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INTP and hating religion.

Scott

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Where is she assuming that? I appreciated toonia's post and thought she was pretty intellectually honest. And while I'm religious myself, I can still agree that many people use religion for the ends she mentioned, unfortunate though that may be.
 

Robert165

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I already pointed to St. Thomas Aquinas. But here's Justin Martyr, who was an early Christian figure:

"Reason directs those who are truly pious and philosophical to honour and love only what is true, declining to follow traditional opinions, if these be worthless. For not only does sound reason direct us to refuse the guidance of those who did or taught anything wrong, but it is incumbent on the lover of truth, by all means, and if death be threatened, even before his own life, to choose to do and say what is right."
still waiting for you to name one precept central to christianity that embodies the spirit of reason
 

Scott

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still waiting for you to name one precept central to christianity that embodies the spirit of reason

1. Not what you asked at first.
2. Embodies the spirit of reason? What are you looking for here? This seems like an absurd criterion for determining whether a religion is reasonable. It really seems like you're just trying to set up a criterion for judgement that is sufficiently strict so as to justify your desired conclusion.
 

Robert165

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1. Not what you asked at first.
2. Embodies the spirit of reason? What are you looking for here? This seems like an absurd criterion for determining whether a religion is reasonable. It really seems like you're just trying to set up a criterion for judgement that is sufficiently strict so as to justify your desired conclusion.
yeah because it really matters so much how i phrase a question.
no religious thought holds up to the test of reason.
see, an honest person starts with facts and proceeds to conclusion.
thats the flaw of religion, their failure to do this.
and then you get into speific examples:

1- christian view of hell (calling it just)
2- christian view of justice
3- christian view of "free will" (free will is supposed to be immune from punishment or reward)
4- christianity = moral example yet bible endorses slavery and mysogeny, genocide and discrimination
5- original sin (god creats flawed creature, blames creature for flaws)
 

Scott

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My INTP and I are both Christians, met at Bible college in fact, but we pretty much find going to church torturous. The music is good sometimes and sometimes I find people that I enjoy getting to know but oftentimes the sermons are unbelievably dumb and, being Evangelical, they want to get some kind of emotional response from people. Highly uncomfortable. There is no way we would go if we didn't believe in God and believe that he commanded believers to meet regularly for worship. Even then sometimes we can't make ourselves do it.

Hey cafe, have you guys ever tried out a liturgical church? I know for me much of evangelicalism just didn't connect with me growing up and plenty of it could be obnoxious, but I really found a spiritual home of sorts in liturgy. I started going to an Anglican church a few years ago in college, and while a liturgical church wasn't where I ever expected to find myself, I quickly fell in love with it. I loved the deep connection to history, the aesthetics of it all, the contemplative nature, the willingness to engage the mind with not just words but also symbolic acts, etc, and the vast theological depth of just about every line in the liturgy. It also made it so that, even when the sermon wasn't great, it didn't really matter all that much because of how much I was able to receive from the liturgy and the eucharist. Anyway, just a thought :)
 

Scott

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yeah because it really matters so much how i phrase a question.

It matters if you ask one thing and then wait expectantly for people to answer something else.

no religious thought holds up to the test of reason.
see, an honest person starts with facts and proceeds to conclusion.
thats the flaw of religion, their failure to do this.
and then you get into speific examples:

1- christian view of hell (calling it just)
2- christian view of justice
3- christian view of "free will" (free will is supposed to be immune from punishment or reward)
4- christianity = moral example yet bible endorses slavery and mysogeny, genocide and discrimination
5- original sin (god creats flawed creature, blames creature for flaws)

This just isn't the case. The idea that "no religious thought holds up to the test of reason" is absurdly absolute. The notion of starting with 'facts' and proceeding is extremely philosophically problematic, though in terms of method, Christian thought does start with things it takes to be known and proceeds from there. Your understanding of epistemology seems nonexistent, which makes me less that excited about being patronized over my supposed lack of epistemic grounding.

As far as your cited examples, obviously many of them could be conversations that would go far beyond any possible scope of this thread (ok, we're probably already outside of the scope of this thread... sorry about that). That said, it seems clear that you're not trying to reasonably understand Christianity before judging it.

