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Role of Religion

gromit

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Humans organize to pursue common interests. A group of persons interested in becoming holy can and will gather to support one another in their pursuit of holiness.

Yes, I can see that. Do you think the gathering together in common purpose itself is a holy act?
 

IZthe411

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IZthe411, I would ask you the same question I asked Beefeater: do you think holiness can exist outside of followers of the Bible?

If you believe in God, and you believe that God speaks through the Bible, and the Bible outlines what's acceptible in terms of holiness, then going beyond those terms can't be holiness, because at that point one begins to define holiness based on terms that deviate from the standard setter.
 

cafe

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Another question (for religious people): how is organized religion related to holiness, in your experience?
I don't really think in terms of holiness a lot. I'm kind of a holistic person and don't make a lot of distinctions between sacred and mundane. Living a life that honors God, to me, is a whole piece of cloth that involves actively loving others and a discipline of the mind and attitude.

A religious community could theoretically be very helpful with this -- people could encourage one another and could share perspectives that could help people be more aware of personal blind spots, etc.

What I've seen irl is more along the lines of attempting to shame people into good behavior and I don't find that particularly helpful myself. I'm assuming it must be helpful or others in some way or I can't imagine why they'd keep it up.
 

IZthe411

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.

What I've seen irl is more along the lines of attempting to shame people into good behavior and I don't find that particularly helpful myself. I'm assuming it must be helpful or others in some way or I can't imagine why they'd keep it up.

That's always going to backfire. While some people's beliefs encourage that type of outlook, a balanced person recognizes that people have a choice to make. Consider the source as well; If well meaning person who has demonstrated their interest in your well being says something along the lines to 'shame' you, it could be that they are trying to make you aware of a potentially dangerous situation you're attempting- to remind you of the negative consequences. It's a case-by-case situation.
 

gromit

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If you believe in God, and you believe that God speaks through the Bible, and the Bible outlines what's acceptible in terms of holiness, then going beyond those terms can't be holiness, because at that point one begins to define holiness based on terms that deviate from the standard setter.
Is that what YOU believe?

I'm kind of a holistic person and don't make a lot of distinctions between sacred and mundane. Living a life that honors God, to me, is a whole piece of cloth that involves actively loving others and a discipline of the mind and attitude.

Yes I can relate to this... :)
 

Beorn

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Heeey Beefeater... thanks for the thoughts! It seems like a little bit of a self-referential loop here, though:



Your faith community helps to provide you with answers and truth outside of yourself, but one of the reasons you chose it was that it affirmed the same view of God as your own? I promise I'm not trying to criticize you, just understand the process. There must be a part of it that I am missing...

I figured this was what you were getting at with your question.

I have a very complex view of God. I developed that view not from searching myself, but from listening and reading about God from others. As I have grown up I have come to accept some of the ideas I have heard and read as true and rejected other ideas. Obviously this did include some internal analysis, but the substance of the analyses never came from within myself. Through this analysis I accepted certain foundational ideas about God.

In order to learn more about God and the truth it only makes sense that I would surround myself with those that have more knowledge than I have and accept the same foundational ideas as I do.

If my foundational beliefs are correct than I can learn the most from those that have built upon that foundation.


What do you mean by "people of God"? Do you think holiness can exist outside of followers of the Bible?

No. It is impossible. To belong to God is to be known by God, and to be known by God is to know God. The Bible is God's unique revelation of himself and it is impossible to know God without affirming what is within the Bible.
 

Owl

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Yes, I can see that. Do you think the gathering together in common purpose itself is a holy act?

No. I'm not sure what holiness is exactly, but I'm fairly sure that evil ends preclude any act meant to advance those ends from being holy.
 

cafe

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That's always going to backfire. While some people's beliefs encourage that type of outlook, a balanced person recognizes that people have a choice to make. Consider the source as well; If well meaning person who has demonstrated their interest in your well being says something along the lines to 'shame' you, it could be that they are trying to make you aware of a potentially dangerous situation you're attempting- to remind you of the negative consequences. It's a case-by-case situation.
I know. :( I've been around it nearly forty years starting with my grandma.

Honestly, it screwed with my head pretty badly and in order to overcome depression I pretty much just had to turn it off. I'm not going to subject myself to it week after week because I really can't.
 

Beorn

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I know. :( I've been around it nearly forty years starting with my grandma.

