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Regarding Religion: Yet Still More Thoughts.

*There have been and are thousands of mutually exclusive religions throughout the world. As implied, not all of these religions can be correct. There have been and are therefore thousands of mutually exclusive deities worshipped throughout the world. As implied, not all of these deities can be correct. Therefore, many of these religions / deities must have been inventions of and by the human mind. Therefore these / those deities that fall under that category have been created in the image of man and not vice versa. Since all of the True Believers in each and all of these religions will claim that all other religions except theirs are manmade inventions / fabrications, what odds that all are manmade since all-but-one have to be manmade and nobody can agree on which one that is? What's more likely - that 999 out of 1000 religions are pure human inventions and thus mental realities and therefore that one religion is a really real reality imposed from the outside-in, or that all 1000 religions are humanly derived from the inside-out? Don't the Mormons believe Christianity and Islam are false religions? Don't Muslims believe Christians and the Mormons are delusionary? Don't Christians debunk the Mormon as well as the Islamic religion?

*Religion A to Religion B (and vice-versa): Our supernatural is the only really real supernatural and your alleged supernatural ain't worth a bucket of spit!

*Did you choose your religion, or did your religion choose you (i.e. - was your religion chosen for you)?

*Religious claims are not evidently true and evidentially not true (via Aron Ra).

*That fact is that your invisible 'friend' in the sky, be it God or be it Allah, is just as imaginary as any creator god, any fertility deity, any storm god, or any sun god.

*Christianity states that Jesus is actually God manifest on Earth who manifested Himself to save us from our sins (which we never committed; our ancestors did the dirty deed, not us) which, being all-knowing, He knew our ancestors would so do those dirty deeds before-the-fact. In any event, God sacrifices Himself (as Jesus) to Himself (as God) from Himself (since God set in train the events that led to sin in the first place). Does this make any real sense? It must, after all, the Father (God) condemns you, but the Son (Jesus) saves you - they're one and the same 'person', but what the heck, that still makes sense, doesn't it?

*Christian philosophy: In order to be a good Christian, never, ever try to think on behalf of yourself. Instead, read, re-read and defer to our holy book written thousands of years ago. Why? Because you could never hope to improve upon the moral lessons, teachings, instructions, principles and sensibilities that's been handed down to you from the Bronze Age.

*Faulty logic, as pointed out by The Bible Skeptic, Brett Palmer.
That Jesus exists proves God exists.
But then again, that Mohammad exists proves Allah exists.
And that crop circles exists proves extraterrestrials exist.
And that lumber yards proves that Paul Bunyan exists.
And that forests in Oregon prove that Bigfoot exists.

*We should take note of how statues devoted to the Buddha in Afghanistan were dynamited and hacked to pieces by a rival religion (Islam) on the grounds that these statues were just pure idols. This example as a sort of religious behavior could be given thousands of times over across history, and across religions.

*When one person sees or hears something that isn't there, that something is a delusion. When millions upon millions of people see and hear something that isn't really there, that something is called a religion.

*Even if America was founded as a Christian nation - a myth [#] perpetuated by the extreme religious Right, especially Right-wing pseudo-'historian' David Barton who insists that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were founded on the Bible even though neither mention Christianity, God, Jesus or the Bible - that would still not of necessity mean that Christianity is the be-all-and-end-all of religious truth.

[#] The founding fathers were deists, not theists.

*The biggest threat to any religion is its own doctrine. (via Dark Matter 2525)

*There are two types of gods, or God. There are the religious gods (or God) which collectively have numbered in the thousands each with their own specific set of traits. Zeus is but one example. Then there is the philosophical concept of a god or God. 1000 theological philosophers would come up with 1000 variations on the theme of what a deity should be like. No matter which way you slice and dice things, you can find a deity to match your philosophical or theological worldview. What we need is for god, God or the gods to actually show their damn faces and settle these ever ongoing theological and philosophical issues once and for all.

Of course maybe there are no gods, god or God.

Then too the gods, god or God would have been just E.T. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic if you aren't in possession of that technology or don't understand that it even is technology. A flashlight to a human being who lived 50,000 years ago would be something supernatural.

*It's easy to invent religions, deities and holy texts out of thin air - out of the human imagination. Scientology and Mormonism are two 'recent' examples. So is "Jedi" theology and the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Then too in the Star Trek universe we have the Q-Continuum and the Organians and the Bajoran Prophets. The (resistance is futile) Borg are 'religious' zealots trying to assimilate anyone and everyone non-Borg into the Borg Collective. As for holy books, the Ferengi have a holy book - the "Rules of Acquisition".

*Double Standards
Christian True Believer: You need to believe in God; the Bible is true; Christianity is the way forward.
Atheist: God isn't real; the Bible isn't true; atheism is the way forward.
Christians are highly respected for their statements; atheists are bucketed for their statements. Does anyone else see a double standard here?

*Religion: If you don't know something, you're justified in just making something up. I don't know what causes lightning, therefore Zeus / Thor is responsible.

*Religions tend to start off with their conclusions and hence discount any pieces of actual evidence that doesn't support those conclusions.

johnprytz 7 Jan 12
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Altough somewhat irrelevant, your knowlege of religions is a little flawed, eg: Only catholics believe christ was God, Islam and Judaism believe Jesus only to be a prophet and not the son of God but do recognise his existance, and God (Jehova) and Allah are the same entity, and the old testament is pretty much the same for Christians, muslims and Jews. If you believe there's a God or not, the wisdom in some of the Bible's lessons/knowlege are no less valid. I myself believe in no such God, or Gods, I believe the notion of an all seeing protecting God, for some, is no more than a crutch for them who cannot stand alone without this safety net. For others I believe it's no more than an indoctrinated habit. I believe this simply from the observance and study of their actions.

@johnprytz
I do get that, but if a debate on specifics is to take place the details must be researched and as accurate as poss as to be able to come to an informed decision. My statement started as "Altough somewhat irrelevant" indicating the mainly bogus nature of the subject (to my mind), nevertheless still may yet hold some mote of truth in reality, and so the specifics need to be accurate and concise.

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Who are you trying to convince?

ps. FWIW Mormons consider themselves to be Christian, and teach that all religions have a piece of the truth.

skado Level 9 Jan 12, 2019
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In “The Perennial Philosophy” Aldous Huxley examines various metaphysical ideas that are common to nearly all religions. I think the best thing is to harvest the wheat and throw out the chaff. By “harvest” I don’t mean to form a rigid, blind belief, but to study, meditate, and allow the ideas to incubate in your consciousness.

Just because someone has described the moon as being made out of cheese, a proven falsity, does not mean that there is no moon and that all discussion and study of the moon must cease.

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