To give a couple of examples, in your third point you arbitrarily assert what free will is supposed to be and act like it's a big problem for Christianity. I don't think any Christian would have a problem with saying, "Ok, sure, that sort of free will doesn't exactly exist, but a different sort, where we're at least able to make choices, does. Which, as it happens, is what we meant by free will all along, along with nearly all of the philosophic tradition as I understand it." Also, in your fifth point you assert that Christians believe God made flawed creatures, which we don't.

Anyway, if you'd like to understand Christianity, I have no doubt that there are enough of us around here who can help you do so, but until then please understand if we don't like getting slapped by mostly baseless and often hardly meaningful assertions.
 

Robert165

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hey, your refusal to acknowldge the more sinister aspects of chritiaity doesn't make me dense or misguided. just makes you dishonest. sending people to hell, forever, because they "sinned", becasue they don't believe in your god, is quite simply one of the meanest, cruelest things i've ever heard.

ok,

you don't get to define free will. if its motivated by punishment or reward its not a real choice, only a reaction to punishment/reward. i know how you people pride yourself on your "individuality" but you're really not making any sort of moral distinction. try doing the right thing simply because it's right.

christinaty most certinly deems people as being flawed. your whole system of justice is built upon that premise.
 

Scott

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9/5?
[I'm going to take a break, and then respond if it still seems wise]
 

Robert165

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[I'm going to take a break, and then respond if it still seems wise]
you can't fault me for being critical to religion on a thread about hating religion. i'd really like to see you defend your god sending people to hell, i dont think you will be able to, not intellligently, since all the court systems down here (enlightend ones) understand justice, ie:

1- the punihsment must fit the crime
2- so no eternal punishment for finite crimes
3- each person must pay for their crime,
you can't send someone to jail in your place
4- so jesus giving you a get out of hell free card
because he absorbed your sins, is not right
 

Owl

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still waiting for you to name one precept central to christianity that embodies the spirit of reason

How about Jesus Christ, who was reason embodied?

Don't believe me? Look at the prologue to the Gospel of John in the original Greek.
 

cafe

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Hey cafe, have you guys ever tried out a liturgical church? I know for me much of evangelicalism just didn't connect with me growing up and plenty of it could be obnoxious, but I really found a spiritual home of sorts in liturgy. I started going to an Anglican church a few years ago in college, and while a liturgical church wasn't where I ever expected to find myself, I quickly fell in love with it. I loved the deep connection to history, the aesthetics of it all, the contemplative nature, the willingness to engage the mind with not just words but also symbolic acts, etc, and the vast theological depth of just about every line in the liturgy. It also made it so that, even when the sermon wasn't great, it didn't really matter all that much because of how much I was able to receive from the liturgy and the eucharist. Anyway, just a thought :)
If we get to the point that we can't make ourselves go to our current church that's probably going to be the direction we head. We're going to our local Salvation Army chapel right now and like everything except the sermons/Sunday school lessons, including the pastor that gives said sermons/lessons. At least they don't spout fiscal conservative propaganda from the pulpit.
 

Robert165

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How about Jesus Christ, who was reason embodied?

Don't believe me? Look at the prologue to the Gospel of John in the original Greek.
a complex idea built upon a hollow shell is a complex idea built upon a hollow shell
 

Scott

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9/5?
If we get to the point that we can't make ourselves go to our current church that's probably going to be the direction we head. We're going to our local Salvation Army chapel right now and like everything except the sermons/Sunday school lessons, including the pastor that gives said sermons/lessons. At least they don't spout fiscal conservative propaganda from the pulpit.

That cool - I have a good friend who grew up in around a Salvation Army chapel when she was living out of a car with her single mom and siblings. Gotta love their commitment to the poor!
 

Siúil a Rúin

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Yes but it seems you're assuming that religion by its very nature means irrationality, which is not necessarily the case. I already pointed to St. Thomas Aquinas before, but even the Islamic philosopher Averroes noted that faith and reason are means towards the same end - ie the truth.
I probably seem to assume that in part for the sake of argument, but was trying to point out the issue of dismissal as "stupid" thinking that either differs and/or is irrational. There are a number of contributions to philosophy and reason related to religious thought. I don't entirely hold a position because it is a rather broad topic to reduce to a single position.
 

