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With or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil, that takes religion. - Steven Weinberg

MojoDave 9 June 17
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2

Level 6

While many below share the same sentiment as I do that bad intentions are inherently the choice of the person; I do agree that religion makes it a whole lot easier to justify any slight.

1

Level 8

All people do good and bad things, religious or not. To me the notion of good and evil people is just a way for people to separate themselves from people who do bad things because they themselves are good with good intentions.

MsAl Level 8 June 17, 2018
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0

Level 8

I'm not convinced of this. All of us have good and evil potential; and there are varying degrees in both of these things. Anyone is capable of both of these things. I think that religious people use religion as an excuse for what they do oftentimes but I think the person who does evil can be be a religious person or not.

If you're talking about a single person, that might be true. I suspect the person quoted above was thinking about the church asking (or telling) good people to do horrible things, like the Crusades, or the Inquisition, or many other examples.

@yppahagn I still think it gets dicey as who is "the church" Do you mean one particular congregation with a minister who is crazier than most? Or do you mean an entire segment such as ALL Christians, ALL Catholics, ALL Jews, ALL Muslims, etc etc. because what you find is fundamentalist groups that are even worse than most and other groups that are more moderate. this is where it gets difficult in making a blanket statement.
0

Level 9

Well said.

2

Level 9

or alternately

Nice! I like it! 🙂
1

Level 7

This goes into it's not bad if it's for god or if we're doing it. It is only bad if other people do blank and so on. Burn people alive? It's okay if it's for god. Etc.

1

Level 7

Interesting point of view.

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