Dont worry bout it OP, religion is dying out and the nonreligious are becomin higher in numbers. These "gods" are people's creations, everyone has their own god it seems like since they like to say lots of things are the "word of god" but its always humans doing the talking. Irreligion ftw, evolve dont dissolve.
I'm an atheist who doesn't believe in any miracles of any kind, save for one: the growth and development of Western Civilizaion. Religion was the first and best early attempt at early social, legal and political organization. Christianity is probably the best and most enduring legacy of the Roman empire, because it preserved Western cultural identity and provided a framework for mass organization, communication and exchange of ideas across all of Europe. The three basic elements of Western and modern civilization: bureaucratic government, highly organized and efficient educational systems, and large commercial institutions, all originated in the Church. You don't need to believe in sentient brush fires, riverboat livestock shows or zombie carpenters to understand why soldiers in battle, kids with cancer or Jewish retailers with weak Fall quarters value religion; and rightly so.
Last night I attended a great meeting! I'm president of the board of a non-profit that was spun off of a little church. Our mission is to build relational bridges across socio-economic ines and overcome issues of povery and fatherlessness in a tiny pocket of West Houston. Our church only has about 30 members, and I'm amazed at what's come of this. We went to the local elementary schools in this little pocket of poverty and asked principals how we address these issues. We identified a few and got started. We pay for and coach kids to play in a sports league they wouldn't be able to play in otherwise. Registration alone costs about $150/kid. Last year we helped with 108 sports registrations for 62 different kids in 3 sports (hoops, baseball and soccer). We discovered pretty early on that, for many of these kids, just getting to a practice or game is tough. Many come from single-parent homes and mom can't get home in time to get them there. So we bought a van so we can help pick them all up before games and practices. Ultimately, we show these families that we care about them by showing them first that we love their kids...without condition. We also provide after-school homework help for kids at the schools we serve. We've seen dramatic improvements in grades and discipline for many of these kids. I could tell stories all day about some of them, individually, And more importantly, we've made friends along the way. We've been able to help people see beyond socio-economic lines, by engaging those outside of our own church into serving and relating to these families...and true friendships have been formed from it. Along those lines, we brought together a group of families from an affluent area and some from the area we serve who were interested in AAU basketball. Now this group is a family...the affluent group knows that part of the deal is that they're covering expenses for those that don't have those resources. The relationships that have been born out of that are incredible. One of the fathers from the less affluent group had a heart attack recently...their family's first call was to us and another family involved with this. We were by his bedside in an hour and taking care of his kids while he was recovering. We also partnered with a summer camp the last two summers to send these kids to summer camp for a week in Arkansas. We sent 22 to camp in 2008 and were lucky enough to be able to send 41 to camp on full scholarship in 2009!! We cover transportation to and from to make sure they get there safely and at no cost to their parents. We're working now to connect some our adult volunteers as mentors to individual kids who need someone in their life who cares for them...particularly those without the presence of a father. We closed our meeting with prayer for the community. We just invested about $150,000 in renovating a community center located right in the middle of the area we serve...and we prayed that it would be used to serve those families. I thanked God for everyone in that room...for hearts big enough to care. http://www.familypointresources.com/Home.html I believe in God. I believe all human beings are created in His image. I believe that God loves us all immensely. I believe He calls on us to serve people out of love...not out of duty. Jesus is the model by which I TRY (but fail miserably) to live my life. I believe Jesus to be entirely unique in history. I believe him to be the very embodiment of God...an expression of love. I am both comforted by Him and made extremely uncomfortable by Him...particularly his call for me to die to my own desires and turn my life upside down for other people. Set whatever law you want. You can't take it away from me.
Ha! For like a month it's been telling me "you must hit some other loser with rep points before you bestow them on the great posts of the one named MadMax." Today it did not give me that message. Enjoy your green bars.
Max, that is awesome ! But, are you saying that if there was no religion that people would not be doing these kinds of things as a community? I mean, I get that you are motivated by your religion to do it, but I am curious to see if that is your only motivation. Because, I am not a religious man at all, but like you, I am very wired to helping people less fortunate than me. So, I guess my question is what motivates you, the religion, or yourself. DD
my faith motivates me. i don't know who/what i'd be without my faith. i know what God has done in me over the last 5 years or so in particular, though...and i doubt seriously i'd be nearly this committed without my faith. it completely shapes my worldview and how i view people, generally. i'm not saying no one else would be doing it....but i'm saying in this particular community, no one else IS doing it. or ever has.
And soup kitchens, homeless shelters, Habitat for Humanity? Should those be outlawed too? You are within your rights to not buy what religion is selling but we live in a marketplace of ideas and in regard to whether there is an afterlife or what happens no one can prove one way or another, there was a thread on that recently. There is no way you can prove with absolute certainty that Christians aren't actually right. That is why its called "faith." Also FYI many sects of Buddhism have a Buddhist hell, depending on what sect of Buddhism there are many hells.
all religions teach valuable lessons in a general way. the problem is that the documents they are based on are inflexible and aren't malleable enough to keep up with an ever-changing world. living one's life in the spirit of religion is a good thing for anyone. parsing these texts specifically, especially when applied politically, is dangerous and causes more harm than good.
I am an Atheist too, but I think Religion even today is largely a good thing if you disregard the crazy stuff that is going on.
Religion has been outlawed in such freedom loving countries such as the Soviet Union, or Communist China. Those secular giants never did anything wrong, right?
And the rising hostility towards religion in the USA is just a complete coincidence to the rise in socialist sentiments...
I don't know about USSR, but under Mao's era China had de facto out-lawed Christianity. But these days, the Chinese gov't organizes religious practice not so much b/c it fears heaven/hell/after-life that sort of things, but b/c it likes to get its hands in any organization that it perceives has potential to threaten its ruling.
The rising hostility toward religion is more akin to the hostility seen in Europe, which is more based off of bad philosophy rather than socialism. There are many freedom loving people who hate religion.
In America, for most of our history that's actually been the reverse. Why so much hostility towards religion?
BTW to the OP, the freedom to worship is protected by our constitution, as is the freedom NOT to worship. DD
