Religion, good or bad? [Archive]

Yami no Takeshi

05-20-2005, 06:33 AM

Hmmm......
To state, first i do not believe in any religion.
Pls note that i said religion, not god.

If u were to push i would admit that might well be some sort of supreme being looking down on us.
But on the other hand i utterly and totally believe that religion is going to be the death of us.

At it's core every religion preaches good, but the reality is that most humans are totally unable stick to actual teachings of religion.
There is wide assumption that Islam is a terrorist religion considering well most terrorist attack are done by muslims, but this is wrong. I am not a muslim, but after reading the Al-Quran it is probably in my opinion one the better and fairest religion in the world.

Back to my point. Humans were probably never actually ready for religion for as i noted we are unable to stick to it so we twist and defile it to suit our purposes and that is where it all goes wrong.

So, considering in my opinion that most religions in the world have gone bad because of us humans, i decided years ago to drift away. Why bother with something that no longer serves it purpose?

So i live my my way according to ethics of right & wrong. It ain't for everyone but it works for me. :smile-big

Narrrf

05-20-2005, 06:49 AM

Oh, cheap debating tactics time! Go quote, requote power!

ummmm... how is that connected to having or not having religion?
Because the negative influence of religeon is so often cited in terms of the dead numbered, while everybody just turns a blind eye to even worse offenders. Wanna know how many people cars killed? Let's ban cars! I just wish everyone would think about that before proclaiming jihad on religion. It's a crusade! Protect the holy city of atheism! Wahaha...

I'm not very funny am I? :sad:

and since when has atheism killed anyone? please provide some examples..
Err, it's no coincidence that the worst offending governments of human rights, (notable the right to live), in this past century were all atheist. Stalin, Hitler, Polpot, Ho Chi Minh, Mao, Kim Jong Il, uhh, the somailan warlords, so on and so forth.

pajamas

05-20-2005, 06:51 AM

I personally prefer not to defend religeon but attack atheism. Like, how many people total or in ratio, did all the crusades, inquisitions, and whatnot kill? Think of the number, then tell me how many people did communism, socialism, and atheism kill just in this past century? Think long and hard before you talk. The answer?

YOU GOT PWNED!

EDIT: I have three red rep bars? It just gets better and better. That sounds nice. Red rep. Red rep pwning y'all~

you're an idiot :oh

I completely hate religon so my answer will be biased. I'd love to have a world without religon, I think it would be a lot of fun. I'd like to go back in time and just wipe out the race that created religon first, go, see what happens, go back, stop myself from ever killing them. I'd like to see what would happen. And I completely believe it would be a better place.

Err, it's no coincidence that the worst offending governments of human rights, (notable the right to live), in this past century were all atheist. Stalin, Hitler, Polpot, Ho Chi Minh, Mao, Kim Jong Il, uhh, the somailan warlords, so on and so forth.

prove it

Fear The Mullet

05-20-2005, 07:33 AM

prove it

Are you shitting me? You have to be shitting me, or you are just frustratingly mentally inept. Stalin alone, for no reason whatsoever, killed upwards of 20-30 million people in the Ukraine by a government imposed and sanctioned famine on those lands to try and gain control. Thats only the people he's killed there, and that was in peace time. NO wars. Not to mention the actions of the KGB, the communist revolution itself killed thousands of people, the purges even more, the Gulags, the NKVD. He alone can be held responsible for at lesat 40-50 millions deaths. And guess what, the USSR was atheist. Why? Because communism is atheist. IN a communist country there is no state religion, and the politicians (if they're good) will at least put up a front of atheism. Therefore atheism can be held linked to all those deaths.

This is the exact same comparison when people say "religion caused the crusades". No it didn't. The establishment did, the people running it did, the corrupt popes of the past did. Religion is a neutral institution , when people abuse it to get what they want, it gets a bad rep. Same with my exapmple above about communism and its atheist ideals.
Religion cannot be bad, or evil, or cause death, because it is just an institution. It is not self supporting, and is organized and run in society by people, because they believe in it. If they become corrupt they deal corruptly in the name of that religion. It tiself infact, never becomes corrupt.

Kitty

05-20-2005, 01:45 PM

Religions are often just worldviews and you can never really get rid of worldviews. For example I have a christian worldview and I know that its right, but if you just eliminated all churches I'd still have that worldview. The problem is that some worldviews tend to advocate murder of innocent people or people use the cause of religion to do distastful acts. Lets not forget, atheism itself is a religion and people use that to act intolerant of those who believe in God, so all types of worldviews and philosophies can be abused.

Actually, Atheism is not a religion. Religion is a "Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe."

dR.wHaCk

05-20-2005, 01:53 PM

i dont care what you guys say... i will be a Christian forever!

baconbits

05-20-2005, 02:18 PM

you're an idiot :oh
Alright people, chill out. We're debating in here so allow people to disagree without getting rude. And I'm just saying this to everyone and not just this poster.

I completely hate religon so my answer will be biased.
Its alright to disagree with religion but to hate it seems a bit extreme. If I said I hated muslims, I'd get flamed all the way outta NF.
I'd love to have a world without religon, I think it would be a lot of fun. I'd like to go back in time and just wipe out the race that created religon first, go, see what happens, go back, stop myself from ever killing them. I'd like to see what would happen. And I completely believe it would be a better place.
I don't think it would because of the reason that christianity keeps people from following their base instincts. If their is no God then all rules are merely man's rules, so any law can be changed. Rape can be ok. Murder is ok if you want it to be. Even religions outside of christianity serve to limit the ability of the powerful to just manipulate the law to their purposes.
prove it
The proof is this and I'll give three examples. In Nazi Germany Nazism was anti religious and strongly atheistic. Their actions are well noted.

Communism and Marxism is very atheist, which is why you are not allowed to be a christian in China. In Russia christians were killed and they also killed way more jews than the Nazis did (mainly because they were around longer). In China they just persecute and jail the religious. I don't know much about the casaulty numbers.

Now I'm not saying that atheists are murderers but I am saying that regardless of what belief system evil people use, evil people will be evil people. They will murder, plunder, and rape regardless of whether they believe in God or not.

vervex

05-20-2005, 02:28 PM

Well, of course, if you only see the bad effects of religion, I understand you are wondering why it exists. We could say just the samething of cars that are polluting the environnement : Should we walk instead ? ;)

There are many good sides to religion (to cars also, lol). If you take the Buddism for example, you can reach some spiritual peace within yourself. I'm not hearing quite often that there are wars between the Buddists. Unless I'm wrong ? Christians have a lot of hope and can make wonderful thing also, when they are all together. And so on with the other religions, because there are a lot of them ;)

I agree with you when you say it brought and still brings a lot of conflicts, but it's not the only source of trouble. If we take out religion, there will still be political conflicts for example. Should we eliminate politics then ?
I think humanity is just not mature enough to deal with differences of opinion, religion, or simply differences in general. Maybe one day will we grow up a little bit...

05-21-2005, 12:19 AM

Religion gives many people direction who would otherwise have none. While I'm not a fan, religion does promote good basic morals, although some of its teachings are flawed.

SoulFire

05-21-2005, 12:24 AM

No.

Humans are responsible, not teachings of whatever kind. if you take out religion, something else will take its place. At least religion offers some form of peace to those who accept it, wether they be muslim, Christian or Catholic, they all have morals and so forth, it just gets overshaded by the fanatic idiots.

Leave it alone.

PervertedMonkey

05-21-2005, 05:07 AM

The proof is this and I'll give three examples. In Nazi Germany Nazism was anti religious and strongly atheistic. Their actions are well noted.

Communism and Marxism is very atheist, which is why you are not allowed to be a christian in China. In Russia christians were killed and they also killed way more jews than the Nazis did (mainly because they were around longer). In China they just persecute and jail the religious. I don't know much about the casaulty numbers.

I'm gonna respond to this in my reply to Narrrf's post, please read below.

Now I'm not saying that atheists are murderers but I am saying that regardless of what belief system evil people use, evil people will be evil people. They will murder, plunder, and rape regardless of whether they believe in God or not.

Now this is exactly my point, if you put an evil man in power, it wont really matter if he believed in God or not, he would go about and murder, look at Saddam, he's not an atheist and look at what he's done

With regards to religion however, let's take 'Bloody' Queen Mary for example, she ordered the burnings and deaths of countless protestants during her reign because she was catholic. And then later when Elizabeth took throne, the pope himself encouraged her assassination because she was a protestant, this coming from the pope.

Because the negative influence of religeon is so often cited in terms of the dead numbered, while everybody just turns a blind eye to even worse offenders. Wanna know how many people cars killed? Let's ban cars! I just wish everyone would think about that before proclaiming jihad on religion. It's a crusade! Protect the holy city of atheism! Wahaha..

No one is saying that religion is unique here in its role in violence, if you want to make a thread about how bad cars are and how we should ban them then by all means, go ahead and make one, this is, afterall, a forum, where we can all freely share our thoughts and opinions and hopefully, even debate on things we dont agree on.

I'm not very funny am I? :sad:

Perhaps if you put a little more effort into it and less sarcasm :smile-big

Err, it's no coincidence that the worst offending governments of human rights, (notable the right to live), in this past century were all atheist. Stalin, Hitler, Polpot, Ho Chi Minh, Mao, Kim Jong Il, uhh, the somailan warlords, so on and so forth.

