Hi there! You are currently browsing as a guest. Why not create an account? Then you get less ads, can thank creators, post feedback, keep a list of your favourites, and more!
Mad Poster
#501 Old 29th Dec 2010 at 8:50 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Oaktree
I have never heard of a religion that doesn't look down on homosexuality.


Unitarian Universalism.
Advertisement
Scholar
#502 Old 29th Dec 2010 at 11:58 PM
Quote: Originally posted by fakepeeps7
Quote: Originally posted by Oaktree
I have never heard of a religion that doesn't look down on homosexuality.
Unitarian Universalism.

Numerous neopagan faiths, too.

Is that a shillelagh in your pocket, or are you just sinning against God?
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#503 Old 30th Dec 2010 at 12:46 AM
Plenty of denominations/sects of the major religions too... you just don't hear much about them. I don't know of any branches of Islam which aren't homophobic, though.

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
Retired
retired moderator
#504 Old 30th Dec 2010 at 1:06 AM
Some large cities have gay-tolerant or friendly Islamic groups. I have a dear gay Muslim friend in Toronto who seems to have found a decent community. That said, another gay Muslim friend of mine could not find a similar religious community in New Zealand.

CAW Wiki - A wiki for CAW users. Feel free to edit.

GON OUT, BACKSON, BISY BACKSON
Test Subject
#505 Old 24th Jan 2011 at 5:03 PM
Quote: Originally posted by Nekowolf
Quote: Originally posted by fakepeeps7
Quote: Originally posted by Oaktree
I have never heard of a religion that doesn't look down on homosexuality.
Unitarian Universalism.
Numerous neopagan faiths, too.


Wicca does not discriminate on sexual preferences.
Scholar
#506 Old 24th Jan 2011 at 5:52 PM
Quote: Originally posted by nonya0992
Wicca does not discriminate on sexual preferences.


Alright, I suppose I should have known that one. I had a number of friends in middle and high school who were bi/gay and Wiccan.
Scholar
#507 Old 25th Jan 2011 at 12:10 AM
Quote: Originally posted by fakepeeps7
Question: Are there any passages in the Koran that actually talk about stoning people?


A little late, but no.
Retired
retired moderator
#508 Old 5th Apr 2011 at 12:02 PM
I think this article by Jerry Coyne is appropriate given some of what has been said in this thread in the past:

Quote:
We’re all familiar with those people who claim that no foul deed, no murder, no injury can be laid at the feet of faith—at least in modern times. They might grudgingly admit that the Inquisition or the Crusades may have had something to do with faith, but those were the bad old days. Now things are different. And while religion may seem to be involved in today’s horrors and evils, when you look deeper, they say, you’ll ultimately find the real causes. The Protestant/Catholic fracas in Northern Ireland? A historical squabble—religion was just a “label” for political opponents. The persecution of Galileo? A civil and political affair, not involving faith. The institutionalized slaughter of the Jews during World War II? Well, the Nazis needed a scapegoat somewhere. The murder of UN workers and Afghanis in last week’s mosque-fuelled riots? Islam had nothing to do with it: it was simply the effect of lying, manipulative mullahs inflaming a populace who hate the colonialism of America and Europe.

[...]

Given our inability to rewind the tape of history, and to do controlled experiments in which we can insert or remove religion like a chemical in a test tube, we’re left with the notion of “reasonable inference”. And of course people will disagree about what inferences are reasonable, just like they disagree about what evidence for global warming is reasonable.

So I offer a tentative suggestion to identify situations in which religion is “responsible” for evils. It’s this:

Would those acts have still been committed had there been no religion?


http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress...blame-religion/

CAW Wiki - A wiki for CAW users. Feel free to edit.

GON OUT, BACKSON, BISY BACKSON
Née whiterider
retired moderator
#509 Old 5th Apr 2011 at 12:33 PM
That test uses flawed logic. There's no clear line in the sand between "religion" and "everything else" - nor between "religious motivation" and "non-religious motivation", or "religious circumstances" and "non-religious circumstances".

If you want to consider whether or not religion is to blame for the recent riots sparked by some dumbshits burning the Quran, I can't imagine a sufficient logical process using that test. Would there have been protests without Islam? Well, no - there wouldn't have been a Quran without Islam. So let's ask if there would have been protests over the burning of a very important secular icon - well, there's a problem there. To draw a decent analogy, you have to make it a highly respected, loved secular icon which is considered to be, by the protesters, deserving of more respect than humans are often afforded. If you draw a true analogy, then you come up with "Islam, but let's not call it Islam and let's ignore Allah", or you come up with a secular cult. That's hardly a religion-free hypothetical.

