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WHAT'S THIS?

First religion topic where the majority of the people posting in it actually understand religion isn't the main problem but rather the people using it as an excuse?

Well done SRF, I am proud.

But an animal... doesn't kill in honor of their god. xD

I'm sorry animals' brains have not developed this far yet. I can only imagine, when humans were just getting started they probably didn't kill each other over a god either, but I'm sure they killed each other for some kind of dominance or property. It takes a natural progression to get to the point where you're using ideology/theology as an excuse to kill another being.

Yes, the crusades never had any religious purposes. And now this religion is just a bad side effect.

No guy religion is a problem, there is no way around it.

Lol, but then how are they going to do their job while artificially getting oxygen? Or unable to move, etc.

Man, I fucking hate bicycles. Every single day there's a bunch of young teenagers that have nothing better to do than ride their bicycles outside my house. They rip up my perfectly green lawns, they throw my mail everywhere and they kick dust all over my poor garden gnomes! If it wasn't for these bicycles they wouldn't be able to do such evil acts! I think we should delete bicycles from the world! Do we really need them any more? Of course not! They are stupid! Get rid of them and solve everything!

I wonder if he gets a killer retirement package.

^You misunderstood. It's not that we don't need religion because some people use it as an excuse for killing other people. We don't need it because we can explain almost everything in this world religion is used for.

Religion giving people hope that they aren't living just too die.

I'm not living just to die, and I'm not religious.

What's the end result of all your hard work in life? What happens after all your success' and failures you die. No matter what we do in our lives in the end we all are going to end up the same.

And if we lie to ourselves, would that make it all better?

Dammit now I have to start debating.

I think your completely missing the point of life here. Sure, we are going to die. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't make the most of what we have now. I think life is about working towards your goals and trying to achieve a sense of happiness along the way. Because there is the possibility that we may die and cease to exist it promotes the idea that we should chase our goals now while we chance. I don't want to wake up at 40 and realize I've blown my one shot at life, so I'm doing everything I can to make my dreams come true right now.

If you spend your entire life doing nothing, simply thinking that it's all a waste of time in the end then you might as well just kill yourself now and get it over with.


Also, is religious pointless? I think Buddhism has a few things to say about that.

^Exactly this.

So.. what do they have to say?

I never once said its a waste of time and you should do all you can to enjoy it. What I am saying is people use religion to give them hope that they aren't living just to end up in a box 6 feet under, people want to believe that their life is worth something if they do all that their holy book tells them. Most people aren't content with knowing they will do all they do in life and not get some bucket of gold at the end of the rainbow.


After all of that I still believe religion, as bad and hateful, as it may be it is a necessity. Religion gives a lot of people their morals it tells them that they will have an eternity of torture if they kill someone or steal. In a way it keeps society in check.

Religion itself is just used to explain natural things
Religion doesnt create bad things that happen, but it just is a hell lot easier to do evil things when you can justify it by
"interpreting" a 2000 year old book.
Religion itself does not discriminate against women, but it does hold on to traditional and conservative ideals, which are usually based on sexism/racism/xenophobia, etc.

Also, organized religion =/= personal faith

^Religion is for people who can't set their own goals in life. And whether you achieve your religous goals or not, isn't really decided by how seriously you took your religion, but instead by what happens when you die. There are so many different beliefs in the world and a lot of people are going to be disappointed. Or maybe afterlife is for every individual exactly the way they depicted it in their minds, sort of like an imaginative existence? Either way, you're better off setting your own goals because then you will not be disappointed having worked hard enough to achieve them.

Again, Bhuddism disagrees with this. In essence it's a mantra for behaving and living, it's not an explanation for how we were created, rather its (I'm my ow personal view) a moral guideline for what values and thought processes promote a sense of self enlightenment and happiness. Sure, the idea of reincarnation is present and many uninformed people would instantly dismiss it based upon this, but reincarnation can be seen as a negative as opposed to 'people not accepting death'. There is no '2000 year old ruling book'. Dont confuse Christanity with all religion.

Bro, I'm Nepali, and in Nepal we follow both Hinduism and Buddhism, the lines are very blurred between the two in our culture. we go to both temples and stupas, celebrate both festivals, etc.
I would be the last one confusing all religion = abrahimic religions.
Now depending on what tenets of Buddhism you believe in, Buddhism does have its own moral stories that say why the universe is what it is, and what steps to follow to reach the end goal.
The difference between Hinduism/Buddhism and the western religions is that, because they both preach tolerance and are not proselytizing, neither say that their way of life is the best way of life, which apparently also leads to less violence.

So erm, don't bother spouting what you read on some atheistic site about Buddhism, as so many people on the internets do

I'm not sure what your point is exactly, or maybe you misunderstood me. I'm actually sort of agreeing with what your saying in a way. By nature, Bhuddism contains a lot of values which are peaceful and promote a disassociation with particular negative values (greed, materialism, over indulgence etc). My point is that there's no 'ruling book' that is justifying Xenphobic/sexist values like you stated. Perhaps you know more about it than I do considering your background so please correct me if I'm wrong. I was using it as an example to argue that not all religion leads to such negative behaviors and attitudes. Also I was implying that "all religion is used just to explain natural things" is blatantly wrong and using the spiritual quest of self enlightenment as an example. Hence my call, don't confuse Christianity with all religion. Just because some religion may harbor very traditional, 'negative' mindsets it doesn't mean that religion as an entity does.

My over all point is that not all religion is sexist, Xenophobic or causing negative disasters etc. Some Religion promotes positive values and enrich the lives of people. We shouldn't simply "delete it", like some people have implied earlier. Despite the fact that it's not feasible to do so, you'd be eradicating a lot of good from this world as well.

loved that part

Religion doesn't spawn stupidity, it is the result of.

+1

The main religions that worsen my overall view of religion are Christianity and Islam, those are the ones that have kinda messed up. But I do like Buddhism, Hinduism and some other Asian ones. The problem with Christianity and Islam is that they have just gotten too big. If they weren't so widespread, there'd be less issues

And if it was not a lie ??

Don't go all Pascal's wager on me.