@xris,
Hi! My Name Is:;119206 wrote:Ok, since I am an aethist I have to agree with you. But one of my classmates who is highly Christian may argue with you. If she had enough brains to say this, I think she would imply that religion is a faith and that in these hard times that is exactly what everyone needs- faith.
Faith is not needed at all IMHO. One can argue faith like they argue the beginning of man with Adam and Eve. The reality of it is we place our faith in the various hands of the men who have written things. The same men who at the time couldn't have fathomed the way we are communicating today.
starfighter;119237 wrote:Some are socially conditioned. Uh-lot of atheists think they aren't getting fooled by religion, believing in some ungrounded mysticism. You may call it a consciousness, I call it a soul... but humans have it, nothing else on earth does. I would agree that animals do not have an instinct for religion but humans wonder and ask why naturally. Thus a natural condition that religion relieves pretty readily.
We are all socially conditioned. We come into the world knowing nothing. We are taught right from wrong we are taught to judge we are trained like you'd train a puppy. Poop here not there, NO NO.
Humans are not instinctively driven to religion. They instinctively receive all their information as passive recipients while young and take this conditioning with them when they age an mature. Instinctively, mankind is seeking some sort of divine answer to questions he cannot answer himself. Instinctively we desire to know, not just have blind faith. The problem is we seek answers in the 'chase' from other people, books, parents, grandparents. Everything we are confronted with, every instance of our existence plays a role in what we have faith in. We seek answers in things, in physical manifestations. We aren't us, we are and become an EGO. We become the person we dress and clothe and we become attached to physical things. Our faiths satisfy the thirst of the Ego which is who we are.
Humans are growing more and more into a consciousness level that was described by Christ. Not that I believe everything Christ said because that was all hearsay as well.
Animals trees the water and everything in this world has the same divine breath of life that we all have. Maybe on different levels, maybe in different ways but ultimately, if there's a God that presence of such is within all creation. The depth and breadth of life. Ever evolving, ever changing, every growing closer and closer to it's sources and shedding the illusive need for faith in what other men have indoctrinated on other men.
starfighter;119237 wrote:This is absolutely erroneous. I hear this from every Atheist's mouthpiece like its some great truth that they have discovered. Any group or gathering judges another. Hell, 1/3 of our government is judicial.
As humans we huddle in our groups to demonize the opposition to justify our machinations eventually destroying what we fear, religious or not. This is Natural Selection. We are a social animal so we can't just fall on the regular rules of the bigger badder one wins. We organize to our ends. We adapt and overcome. We use that big brain of ours to make it much more complicated.
You are entitled to your opinion but prior to religion, humans had nothing to judge. There was no yardstick to judge one another by. Religion has provided man with the yardstick for judgment and judgment is like a cancer that consumes us all. What we don't understand is that when we judge, we become the judged. We create problems in our world with judgment and if there were no religions and we all understood who we are and why we are, then we'd see ourselves and our reflection within everyone we encounter.
Neighbors don't talk to each other because of different religious beliefs. It destroys families, one being my own family who is radical Christianity. The judgment coming from those who think they know or who have dedicated themselves to the faith and doctrine another man has laid out before them... Many will fight to their death over their belief in their religion and we see examples of that all over the world. Christians are no different than Muslims. They kill each other mostly over religion. So religion doesn't stand very tall in my book.
starfighter;119237 wrote:I was an Atheist. God did not make sense. I was given the opportunity to defend my country in a theater of combat and witnessed things that prove to me there is much more then what we understand. Proof of a higher power I guess. Everything anyone has ever come up with is based on perception, but just because I am religious does not mean I am unable to think outside of some conditioning.
You were an atheist. That's simply a label for the ego. It's not really what you were because while you were an atheist, you were still you, not the label. If you were the label, the label would not have changed.
Of course, people come to realize that there is a power that is beyond their current comprehension and much of what Christ again tried to describe but people comprehendeth not. Lao Tsu, the buddah, these great illuminates were able to comprehend something most people could not which lead to confusion and 'Man making GOD in his own image'.
