Religion -- RSQUBF discussion forum

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, [5], 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 01:06:07 10/27/04 Wed
Author: Mike K.
Subject: Religion
In reply to: Chris 's message, "Absolutism, authoritarianism and activism" on 14:45:00 10/26/04 Tue

God Hates Religion

The problem is that first, one should be clear on the definition of religion.

Religion is usually characterized as "a personal or institutionalized system of religious beliefs, attitudes and practices" where "religious" is defined as "relating to or manifesting faithful devotion to an acknowledged ultimate reality or deity"

The funny thing is that no human being CAN live without beliefs, attitudes or practices. Even atheism is a religion, namely the devotion to acknowledging that there is no God.
Even the Charta of Human Rights, even the 10 commandments, could be understood as a religion.

Ultimately, merely believing in God is a form of religion already.
The problem is that a re-definition of "being religious" as "having beliefs, practices or attitudes which are accepted without questioning and irrationally rejecting all forms of contrary evidence" - by the way: with this twist, I have just shown you the sociological definition of "fundamentalism".

I think what God hates is not religion, why did He give us the Bible as a guideline for our lives if He doesn't want us to live by it?
I think what God hates is fundamentalism, i.e. having our *own* set of beliefs, attitudes and practices, and becoming stubborn, as in "rejecting all other things, because they could never possibly come from God". This blocks the way for God's working, and this is one of the reasons why fundamentalism is so bad: man puts their *own* concepts above God!

btw: the Living Stream Ministry publishes a book entitled "Christ versus Religion".
It's usually the fundamentalists who hate religion and then redefine the word "religion" to imply a lot of negative things when in reality they're merely talking about themselves ;)

In Christ,
Mike K.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

Christ vs. Religion -- Mike K., 05:06:18 10/27/04 Wed