Ok first of all, none of these guys killed people in the name of atheism, unlike many of the massacres caused by religious zealots in the name of their so called 'religion'

Beleive it or not Hitler was not an atheist, he was infact Catholic and wrote many times about the benefit of Christianity, ofcourse you could say that this was merely all propaganda, but fact is, although he MAY not be a Christian, he was not an atheist either.

And to that I offer this link for some light reading and background on our favourite 20th centure butcher. http://kevin.davnet.org/essays/hitler.html

Now as for the rest of your examples goes(those of whom are ruling a communist nation), none of them, I repeat, none of them killed people in the name of atheism, the communist government see religion as a potential focus of opposition and a threat to its power, that is basically the only reason for their so called 'war' on religion, its not because of any belief system that they have that says religion is wrong and stupid but mainly because they see religion as a threat to their power.

Stalin was a pathological, paranoid, cold blooded killer who killed indiscriminately, segments of the Russian population without regard to religion in most cases. People who were killed in communist countries died for alot of reasons, so if you take a closer look, this is really more of a political issue and not a question of atheism.

I came across an article some time ago that explains what i want to say quite well and since i saved it i'd like to post it here...

Even if some people were killed simply because they followed a religion, it does not follow that they were killed in the name of atheism. Why? Because atheism is not inherently opposed to religion - it is possible to be both an atheist and religious and some religions are themselves atheistic.

To understand this better, consider times in the past when religion has been involved with violence - the Inquisition would be good. How many people were killed during the Inquisition for theism? None. Those doing the killing acted not because of theism, but rather because of Christian doctrines. The belief system is what inspired people to act (sometimes for good, sometimes for ill). The single belief of theism, however, did not.

Similarly, communism certainly inspired people to act and gave them motivations to do certain things, but atheism - which is the absence of a belief and not even a belief itself - did not. The assumption that people in Russia and China were killed because of atheism is based upon two other myths: first, that atheism is itself some sort of philosophy or belief system which can motivate people, and second that atheism is somehow interchangable with the actual belief system of communism.

Also, note that just because a government is communist, it does not necessarily follow that its also an atheist, in fact, there have been many communist countries in Europe and elsewhere that were Christian, including Roman Catholic Italy, Hungary, and Poland, and Lutheran Germany.

Now if I may, I wish to sum up my points as so...

Acts of Religion: "You are all wrong, my god is the true god, you must all die"

Acts of a communist goverment: "Religion is a threat to our form of government, we must wipe out all form of religion"

Now if what you have been saying is true and atheism is in fact responsible for all those deaths, would a communist government not sound more like so: "Religion is stupid, there is no god, anyone who believes otherwise must die"

EDIT: edited to include baconbits' reply, didnt want to double post

Kakashi_Love

05-21-2005, 05:35 AM

religion is all brainwash. but you know what, i like that kind of brainwash. you know what every religion has in common? they all teach about love and kindness. and i support that. :)

PervertedMonkey

05-21-2005, 05:40 AM

religion is all brainwash. but you know what, i like that kind of brainwash. you know what every religion has in common? they all teach about love and kindness. and i support that. :)

Even the type of brainwashing that tells you you should kill other people coz they dont have the same faith as you?

Narrrf

05-21-2005, 05:44 AM

For the sake of argument, I'm only going to be talking about Christianity. Let Islam fend for itself.

Why the heck would we debate on the things we agreed upon? It makes no sense. What I'm saying is that the violent side effects of religion are so small as to not matter. Tell me, how many abortion doctors did christians kill? How many gays did they kill? The answer? Not many. Actually, very few.

I hate it when my humor is misinterpreted as sarcasm. How is that from all the punches I pulled, it's all sarcasm. I swear, it makes no sense.

Anyways, err, PervertedMonkey? Did you read the website you cited agaisnt me? I sure wish you would've. Or at least a bit more thoroughly. Hitler was not a Christian. He was not a Catholic. By default, that makes him an Atheist. He was a monster.

Someone can't just say "I'm Christian," and then be christian. It is an embodiment of your actions and the reflection of your soul. By gum, you think this is just for the taking? Hitler was not a Christian as his actions documented by that website make abundantly clear.

As for the other communist countries, no, they did not kill in the name of atheism persay. Certainly they were atheists. Their religion was politics. Their religion was power. They were hedonists, living for themselves, only too warped on who they were. They denounced religion and killed whatever christians they may. Now, certainly they didn't explicity come out and said they killed in the name of atheism. But they didn't have to. Their actions speak for them. Now you don't see the connection between atheism, hedonism, and these wicked governments? You still think it's a political issue and not that they were damned atheist monsters?

PervertedMonkey

05-21-2005, 06:14 AM

What I'm saying is that the violent side effects of religion are so small as to not matter. Tell me, how many abortion doctors did christians kill? How many gays did they kill? The answer? Not many. Actually, very few.

First of all, I dont agree that violent side effects of religion are small and do not matter. and secondly, I'm also not saying that its the only and main reason for violence in the world, I am merely asking the question if the world would be better off if religion did not exist, hence the title of my thread.

Anyways, err, PervertedMonkey? Did you read the website you cited agaisnt me? I sure wish you would've. Or at least a bit more thoroughly. Hitler was not a Christian. He was not a Catholic. By default, that makes him an Atheist. He was a monster.

Yes Narrrf I did read it, and I hope you read my post clearly, I also stated that although hitler may not have been a crhistian, he was not an atheist either. The website also stated that Hitler considered himself to be religious.

And where does it say that your either a Christian or an Atheist by default?

If you were refering this: For the sake of argument, I'm only going to be talking about Christianity. Let Islam fend for itself. then there would seem to be no point in continuing this debate since you would consider a non-christian belief to be atheism.

Someone can't just say "I'm Christian," and then be christian. It is an embodiment of your actions and the reflection of your soul. By gum, you think this is just for the taking? Hitler was not a Christian as his actions documented by that website make abundantly clear.

I totally agree, you cant say one thing and do another, BUT, like I said before, he may not be a christian but it doesnt mean he's an atheist, but if you insist on sticking by with your 'atheist by default' then this fact is moot.

As for the other communist countries, no, they did not kill in the name of atheism persay. Certainly they were atheists. Their religion was politics. Their religion was power. They were hedonists, living for themselves, only too warped on who they were. They denounced religion and killed whatever christians they may. Now, certainly they didn't explicity come out and said they killed in the name of atheism. But they didn't have to. Their actions speak for them. Now you don't see the connection between atheism, hedonism, and these wicked governments? You still think it's a political issue and not that they were damned atheist monsters?

No there is no connection, as I have stated before, they killed to preserve and maintain their form of government/power, it had nothing to do with atheism.

Yes I do, its a political issue and not coz they were athiest, what would be the point if they were doing it all for ahteism??? You really mean to say that all those killings were merely the 'purging' of religion and it was done simply for that reason alone?

Kakashi_Love

05-22-2005, 05:42 PM

Even the type of brainwashing that tells you you should kill other people coz they dont have the same faith as you?

i dont believe any religion tells u to kill. people kill on their own because of their own selfish reasons. the religion never tells them too.

Mineko-Iwasa

05-22-2005, 05:45 PM

i dont believe any religion tells u to kill. people kill on their own because of their own selfish reasons. the religion never tells them too.
they don't tell us to kill, but allow us to do so, BUT just in certain translations from holy books....

stomponfrogs

05-22-2005, 05:49 PM

You can't say when something prevented a war, because you would have to prove something that never happened. Those who are truely religious tend to be rather peaceful, and that in itself would prevent wars between people who might have otherwise been more violent.

05-22-2005, 06:01 PM

i dont believe any religion tells u to kill. people kill on their own because of their own selfish reasons. the religion never tells them too.
Ah, but the religious leaders do tell them to.

Mineko-Iwasa

05-22-2005, 06:04 PM

Ah, but the religious leaders do tell them to.
They are THE LEADERS. They don't care about god, they just want THE POWER!

Kojiro Ganryu Sasaki

05-22-2005, 06:04 PM

Religions are often just worldviews and you can never really get rid of worldviews. For example I have a christian worldview and I know that its right, but if you just eliminated all churches I'd still have that worldview. The problem is that some worldviews tend to advocate murder of innocent people or people use the cause of religion to do distastful acts. Lets not forget, atheism itself is a religion and people use that to act intolerant of those who believe in God, so all types of worldviews and philosophies can be abused.

Atheism is not a religion. It is the belief that there simply is no god. One could claim it's purely based on rationality.

05-22-2005, 06:17 PM

They are THE LEADERS. They don't care about god, they just want THE POWER!
But they wouldn't have power without religion; therefore religion is a root of the problem.

Mineko-Iwasa

05-22-2005, 06:21 PM

who created religion? man
what are man? the leaders

but yeah, religion is the problem.
you know, if somebody tells you, you get all the women in "heaven" you want if you do a suicide attack, than which man would not do it?

BlueCheese

05-22-2005, 06:30 PM

For many peope religion gives hope and something to live for. I'm not religous myself but i can understand how for many religion is a good thing.

9th

05-22-2005, 06:37 PM

Religions aren't the real problem, its the people who abuse the religion.

05-22-2005, 07:34 PM

Religions aren't the real problem, its the people who abuse the religion.
And these people could not abuse religion without religion; therefore, religion is a root cause.

SoulFire

05-22-2005, 07:38 PM

And these people could not abuse religion without religion; therefore, religion is a root cause.

Misconceptions of the holy books of whatever religion are human, as are the misunderstandings about how to go about certain rules and writings.

