Thread: Respect vs. Blasphemy

From this Christians perspective regarding respect towards others, and I quote, "If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to move mountains, but do not have love(respect), I am nothing." Pauls 1st letter to the Corinthians, chapter 13, verse 2.

ControlFreak1,
Proverbs 10:10
He that winketh with the eye causeth sorrow

The Lord will not put up with your signature line forever!

edit: oops! xman forgive me, I just read your post. I wist not what I was doing

I must be honest. As a whole, I do not respect religion at all.

But before I expound upon this, a few definitions.

Spirituality is not the same as religion.

Religion is not the same as individuals.

Spirituality is one's personal understanding of the powers that be, whether they be scientific and physical, or supernatural in nature. This understanding applies to the person who has it.

Religion is an organized insistence upon certain ways of thinking and believing, instilled in a person by someone other than themselves.

An individual is just that - individual.

Having spent time in parts of the world (and indeed, parts of the US) where religion creates nothing but hatred, violence, and chaos, I cannot in good conscience support any organized religion of any kind - even those that are truly peaceful. All it takes is one maniac to turn a peaceful religion into the new Inquisition.

The inherent flaw is that in organized religion, an individual is actively discouraged from thinking for themselves. They follow a leader blindly. And that is the quickest way I know of to go from normal, empathetic human beings, to hordes of violent fundamentalist. We've seen it over and over again in history.

However. I know many people who are spiritual. They may express this privately, or in a Unitarian/Universalist church or some similar place. But the emphasis is always on one's personal experience of the universe and all the things in it. In personal spirituality, individual thought is not only encouraged, but necessary.

And finally, individuals. I once dated a man for 2 years who was devoutly Episcopalian. The Episcopal church is generally known for its accepting attitude, and this gentleman was no different. Though he was well aware that I was an agnostic atheist, he held quite firmly that even someone with my beliefs could go to heaven, if they were a caring, loving, and giving human being. That was what truly mattered to God, in his eyes. And so, religion was never an issue in our relationship.

But all it would take to turn such an accepting sect of Christianity into Westboro is one maniac, and a sufficiently devout congregation. That is what scares me.

I simply can't respect religion.

Originally Posted by hoglahoo

ControlFreak1,
Proverbs 10:10
He that winketh with the eye causeth sorrow

The Lord will not put up with your signature line forever!

edit: oops! xman forgive me, I just read your post. I wist not what I was doing

Huh? I ain't winkin'. AH HAAAA !! But I see that you ARE !

(don't pay attention to X, in Germany they say - "Er hat ein vogel." - literally 'he has a bird', a bird brain, bats in the bellfree, coocoo coocoo.)

('a troll', the nerve of that fella, I resemble that comment!)

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

It must be nice to be sure whether on one side or the other .... like Larry Slade, a character in O'neill's The Iceman Cometh, I have the curse of being able to see both sides of the issue.

Haven't read that. Although I wholly agree with that. I'm quite sure of what I believe in, but I can still see both sides of the thing.

Originally Posted by ControlFreak1

But atheism is a religious belief also, why should they be the ones to get the break? It is a religion like any, based on faith - believing in what you can not see, you have to 'believe' that there is no God. The only way around that is that you would have to be everywhere in the universe at the same time, which would virtually make you god and therefore disprove your belief. The 'atheists' have set up this phoney ploy so that they can use it to try and get their way, to be treated 'special', and shove their religion on everyone else. "Oh look, it's the poor little atheist, let's just leave them alone, they're special."

How about just respecting individuals who deserve respect.

That is a good troll with atheists but not to be taken seriously. You've surely noticed, no atheist here has ever tried to deny your faith.
With my 'faith' there's nothing to deny or accept as i do not have one. Religions, for me, are something to not care at all.

What i agree is that we should respect those individual who deserve our respect, regardless of their religion, nationality, race etc.

Sailor - Exactly. I respect religious individuals, if they are worthy of respect. Just like I would with atheists, or any other "group" of people. It's the establishment of religion that I have a problem with - not necessarily the people.

Atheism is never a religion. It is not organized, and there is no set of codes.

Atheists who resolutely believe there is no god are few, and far between.

For the most part, atheists simply see no reason to believe in a god. But they do understand that they cannot prove there isn't one.

Originally Posted by MistressNomad

I simply can't respect religion.

I want to try again to clarify this point. Religion is a noun. It is a thing as inanimate as a game show, a cruise ship or the New York Yankees. Although there are people involved, it is no more responsible for what the followers do than the movie Star Wars. Once people get involved and begin to read into it thier own interpretations, they can get out of control. It is what the people can potentially do with religion that is problematic. Whether you respect religion is as immaterial as whether you respect the paint on a helicopter. When some nut gets into the helicopter and flies it into a school is when we worry about respect or fear. Is it the color of the helicopter that did the damage?

Again,the answer to the question as asked means nothing. The question should be: Do you respect those who have a different religious belief than your own?

Brad

Originally Posted by icedog

I want to try again to clarify this point. Religion is a noun. It is a thing as inanimate as a game show, a cruise ship or the New York Yankees. Although there are people involved, it is no more responsible for what the followers do than the movie Star Wars. Once people get involved and begin to read into it thier own interpretations, they can get out of control. It is what the people can potentially do with religion that is problematic. Whether you respect religion is as immaterial as whether you respect the paint on a helicopter. When some nut gets into the helicopter and flies it into a school is when we worry about respect or fear. Is it the color of the helicopter that did the damage?

Again,the answer to the question as asked means nothing. The question should be: Do you respect those who have a different religious belief than your own?

Brad

I disagree. It's a perfectly legitimate question.

There are certain parameters that define what is, and is not a religion. These parameters mostly have to do with defined hierarchy, intellectual submission of the majority, and long-standing traditions. It is selling these ideas to the public, and yes, I do mean selling. Religious organizations advertise, collect money, and some even have door-to-door street teams.

Organized religions are, in essence, a business. And just as you can have a problem with your goverment's business model as a whole (taxes, degrees of financial freedom, etc) you can have a problem with religion as a whole.

I have a problem with the idea of hierarchy not based on merit. I have a problem with intellectual submission. I have a problem with unquestioned tradition. So, it stands to reason I'd have a problem with religion as a model.

But to answer your question, which is, do I respect those of different religious beliefs than myself, the answer is maybe. I respect people who deserve respect, regardless of their spiritual beliefs.

The things on which I judge a person's worthiness of respect are things such as kindness, thoughtfulness, empathy, and intellectual curiosity/openness. None of those things really have anything to do with religion.

Originally Posted by Sailor

With my 'faith' there's nothing to deny or accept as i do not have one.

An absolute dogma of the 'atheist' religion - denying that there is nothing to deny or accept. You must 'tow-the-line'.