Yes, much of what people think and feel have much to so with perception. We perceive, we reflect what we perceive and then we perceive the reflection as something outside of us. However, there are some, more and more today that see things differently.... vibrate on a level of conscious thought and energy that cannot be understood by the masses. Trying to explain would only lead to confusion. There are some that are on a totally different level of vibratory thought and realization of which there is no need for faith. People scratch their head and don't understand yet they don't seek answers within the divine inspiration that is within. It's hard to hear truth in all the chatter in world, one has to rise above it and out of it and then when we look down and see the world, much light is shed on WHY.
starfighter;119237 wrote:As humanity we were born without religion. We developed it during our evolution socially. It was something that humanity needed. It has survived our social evolution and will indefinitely. Religion is part of the human condition. Aliens didn't land and make cavemen go to mass. Its our invention.
Aliens may have landed. How can we explain the pyramids. LOL. No really, cavemen didn't go to mass. They didn't have religions back then thus they more than likely didn't have mass. Religions, as you've said were created by man. So the heads of the religions, or the gods, wouldn't those too be creations of man?
Humanity, just like dogs in the alley or the cats on the street, develop a heirarchy of leadership. Mankind in the days of formation of religion were gullible to believe almost anything coming from an educated man. They first thought the sun was a god or the super power outside themselves, then over the years, people evolved and better writings came out, more creative stories and more believable experiences and then faith. They taught that you must have faith because intellect and reason would lead elsewhere so one must have and embrace faith. Trouble is, the faith we have is based upon the creativity of another human being, a more educated and followed one.
You see, our instict is not to find religion but to follow a leader. Whether it be a pastor in our church or the book we have by our bedside. Humankind is a group of species that follows each other. We follow in the footsteps set before us by those who travelled that road before we did. We veer off, we start thinking and reflecting what is and sometimes we even find a quiet place where we discover yet more. Those illuminates are usually thought of as crazy because the doctrine of the God man created in his image has been followed so long that if we were betting men, it's best to bet on religion so we don't go to hell. It's silly really. There's no hell and no heaven aside from that which we've created.
starfighter;119237 wrote:Thats people, not religion man. God (I'll use that word I guess) made us in his image. I don't think he snapped a polaroid of himself in the mirror myspace style and photocopied it. Humanity can create anything it imagines, we have so far. We must be wise and beautiful. We will evolve into perfection or destroy ourselves, one or the other. Religion exists, we must evolve with it, it is symbiotic.
God did not make us in his image, we made God in our image. Now the story that leads us to belief in this was written in Genesis, thousands and thousands of years after these stories could have actually taken place. So to believe for a moment that God made man and not the other way around, to me is silly when we all know deep down who manufactured all these different deities worshipped in the world. They are manifesations of man.
Think about it. God has never been seen, never been made known and all the various descriptions and myths about this god and his coming again and all that other crap was invented by man. Again, first the sun was god and then God evolved into the image of man. God has evolved from the sun, to a flower to a deity that looks like you and I but much larger and more powerful today. If that's believable, then I have some ocean front property in Arizona with a purple unicorn you can ride around on top of the water. LOL. See what I mean.
Mankind is creative and we getting more and more creative. So creative that we can take one religion, Christianity and divide it up into branches and divisions and different flavors to the point where the flavor of Christianity one chooses is the flavor that tastes best in their mouth based solely on their perception, detached from theselves but attached to 'things' and 'ego'.
starfighter;119237 wrote:Besides the point I am making. I appreciate your direct rebuttal to what I wrote. I appreciate your opinion and the opportunity to discuss this. I'm gonna bust you a thank you not cause I agree but more cause I appreciate the intelligent rebuttal.
Likewise brother. We can agree to disagree. Doesn't matter to me either way. Talking about this sort of stuff is good for all of us and as a religious person, it's admirable of you to have an open mind and not allow your faith to blind thine eyes.
I may not answer again for a while because sometimes I just think, ponder and meditate, besides I'm busy with another website and all those things in life that consume our time and keep us out of touch with who we really are.
Peace!
