being right up to a point and then also being completely wrong at the same time.

 

I think it is important that, at least, a segment of the population believe in God. Simply because it could be the case that God exists. So, if something can be achieved through belief, then there's only one way to find out. In other words, "leave no stone unturned".

I see it as being scientific, even though the ends can't really be falsified. The ends being the existence of a sentience, which you can't verify.

But I think it's probably the case that you have to believe correctly, that you have to see reality/God for what it is, before you can experience anything that makes belief worthwhile. It seems like most believers don't have either the guts or the intelligence to think for themselves. And I think any religion which indulges in violence or discrimination, or even saying "you're wrong; we're right" without providing any evidence, isn't on-track. And that is most religions and almost all religious people.

But it's closed-minded to say that belief in God is a sickness which should be eradicated. It's as much an endurance test, a psychological undertaking, as anything. It's not a joke or a game, not for the true believer.

 

So by your accounts I should believe in the Easter Bunny, tooth fairy, & Santa Claus because they MIGHT be real...?

 

Of course the obvious difference between the mythical figures you mention and God is that no adult takes the Easter Bunny, the tooth fairy and Santa seriously, while many highly intelligent adults throughout the ages the world over,i ncluding respected scientists and philosophers, take God seriously. Why is that?

 

A better analogy would be Zeus, Rah, Thor, Apollo, Hercules, etc. Should believe in them because they MIGHT be real? And highly intelligent adults (i.e. the kind who accurately measured the diameter of the earth in 300 BC, or built pyramids) did believe in them for thousands of years.

 

But I think something should be done. When you have generation after generation indoctrinating their children and telling them there's a god only because their parents told them there is a god, the majority of people will believe it without question. And that is not healthy.

 

Right on MrStiffy

 

If "something" involves the government stepping in, I think that would be worse than parental invlovement. Indoctrination is indoctrination, and official efforts to impose "political correctness" in other areas don't inspire confidence. Two of the main reasons that persuade many parents to push religion are the fear that if they don't: (1) the kids will go to hell; and (2) the kids will turn to sex, drugs and rock n' roll. Only by countering those beliefs can anybody make any headway in reducing the pressure to give kids a religious upbringing.