[quote=svelte]creech, I think there are two stunningly great posts in this thread – the one you quote from zk is one of them, and edna’s is the other. Sometimes piggs amaze me.

I have never been a Christian, or any other religion for that matter. I can remember being 8 yo and my parents dragging me to church each Sunday, thinking wtf are all these crazy people doing in these pews?

Almost weekly I have smiling brainless twits appear on my doorstep salivating at the opportunity to foist their propoganda on me, the known neighborhood agnostic. I resent that, as I don’t try to convert Christians.

But I’ve always taken a live and let live approach, so I have been ambivalent to Christians in general. You can kind of sum up my feelings with this saying I found awhile back:

Religion is like a penis. It’s okay to have one. It’s okay to be proud of it. But don’t go whipping it out in public and waving it around.

But then Prop 8 happened, where Christians were dead set on enforcing restraints on other people, and justifying such an action by saying it is against their religion. They didn’t seem to care no one was forcing THEM to marry a same sex partner, they were simply dead set on making sure non-Christians lived by Christian rules.

Now I am very vocally anti-Christian. The gloves have come off. I speak my thoughts about Christians loud and clear every opportunity I get.[/quote]

religions do serve a purpose. they provide a down-to-earth and easy-to-understand answer to existential and abstract question mankind have about their purpose here on earth. and if you do breakdown all religions, and remove the superficial elements such as the various stories and the various deities or holy spirits, their answers are more or less the same. and the practice of religion does offer comfort to humankind in general, and help with general psychological well being.

the bottomline of all religions is to remove the idea of self. and through the gradual transcendence of self to one of selflessness, one return to our true origin. some call it union with god, some call it a return to allah, some call it nirvana. but it is all the same. the big problem is except for a very few traditions, most religions insist they provide the only path to that destination.

by focusing on being the one and only right religion, a religion that was suppose to aid humankind into selflessness, and rid the ego, instead became filled with “ego”. Just as a human that is selfish can do great harm. A religion with a lot of selfishness and ego will therefore produce many followers that march down a path of intolerance which lead to a whole host of intolerance.

why did missionaries make the mayans burn their books and destroy the entirely of their written language? because they were focused on the “ego” of their religion. theirs was the true religion, the only right religion, and if these unknown scripts pose a possible threat, it must be destroyed.

I don’t believe it is the original intent to push the religion itself into an egotistical and intolerant institution. unfortunately, the fundamentalist arm of every religion really enjoy focusing on literal interpretations (that is always easier, because there is no thinking and questioning involved). and since it is written right there, they will carry it out to reckless abandonment.