Pope Benedict XVI to resign.

[Meat Pie]

Like a Ratzinger deserting a sinking ship.

 

[josht]

 

[IanB]

I wasn't being sarcastic Satch! I really do think that this ridiculous position with its funny little rituals and outdated moral teachings fully deserves our ridicule.

I think you have to be sensitive to people who believe in these things. I sometimes find myself wondering if religious discrimination, is the same as sexual discrimination or if poking fun/ridiculing someone because of their religious belief is any different to poking fun/ridiculing someone because of there sexual preferences?

I sometimes think that, your religious choices are free will, and you can choose what you want to believe in, but I am sure someone who is religious would say they have no free choice in it as it is who they are, and they would not be them if they did not feel that way.

At the end of the day, I don't think there is any need to poke fun at it, its not something I believe in, and if it keeps them happy, so be it. As long as we are not forced in to anything, and continue to have free will to do what we want, I do not see the problem.

Just because someone is different to us, or believes in different things does not mean we should ridicule them. When we start exploring space, and meeting new Alien races, they are going to be very different to us, and I really hope we don't ridicule them on first contact.

I think people who don't believe in the religious beliefs of someone else can counter most arguments, without having to result to the levels of ridiculing someone to score points.

Ian

 

[Meat Pie]

I'll stop mocking religion when it stops being one of the biggest threats to humanity.

Believing in something without evidence creates a dangerous world where people can allow themselves to deny global warming, it allows people to do horrendous acts but feel that what they do is moral, and it has time and time again dragged humanity back: whether its believing that condoms are ineffective in protecting against sexual diseases, or promoting discrimination way into the 21st century, or even enabling people to ignore evidence that incriminates people such as the Pope, so that their belief can be maintained.

Religion is dangerous. It doesn't deserve respect.

 

[Sam]

Religious discrimination is completely different to sexual, or racial, or gender discrimination for one important reason.

Religion is something you choose. The latter three are not. As a rule, it's fair to criticise people for things they choose but not for things they have no control over.

 

[Earthwürm]

I wasn't being sarcastic Satch! I really do think that this ridiculous position with its funny little rituals and outdated moral teachings fully deserves our ridicule.

I think you have to be sensitive to people who believe in these things. I sometimes find myself wondering if religious discrimination, is the same as sexual discrimination or if poking fun/ridiculing someone because of their religious belief is any different to poking fun/ridiculing someone because of there sexual preferences?

I sometimes think that, your religious choices are free will, and you can choose what you want to believe in, but I am sure someone who is religious would say they have no free choice in it as it is who they are, and they would not be them if they did not feel that way.

At the end of the day, I don't think there is any need to poke fun at it, its not something I believe in, and if it keeps them happy, so be it. As long as we are not forced in to anything, and continue to have free will to do what we want, I do not see the problem.

Just because someone is different to us, or believes in different things does not mean we should ridicule them. When we start exploring space, and meeting new Alien races, they are going to be very different to us, and I really hope we don't ridicule them on first contact.

I think people who don't believe in the religious beliefs of someone else can counter most arguments, without having to result to the levels of ridiculing someone to score points.

Ian

I'm with you, I think it's exactly the same issues. People have a problem with certain individuals and how they carry themselves, and apply this problem to the entire section of society from which they originate. I think everyone has a right to follow a religion without ridicule, just like everyone has a right to disagree with religion without judgement. It's when individuals from these two sides start trying to impose their beliefs on each other it becomes a problem.

 

[TheMan]

I wasn't being sarcastic Satch! I really do think that this ridiculous position with its funny little rituals and outdated moral teachings fully deserves our ridicule.

I think you have to be sensitive to people who believe in these things. I sometimes find myself wondering if religious discrimination, is the same as sexual discrimination or if poking fun/ridiculing someone because of their religious belief is any different to poking fun/ridiculing someone because of there sexual preferences?

Ian, ordinarily, and in most cases I absolutely agree with what you said... however, and may be it is worth a check in here, as to how many of the gay dudes were brainwashed into being gay? Or dragged as a child to gay services, where you are going to Hell if you are not gay or became heterosexual, or were forced to around knocking on doors to tell other people they must be gay to rescue their souls, or give their money to a gay bar so they can "help" other people along the absolutely correct gay path - and that whilst they should respect heterosexuals they are wrong, and only gay is the true path of life...

If someone is a Christian who chose to be one, as an adult, without being forced or brainwashed into it then fine. Take me, I come from atheist parenting, but with family lineage as lay preachers, whom built churches in the community still standing today. Something I am proud to be a part of, as hearts of those communities.

I don't however, go there to worship, and do not class myself as religious - though I openly admit to feeling spiritual, and being a seeker and investigator of faiths and religions and theology/theosophy. You can happily take the pee because it is a choice I made, and I am OK with that.

What I am not OK with however, is the endless guilt tripping, brain washing, religious bigotry and ring fencing that it has - and how it divides families, results in family being cast out for FAITH (remember, it is not called FACT for a reason), and has resulted in murderous slaying and plundering of riches such as the conquistadors throughout history - as well as manipulation by the hand of evil men bent upon power and dominance.