On the other end of the question: would the Quran have been burned if it weren't for Christianity? Well, there's nothing in the Bible about burning the Quran. The vast majority of Christians would never even consider doing such a thing. So is the motivation a religious one, if it doesn't form part of the religion except in the minds of the handful of people who actually did the burning? Isn't that an idiosyncrasy, not an act of religion?
So do we exclude it, from our hypothetical alternate reality, as part of our exclusion of religion? Or do we say that it's this one person's predispositions at fault?
Are there Islamophobes who aren't Christian? There certainly are - would these particular people have ended up burning Qurans out of pedestrian Islamophobia, without the influence of Christianity? As I said - there's no clear line - there's no way to apply the test.

What if we combine the two religion-free analogies? I don't believe the protesters care whether or not the Quran burners are religious. Do the Quran burners care if the Quran is a religious symbol or a secular one? Would they have still attempted something of a similar class of egocentrism if it was just Pakis (in the sense of the offensive term for anyone who isn't clearly black or white and doesn't speak Chinese), rather than Muslims, who they discriminated against? Again - we can't know.

That thought exercise is an interesting thing to contemplate, but it's not going to provide any reasonably supported answers.

What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact.
Retired
retired moderator
#510 Old 5th Apr 2011 at 1:57 PM Last edited by kiwi_tea : 5th Apr 2011 at 2:23 PM.
But isn't religion just an idiosyncrasy turned doctrinal claim about the nature of nature or the universe?

Not that I'm arguing with your broader premise, just that... ...there seems no reason to dismiss a minority religion as mere "idiosyncrasy". That doesn't appear to distinguish it from other religious beliefs at all.

Edit: Although I think the more important point in Coyne's argument is that there is no reason to rationalise away the role of faith in these situations, which I think people of faith have a strong tendency to do.

A funny thing happened to me the other day. I was talking with a religious friend of mine from New York, and I mentioned what a powerful role religion plays in politics and daily life in the USA. She, a liberal minded-interdenominational bridge-builder, replied that she didn't think religion had as much a role in politics as people thought because look how nasty people in politics tend to be. As if she believed nastiness isn't often or ever doctrinally demanded in faith! Nastiness like Creationism in schools, or laws restricting abortion rights, or opposition to gay marriage - or even opposition to interracial marriage prior to Loving v Virginia - tend to be motivated demonstrably by religious doctrine. Another example is the nasty and inhumane "appeal to nature" fallacy that is worked into a lot of Pagan and Buddhist belief systems.

While I'll concede we can't say "This wouldn't have happened without religion" very easily, it certainly seems like religious thought - prejudice without evidence - is perfectly designed to rationalise away unreasonable bigotries in a way that many non-religious systems struggle to do without resorting to murder and violence (a la Stalin). But again, I concede to your general point. I was about to use Aussie PM Julia Gillard's opposition to gay marriage as an example, seeing as she's an atheist, but it occurs to me again that's probably political pandering to the religious vote.

CAW Wiki - A wiki for CAW users. Feel free to edit.

GON OUT, BACKSON, BISY BACKSON
Mad Poster
#511 Old 5th Apr 2011 at 3:24 PM
Quote: Originally posted by kiwi_tea
But isn't religion just an idiosyncrasy turned doctrinal claim about the nature of nature or the universe?

Not that I'm arguing with your broader premise, just that... ...there seems no reason to dismiss a minority religion as mere "idiosyncrasy". That doesn't appear to distinguish it from other religious beliefs at all.

Edit: Although I think the more important point in Coyne's argument is that there is no reason to rationalise away the role of faith in these situations, which I think people of faith have a strong tendency to do.

While I'll concede we can't say "This wouldn't have happened without religion" very easily, it certainly seems like religious thought - prejudice without evidence - is perfectly designed to rationalise away unreasonable bigotries in a way that many non-religious systems struggle to do without resorting to murder and violence (a la Stalin). But again, I concede to your general point. I was about to use Aussie PM Julia Gillard's opposition to gay marriage as an example, seeing as she's an atheist, but it occurs to me again that's probably political pandering to the religious vote.


I'm wondering if there's a larger point Coyne is making - if it could be proved that religion was the cause of the things you listed, then what? Logic wins, game over?
Edit: (i wrote a longer thing, but accidentally deleted it and don't have time to redo - in other words, I'm not trying to be a troll.)
Scholar
#512 Old 5th Apr 2011 at 4:05 PM
"But isn't religion just an idiosyncrasy turned doctrinal claim about the nature of nature or the universe?"

