I love religion!

[Zagreus]

Hello Zag,

While I applaud your decision on taking a more "fair" approach towards your stance on religion, I believe most of us, if not all here, have seen way too much violence involving religion to be bothered to give it's possible "good" a second thought.

It's human nature to be violent, it's not a part of religion. People may use religion to justify their actions, but the heart of most (all?) religions that I'm aware of is peace. War is largely about personal greed and politics. The good religion can do can be weighed up too. Yes, war may kill millions of people, but religious people such as Sri Ramakrishna are the cause of foundations that help millions of people. Gandhi could be another example. Remove religion you remove most of our species' history, be it culture, art, thought, etc.

I'm not saying the non-religious have never contributed to violence, but religion further divides a race already divided by so many other factors that its doing much more damage then good, in my opinion.

No, it's people's mentality that divides our species. The idea that I'm right, and you're wrong. Some religious people can be guilty of this, but so are some atheists. A Rabbi a few years ago said to me when I asked him about his views on the other Abhamaic faiths: "I think that if you are a Jew, you should be the best Jew that you can, if you are a Christian you should be the best Christian you can, and if you are a Muslim you should be the best Muslim that you can. We are all worshipping the same G-d after all" (or something like that).

If everyone thought like that, regardless of their faith or lack of it, humanity would get on better. It's the delusion that one idea is right above others is the problem, in my opinion. It's also the necessity to force this belief on others. Dawkins is as guilty of this as any religious person. (Are you getting it yet that I'm not that keen on Dawkins? Sorry, I'll stop mentioning him...)

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Well, Religion makes me laugh.....

If nothing else.

Yes... nonesense can have that effect The rest of the time it just confuses me

No offence, but these are the types of comment I’m complaining about. Yes, silly people believing in religion. What idiots Socrates, Plato, Isaac Newton, William Blake, Martin Luther King, for example, were.

But Zagreus,

Most fundementalists Christians DO believe in an adult version

of Father Christmas living up in the sky.

They even take the Creation myth seriously.

If you want proof go to answersingenesis.com(which I am ashamed to say was

started by an Australian) where they perform the most amazing mental gymnastics

in order to "prove" Creation true.

I know. I’ve already said I don’t agree AT ALL (emphasis, not shouting) with literalist religious views. Not all religious people think like that though; it’s the fundamentalists!

Trust me, I have spent time on the religion forum I mentioned arguing against people who are trying to prove evolution a fallacy and creationism correct. They just demonstrate a total lack of understanding of the ideas. This doesn’t mean they are stupid, they may have just been raised in a culture where this wasn’t taught.

My point is that not all religious people think like that, and should not be treated as such. I should mention, as I’ve found this has bearing on conversations, I’m from the UK, where religion isn’t quite such an issue as it is in, say, the US.

To give an example, a friend of mine is a lesbian Christian who doesn’t believe in salvation. She also has a master’s degree in theology. Doesn’t really fit into your fundamentalist box does she?