Spiritualism, and peoples choice deserves respect, as I believe does our connection to something far greater than we know, should you choose to believe in such - otherwise, it should be treated with the contempt for which it deserves! I find great wisdom in the Bible at times, to read it as a book of decency and moral code - when you strip out how many slaves you are allowed (?) and all the other stuff I am sure God wrote...

Choosing the right religion, is akin to a bet on the races - everyone claims every other is wrong - and this creates divisions, wars, and vile acts.

Those who choose a religion, faith or path of some kind, of their own volition, will have gone through a thought and consideration process with their own conscious, which will make them less likely to be reactionary at a bit of fun pokery... the brain washed however?

Well, why don't you mosey on over to YT and take a look at Tom Cruise talking about his love of Sea Org and Scientology? ...

 

[Nick]

Believing in something without evidence

The evidence that God exists is the Bible. Believing that to be true is a completely different argument.

Religion is something you choose.

Not really, babies are baptised soon after birth. They are raised with the Christian traditions, and it's hard to break them after being drilled in through Church, school and at home.

Religion is dangerous. It doesn't deserve respect.

Wow, where did you get to that conclusion from? Yes, religion may cause many wars and violence, but how does that mean it doesn't deserve respect. Are you suggesting that the majority of the world's population should not be respected due to their beliefs, some of which may not be from their own free will to follow that religion? Respect is something that is mutual, if you can't respect someone's beliefs then why should they respect yours?

Anyway, most Christians are nowhere near as fundamentalist as the Pope, and also many are not against global warming, evolution or the Big Bang.

 

[Rupert]

Edit - started writing this after Ian's post so it may have been eclipsed by more recent posts.

I sometimes find myself wondering if religious discrimination, is the same as sexual discrimination or if poking fun/ridiculing someone because of their religious belief is any different to poking fun/ridiculing someone because of there sexual preferences?

If you have a strong religious belief then often you are discounting an astonishing, overwhelming volume of proven scientific work, to favour a completely notional theory about a magical/spiritual force that somehow controls everything ever, and that nobody can ever prove actually exists. To believe (for example) that the earth is 6000 years old, that evolution doesn't exist, that a god-induced flood came and caused the death of millions of innocent people because the man in the sky was angry - all in the face of overwhelming evidence to say the contrary - to me is something that seems so ridiculous that maybe it isn't unfair to ridicule it.

Homosexuality isn't a choice, you can't look at a vast amount of evidence and decide "nah, that's not for me". I don't really know why it's even labelled as sexual 'preference'. So yes, there's a clear difference between making fun of beliefs and sexual orientation.

If you said to me that you believed in (for example) a giant flying spaghetti monster that annihilated almost all the world apart from a single family, a couple of each animal and put them on a big boat one time, I'd say you were being ridiculous. If you told me you were gay, I'd say that were fine.

just like everyone has a right to disagree with religion without judgement.

I completely disagree, especially when religions take it upon themselves to judge everyone else. No decision/belief/statement should ever be without judgement.

 

[Meat Pie]

You don't get the same paranoid defensive guardedness about laughing about political ideology, I don't see why Religion should be exempt. Religion isn't special, it doesn't get to make demands not to be mocked like any other belief someone may hold. If you have to give respect to Sky-Daddy theorem, then you have to give respect to Big-Foot and Loch Ness monster sightings, or give respect to crop circles, or healing crystals.

I don't generally go out of my way to offend the religious, but I'm not going to patronise them by acting like they're Children who believe in Santa Claus when the topic comes up.

Nick - The Harry Potter books are as much evidence of wizards as the Bible is of God. Just existing in the written word is not the same as researched evidence put into a well reasoned case, that is then peer reviewed by experts.

You have a point about religion indoctrinating children, and I am thoroughly against that, but that doesn't mean that as an adult with every opportunity to really consider your beliefs against scientific reality, that you have no responsibility for perpetuating your own belief system, against all reasonable evidence.

Where did I get that conclusion? Because believing in things that aren't true inevitably lead to false conclusions about your reality, which makes it impossible not to be a danger. Also, I respect people as intelligent perceptive beings and it's for that reason that I cannot respect their outdated irrational beliefs. Not respecting a belief is not disrespecting a person as a whole.

 

[Rupert]

Believing in something without evidence

The evidence that God exists is the Bible.

I genuinely can't tell if that's a serious statement. If I write that "the sky is filled with dancing pixies scattering fairy dust" on a piece of paper, this couldn't be used as evidence of that theory. I wouldn't use Lord Of The Rings as evidence that dragons exist, yet that's also a fictional book like the bible. A book written 300 years after the death of a magical carpenter by some Arabs trying to build a following so they could leverage some political clout equally does not qualify as evidence.

Edit - whoops Meat Pie basically already wrote this, sorry.