Blackmail!

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I already pointed to St. Thomas Aquinas before, but even the Islamic philosopher Averroes noted that faith and reason are means towards the same end - ie the truth.

In the same time, Ibn Rushd (Averroes) noticed that faith and reason can lead to conflicting solutions -most of the time, he said-, and hence, do not belong to the same "world", to the same "sphere".

Anyway.

I am ENTP and I am a strong atheist. The cultural aspects of religion are sometimes interesting, if not impressive, but epistemologically, well... religion is not my cup of tea AT ALL. It's not that I despise religious people (and technically, I often know religions very well, their history, structure and ethos), it's rather that "faith" is somewhat a mistery, something totally unknown and alien to me. I do not think I'm really biased against religious people, it's rather that I do not understand them, and vice-versa. But what I can't really stand is deliberate proselytism: for me it's the greatest possible offense; live and let live.

I tend to think that ultimately, everything within this material world can be explained thanks to reason, that there is an obvious logical explaination to everything. Even if this contradicts a little bit with Feyerabend's assumption that irrationality cannot be rationally dismissed (See also Gödel's incompleteness theorems).

---

Tonight, I had a conversation with my mother and my brother. She told me one cannot understand the universe through reason or pure thinking only. I just answered "why"? The fact is, I did not really understand the meaning of her sentence: it seems so counter-intuitive, at least to me.
Having met a lot of religious people, I'd be tempted to say that most of the time, they believe because they don't know, or don't want to know. It may be whether because they live happier without any form of intellectual curiosity, or whether because they lack the intellectual skills to grasp new concepts, especially scientific or conceptual ones. Their perception of universe seems rather based on a "general impression" (sometimes very blurry), on an aesthetic experience rather than knowledge or a careful and methodical analysis of surrounding phenomenons.

I'd say we do not perceive the universe the same way, that we do not see trees or bees the same way, that we do not savor apples or wine the same way, that we do not hear music the same way. Sometimes, when I talk to my mother, it's a little bit like if she was some kind of alien intelligence. It's disconcerting somewhat: she's so close and so far away for me, both in the same time. We speak the same language, yet the meaning we put behind the same words is not the same. :huh:
 
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onemoretime

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How about Jesus Christ, who was reason embodied?

Don't believe me? Look at the prologue to the Gospel of John in the original Greek.

Propaganda to make a book more appealing to Gnostics doesn't confer a quality on a figure who may or may not have tangibly existed.
 

Blackmail!

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While I was telling my story, I totally forgot to answer to this thread.

So no, I do not "hate" religion. For me, it's just a sociological phenomena (like ideologies, economy and politics), and as such, it can be meticulously and scientifically analyzed, especially if I have to behave under special circumstances.

But that's all.

---

Maybe, if I had grown up into a society where religion is still a major aspect of life (the USA for instance), I could have hated religion. Fortunately, that's not the case.
Once again, the only element of religion I find to be deeply dishonorable is the deliberate manipulation of weak minds, even (or especially) if it's "for their own good".
What one believes should only remain a private matter, even if it's not forbidden to discuss why and what one believes (or not!).

When for instance I say Jesus, Solomon or David probably never existed at all, or that Mohammed was a despicable psychopath, I'm not provocative, I'm just exposing what I really think. I'm honest, but that doesn't mean I want my interlocutors to blindly agree with me; not at all in fact, I'd probably be disappointed. As long as nobody gets hurt in the process, I have the right to think what I want just as they have the right to think the opposite, capice?
 
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Haphazard

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If you do not allow the explanation for anything religious to be "Because God said so," everything begins to make sense.
 

Haphazard

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is that in support of becasue god says so or agianst it?

I don't know.

If you look on a very basic level religions very much so follow Darwin's theories; strong ones survive. Is it because of some God-given rules? I really have no idea, and I think it's kind of beside the point.
 
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