XPost: talk.atheism, alt.religion, alt.religion.christian   
   From: vigyazat@hotmail.co.uk   
      
   From "Pro-Humanist FREELOVER" :   
      
   > It would be easy to envision a non-religious   
   > society being secular. It would be difficult   
   > to be secular once one enfused religion   
   > into the law, as has occurred in the past   
   > in Europe, and at present in many Islamic   
   > countries.   
      
   Do you believe that there's a difference between people holding an opinion   
   based on their religious beliefs, and people trying to force laws based on   
   those beliefs onto the books?   
      
      
   >>> History has shown that in soci-   
   >>> eties where one religious outlook becomes   
   >>> dominant, an uneasy situation ensues for other   
   >>> outlooks; at the extreme, religious control of   
   >>> society can degenerate into Taliban-like rule.   
   >>   
   >>Agreed.  "At the extreme".  35 million against 260 million worth of   
   >>extreme, perhaps?  America's problem isn't that the religious right   
   >>exists, and it certainly isn't that religion exists: it's that America   
   >>allows the right a disproportionate amount of power.   
   >>   
   >>That's not a problem that's going to be solved by destroying religion -   
   >   
   > Of note, the title mentions 'better off', not   
   > 'destroy'.   
      
   Not sure why that's of note: the full title is "We'd be better off without   
   religion".  That's "without"; not "with a little less".  This would seem to   
   suggest that at some point between here and the imagined scenario religion   
   would cease to exist, and thus that religion would have been destroyed.   
      
      
   > In most of Europe, religion is much less   
   > prominent than it is in America and in   
   > many countries once ruled by the Catholic   
   > faith and in countries deeply steeped in   
   > the religion and of Islam and the laws of   
   > shariah.   
      
   It's true that religion is less prominent in Europe, and it's also true   
   that, in general, it's the influence of American-style fundamentalist   
   evangelism that's at the root of most of the big religion-related issues   
   Europe faces.  This is interesting to me, because it would seem to suggest   
   that it's not so much religion that's at the heart of this as it is some   
   deep aspect of American culture and psychology.   
      
   I'm not trying to suggest that America is directly causing what religious   
   contention Europe does experience (after all, our religious issues can   
   stretch back centuries earlier than the birth of the USA), but there is   
   something in the more recent decades that seems to have gained a   
   particularly strong foothold in America specifically, and it does lead me   
   to wonder why.  And it does also suggest that 'religion', as often attacked   
   by those seeking to oppose the rabid fundamentalist, isn't necessarily the   
   root cause of the problem, because otherwise the problem would be common to   
   all religious people everywhere.   
      
      
   > Are you submitting that Christianity played   
   > a minimal role in Germany's anti-Judaism?   
      
   No.  I'm submitting that Christianity wasn't necessarily solely to blame   
   for Germany's anti-Judaism, and that such anti-Judaism isn't common to all   
   - or even most - Christians then or now.   
      
      
   > Atheist towards X is a logical   
   > stance/approach, pointing out   
   > to believers that they have much   
   > more in common with atheists   
   > than they realize.   
      
   No - 'atheist' means without belief in gods.  I understand the point that's   
   being made - that a believer in one god should see why an atheist doesn't   
   believe in any - but the argument, popular as it is lately, really doesn't   
   work.  An atheist is one who doesn't believe in any god or gods, and the   
   reason for that is usually because the very idea of belief seems absurd to   
   them.  Belief by definition doesn't seem absurd to a believer - so the very   
   basis of one group's disbelief simply doesn't register with the other.   
      
   An atheist disbelieves because it's the logical stance to take.  A believer   
   in one particular god may well disbelieve in others because they one they   
   do follow has told them that all the others are fakes.  There really is no   
   similarity in outlook here at all.   
      
      
   >>Which is fine, of course - except that the atheist occasionally uses   
   >>that one god as the template for all gods; that one religion as a   
   >>stand-in for all religions; and then attacks that all-in-one religion   
   >>from a self-proclaimed position of intellectual superiority.   
   >   
   > ?   
      
   You surely understand the sort of attitude I'm referring to?  The attitude   
   quite often found on groups like this that leads supposed intellectuals to   
   post tirades against 'religion', and to justify their attacks by reference   
   to all the things they see wrong with the Bible?  For example, that Jesus   
   said something that doesn't correspond with today's morals, or that   
   contradicts something he said elsewhere, so therefore not only is   
   Christianity stupid and unutterably evil, but so is all other religion as   
   well?   
      
      
   >>Or is it in fact the case that 'divine' is popularly accorded only one   
   >>true meaning, and that that meaning is 'of the Christian God'?   
   >   
   > Divine is, like gods, whatever people   
   > wish to imagine it is.   
      
   Yes, that's right.  And that covers an awful lot of territory.  Yet that's   
   the wide-ranging concept that's attacked in its entirety, in every possible   
   interpretation, every time someone presents a lecture condemning   
   'religion'.  And why is divinity as a whole so attacked?  All too often   
   it's because Christianity has done something the lecturer doesn't approve   
   of; or because so-called Islamists set off a bomb.   
      
      
   >>Agreed - religion has no place in schools.   
   >   
   > You probably were referring to public   
   > schools, as private schools delight   
   > in using their schools to promote their   
   > religious views.   
      
   No - I was referring to schools.  Religion has no place there; which is to   
   say that I would be happy to see religion removed from schools altogether -   
   with the exception of lessons in comparative religion, since whether we   
   like it or not, religion is prominent in the world.   
      
      
   > The mass murder by Islamists is taught,   
   > direct from ancient texts, as justified reli-   
   > giously.   
      
   And yet other Islamists - perhaps the majority - find in those same texts   
   lessons that forbid such acts.   
      
   This is the point: it doesn't matter whether we allow religion to exist or   
   not.  While it exists it can be used as an excuse.  Once we dispose of it,   
   deny it to all, those determined to kill will simply find another excuse   
   until we ban that too, and so on and so on.   
      
      
   >>Of course, it's to the anti-theist's advantage to blur or play down this   
   >>distinction.   
   >   
   > The distinction is non-existent among   
   > the religious who cling to their ancient   
   > texts as if their very lives depended on   
      
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