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i go to a school where it is required to take a religion. However, since most of the issues that our generation is gonna face are going to be primarily in muslim countries, I decided to take an islam course to better understand how to about interacting with this section of the world.

♥Rαvεr♥ wrote:
Sounds like a good idea.

Why do you think people feel the need to believe in something?

because their terrified to death of where they go when they die?

I have no clue, i don’t do religion or anything to do with it

basic human nature. goes back to the story of pandora’s box. After opening the box containing the plagues and horrors of the world, pandora closed the box before one more thing could get out. That one thing was the knowledge of future horrors, which in essense gave the people hope. Religion is the ultimate form of a basic human feeling, hope. People hope that there is retribution to bad acts and rewards for good acts, there is some sort of divine karma that will keep the world in order.

you misunderstood, the pandora’s box is just an example, not the root of everything. Hope is the root to everything. And I can see how you could mistaken it for being an excuse as to why people do horrible things, but its just a rational to ourselves. It would be very hard for the world to move forward if everyone in it believed that everyone they were talking to would be bad or evil to them. Therefore people make, I guess what you can call excuses, but not because they want a scapegoat whenever they do something bad, but because they want to keep their hope that in the world, everything will eventually turn out ok. In the pandoras box thing, people can say that the evils from the box made them do things and I think thats what you mean as “an excuse for bad behaviour”. but the truth is whenever someone witnesses a horrible act, they can convince themselves that the whole world isn’t horrible by saying, “that man isn’t truly evil, people aren’t actually like that, it was just that **** box, the world is still a good place.” same with god, if someone sees a terrible act, they can tell themselve, “that person is going to be punished after life” and therefore keeps the hope that there is some justice in the world.

Growing up I did not go to church to often and struggled with my beliefs, not just religious but values and morals in general. When my husband I got engaged to be married, I decided I did not want to raise children in the same confusion that I was raised with. So when we started looking for a church that fit our non conventional beliefs. Each sunday we would visit a new church just to get a feeling for it. We did not read they’re doctrine or anything. Once thing we noticed is that a lot of them made us feel like we were somehow bad or like “sinners.” THe first time we went to a Unity service, it just felt right, we left feeling good. And starting going every Sunday and learning more and more about them. And here was the great thing. you can believe what you want. They share their thoughts and beliefs and it is up to you believe them or not, it is up to you to use them in your life or not. No condemning or saying you are wrong. It is great.

I guess when I was looking into religion, I was look for a guide. Something to help guide me to be a better person, a better future parent. It worked.

I dont know about religion.All i know is getting to know God and developing a relationship with him.Studying religion is just something I dont have a desire to do, no interest,at least not right now.A good reason to study religion would be a good reason to study anything,to get knowledge,knowledge gives us power and more.

Just a thought but…if this post would have asked what to study in the area of religion I would advise to study on Faith ,truth and Love wherever you can find it.

studying religion and following it are two very different things, while they are connected they are different. Sounds like a few people need to make that distinction.

The Tao Te Ching is a set of rules and wisdom essentially set down to create ballance in individual lives and within leadership. When reading it, I was surprised to find how many of the sayings I would like to share with world leaders.

I guess to get a different perspective of the world, yknow, walk in someone else’s shoes who hold those beliefs.

Most of the time, it seems to me like people are looking for something to believe in, unquestionable answers to everything as told by some divine figure instead of scientific theory. I personally think religions should be relegated to the history books because they do nothing but segregate and divide people more than anything else in the world.

However, with that said, I’d like to see a religion based on science. I wonder how that would pan out.

They do divide but they don’t belong in history books.

So while humanity struggles to unify and become a class one civilization, you wish to keep the biggest divider in human history in place for what reason?

Right and wrong exists. And just for the sake of argument who ever said division was a bad thing? Oh lets try to keep this enjoyable; just a friendly little discourse.

I’d have to disagree, an individuals perception of right and wrong exists. This is why we have lawmakers and lawbreakers. I’m not saying division’s a bad thing, either. Everyone wants to be unique, even if that means conforming to another trend (which is rather self-defeating, in my opinion). But religion isn’t a divider like fashion, people may fight about clothes, but I’ve never seen anyone cause a war over a pair of nikes.

Point taken. But if God does exist then “religion” would not be destined for the history books.

Of course it would. Religion has played a huge part in human history and at the core of each religion there is one underlying principle. Love. It’s a shame that most people forget about loving their fellow man regardless of race, creed or colour and focus on smiting those who aren’t involved in their sect of mythology.

I just saw your profile; how does being a Roman Catholic Atheist work?

You get raised as a Roman Catholic, realize that the existence of God as featured in the bible is untrue, but hold true to the core principles and teachings of both testaments.

Interesting. I’m a christian (obviously) and hold to all the bible’s teachings.

The thing you’ve got to realize about the bible is that it’s around 2000 years old, well the new testament at least. Not only that, but the teachings of Christ in the gospels were told as stories, passed down from ear to ear for at least sixty years before they were ever written down. If you play a game of Chinese whispers, the message you get at the end will seldom be the one it started as. Which led me to believe that Jesus wasn’t a superhero, he was a great spiritual teacher with a strong, resonating message that to this day people bastardise. The majority of those who follow Christianity now are as bad as the Jews at the time of Christ. Twisting the words in their holy book for economic gain.

♥Rαvεr♥ wrote:
How do you know that it took 60years?

First paragraph, second line in the wikipedia article.
Here’s the URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel

I’m sorry, but I don’t know what the rest of your post is in reference to. Could you elaborate, please?

I pulled the time from memory, I originally heard it on a documentary about the gospel of Judas. It touched on the early Christian gospels, early Christianity, and a group of people whose name I can’t remember. It’s definitely worth watching if you’re into that kinda thing. Luckily, wikipedia saved me from scouring the depths of google.

I know, it says sixty five to a hundred. I was working within a timeframe. :P

Of course. I completely agree. The teachings of Jesus, and his unconditional love for all mankind is what’s relevant, and that’s what most people unfortunately overlook.

I can honestly say I’ve never heard of the Sophia of Jesus Christ, but it sounds quite interesting. What’s it about?