These faults are human, thus the fault lies with them :wink

9th

05-22-2005, 07:41 PM

And these people could not abuse religion without religion; therefore, religion is a root cause.
Not really we can't put the blame on the religion just because its easier. If some people abuse the religion, and most folks DOESN't abuse it.

I think religion works great in some countrys, its keep people faith up and make them want to live longer and do their best. Its true, not all want Jihad.

So therefore i can easily say, No...no its NOT the root of the problem. Not everything is negative with religion.

05-22-2005, 07:44 PM

Not really we can't put the blame on the religion just because its easier. If some people abuse the religion, and most folks DOESN't abuse it.

I think religion works great in some countrys, its keep people faith up and make them want to live longer and do their best. Its true, not all want Jihad.

So therefore i can easily say, No...no its NOT the root of the problem. Not everything is negative with religion.
There are very few things with which everything is negative. You simply have to work with the negatives vs. the positives.
I'm not anti-religion; I'm just pointing out that it does cause problems.

9th

05-22-2005, 07:50 PM

There are very few things with which everything is negative. You simply have to work with the negatives vs. the positives.
I'm not anti-religion; I'm just pointing out that it does cause problems.
Yes and what I said is that it wasn't the root of the problems, simply put it...its a certain SOMEONE who got to abuse religion to make something negative from it. So the root of the problem is the person?

Guns don't kill people.....People kill people.

dmby

05-22-2005, 08:04 PM

Its not all religions that cause problems. Buddhism, my religion, is very peaceful. And I also believe that Religion as a philosophy is fine. It is not a bad thing. The establishment is the problem. People use the guise of religion as an excuse to make bad things happen. It has happened for all of eternity. But think of it; with the establishment gone, people would not have that guise to hide behind anymore.

05-22-2005, 08:05 PM

Yes and what I said is that it wasn't the root of the problems, simply put it...its a certain SOMEONE who got to abuse religion to make something negative from it. So the root of the problem is the person?

Guns don't kill people.....People kill people.
There doesn't have to be a singular root to a problem. Abuse of religion has two: corrupt people and religion. Shootings also have two: people and guns.

Masaki

05-22-2005, 08:07 PM

I can number a number of issues that came from religion:

Witch Trials
Holocaust
Crusades
9/11
Slavery of Africans
Hatred of homosexuals
The killing of the Catholics in Britain, I forget the time period

9th

05-22-2005, 09:15 PM

There doesn't have to be a singular root to a problem. Abuse of religion has two: corrupt people and religion. Shootings also have two: people and guns.
No it doesn't but in some cases there are and mostly when people refer to the root of a problem, its mostly a singular problem.

First of, let me know what the gun did to make the person shoot another person dead? If it was the existence of the gun, then drop the subject. Because thats a no no. You can as well blame the other person for him to even exist.

05-22-2005, 09:16 PM

No it doesn't but in some cases there are and mostly when people refer to the root of a problem, its mostly a singular problem.

First of, let me know what the gun did to make the person shoot another person dead? If it was the existence of the gun, then drop the subject. Because thats a no no. You can as well blame the other person for him to even exist.
It did nothing to make the person shoot the other. However, if the gun did not exist, could he have still shot the other person?

9th

05-22-2005, 09:19 PM

It did nothing to make the person shoot the other. However, if the gun did not exist, could he have still shot the other person?
There is always other ways to hurt a person. Same goes for religion, if it didnt exist... do you think the problem would vanish? No. Would same shit happen? Don't know...but it wouldnt be the a big diffrence, many places would be caotic. Then some places might even shape up.

Code

05-22-2005, 09:27 PM

05-22-2005, 09:45 PM

There is always other ways to hurt a person. Same goes for religion, if it didnt exist... do you think the problem would vanish? No. Would same shit happen? Don't know...but it wouldnt be the a big diffrence, many places would be caotic. Then some places might even shape up.
Of course there are other ways, but it becomes significantly harder if you don't have a gun, because you lose its defensive element (you can attack from long range, while your opponent cannot; therefore, you can often win with little resistance). Religion gives the religious leader a similar element in the faith of the people. It makes it far easier for him to control the people's hearts and minds.

Aldredian_Sahn

05-22-2005, 10:19 PM

And these people could not abuse religion without religion; therefore, religion is a root cause.
Seriously guys, religion is no where near the root of the problem. Religion is just a way to power for some, an easy way to manipulate those who don't question their religion. It doesn't have to be religion. Some people will do anything to get power. Hitler didn't have power from a religion, it was government and a superior race. People wanted to hear what he was saying and many believed without question. There are just greedy people in this world and they will use anything to get power and control. People who really have faith in their religions will question them to find the truth. Those aren't the ones who blindly follow. Those are the people who are following the real religion (I'm excluding any religion that promotes bad things, if they exist because I am). Everyone else is just...bluntly put...dumb to follow blindly. Yeah.

PervertedMonkey

05-22-2005, 11:19 PM

its a certain SOMEONE who got to abuse religion to make something negative from it. So the root of the problem is the person?

Guns don't kill people.....People kill people.

-----------------------------------------

No it doesn't but in some cases there are and mostly when people refer to the root of a problem, its mostly a singular problem.

First of, let me know what the gun did to make the person shoot another person dead? If it was the existence of the gun, then drop the subject. Because thats a no no. You can as well blame the other person for him to even exist.

I think you are oversimplifying the matter, you cant just say that oh its the person's fault and the gun has nothing to do with it, why do we have shooting accidents all over the world? Why do many children accidentally shoot people when they see a gun? I guess its the childrens fault isnt it? Since you cant blame it on the gun right?

Same goes for religion, I'm not saying that its purely religions fault, BUT you cant simply say that religion is blameless... take the crusades for example, the christian crusaders wiped out hundreds and thousands of Mohammedans, 'pagans', 'heretics', or those under the ban of excommunication.

Now are you telling me that if religion did not exist, these 'crusaders' would have still found a way to do these things? No they wouldnt, because without religion, they wouldnt even be able to distinguish anyone from each other because there would not have been any basis for distinction.

Same with the inquisition, who would they persecute and burn at the stake if they didnt have teachings that said those people were heretics and needed to be killed? You are saying that these would have happened anyway? Again, I dont think so, most of these people who were killed were no different than any other people who lived during the time, so you cant say that they would have eventually been killed because they were not distinct by race, gender or status, only by their RELIGION!

Aldredian_Sahn

05-23-2005, 12:27 AM

Same with the inquisition, who would they persecute and burn at the stake if they didnt have teachings that said those people were heretics and needed to be killed? You are saying that these would have happened anyway? Again, I dont think so, most of these people who were killed were no different than any other people who lived during the time, so you cant say that they would have eventually been killed because they were not distinct by race, gender or status, only by their RELIGION!
Except that, although those people may not have been killed, others surely would have been. People are always placing themselves in groups and if it wasn't the people that used religion to do their personaly biddings, they or someone else would have surely used another excuse, such as race, gender, or status. Like I said before, some people, if not everyone, likes power and they will do anything and use any excuse to attain it. Religion is not the source, the problem comes from within the human race.

baconbits

05-23-2005, 12:34 AM

I think you are oversimplifying the matter, you cant just say that oh its the person's fault and the gun has nothing to do with it, why do we have shooting accidents all over the world? Why do many children accidentally shoot people when they see a gun? I guess its the childrens fault isnt it? Since you cant blame it on the gun right?
Well I know that this is a rabbit trail but I think a distinction must be made between an accident and a murder. If a gun just discharges on its own its the gun manufacture's fault, but any other time its the fault of a person. I just have to crack a smile on this point because at any other time a person blaming an inanimate object for something would be laughed at, so why are guns and SUV's the exception?
Same goes for religion, I'm not saying that its purely religions fault, BUT you cant simply say that religion is blameless... take the crusades for example, the christian crusaders wiped out hundreds and thousands of Mohammedans, 'pagans', 'heretics', or those under the ban of excommunication.

Now are you telling me that if religion did not exist, these 'crusaders' would have still found a way to do these things? No they wouldnt, because without religion, they wouldnt even be able to distinguish anyone from each other because there would not have been any basis for distinction.
Well this point is well taken but I have seen many wars where people just discriminate and kill people that I couldn't tell apart. The Bosnian and Serb case comes to mind. The racism between the Chinese and Japanese also jumps out at me. These two things are just a couple of many examples of groups of people killing other groups because of minor differences. Can people use religions badly? Yes, but evil people are evil people, and they'll use what ever they can to achieve what they want.

Same with the inquisition, who would they persecute and burn at the stake if they didnt have teachings that said those people were heretics and needed to be killed? You are saying that these would have happened anyway? Again, I dont think so, most of these people who were killed were no different than any other people who lived during the time, so you cant say that they would have eventually been killed because they were not distinct by race, gender or status, only by their RELIGION!
The inquisition could be paralleled with the Russian killing of the province peoples Stalin (I forget the province), the Nazi killings, Chinese Government killings, ... I could go on. I'll grant the point that religion can be used as an excuse for killing but they are not the cause of the killing. Killing is the natural desire of violent men.

PervertedMonkey

05-23-2005, 01:41 AM

Except that, although those people may not have been killed, others surely would have been. People are always placing themselves in groups and if it wasn't the people that used religion to do their personaly biddings, they or someone else would have surely used another excuse, such as race, gender, or status. Like I said before, some people, if not everyone, likes power and they will do anything and use any excuse to attain it. Religion is not the source, the problem comes from within the human race.

No one is arguing that other people wont die or that violence will stop when religion is gone, all im saying is that the world MIGHT have been better off if it hadnt existed, I'm asking the possibility that perhaps, there might have been far less conflicts and wars had it not been for religion.

