XPost: sci.skeptic, alt.philosophy, sci.logic   
   XPost: alt.talk.creationism, alt.atheism   
   From: ingilt@yahoo.co.uk   
      
   On 05/04/2016 18:35, BruceS wrote:   
   > On 04/05/2016 10:19 AM, Bob Officer wrote:   
   >> Alex W.  wrote:   
   >    
   >>> There is, however, a secondary purpose: to oppose, counter or at least   
   >>> mitigate the religious mindset and so to reduce its impact on all our   
   >>> lives.  Uncontested, the god-ridden mindset will happily attempt to   
   >>> order society from the very shape and functioning of the nation down to   
   >>> the day to day decisions of the individual according to the spurious   
   >>> diktats of the deity.  For all our sakes, this must not be allowed.   
   >>   
   >> Or the dictates of the man on the pulpit.   
   >   
   > IMO, it's always the man on the pulpit.  Whatever the magic book being   
   > invoked, it's the man interpreting that book that counts.  Despite all   
   > the horrific things in the Bible, I know of no priests who (openly)   
   > advocate genocide, rape, slavery, etc.  Instead, the modern ones pick   
   > and choose from the Bible passages that support their "morality", such   
   > as it is.  The dictates of the deity are not important to the believers.   
      
   I would not put too much stock in current "good" behaviour.   
   Historically, the men in the pulpits have advocated all that, and more.   
     Until around 150 years ago, Christian priests routinely blessed and/or   
   preached all of the above, and they still supported and dispensed divine   
   blessing for some of them in living memory -- and I am not even counting   
   the outliers of clerics espousing the attempted genocides in Germany,   
   Bosnia and Rwanda....   
      
   Even assuming that a leopard can change its spots, I would still be   
   extremely confident that a conservative ideology like the world's three   
   bible-based monotheisms will take considerably longer than a generation   
   or three to genuinely change.   
      
      
   >   
   >> I witnessed the froth which these warped control freaks can bring forth.   
   >> Their monologues and pronouncements which on the TV seem to hold the   
   >> sheep   
   >> in thrall, changing them in an instant to lemmings running over the   
   >> cliffs.   
   >   
   > Fine by me.  Let the believers "run over the cliffs".  The real problem   
   > comes when they want to push the rest of us over the cliffs.   
      
   Quite.   
   And that is why they and their weird views cannot be left unopposed.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)