 

[Simon]

As a fan of arcane ritual and outlandish fancy dress, I am thrilled at this development.

It's like a year of double Eurovision. Can't wait to see that smoke!

 

[Dave]

As a fan of arcane ritual and outlandish fancy dress, I am thrilled at this development.

It's like a year of double Eurovision. Can't wait to see that smoke!

I so agree....

Love a bit of pomp

 

[Nick]

Nick - The Harry Potter books are as much evidence of wizards as the Bible is of God. Just existing in the written word is not the same as researched evidence put into a well reasoned case, that is then peer reviewed by experts.

Unless you can prove that everything in the Bible is false, then there is still room for belief in it. Whether it was the existence of a person or a certain law or moral, if there's only one thing that was true, then there's something to believe and have faith in. I'm not saying it makes God real, I'm saying that it makes faith in their religion justified.

Because believing in things that aren't true

See above.

Where did I get that conclusion? Because believing in things that aren't true inevitably lead to false conclusions about your reality, which makes it impossible not to be a danger. Also, I respect people as intelligent perceptive beings and it's for that reason that I cannot respect their outdated irrational beliefs. Not respecting a belief is not disrespecting a person as a whole.

But, you could argue that everything you know is just in your imagination, and everyone's in a massive space ship, in a coma. You can't prove anything is correct, and you can't prove anything is incorrect. You can only have faith in a concept, and that creates belief in a idea. People's beliefs are all they are, really, otherwise they would be robots. Belief and faith is the only thing that separates us from being any other animal, and that is why that is all we are, really, apart from our bodies. Everything we know, do or are is our beliefs.

 

[Simon]

Tin hats, folks! Someone's mentioned the R word!

 

[Dave]

I'll stop mocking religion when it stops being one of the biggest threats to humanity.

Believing in something without evidence creates a dangerous world where people can allow themselves to deny global warming, it allows people to do horrendous acts but feel that what they do is moral, and it has time and time again dragged humanity back: whether its believing that condoms are ineffective in protecting against sexual diseases, or promoting discrimination way into the 21st century, or even enabling people to ignore evidence that incriminates people such as the Pope, so that their belief can be maintained.

Religion is dangerous. It doesn't deserve respect.

My one issue with this argument is that its a bit wrong (yeah its a big singular issue). You could rid the world of religion tomorrow and nothing would change. Violence, war, greed, discrimination and every other negative you can put on religion is a human construct and will exist even if religion is no more. Humans have many banners to justify their crud and religion is just one such banner.

If you think religion causes all those problems you underestimate the poison in humanity (no I'm not religious)

 

[Sam]

The end of religion would not be the end of war and violence, but I think it's fair to predict that it would lessen, though of course not cease completely.

This is because of the number of wars that are fought on a religious basis. Israel/Palestine, Israel/Iran, India/Pakistan and Mali to name some current examples. I'm sure some of these wars would still exist without religion, but maybe some wouldn't.

There doesn't have to be a black and white answer to every debate. We don't either have to conclude that religion is one of the 'biggest threats to humanity' (Meat Pie) or that if it was abolished, 'nothing would change' (Dave). It's boring, but maybe the answer is somewhere between the two.

 

[Nick]

The end of religion would not be the end of war and violence, but I think it's fair to predict that it would lessen, though of course not cease completely.

This is because of the number of wars that are fought on a religious basis. Israel/Palestine, Israel/Iran, India/Pakistan and Mali to name some current examples. I'm sure some of these wars would still exist without religion, but maybe some wouldn't.

There doesn't have to be a black and white answer to every debate. We don't either have to conclude that religion is one of the 'biggest threats to humanity' (Meat Pie) or that if it was abolished, 'nothing would change' (Dave). It's boring, but maybe the answer is somewhere between the two.

An excellent point Sam.

It is quite probable that the wars we see today wouldn't be much different if there was religion or not. Although it's impossible to tell. We do know that there were certainly wars and suffering outside of religion, before some of the main religions were founded- the Battle of Badr, for example, occurred due to the Meccans attacking the Muslims. There was definitely fighting back then.

You could argue it both ways really. One that many wars wouldn't have happened without religion- such as the Crusades and the ongoing one between Israel and Palestine- and also that there were wars before, so they could have continued regardless.

There's no way to tell though.

 

[Dave]

I would place a lot of money on absolutely nothing changing if religion ended. Nearly all your examples Sam truly have little to do with religion, its to do with money, land and power. Religion is just the banner to rouse the masses. Patriotism would have the same effect quite easily.

The root of all these problems is humanity, blaming religion is just an attempt to absolve us of that responsibility.

 

[Nick]

Religion is just the banner to rouse the masses.

Sort of true. Some of the wars may have been used to get certain factions and denominations of a religion to work together against a common enemy. It works like a charm by saying "hey, this religion is causing a threat to your beliefs so end your petty squabbles and fight for your religion." Not only does it attempt to defeat your enemy, but under a single leader, would get you a lot of power and support.

Although some people very deeply hate other religions, and want to destroy them anyway.