Now I know people with different motives have been using religion as an EXCUSE to kill, and if not for religion, they probably would have found a different way, I understand that perfectly and I agree.

What I'm talking about are those instances of violence that were initiated SOLELY based on religion, without any ulterior motives.

Well I know that this is a rabbit trail but I think a distinction must be made between an accident and a murder. If a gun just discharges on its own its the gun manufacture's fault, but any other time its the fault of a person. I just have to crack a smile on this point because at any other time a person blaming an inanimate object for something would be laughed at, so why are guns and SUV's the exception?

I think you're missing my point, I'm not blaming the the gun per se, I'm saying if the gun hadnt existed, then the person wouldnt be dead, granted there are many other ways to kill a person, but let me offer this analogy...

Lets say that religions are like guns... People may use them to kill, ofcourse there are alot of other ways to kill people, with knives, swords, and probably most any object you can think of. BUT out of all these, guns kill the most, and if you take out the guns, then there would most likely be alot of people alive today, same with religion.

Now dont get me wrong, I'm not saying its not the person's fault, I'm a strong believer that everyone is responsible for their own actions, but all im saying is that there will always be times that a person might not have killed another person if the guns hadnt been there.

How many instances of gang violence were there, or people killing each other simply because they were carrying a gun and had an inkling on using it, you cant argue the fact that in alot of cases, if they didnt had the guns, they probably might not have killed.

Well this point is well taken but I have seen many wars where people just discriminate and kill people that I couldn't tell apart. The Bosnian and Serb case comes to mind. The racism between the Chinese and Japanese also jumps out at me. These two things are just a couple of many examples of groups of people killing other groups because of minor differences. Can people use religions badly? Yes, but evil people are evil people, and they'll use what ever they can to achieve what they want.

I'm not arguing that fact, I totally agree, evil people will always be evil, regardless of religion... But again, how about those people who were not evil? Those who simply blindly followed their faith and were caused to resort to violence because of religion, I doubt you would consider the popes to be evil, but there were many of them who encouraged violence against the so called 'heretics' and 'pagans' of the world.

The inquisition could be paralleled with the Russian killing of the province peoples Stalin (I forget the province), the Nazi killings, Chinese Government killings, ... I could go on. I'll grant the point that religion can be used as an excuse for killing but they are not the cause of the killing. Killing is the natural desire of violent men.

I disagree, yes, religion CAN be an excuse but can ALSO be a cause.

baconbits

05-23-2005, 01:52 AM

I disagree, yes, religion CAN be an excuse but can ALSO be a cause.
I see your line of reasoning here. You're not saying that religion is the sole cause.

The thing that I'm saying is similar to the gun argument. Because guns exist, evil people use them to kill. Good people use them to protect.

Because religion exists bad people use it to get a power base of unquestioning followers. Because religion exists good people use it to do good things and to instill morality.

PervertedMonkey

05-23-2005, 02:35 AM

I see your line of reasoning here. You're not saying that religion is the sole cause.

The thing that I'm saying is similar to the gun argument. Because guns exist, evil people use them to kill. Good people use them to protect.

Because religion exists bad people use it to get a power base of unquestioning followers. Because religion exists good people use it to do good things and to instill morality.

Close enough, but I'm also saying that sometimes, good people, with perhaps good intentions end up doing bad things because of religion.

:)

lpzie

05-23-2005, 03:58 AM

I'd like to go back in time and just wipe out the race that created religon first, go, see what happens, go back, stop myself from ever killing them. I'd like to see what would happen. And I completely believe it would be a better place.

[ taken from www.christian-thinktank.com ]
"So, how did you come to the conclusion that mankind somehow 'invented' God[/religion]?

"What historical or archaeological data could you advance for your position? (recognizing that 'religion'--good, bad, and ugly--already was present in earliest recorded history of civilization...there are NO evidences of development at all in the earliest written records of humanity--it is already completely full-blown and well-developed by then...so I cannot imagine how you could identify a point in time in which this 'invention' occurred)?

"Not only can we not identify in historical sources a point of 'invention', we cannot even trace a line of development! The earliest religious practices on record are from ancient Egypt and ancient Mesopotamia. And these ancient religions have very well-developed theologies, rituals, ethical systems, and even institutions. Even the universality of the flood traditions in all ancient cultures (in which a god or gods judged the world with a flood) represents an essentially 'modern' religious outlook.

"You realize that IF God created us with a pre-built notion of an "disembodied consciousness with virtually unlimited abilities", we would be EXPECTED to 'come up with' an idea of "god"--as a means for Him/Her/It/They to initiate personal communication with our species, so any argument that we 'learn' the concept of 'god' from culture or we externalize parental roles/powers to an abstract "Thou" will count in support of BOTH theories...

"Abstraction" alone, by the way, cannot disqualify the concept of 'god', since the same level of abstraction applies to a wide range of related terms that obviously 'exist'--agent, consciousness, minds, justice, love, truth, etc.

"I am curious, therefore, how you would support such a position--with real data.

spykiddo

05-23-2005, 04:08 AM

everyone has belief its better to have a religion for me because the root of wars and problems is not the religins

05-23-2005, 11:56 AM

Seriously guys, religion is no where near the root of the problem. Religion is just a way to power for some, an easy way to manipulate those who don't question their religion. It doesn't have to be religion. Some people will do anything to get power. Hitler didn't have power from a religion, it was government and a superior race. People wanted to hear what he was saying and many believed without question. There are just greedy people in this world and they will use anything to get power and control. People who really have faith in their religions will question them to find the truth. Those aren't the ones who blindly follow. Those are the people who are following the real religion (I'm excluding any religion that promotes bad things, if they exist because I am). Everyone else is just...bluntly put...dumb to follow blindly. Yeah.
People need opportunity to gain power. Religion gives people that opportunity.
Hitler was able to gain power without using religion because his country was in a state of financial chaos and political discord. We don't have any similar circumstances in the United States. The easiest way, by far, to gain power over people is by manipulating religion.
It is a tool used to gain power; therefore, it is an element of that.

05-23-2005, 11:57 AM

Sayo

05-23-2005, 12:02 PM

everyone has belief its better to have a religion for me because the root of wars and problems is not the religins
what is this guy trying to say?

05-23-2005, 12:03 PM

what is this guy trying to say?
Unfortunately, we have at least 2 new arrivals to the religion threads who are not fluent in English and thus are having trouble communicating.

And he said, "Everyone has beliefs. It is better to have religion because religion is not the root of wars and problems."
Which is a rebuttal with no evidence.

Sayo

05-23-2005, 12:06 PM

I see, well i made something out of it wich says: "it's better to have a religion because religion is not the root of war" so now we are forced to have a religion no mather what it is or else wars will never stop?
sounds a bit extreem, i mean, to have a religion is ok but to belief it resolves things like war is a bit to far, in the contrary alot of wars used/are based on religion .. .

And he said, "Everyone has beliefs. It is better to have religion because religion is not the root of wars and problems."
Which is a rebuttal with no evidence.
<readed after edit>

05-23-2005, 12:07 PM

what is this guy trying to say?

Everyone has the right to choose what beliefs they decide to follow; it may not necessarily be religion, but a set of values for example. This user chooses religion as a guideline in life. Furthermore, he's saying that the root of the world's probelms (war, strife, famine) does not stem from religion.
There you go. (:

*chooses not to debate on this topic due to extreme bias* =P

Snickus

05-23-2005, 02:03 PM

I've seen the best and worst of human actions under religion.

I still think, however, that religion is an important factor in life. A lot of people feel complete with religion. It may cause some bad things, like radical groups, but i've also seen it be a powerful force. Look at Christian Charities or the Dalai Lama (who I highly respect).

kireato

05-23-2005, 04:29 PM

Better off without religion? I don't think so... Or at least, could you realistically imagine a world without religions? Without having subjectives reactions? Nope.

There's best and worst, as said earlier, and i think we may as well accept the experience we've taken out of it.

It's hard to explain. religions can't be eliminated, and they are part of this world. It has intereacted with good and bad actions and so there is no point in removing it because there are some problems with it. if that's so, then it's like denying life as life isn't perfect...

*confused*

Jin

05-23-2005, 05:12 PM

When you take a look at the all the death and suffering caused by 'religion', such as the crusades, the inquisition, the holy wars, to name a few, it begs the question, would the world be better off without religion?

Now I know there is no way to remove religion from society (atleast not in the near future), but I guess the question is, has it done more harm than good? So many of our conflicts today and past have been caused by the belief in different religions, and so much of our efforts and resources have gone into them, would the world be a different(better?) place today if religion did not exist?

Thoughts anyone?

The world would be diffrent but would it be better that we can not say. There will always be war. As long as Humans are alive there will always be war. Its just what the war will be about that will change. Many people use religion as a reason to have war. Some times it was the reason some times its just the reason they give us.

I do belive that threw religion the world will go to WWIII. People always belive that there god is behind them that they are doing the right thing. We have war so we may live in peace.

Akatsuki™

05-23-2005, 05:41 PM

Now this is exactly my point, if you put an evil man in power, it wont really matter if he believed in God or not, he would go about and murder, look at Saddam, he's not an atheist and look at what he's done

Just to correct perverted monkey he is a bathist socailist and infact an atheist he was no way a muslim if you research you'll see!

