Religion

You know, I used to kind of agree with you, but wait until A life threatening event or illness hits you and you might change your perceptions a bit... Introspection and relying on yourself or others wears you out and can only carry you so far.

You need some sort of spiritual faith, IMO, no matter what it is.You're gonna die one day, and I want to know I'll be there with a higher power when I go to live out eternity. This is not the only chance you get, I don't think.
The golden rule can apply whether you are religious, or not.
By the way, all I read of this thread was the first post, so I apologize if I repeated someone else's opinion.

 

The one commonality I have with Miss tery is her belief about religion, my relationship with God is a spiritual one and in many cases it takes events like Silver described above for many people to understand that.

 

Tery, I got your back. The "golden rule" does not have it's basis in religion, rather it's a merely a heapin' dose of common sense.

There is no dog....

 

YOU CANNOT PROVE THIS.

 

You are correct. It is merely an observation on my part in my day-to-day interactions with people.

 

Damn, all kinds of shit happens when I'm gone for a little while . . . .

I can see Miss T's point about so many professed christians behaving in ways that are the opposite of what they profess to believe in. I've seen a lot of that in my life, too, & not just in christians--in other religions as well. We just see more hypocrisy in christianity, I think, because we live in a predominantly "christian" culture. It's hard not to become disenchanted with religion in general after you've dealt with some hard-core hypocrites.

Still, I believe in something beyond what can be measured by science. I am pagan--which is really undefinable these days. I believe in the sanctity of life and nature. I believe there are energies that we don't yet understand & can't measure. I believe that emotions and thoughts can have effects beyond what we realize. And I don't find it necessary to understand & quantify things in order to live by what I believe.

I also have the luxury, in my belief system, of being perfectly free to adjust my beliefs to take into account any new discoveries.

An interesting (to me) side note: among the people who trash a bookstore the worst---Christians, New Age devotees (ah, they shame me!), teachers, bad parents, and rednecks into car/cycle/truck magazines.

 

Kind of like the way that you continue to believe in the spontaneous creation of the universe when it is totally at odds with one of our most apparent theories....

 

BINGO Silver . . . . Folks want to know that they know that if they were to die, they would go to Heaven. I think the problem is with so many denominations, you get conflicting information. Some say you need to be 'born again' (evangelical, baptist) while others say doing good works is sufficent (Roman Catholic). For example, many folks practice Mormonism B-U-T, some preachers/folks say that Mormonism isn't the way/true religion. But I'm sure some of us know some folks who are devout Mormon who seem to have everything together (they appear to have a strong walk with God, things are going pretty well in their lives, etc.) and we say how many folks convert to Mormonism on a daily basis. Their denomination seems to have everything in order (and I'm sure this makes a few other ones jealous). Do the folks/denominations who say Mormonism isn't the way have a legitamate gripe O-R is it just a case of being selfish that their denomination is flourishing while there's isn't ?

 

You been talking to Yoda again? You just described The Force.

 

this proves your ignorance and inability to make a point. blanket assumptions are a bad thing. if you knew anything about religion and faith you might have a better understanding of people and the world in which you live.

odds are the believers in god out number the non-believers (agnostics not included), therefore by sheer number volume of course you initial point is provable. the irony is, morals are based in a faith and religion. i just made your point for you. however; this only works out if in fact the believers have a super majority.