religious friends

[Dotard]

This one --> just didn't seem to work.

[LukeMC]

Bex, I suppose it depends. If a friend of mine was blatently racist, I wouldn't be able to stand by and agree with their hateful speeches about how all black, chinese, polish, swedish, japanese, indian, pakistani, et al people needed to be deported from the country. I'd have to disagree. Same for sexism, same for gay rights. If they've come to ridiculous and potentially harmful conclusions about the world which leave them with a bitter hate in the pit of their hearts, I'd want to turn those beliefs around into somethign which makes consistent sense. All of their little prejudices are probably harmless in private, but when enough of them vote on these grounds it gets messy. If they're trying to pass legislations to makes gay marriage illegal, or deport immigrants, or any other such thing, it gets messy. If they vote for their president or pirmie minister just because they share similarly bigoted views, the more gentle percentage of the population must suffer.

Then there's religion. When somebody tells me they believe the earth was created 6000 years ago by a magical father and all the animals were put here in present form, I have to say "but everybody knows that's not true. The human race is older than that". If they pursue the crazy belief and cannot provide evidence for it, I wonder why on earth they believe it. It's especially bad if their views on gay rights and gender roles are formulated from this religion. It's like they're leading a double life- only one of which is in the real world. We could pursue deep and meaningful conversations, discuss all sorts of issues and try to find a place for ourselves in this universe, but now we have a wall between us. This person is basing his/her views on fantasy stories and things which don't exist. No meaningful conversation can go very far before they start uttering absolute jibba-jibba, and the ludicrousy of this belief drives you insane. Sweet friend of mine, stop talking such insane nonsense :|

[Edwardo Piet]

Yeah, as I said, I think its when you can't even have a normal conversation with your religious friends because of their beliefs, that the problem occurs.
And when the friendship just isn't going anywhere. Its at a standstill and starting to shrink. Because you can't talk about much when you're beliefs are so different.
However, when its not just friends.
I think everyone should have to criticize religious beliefs just as much as political beliefs, or other beliefs, etc.
Religious beliefs shouldn't be given any more respect just because they are so absurd - and have zero evidence - that their claims cannot be disproved. I think they especially should not be given more respect for this reason in fact.
Evf

[puglover]

Or you could just be my mother who is totally apathetic and whom seems to just follow what ever I do these days..
I suppose you could say the my parents are a combination of apathetic/agnostic/too concerned with their day to day life..
I remember when I was about 12-14 years old and i had become a christian lol.. i was curious about sunday school and stuff and i went with my friend.. i would come home and demand that we all pray together! haha. lol. then mum would say if you want to pray.. pray! lol. i sulked because i didnt want to pray alone lol. my belief was okay and innocent for back then.

"There are no hard distinctions between what is real and what is unreal, nor between what is true and what is false. A thing is not necessarily either true or false; it can be both true and false."
-Harold Pinter

"Truth .. is forever elusive. You never quite find it but the search for it is compulsive. The search is clearly what drives the endeavour. The search is your task. More often than not you stumble upon the truth in the dark colliding with it or just glimpsing an image or a shape which seems to correspond to the truth, often without realising that you have done so. But the real truth is that there never is any such thing as one truth to be found.."

"[People] must be allowed to breathe their own air. [You] cannot confine and constrict them to satisfy [your] own taste or disposition or prejudice."

"give them the freedom to which way they will." <- so long as they wont kill me for being gay XD!

Art,Truth and Politics. Harold Pinter.

[Kyuuketsuki]

Have any atheists here managed to maintain a friendship with an overtly religious person?

No ... all my friends are atheists.

I suppose it partly depends on what you consider a friend to be ... I personally consider a friend to be someone very, very close so yes I know a few religious people with whom I am quite friendly but none of them are close.

I guess it's because the strongest focus of my friendships is respect, I respect my friends, I respect their views, if I couldn't they wouldn't be my friends

Kyu

[lukec]

I guess it's because the strongest focus of my friendships is respect, I respect my friends, I respect their views, if I couldn't they wouldn't be my friends

I have religious friends, and I respect their views. It is up to them what they believe, and I have had long conversations with some of them. Respecting someone's views is not a matter of agreeing with them- there is no way you could agree with someone about ever issue, ever. I look for good, happy people, and that is how I find friends.

[puglover]

I guess it's because the strongest focus of my friendships is respect, I respect my friends, I respect their views, if I couldn't they wouldn't be my friends

I have religious friends, and I respect their views. It is up to them what they believe, and I have had long conversations with some of them. Respecting someone's views is not a matter of agreeing with them- there is no way you could agree with someone about ever issue, ever. I look for good, happy people, and that is how I find friends.

phew.
finally i am not alone.
it was getting hot in here. lol

[leo-rcc]

With some friends I know religion is a touchy subject and they don't like the prospect of being put to the test so hey tend to stay away from the topic. And therefore so do I. That doesn't mean I don't tease them sometimes though, friends must be able to take some banter from friends every now and again.

[Giff]

Christians dont respect other religions. At least the fundamentalist and if you read the bible is that what you suppose to do. So why should athesits and sceptics respect christianity and the other three monotheistic religions?

I can respect Buddhism Hinduism(but not the discriminating part) shinto, konfucism, shamanism (native maerican, sami, Mongolian, african and so on) and others like them. Why them and not the monotheistic? because they are often more opened minded dont try to convert people and generally do they not come with ridiciolus claims that the theory of evolution is not right and so on.

I rather see a whole world being buddhists then a few that are monotheistic fundamentalists.

[leo-rcc]

Well I think we can dispense with Shintoism, blessing laptops is not my thing really. I'd rather stick with a proper antivirus program.