Snickus

05-23-2005, 06:11 PM

I can number a number of issues that came from religion:
...
...
Slavery of Africans

From studying History of the Americas, my feeling is that slavery occured for economic reasons. It used to be more profitable to raise slaves for labour then to hire work, but eventually it became cheaper to hire work than to care for slaves, and the slave trade started to dwindle in the north United States and to some extent (but not much) in Brazil. The ethics of slavery eventually came into question by Britain, who pressured Brazil and the US, and eventually the US went into a large debate over the subject and the civil war later broke out etc...

I think I went off on a tangent there ^^.

Aldredian_Sahn

05-23-2005, 07:15 PM

No one is arguing that other people wont die or that violence will stop when religion is gone, all im saying is that the world MIGHT have been better off if it hadnt existed, I'm asking the possibility that perhaps, there might have been far less conflicts and wars had it not been for religion.

Now I know people with different motives have been using religion as an EXCUSE to kill, and if not for religion, they probably would have found a different way, I understand that perfectly and I agree.

What I'm talking about are those instances of violence that were initiated SOLELY based on religion, without any ulterior motives.
What is religion, a set of beliefs that a whole bunch of people believe in? Yes, no? What are you saying, the world MIGHT have been better off if people didn't have beliefs? If that's it, I really don't think the world would be organized very well. Of course we have laws which are not religion, but laws exist in nations and people didn't have nations or states in the beginning. So they had beliefs to organize their groups. Yeah I know, I'm kind of rambling. I'm just kind of getting my thoughts down. The question that surpasses the idea that the world MIGHT have been better off without religion is the possibility of such a thing. I don't understand the reason of arguing over something that isn't possible, so would it have been possible not to have 'religions' or group beliefs?

PervertedMonkey

05-24-2005, 11:01 PM

Just to correct perverted monkey he is a bathist socailist and infact an atheist he was no way a muslim if you research you'll see!

Hmmm... you could be right on this one, dont have time to look it up now but my point still stands, there have been many religious leaders in the past and current that are just as vicious.

What is religion, a set of beliefs that a whole bunch of people believe in? Yes, no? What are you saying, the world MIGHT have been better off if people didn't have beliefs? If that's it, I really don't think the world would be organized very well. Of course we have laws which are not religion, but laws exist in nations and people didn't have nations or states in the beginning. So they had beliefs to organize their groups. Yeah I know, I'm kind of rambling. I'm just kind of getting my thoughts down. The question that surpasses the idea that the world MIGHT have been better off without religion is the possibility of such a thing. I don't understand the reason of arguing over something that isn't possible, so would it have been possible not to have 'religions' or group beliefs?

I agree with you, partially. You're right that the world wouldn't be much organized if there were no sets of beliefs but at the same time I think that these sets of beliefs doesnt necessarily have to come from religion... Beliefs can simply be a set of ethical codes and standars, it doesnt have to be divine related.

Now I know that its impossible to remove religion now, but I think sometime in the future, religion will become a thing of the past.

spykiddo

05-25-2005, 03:59 AM

ei perverted monkey how did u become a genin or how to raise a rank

Kimi Sama

05-25-2005, 07:08 AM

PervertedMonkey

05-25-2005, 07:34 AM

Humans are deeply flawed creatures. Religion is not a cause of violence, people are. Some people have violent and/or intolerent mindsets, and use religion as a cover for this by saying "God told me to do it".
If people were perfect, religion would be as well.

If religion was removed from the equation, people would murder and violate each other just as much as they do now, possibly even more so. The only difference is that they wont have the well worn phrase "In the name of God" to cover thier tracks.

You are saying this under the assumption that religion has a divine origin, but since most (I wont say ALL coz i'll just get flamed, although thats what i believe) have earthly origins meaning they are made up by humans, they are already flawed, thats why some religions say its ok to kill as long as you do it for that particular religion.

ExAzrael

05-25-2005, 08:20 AM

Personally, I think the faster society gets over religion, the better. :\

(man, I'm posting a lot << )

kireato

05-25-2005, 09:02 AM

You are saying this under the assumption that religion has a divine origin, but since most (I wont say ALL coz i'll just get flamed, although thats what i believe) have earthly origins meaning they are made up by humans, they are already flawed, thats why some religions say its ok to kill as long as you do it for that particular religion.

When is he making any assumption? Saying that man isn't perfect means saying that religion is divine???

Yeah, religions have earthly origins... And that's why the fact MAN are flawed makes religion flawed... Not the opposite.

The root of the problem is clearly man. That and... A good part of the principles of some religions are necessary laws we should follow. (I don't say all, some are rubbish, and half the stuff can be interpreted as you like it...)

*is agnostic*

05-25-2005, 09:40 AM

Humans are deeply flawed creatures. Religion is not a cause of violence, people are. Some people have violent and/or intolerent mindsets, and use religion as a cover for this by saying "God told me to do it".
If people were perfect, religion would be as well.

If religion was removed from the equation, people would murder and violate each other just as much as they do now, possibly even more so. The only difference is that they wont have the well worn phrase "In the name of God" to cover thier tracks.
It's not a reason people commit murder... but it is a means of controlling people in order to make them commit murder.

kireato

05-25-2005, 09:55 AM

It's not a reason people commit murder... but it is a means of controlling people in order to make them commit murder.

What exactly is the difference between a reason and a mean to give others a reason?

05-25-2005, 11:56 AM

What exactly is the difference between a reason and a mean to give others a reason?
The second is one person controlling another. The first is one person acting alone and making their own decisions.

kireato

05-25-2005, 02:07 PM

What you said originally was that religion wasn't a reason to commit murder but rather the mean some used to control others in that same purpose.

Then i asked what the difference was between the reason and a mean to give others a reason (don't worry, i'm just checking i'm not getting lost. :)) And your answer is that in one case, one person is controlled, and in the other, he's taking his own decisions.

So... In what way does the controlled person feel the difference between being controlled and taking his own decision? I've always thought that whenever someone controlled someone, it was because that person was willing to be controlled/could accept the idea of murdering.

Basically, leaders behind religions can induce ideas however they want, they need a receptive population for their idea to work. Subtly controlling someone means that the decision could have been taken alone as the idea of murdering was already present. Leaders just gave a confirmation that it was ok and allowed.

I mean... you can't force someone who doesn't have a good reason to do it to hate and kill for a "religion's" sake. So from this sense, are religions really a mean rather than an excuse for doing something wrong which would have been done anyway?

*hopes he wasn't too confusing*

Then again, this arguement is based on the fact that we can all think for ourselves, and that when you "control" someone else, the only thing you do is make that person see something which he already has inside and follow it... given that it's what the controller wants.

Jedi Mind Tricks

05-31-2005, 11:29 PM

No. Religion in itself is perfectly fine. It's the people that abuse/misuse religion as an excuse to wage wars that is wrong. Or the people that want to force their (religious) beliefs on others. That's where it gets messy.
I think it's good for people to have something they believe in, something that gives them hope when everything else seems like shades of dark. (I'm agnostic, but that's beside the point) The basic ideas of religion aren't bad at all. But like I said, it's the people that misuse the name of religion for their own desires that really farks things up.

Yep, agreed,
if you look at religion they do not promote violence; they promote peace.

There may be violent refrences in holy books, but these are used so that people who follow their religion properly, know the right way to go about defending youself if in trouble.

People have abused the violent refrences and used it to their own advantage for their own twisted ideals.

My opinion...

PervertedMonkey

06-02-2005, 12:20 AM

yes but dont you guys see, some of these 'religion' teaches their followers to go and 'force' theire beliefs onto others, and during the middle ages, people who would not convert were judged to be killed.

we've already discussed the 'excuse to wage war' issue a few pages back, yes some people do use religion as an 'excuse' BUT there are also people who wage war BECAUSE of religion, and simply for that reason, NOT AS AN EXCUSE.

Jedi Mind Tricks

06-02-2005, 12:41 AM

some of these 'religion' teaches their followers to go and 'force' theire beliefs onto others,

Which religion's do you speak of?

blynx

06-02-2005, 12:57 AM

I'm fine without religion. I used to be catholic, but the study of the Bible, life itself (and conseqently, mi own beliefs), made me change my mind.
I could qualify myself as an agnostic.

PervertedMonkey

06-02-2005, 12:57 AM

Which religion's do you speak of?

well, christianity for one, during the middle ages

hostilecrayon

06-02-2005, 01:15 AM

Well, when speaking on religion, one must seperate the regular religious masses from the extremests. This is a very important factor, expecially when discussing the 'crimes' of religious parties.

I've studied religion for quite some time and have studied over 20 different religions. When you look at the religions of the world side by side without bias, you'll notice they have have one very basic principle: do good. All religions boil down to this principle. When looking at the basic religious person, you'll find that somewhere in their daily life, they put this into use.

On the other hand, you have the extremests. Much of the time, no matter what religion you're talking about, their basic principle is: kill all who are not of my religion.