Honestly, it screwed with my head pretty badly and in order to overcome depression I pretty much just had to turn it off. I'm not going to subject myself to it week after week because I really can't.

This saddens me.
 

IZthe411

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I know. :( I've been around it nearly forty years starting with my grandma.

Honestly, it screwed with my head pretty badly and in order to overcome depression I pretty much just had to turn it off. I'm not going to subject myself to it week after week because I really can't.

That's one of the things people fail to consider when it comes to why people are turned off to religion. Sometimes the families are worse than the preacher. And that can scar you for life.
 

Mole

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The Unholy and Moral Courage

If you believe in God, and you believe that God speaks through the Bible, and the Bible outlines what's acceptible in terms of holiness, then going beyond those terms can't be holiness, because at that point one begins to define holiness based on terms that deviate from the standard setter.

Sure, some define holiness as wholeness. Some define holiness as integrity.

And in a world where we are constantly learning new things, we are constantly seeking to integrate the new things into our whole view of the world.

But perhaps the most difficult form of holiness is moral integrity. For moral integrity takes moral courage. And although physical courage is common, moral courage is rare.

And the sister of moral integrity is intellectual integrity. And it is no surprise to find that is in rare supply as well.

So with moral courage so rare, it is no surprise to find holiness is rare as well.

The unholy of course seek to spoil the intellectual integrity and the moral integrity of the holy.

But most of all, the unholy hate moral courage.
 

Mole

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Across the world almost everyone is born into a religion. The number of converts is insignificant.

But the problem is that the various religions are incompatible. So they can't all be true.

Of course most religions tell you their religion is the one true religion. But with so many religions making that claim, it becomes risible.

So unfortunately believing your religion is the one true religion, requires us to put our critical minds to sleep.

This is achieved by putting the believers into a trance where their critical faculties are temporarily asleep.

And a trance can be induced by any repetition such as religious ritual, or the repeating of religious dogma, or the repetition of religious feeling.

Of course we are no different and create belief in MBTI by the repetition of the four magic letters.
 

cafe

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That's one of the things people fail to consider when it comes to why people are turned off to religion. Sometimes the families are worse than the preacher. And that can scar you for life.
Well, I will say in her defense that my grandma loved me with absolute devotion. She was the rock of my childhood and I miss her terribly eleven years after her death. If heaven is real and like I believe it to be, she will be the first face I look for after Jesus and my husband, if he precedes me.

But she just had struggles of her own, just like anybody does. The problem with guilt and shame as motivators is that they either work too well or they don't work at all.
 
G

Ginkgo

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I don't think full comprehension is a prerequisite for relation... but some experience is necessary.

I can't fully comprehend this world? Can you?

Yet I relate to this world just as I relate to the spiritual world.

The more I comprehend both worlds the better I am able to relate to both worlds.

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSKh4K6YVmQ"]Truth vs Fact[/YOUTUBE]

My problem is that, in the modern world, many people attempt to merge truth with fact, and thus convolute the meaning of both and creating cognitive dissonance. Because truth is highly subjective, it is a daunting task to convince others and affirm a universal truth. Such is the case with Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Marxism, various philosophies, Buddhism, (you get the picture). And so we find that people will apply "truth" to the tangible world, like one will apply prayer to illness, and so it becomes - quite literally - an imaginary scalpel. Dangerous.

I also find that we dehumanize others in the name of truth, the same way that the Nazis dehumanized the Jews by painting caricatures of them, the same way Christianity dehumanizes non-Christians by condemning them to hell, the same way Stalin executed enemies of the state. Forming universal truths that do not incite some sort of tribalism is like trying to mix all the colors of the rainbow in to one, while still maintaining the originals.
 

Mole

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My problem is that, in the modern world, many people attempt to merge truth with fact, and thus convolute the meaning of both and creating cognitive dissonance. Because truth is highly subjective, it is a daunting task to convince others and affirm a universal truth. Such is the case with Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Marxism, various philosophies, Buddhism, (you get the picture). And so we find that people will apply "truth" to the tangible world, like one will apply prayer to illness, and so it becomes - quite literally - an imaginary scalpel. Dangerous.

