Is religion a threat to the survival of the world?

[Question Everything]

[center][youtube][/youtube][/center]

I want to start off that by "religion", I am not talking about the kind of Judaism that cnorman18 talks about. I have no dispute with it, and I love the idea of focusing on what we can do to make the world better. In fact, I am in a religion, Yoism, that is based on that very sentiment.

Is Christopher Hitchens right? Are we faced with a choice between civilization and religion? Does religion threaten to destroy the world? (He says this in the beginning of part 2.)

I would like to add to this by saying that in addition to religious nut jobs popping off with nuclear weapons, peak oil and global warming are serious threats to civilization, and if you think the Earth is less than 10,000 years old (few non religious people do), you will never understand those problems and what needs to be done about them.

[theopoesis]

Is Christopher Hitchens right? Are we faced with a choice between civilization and religion? Does religion threaten to destroy the world? (He says this in the beginning of part 2.)

Nope.

Nationalism and patriotism using something other than religion as a veil could just as easily lead to militant violence.

China is mostly non-religious (at least officially) and it's economic development poses the greatest threat for climate change in the next fifty years. India's development is probably #2.

Christianity has made is contributions to society just as it has done things to threaten it. Likewise for any group.

[Adstar]

Religion is a threat to the world.

But the true Faith in Jesus is of no threat to this world.


All Praise The Ancient Of Days

[Slopeshoulder]

Religion is not a threat. Properly understood and apllied it is IMO a positive.

But like anything else, retrograde versions are threat to progress, closed minded extremisms and triumphalisms are a threat to society.

[Question Everything]

But like anything else, retrograde versions are threat to progress, closed minded extremisms and triumphalisms are a threat to society.

That is basically what Hitchens is saying.

[flitzerbiest]

Christianity has made is contributions to society just as it has done things to threaten it. Likewise for any group.

This would seem to be another way of saying that there is nothing particularly divine at work in Christianity. It doesn't rise out of the crowd. It is irrelevant.

[theopoesis]

Christianity has made is contributions to society just as it has done things to threaten it. Likewise for any group.

This would seem to be another way of saying that there is nothing particularly divine at work in Christianity. It doesn't rise out of the crowd. It is irrelevant.

That's a big jump. Saying something has strengths and weaknesses is a big difference from saying it is irrelevant. Care to establish its irrelevancy?

[flitzerbiest]

Christianity has made is contributions to society just as it has done things to threaten it. Likewise for any group.

This would seem to be another way of saying that there is nothing particularly divine at work in Christianity. It doesn't rise out of the crowd. It is irrelevant.

That's a big jump. Saying something has strengths and weaknesses is a big difference from saying it is irrelevant. Care to establish its irrelevancy?

The supernatural claim is yours, not mine. An organization steered and powered by the spirit of God ought to be an indisputable positive influence within society. As you have already conceded, it is just one social group among many.

[theopoesis]

Christianity has made is contributions to society just as it has done things to threaten it. Likewise for any group.

This would seem to be another way of saying that there is nothing particularly divine at work in Christianity. It doesn't rise out of the crowd. It is irrelevant.

That's a big jump. Saying something has strengths and weaknesses is a big difference from saying it is irrelevant. Care to establish its irrelevancy?

The supernatural claim is yours, not mine. An organization steered and powered by the spirit of God ought to be an indisputable positive influence within society. As you have already conceded, it is just one social group among many.

Do to many misinterpretations of my initial point, I retract my statement, replacing it with what follows:

"Christianity" is the name given to the group of people which includes a subset with relation to the Triune God, Creator of the Universe, and Redeemer of the Church. As a group of people, "Christianity" is prone to mistakes as any group is; however, this mistaken nature is entirely commensurate with the dual realities of (1) a group which includes the saved and the unsaved (the theological doctrine of the visible and invisible church) and (2) a religion of sanctification and eschatology in tension (whereby a human in relation to God is sanctified such that sin is declining, but is not fully sanctified until the end times). Therefore, any admission of failings on the part of Christianity should be interpreted as a posture of humility granting the mistakes of Christianity (i.e. the inquisition), but not as a concession of Christianity's "irrelevance" or equivalence with all social groups. Rather, Christianity's propensity for mistakes in no way detracts from proper recognition of its contributions to the world, nor of the possibility of the Christian God being a source of moral transformation.

With that correction, I hereby withdraw from this thread.

adieu

[Board]

Any "ism" that causes a divide so great among humans that they would kill each other over it has the potential of leading us down the road to destruction. All it takes is the right person at the right time to sway the minds of men and use these "isms" for their will. It is embedded in our history. But if something has such a great power over people to do as much pure evil as it does good, why keep it around? I wold like to say a world devoid of "isms" is possible but I doubt it... maybe in another 2,000 years we will grow up... if we are still here.

Reminds me of the last speech in Religulous:

The irony of religion is that because of its power to divert man to destructive courses, the world could actually come to an end. The plain fact is, religion must die for mankind to live. The hour is getting very late to be able to indulge in having in key decisions made by religious people. By irrationalists, by those who would steer the ship of state not by a compass, but by the equivalent of reading the entrails of a chicken. George Bush prayed a lot about Iraq, but he didn't learn a lot about it. Faith means making a virtue out of not thinking. It's nothing to brag about. And those who preach faith, and enable and elevate it are intellectual slaveholders, keeping mankind in a bondage to fantasy and nonsense that has spawned and justified so much lunacy and destruction. Religion is dangerous because it allows human beings who don't have all the answers to think that they do. Most people would think it's wonderful when someone says, "I'm willing, Lord! I'll do whatever you want me to do!" Except that since there are no gods actually talking to us, that void is filled in by people with their own corruptions and limitations and agendas. And anyone who tells you they know, they just know what happens when you die, I promise you, you don't. How can I be so sure? Because I don't know, and you do not possess mental powers that I do not. The only appropriate attitude for man to have about the big questions is not the arrogant certitude that is the hallmark of religion, but doubt. Doubt is humble, and that's what man needs to be, considering that human history is just a litany of getting **** dead wrong. This is why rational people, anti-religionists, must end their timidity and come out of the closet and assert themselves. And those who consider themselves only moderately religious really need to look in the mirror and realize that the solace and comfort that religion brings you actually comes at a terrible price. If you belonged to a political party or a social club that was tied to as much bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, violence, and sheer ignorance as religion is, you'd resign in protest. To do otherwise is to be an enabler, a mafia wife, for the true devils of extremism that draw their legitimacy from the billions of their fellow travelers. If the world does come to an end here, or wherever, or if it limps into the future, decimated by the effects of religion-inspired nuclear terrorism, let's remember what the real problem was that we learned how to precipitate mass death before we got past the neurological disorder of wishing for it. That's it. Grow up or die.