So, if you were to ask me if religion has done the world harm, I'd have to say not at all. If anything, it has insteeled morals into some people who otherwise would not have them. What then, has done the world harm? Religious extremests. It's really that simple. Religious extremests massacured the Pagans. Religious extremests attacked the Jainists. Religious extremests started holy wars. Religious extremests have been involved in terrorist actions. Religion is just fine by itself. It's the extremests that need to be done away with.

mflow

06-02-2005, 01:18 AM

well, christianity for one, during the middle ages

The same could be said about Islam and the conversion of Muslims or death back when Muhammed founded the religion. He let Christians and Jews keep their religion but he threatened all the pagans to convert or die. Those were actions of the past which may affect how we view the religion today, but is not the same as hundreds of years ago. Christians ran around killing each other back when England converted to Anglican, then back to Catholicism, then back to Anglican once again. However, most reasonable followers today do not force their religion to others. Islam is a religion clouded with terrorism today but it's still the fastest growing religion on the planet, so the misconceptions of the past shouldn't be used as evidence as to what the religion is today, since the religion has changed. (even though it's still valid :amuse )

PervertedMonkey

06-02-2005, 01:44 AM

So, if you were to ask me if religion has done the world harm, I'd have to say not at all. If anything, it has insteeled morals into some people who otherwise would not have them. What then, has done the world harm? Religious extremests. It's really that simple. Religious extremests massacured the Pagans. Religious extremests attacked the Jainists. Religious extremests started holy wars. Religious extremests have been involved in terrorist actions. Religion is just fine by itself. It's the extremests that need to be done away with.

Point taken, BUT you have to also consider the fact that religion is infact the source for those religious extremests, you have to take religion as a whole, you cant just say that religion is good and its the people who are bad... yes i understand that, BUT remember, those so-called religious extremests would not have a banner to rally upon if it were not for the existence of religion. they would have no cause and no reason... therefore my main point (also the main topic of this thread) is that religion is the cause of alot of the horrible things that have happened in this world.... and continue to do so

kungfuchopstickz

06-02-2005, 02:35 AM

I believe religion is for the good of mankind. It gives us hope as well as teaches us morals. Religion only divides people because they use it as a crutch to act on their own hates and prejudices. If one follows any religion 100%, they would not wage war or do despicable deeds claiming it was for their "God".

yo586

06-02-2005, 02:36 AM

alright, not gonna step into a full blown debate but i have this one point to say. . .

it is true, religious extremists are the cause of (almost) all that is wrong in religion. but as pervertedmonkey says, there is no way to have religion without the extremists. common human nature, some asshole out there is gonna take everything WAY too seriously. actually, come to think of it, the only religion I have studied thus far that followers have not found a phrase that they can justify killing with is Buddhism. hence the reason I really like buddhism.
still, extremists will arise in every aspect of humanity, and religion in and of itself cannot be held to blame for this. really, when you look at the grand total, as many lives have been saved or bettered by religion than ended or worsened. reason we don't hear about all the good stuff is because, simply put, it makes bad press (this can be argued, but is my personal belief from travels and classes on the subject)

as for the topic, would the world be better off without religion? I honestly can't answer that. sometimes I think yes, sometimes I think no, but I don't spend too much time pondering that question. Fact of the matter is, so long as we humans continue to search for purpose/meaning to our lives, a universal truth, or the "right" way to do things there will be religion in some form in this world. the religion most commonly held by people today is that of science, a tricky religion because its ardent followers claim that it is not religious because it is all "factual". but all that aside, a world without religion is useless to contemplate simply because it will never exist so long as there are creatures alive that can think and moralize.

and im out

akuma no omoigakenai saku

06-04-2005, 04:36 AM

back to some stuff from the beginning of the thread. What do you mean hitler was an athiest. He was Roman Catholic, except that he claimed to believed a bunch on ancient germanic mythology that was not Christian. Also, one of his chief advisors apparently claimed to be the direct descendent of the Norse god Thor. That's called being a crackpot, not an athiest.

Akatsuki™

07-12-2005, 04:18 PM

I understand that my comment is very late, but i just want to add that people need to distinguish between the religion itself, and the individuals claiming to portray it.
For example Bin Laden and co (the individuals) claim its ok to commit suicide attacks and what not, when clearly Islaam (the religion) doesn’t teach such Muslims to do this.
So i urge the people to base their comments on knowledge, and not on something they received from individuals.
IF they want to put a point across they should at least study the actual religion itself, rather than make claims by using the understanding of radical individuals who claim to follow such religious doctrines.

TheMexicanKingVII

07-12-2005, 04:27 PM

Religion and Bibles are really in a sense a book of standard morality. I really believe that there is no god but I also believe in one. I don't know why but the way I see it is, there has always been a endless spiral of violence in this world. People wanted something too believe in and some how wanted people to be better citizens. So this is where all the god and bible stuff originated from.

Do I believe the world would be better off with religion no, but the extremist yes. They're the ones who take their own religion out of context and misconstrue what it is saying. Everyone interprets it differently. People need something to believe in too know there is something after death. No one wants to live life knowing there is no purpose to them.

Religion comferts and sets the mind at ease.

Akatsuki™

07-12-2005, 05:04 PM

Exactly my point king its the extremists that take things out of context thus causing the problems not the religon itself :amuse

Twizted3584

07-15-2005, 06:06 AM

Better off without organized religon...most definately. No one should ever be told what to believe. Especially not by some guy in a white robe and hat 5,000 miles away.

Tenrow

07-15-2005, 06:51 AM

IMO i think that everyone should be athiest. When a faith at one point become too faithful, religion just becomes feared. People die because of religion. Only people who follow a belief, but not overtake their lives outside of that faith are the only ones who get it. I mean its like researching information on Adolf Hitler. You can't base everything about germans just because of the actions of 1 insane guy.

For those who played FFX, Yevon was just like that. Religion gives people hope for the future, that maybe there is an afterlife, however religions are more or less false hope. You don't know what happens when you die. For all you know you can just be rotting in the ground. Just like you don't know it there is a god(s)

lekki

07-15-2005, 08:29 AM

Religion should be made fully transparent.
It's never been religions fault for the most part because there are few religions that actually started out by stating that they should harm others.
It's when people like popes and imams and such get their hands on it and they crave power that these terrible things happen. They preach their twisted interpretation of things to the people and it gets all fucked up.

Religion is for the good of the people and so it should be by the people too.
There should never be closed door tribunals and decision making since religion is supposed to be divine and perfect and shouldn't be flawed. The flaws come from human meddling. Governments are allowed to be flawed because they come from human origins, not true with religion if you believe in the almighty God.

But it's far too late now. Let's see where it takes us.
If govenrments tried to outlaw religion now, we would see some of the biggest wars ever in the history of mankind.

Katon_Chidori

07-16-2005, 01:33 AM

When you take a look at the all the death and suffering caused by 'religion', such as the crusades, the inquisition, the holy wars, to name a few, it begs the question, would the world be better off without religion?

Now I know there is no way to remove religion from society (atleast not in the near future), but I guess the question is, has it done more harm than good? So many of our conflicts today and past have been caused by the belief in different religions, and so much of our efforts and resources have gone into them, would the world be a different(better?) place today if religion did not exist?

Thoughts anyone?

Im a Christian and all (Go to Church every Sunday) but religion isnt the thing that created all those disasters.... It was the idiot priests inquisitors zealots and missionaries that created that terror. Such as when the over 30,000 Incans we killed when they refused to accept Christianity. The missionaries from Spain caused that to happen. The Holy wars were from the Pope who was "On Crack" In my opinion. Had all of Europe whipped into a frenzy just to capture the ctiy of jerusalem. Not to mention how much the slave trade increased when Children left their homes in an attempt to retake the holy land called "The Childrens Crusade" So overall i have to say that a world without religion would be better. We wouldnt be fighting Iraq..... (Our terrorist is another's Freedom fighter.......... There wouldnt have been any mass slaughters like WW2 with the Nazi Camps and all.......... Now i've been typing for about 5 minbs now im tired............. Good night :D

blacklusterseph004

07-16-2005, 07:21 PM

If there wasn't any religion I don't think our situation would be any better. You'd still get extremists, that simply change their reasons for doing harm to others. It may be nationalism or racism or some other "ism", but people would still do bad things with other motivations. I must admit though, that nothing motivates a mass of people more than religion. Interestingly enough, I think that satanism advocates doing harm to others and yourself, and its also a religion.

Outenkun

09-14-2005, 06:40 PM

Personally, I think the world would be better without it. There would be so much less prejudice without. Take Kentucky for an example, I lived there for a year and was ready to punch the priests. Between the parades stating gays are going to hell, and if you don’t believe in god, bla blah blah. Its just taken to far.

Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against you if you are religious, its your choice and none of my business.

earthshine

09-14-2005, 06:43 PM

its both, it can stir up alot of crap, but it also gives people somthing to hang on to when they want to give up on life

Outenkun

09-14-2005, 06:50 PM

its both, it can stir up alot of crap, but it also gives people somthing to hang on to when they want to give up on life
I suppose it can be good in that it must be nice to believe there is always someone or something looking out for you. But is worth it?

Jones

09-14-2005, 06:52 PM

i say w/e makes you happy. just dont press it on other people. i think that's kinda stupid. people need to find their own way to live. not have creepy people coming to their door and asking if they have found god yet.

mow

09-14-2005, 06:55 PM

On Second though, merging.

ninamori

09-14-2005, 06:55 PM

My parents have always said, "Nothing good has ever happened as a result of religion."

And I agree with them. :oh

*edit*
Well, nevermind, then! *glares at Moe*

<______<

skunkworks

09-14-2005, 06:58 PM

Religion isn't inherently flawed, but people are. Religion today isn't very appealing because the most dominant one, Christianity, has a good portion of its followers going around telling people they're going to hell if they don't believe in Jesus. Belief in g-d isn't something to be forced on a person, they have to come to their own conclusions. Religion isn't all that detrimental. I mean look at the Jewish people, they've been expelled from over 70 countries, been through the Holocaust, and they still hold a strong belief in g-d.