I also find that we dehumanize others in the name of truth, the same way that the Nazis dehumanized the Jews by painting caricatures of them, the same way Christianity dehumanizes non-Christians by condemning them to hell, the same way Stalin executed enemies of the state. Forming universal truths that do not incite some sort of tribalism is like trying to mix all the colors of the rainbow in to one, while still maintaining the originals.

Natural Selection is a fact and it is also true.

And Natural Selection can't be true for some of us and not for others. If it is true, it is true for everyone.

The truth is indivisible - it can't be true for some and not for others. But this is precisely what religious Truth is - it is true for some and not for others.

And usually religious Truth is written with a capital T, to distinguish it from truth with a small t.

So religious Truth is privileged - it is the kind of truth you are having when you are not having any truth.

Religious Truth is outside evidence and reason, while truth depends on evidence and reason.

Modern medicine is based on evidence and reason, and no one goes to the Bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita or the Analects of Confucius for medical advice.
 

IZthe411

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But the problem is that the various religions are incompatible. So they can't all be true.

Of course most religions tell you their religion is the one true religion. But with so many religions making that claim, it becomes risible.

So unfortunately believing your religion is the one true religion, requires us to put our critical minds to sleep.

This is achieved by putting the believers into a trance where their critical faculties are temporarily asleep.

And a trance can be induced by any repetition such as religious ritual, or the repeating of religious dogma, or the repetition of religious feeling.

Of course we are no different and create belief in MBTI by the repetition of the four magic letters.

I agree with your beginning, disagree with the middle, and agree with the end.

I agree that all religions cannot be true. If all religions were true (different roads leading to the same outcome) then where God is seen true for one he'd be a liar in another.

So the goal should be to find the one that's true- not true in the relative sense, but absolute.

And once you find that which is true, is there really a need to keep searching? At that point, everything else is false- worthless pursuit. Yet the critical mind will still be at work- because the truth when it comes to God is infinite- so there's always something to learn, and a need to figure out how this new knowledge connects with what you've already learned. Some of that new stuff has to be useless knowledge because it is out there in equal, if not in a greater abundance.

“Keep testing whether you are in the faith, keep proving what you yourselves are.”—2 Cor. 13:5.

Memorizing information is useless if you cannot apply it when test time comes. The pursuit of truth can't be reduced to empty rituals, chants and the like.
 

IZthe411

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Well, I will say in her defense that my grandma loved me with absolute devotion. She was the rock of my childhood and I miss her terribly eleven years after her death. If heaven is real and like I believe it to be, she will be the first face I look for after Jesus and my husband, if he precedes me.

But she just had struggles of her own, just like anybody does. The problem with guilt and shame as motivators is that they either work too well or they don't work at all.

Agreed!
 
G

Ginkgo

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Natural Selection is a fact and it is also true.

And Natural Selection can't be true for some of us and not for others. If it is true, it is true for everyone.

The truth is indivisible - it can't be true for some and not for others. But this is precisely what religious Truth is - it is true for some and not for others.

And usually religious Truth is written with a capital T, to distinguish it from truth with a small t.

So religious Truth is privileged - it is the kind of truth you are having when you are not having any truth.

Religious Truth is outside evidence and reason, while truth depends on evidence and reason.

Modern medicine is based on evidence and reason, and no one goes to the Bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita or the Analects of Confucius for medical advice.

You're on the same page of the story, but arguing about the names of the characters, Vic. And so even semantics are a product of Truth vs. truth.
 

Beorn

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[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSKh4K6YVmQ"]Truth vs Fact[/YOUTUBE]

unimpressed.

To say absolute truth requires universal acceptance is absurd. This presumes that humans create truth. This means that the laws of gravity were not within the category of absolute truth in 100 AD.

Moreover, the analysis of belief and truth applies to facts as well. It is a fact that there is a chair below me and that it will support my weight. But, I must place belief or faith in that fact before I sit down and the fact is proven.



I also find that we dehumanize others in the name of truth, the same way that the Nazis dehumanized the Jews by painting caricatures of them, the same way Christianity dehumanizes non-Christians by condemning them to hell, the same way Stalin executed enemies of the state. Forming universal truths that do not incite some sort of tribalism is like trying to mix all the colors of the rainbow in to one, while still maintaining the originals.


Out of any system of belief christianity puts the highest level of value on ALL HUMANS. All humans are valuable because they are image bearers of God who is of infinite value. This value is inherent and cannot be taken away.
 
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