Hatsune Miku

09-14-2005, 07:02 PM

It's good and bad. What's good about it, I don't have to wear specific clothing for it everyday like the Muslims. What's bad is that I have to pray to a shrine in my home most of the time because my mum ordered me to.

sasukecopyninja

09-14-2005, 07:10 PM

Ok, first off Religion is a choice, its something people choose to or not to, its somethign that people choose to go with because they beleive in what it is offering and preaching, and peopel who arn't religious are the opposate. THis world would fall apart without religion, as quote by some guy i forget his name "If religion was not here, we, humans, would create it", and its so true, personally I'm agnostic...not athiest..:P lol i believe ina god but do not follow any religion, and mopst ppl are religious ro agnostic not so many are athiest. But I got offtopic sorry. but religion is good, I'm glad there is religion it game me something to base my life upon by not listneing to religious preaching, I have LOTS of religious friends and LOTS of non religious friends. Yes religion may start wars and lead to cultish affairs but it blanaces out in the end, and without balance there is chaos and with chaos there is no hope ^_^ so my opinion after ona dn offtip random babbling RELIGION GOOD! :tem

onewithchaos

09-24-2005, 06:23 AM

religion is pretty much a guideline in which you can base your life, choose good/bad. if you think about it yourself u dont really need religion, if you need help religion can help out. most religions have similar ideas. so overall religion is all right. i dont belong to one, still believe in God. so life's good :D

Danny Lilithborne

09-24-2005, 06:58 AM

Good.

I'll explain why when I'm not sick.

PervertedMonkey

12-08-2005, 01:57 AM

Good.

I'll explain why when I'm not sick.

That must be one horrible fever :P

sonnie_skies

12-08-2005, 02:02 AM

I do believe in God, but organized religion basically exists as a way of controlling human behavior. The church is so full of politics I fail to see how it really serves God anymore. I'm not picking on Catholicism, as there are plenty of other denominations with equally torrid pasts, but just google the phrase "French pope" and you'll see just how unorganized and tumultuous religion can be; how can any organization effectively serve God like that?

Catatonik

12-08-2005, 02:08 AM

It's a matter of perspective.

As it began, religion was an early form of philosophy/spirituality and government.

It's intentions and goals are (usually) strongly intended to help and support the masses. It provides a focus, rules and explanation for the mysteries all around us. Wether or not one accepts a religion does not take away from the support and strength it can give other people. This is, in my opinion, a genuinely good thing.

But like all institutions, religiong is prey to mis-interpertation, fanaticism, and misunderstanding..as well as flat out twisting and manipulation. That's where the truly negative aspects come out, when it becomes an institution and can be twisted to suit a person (or peoples) personal needs.

As an agnostic I take a stance of deciding that because I am sure I cannot know the truth, and I don't trust the words twisted by human mouths, that learning and studying are helpful, but in the end, I live by my own morals and accept no religion.

But at the same time I don't slag any religion or another persons faith.

That said, as far as institutionalized religions go, i dislike and distrust all of them, because they are not an expression of faith, but a tool of man.

So, rambling asides, faith is a powerful and useful option, institutiojnalized/organized religion is.....well, in my opinion innately flawed and easily corrupt.

Yasha

12-10-2005, 12:53 AM

Religion, good or bad?

Perhaps the better question is "Do we really need it?"

Ize19

12-10-2005, 02:57 AM

Okay, here we go. Would the world be better off without religion? No, I'm afraid I don't believe so. Why is that? Quite simply, I am a Christian, and I've seen the transforming power of God. It's not the morals it teaches, or the hope of another life, though those are good, both are secondary. What's really important is the relationship it offers people to have with their creator.
For those who have said that religions fine, so long as you don't try to convert others to your religion, while I certainly don't believe in violently attempting to sway someone, or exterminating them if they refuse to be swayed, (truth is repulsive if not undergirded by love) that opinion only holds if people don't believe in that religion. For those that do believe, however, it becomes a matter of trying to save your neighbors soul, which I believe is worth getting a few people angry at you for shoving your religion down their throughts if even one person's soul is saved.
As for those who say that religion provides people an excuse to commit evil, well, that's your opinion, and I'm sorry. The fact is, if you take away religion, people will no longer gather under the banner of religion, but suddenly other distinctions will rise to prominence, due to the gap. People are born into sin, eliminating the path to redemption will only cause people to indulge in more sin.

Zhongda

12-10-2005, 08:01 PM

Noexism is the answer *see sig :noworry

Razgriez

12-11-2005, 01:54 AM

Yes, religion has been the cause of many problems, but at the sametime it has really guided quite a few people. I think it has caused more good then harm so Ill just say religion is a good thing.

Religion also gives many people hope and a reason to live. It gives people the ability to dream and believe that if they do right they will pass on and rise to heaven or wherever your suppose to go after death.

Personally, I dont believe in any particular religion, but its still a good thing.

rimpelcut

12-11-2005, 03:09 AM

religion is good for all the knowledge it holds but it's bad for all the standards it puts apon you and actually gives you fear and stuff like that: for instance it teaches you that you are powerless and that you should surrender yourself to god to get strength in life. Also I would like to point out that standards you yourself have put upon yourself causes fear and anxiety and doubt and lust. You have created those standards in complete confusion about the matter. Once you think of fear as an actual bad thing that happens to you that you cannot control you will fear, fear. You will fight with fear never realizing the truth because you stay with that standard. If you would only examine one more time...
btw the truth is that fear is the same thing as stress which is muscle/tendon tension.

PervertedMonkey

03-20-2006, 11:34 PM

Perhaps the better question is "Do we really need it?"

Or perhaps to better phrase it, "Is the world ready to give up religion?"

Negative-Ion

03-20-2006, 11:37 PM

Religion is just an opinion. An opinion that a lot of people share.

CrazyMoronX

03-21-2006, 12:10 AM

When you take a look at the all the death and suffering caused by 'Germans', such as the WWI, WWII, the death of millions of innocent Jews, to name a few, it begs the question, would the world be better off without Germans?

Now I know there is no way to remove Germans from society (atleast not in the near future), but I guess the question is, have they done more harm than good? So many of our conflicts today and past have been caused by the belief in different cultures, and so much of our efforts and resources have gone into them, would the world be a different(better?) place today if Germans did not exist?

Thoughts anyone?

Basically, there is good and bad in every aspect of the world. You can say Religion is bad as whole, just because of a few bad apples. Same as you cannot say Germans are all Jew killing Nazis.

Unrequited Silence

03-22-2006, 12:38 PM

No. Religion in itself is perfectly fine. It's the people that abuse/misuse religion as an excuse to wage wars that is wrong. Or the people that want to force their (religious) beliefs on others. That's where it gets messy.
I think it's good for people to have something they believe in, something that gives them hope when everything else seems like shades of dark. (I'm agnostic, but that's beside the point) The basic ideas of religion aren't bad at all. But like I said, it's the people that misuse the name of religion for their own desires that really farks things up.

When you give a crooked religious leader power who allies himself with the gov't of what ever nation hes from this is what results..1st century Christians had to deal with this, by time alot of time passed by after Christ's death Chritianity was so far off from its roots and crooked, it lost its validility.. Religion and politics should never mix as even the bible forbids it, yet religious leaders ignored this and used the gov't to there advantage making the church the most powerful weapon in any given nation..

Aldredian_Sahn

03-22-2006, 08:51 PM

Religion is just an opinion. An opinion that a lot of people share.
A little bit more than that. But also, one that has a lot of power over the world.

Or perhaps to better phrase it, "Is the world ready to give up religion?"
And the answer would be, hell no it ain't.

BGtymin

03-22-2006, 10:58 PM

First off religion will always, always find it's way back into peoples minds and this has nothing to do with the current religions being "dug in" so to speak, but it is because of human nature. You could have someone separate a few thousand babies and have no one teach them any morals, ethics, or theology of any kind and I bet that eventually they would create some sort of religion. When I say created, I am not saying religions are made up (although certain parts of them were made up throught the years, plus there is scientology) I believe in God, I am just saying that people will make things up if needed (once again scientology, some people NEEDED to get rich so they CREATED a scam). I have two debate theorys about this, the first is that religion can be created to bring order much like government (most early religions were pretty much governments), and the other is that people create them becuase of fear for the unknown

For my "order" theory I say that religion can be created to make peace, establish a culture with morals, ideals, and beliefs, it also lets us set up a system of dealing with criminals because without religion anarchy is a definite.

For my "fear" theory I must first state a belief of mine. I believe that Ignorance is the start of all good and bad, and that it just depends which path you take. Ignorance (about life) creates confusion, which creates fear, think about it what is more frightening a guy with a knife saying, "I'm gonna kill you", or a guy with a mask on saying, "I'm gonna kill you" we (as people) have a general fear of the unknown. That being said I will now say that fear is the impetus for human beings, we try in school for the fear of not succeeding in life, we try to be normal for the fear of being cast out and alone, we kill for the fear of being killed ourselves (I mean in a self defense sort of way, or even like if you are in the military). I think that religion helps us deal with that crippling fear of death because it still remains the greatest mystery of all time (the irony is that we deal with death so much yet still no nothing about it past forensics). I believe that fear is more powerful than religion, hell it is even used by some religion too keep peoples faith (althought it often has the adverse effect) which is just wrong.

So this is what I believe will happen if religion is somehow "removed" from society. I would also like to add that I disagree with people who blame the average joe for problems with religion, the problem is the officials (all the popes and whatnot) they get greedy, like everyone does at sometime, but not everyone has control over such a powerful force like they do, and that is the differance.

If you read all of my BS, I thank you, sorry if I said anything that was worded oddly, or misspelled, or just plain confusing. Wow I write a lot more than I thought I would.

Shika-Chou

04-03-2006, 11:57 PM

religion can be just as good as it can be evil. I think that if it brings someone comfort and hope that it is a wonderful thing to have faith in. On the other hand, it's when people take it too far that I can't stand. It's frustrating when people try to impose their own views and beliefs on others that do not want it. It is even worse when powerful figures use religion to justify their actions or create rules/laws because scriptures and writings from so long ago cannot always be applied today. Religion is just one of those topics people will never agree on.

just my thoughts on this topic

4OkageOfTheLeaf

06-03-2006, 07:27 PM

i really cant believe you said somthing like that.

Charlie

06-03-2006, 07:46 PM

obviously because i'm an atheist, i do not agree with religion. it brings too much differences among the people that can cause hatred and war.

but i can't deny that it isn't like that with everyone. there are people who just need someone to pray to, and we have to let them do that. while religion can cause people to die for its sake, some people also become motivated to live for it.

silent_itachi

06-03-2006, 07:53 PM

To me, religion has no visual definition. One guy told me that and I agreed. Also, each religion says that God is real, but one religion says that Allah, or Shiva, or maybe even Tata-Gata. To me, there is one Supereme Being. This is a question that can't be answered easily. (Literally, I would reach the maximum character limit).

jedimaster

06-04-2006, 05:02 AM

I don't think it really makes a difference if there was religion or not, I think that people will still come up with other reasons to wage war with other people.

As many have said, religion itself is good, but then people abuse it, twisting the rules to dictate or make a war right.

Don't have any evidence to support myself

Insipidipity

06-04-2006, 05:12 AM

Religion isn't strictly defined enough to give it the properties of good or bad. A religion can be both, a religion could even be wholly bad. It depends on:
1. The specific religion(it's beliefs and whatnot)
2. The people who practice it
3. The reason it's practiced

Also, good and bad aren't defined well enough to make a decision either. According to any religion, what they do is "good", but according to another, it might be considered "bad"(If by good you mean benevolent and bad malevolent)
If you mean is it logical(a smart thing to do) or illogical(an unwise thing to do), it also depends on the religion and the people who practice it, but for the most part, it's likely a bad thing to do, the less flexibility in making decisions, the more room there is for a particular belief not to fit a particular situation, but on the other hand, for people who are bad at making decisions on their own or have no trust in themselves, it's probably a good idea to give them at least a set of guidelines.

yami silaas

06-07-2006, 02:51 PM

ok im gonna put this reeeeeaaaallyyy simply how many of you were pissed off by nine eleven? guess what those bastards killed all those people for? RELIGION! and the revolutionary war? FREEDOM OF RELIGION!!! why are we over in irac? TO GIVE PEOPLE OVER THERE THERE "RELIGIOUS RIGHTS"!!!!
ok ill go waaaaay back to the past for this one. the crusades. reliogious. amazing.
do any of you religious people look at the millions of inocent people were killed because of religion.
tell me... any one remember the nazis and the jews? tens of thousands of inocent jewish people killed because of thier religion! religion is a hatefull thing it only causes pain and suffering!

MartialHorror

06-07-2006, 03:11 PM

Religion is pure.

Humans are evil.

Humans can use their evil to infect religion.

Its sad really.

el zilcho

06-07-2006, 03:25 PM

Or perhaps to better phrase it, "Is the world ready to give up religion?"
I'm afraid that day will never come. While the most popular true religion will change from time to time, that people will want to believe in something greater than physical reality will not. The belief that there is no "God" (or one that we can ever know of), no afterlife (or one that we can ever know of), or grand purpose (same as above) is a cold and disheartening thing to accept, taking a great deal of maturity to comes to term with, as it requires humanity to be its own salvation - or destroyer, without some supernatural entity dealing justice beyond the grave.

MartialHorror

06-07-2006, 03:33 PM

Please understand Atheism is a religion.

Its a belief based by faith. You can't prove it.

Christians/Muslims/Jews believe in Science too.

el zilcho

06-07-2006, 03:41 PM

Please understand Atheism is a religion.

Its a belief based by faith. You can't prove it.

Christians/Muslims/Jews believe in Science too.

Atheism is a belief. There are no rites and rituals. It is akin to religion, yes, but if anything, it is the lack of religion. There is no dogma. There are no shared beliefs beyond the fact that there is no God. Some believe it because science has not proven anything of the sort. Some believe it because of philosophical reasons. There is no distinguished organization, and because of that, it cannot be classified as a religion, but simply a belief.

wiggely

06-07-2006, 04:06 PM

Religion isn't strictly defined enough to give it the properties of good or bad. A religion can be both, a religion could even be wholly bad.
agreed. what i believe the thread is debating, at least what makes sense to me, is organinized religion bad? and to this the answer is it has its good points and its bad points.

however i believe, and there is no evidence against this, that all the good that organized religion creates can be created without organized religion. this way we cans still have all the benefits of organized religion but with none of the drawbacks.

what do i mean by no organized religion? i just mean one can practice religious views independently from groups.

what makes organized religion bad? its the group concept. it is a fact that people act differently when they are in groups. in some cases one wouldn't even consider doing a certain act, but when in a group that same act is deemed acceptable. the problem in itself isn't religion, but the group mentality.

Religion is pure.

Humans are evil.

Humans can use their evil to infect religion.

Its sad really.

i agree with the religion is pure part, unless of course it calls for unethical behavoir. i don't think humans are evil. they can act evil, but aren't evil in themselves.

Insipidipity

06-07-2006, 04:07 PM

Please understand Atheism is a religion.

Its a belief based by faith. You can't prove it.

Christians/Muslims/Jews believe in Science too.
Please understand the following:
1. If Atheism is a religion, then theism is a religion in of itself. Which it is not. 2. It is a single belief, a religion is a set of beliefs and practices.
3. Nor is it a belief based on faith, it's a lack of a belief in it's purest form. You cannot have faith without a belief. There are aspects of atheism which are a disbelief(which is a belief in of itself), but not all of it is.
4. Science is not a belief. It is a method of understanding the universe

I thought I explained this all to you already...

Religion is pure.

Humans are evil.

Humans can use their evil to infect religion.

Its sad really.
Religion is a human construct.
Good and bad are subjective without a clear definition. Most people would judge good and bad to mean "good and evil" but those are defined by religions so by definition a religion likely wouldn't consider itself evil. Any meaning outside of the religious one is undefined in terms of the question. Until it is, its unresolvable.

MartialHorror

06-07-2006, 04:35 PM

1) Why Atheism is a religion: Realize that Christians and other religions at times have lack of faith, but they follow the religion anyway. You can say its because of lack of faith, but I can say I lack faith not beleiving in a God. So am I not religious for that same reason? You believe there is no God. You do not know. I believe there is a God. I do not know. You don't need dogma to be a religion. There are many minor religions(Anthropology is a great class, lol) that don't really have dogma.

I do consider theism to be a religion. just without a dogmatic part.

Some people use the term "Right path" and "Left path"(Oddly enough, its used mostly for satanism)

Right Path= Dogmatic version
Left Path= belief, but doesn't follow any rules necessarily.

Positive Atheists, imo, are more religious than most Christians. They stick to their unproven beliefs with vengeance.

2) Er, I didn't say Science was a belief. Certain Atheists tend to think they are the only ones that follow science, making them correct. I probably believe in Science just as much as you do, I just back it up with Religion(or vice versa).

3) Some are. I worded that wrong. Satanism(While misunderstood for being devil worshipers) is something I don't consider to be pure, being it preaches dwelving into human desires without holding back. Then you have the Jonestown embarassment. The dude went from Christian to thinking he was God, yet didn't do godly things.

But when religions are created for the betterment of the world(assuming they aren't correct), then they are pure. I guess I should say for Gods ambitions, not ones own. The one issue I have trouble with buying how Christianity is false due to lying is how all these people(except John) died in terrible ways yet didn't renounce their faith. There must have been something awry going on back then. Also, history supports the Bible more than any other religion. I've explained it to you in other threads. Many Atheist claims(Pilate not existing, Moses not existing, ect) have been discredited as either very possible or fact. That doesn't mean everything is correct. But this stuff didn't come out of nowhere either.

Can you find any evil within Christianity? Doubt it, but you find alot within the Christians.

el zilcho

06-07-2006, 05:03 PM

You seem to be hearing, but not listening. Atheism is a belief, yes... that there is no "God". That is all. Only a belief. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough in my description. Depending upon the reasons for that belief, Atheism is not a lack of faith (that's more close to Agnosticism, anyway), but a rejection of it. Similarly, it is a rejection of religion. I was using a metaphor before.

Main Entry: re·li·gion
Pronunciation: ri-'li-j&n
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English religioun, from Latin religion-, religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps from religare to restrain, tie back -- more at RELY
1 a : the state of a religious <a nun in her 20th year of religion> b (1) : the service and worship of God or the supernatural (2) : commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance
2 : a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices
3 archaic : scrupulous conformity : CONSCIENTIOUSNESS
4 : a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith

1 a: Doesn't apply.
1 b: Atheism is the rejection of such things.
2: The rejection of a deity means this does not apply.
3: Archaic terminologies do not concern us in this discussion.
4: Even in this metaphorical sense, Atheism can only be considered a religion in regards to the ardor of which it's upholders argue for it. The rejection of faith disqualifies the second portion of these qualifiactions.

Atheism is the antithesis, the antonym of Thei