In some ways, while I'd say that may be true, it also heavily matters on what the doctrine is and what comes out of it.

Take fundamentalist Christianity. They see their doctrine as that they are superior, they must convert others, they must not question the Bible, etc. That can lead to some bad things. But, then take, say, the Nine Noble Virtues of Heathenry. Courage, Truth, Honor, Fidelity, Discipline, Hospitality, Self-reliance, Industriousness, and Perseverance. These are not bad ideas for any person.

But it also matters to how those doctrines are seen or defined by the believers, too. You could consider the Bible as the Christian doctrine, but my girlfriend (a Christian) doesn't think of it as a literal thing. So she believes in evolution and the sciences, whereas Evangelicals see the same book in a very different way. And the same is true of minority religions as well, of course. Do I believe in the physical interpretation that our world is Midgard and rests among the branches of Yggdrasil? No, I don't. We're a giant hunk of rock being pulled through space by solar gravity, created by swirling mass of dust and rock chunks, swirling around into a hot spherical shape that eventually cooled into what became our planet.

So the intricacies of faith are far too complicated to define in an easy way. Because what the doctrine is matters, how the doctrine is defined, who believes it, how they believe in it, what they want out of, etc. It's different among individuals, and groups, and group agendas, and so on. Yes, this group could be religiously motivated to be against, say, gays. But this other group, for the same reason, could be for gays. It's as complicated as politics.

Is that a shillelagh in your pocket, or are you just sinning against God?
Alchemist
#513 Old 19th Jun 2011 at 10:39 PM
Quote: Originally posted by fraroc
Yeah, My religion teacher (who wasnt a nun, but a theology major) had told us that we dont really know if anyone is in Hell and that God's love for all life is so great that he can forgive all sins, no matter how bad.


you mentioned that you went to a catholic school, and IDK if catholicism is allowed in the christianity thread, so i'll post my question here so as to not de-rail the other thread:

if god forgives all sins, whats the point of having sins in the first place? its like putting up a traffic signal and saying "if you want to stop on red, good, but if you dont, dont worry, we wont actually punish you".
or, "it doesnt matter who you kill and how many lives you ruin, as long as you say you're sorry for it afterward".
coughunlessofcoursetheresnosuchthingassinsanywayandwemadeallthatshituptoguilttriptheguiltycough

"The more you know, the sadder you get."~ Stephen Colbert
"I'm not going to censor myself to comfort your ignorance." ~ Jon Stewart
Versigtig, ek's nog steeds fokken giftig
Scholar
#514 Old 19th Jun 2011 at 11:04 PM
Quote: Originally posted by SuicidiaParasidia
you mentioned that you went to a catholic school, and IDK if catholicism is allowed in the christianity thread, so i'll post my question here so as to not de-rail the other thread:


Catholicism is a branch of Christianity.

Not a comprehensive list:
Catholic, Orthodox/Eastern Christian, Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Congregational, Anglican, Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, Jehovah's Witnesses, Adventist, Latter Day Saints, Apostolic, New Apostolic, Stone-Campbell, Unity, Christian Science, Brethren, Mennonite, Quakers, Unitarian...

All Christian.

Sarcasm is a body's natural defense against stupid.
Alchemist
#515 Old 20th Jun 2011 at 12:33 AM
Quote: Originally posted by kattenijin
Catholicism is a branch of Christianity.

Not a comprehensive list:
Catholic, Orthodox/Eastern Christian, Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Congregational, Anglican, Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, Jehovah's Witnesses, Adventist, Latter Day Saints, Apostolic, New Apostolic, Stone-Campbell, Unity, Christian Science, Brethren, Mennonite, Quakers, Unitarian...

All Christian.


ahh alright, thanks. i dont really pay attention to such things, so it was nice of you to point that out.

"The more you know, the sadder you get."~ Stephen Colbert
"I'm not going to censor myself to comfort your ignorance." ~ Jon Stewart
Versigtig, ek's nog steeds fokken giftig
Scholar
#516 Old 21st Jun 2011 at 4:50 PM
The Muslim Day of Judgment is on a Friday. Now this isn't important all by itself, but I suddenly remembered Rebecca Black's song 'Friday' and now I am extremely unnerved.

Mad Poster
#517 Old 22nd Jun 2011 at 7:15 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Black_Barook!
The Muslim Day of Judgment is on a Friday. Now this isn't important all by itself, but I suddenly remembered Rebecca Black's song 'Friday' and now I am extremely unnerved.


Because some people say that its on 21 Decmeber 2012, this day will be Friday, although we all now that only God knows when the Judgment day is.

P.S. Black_Barook! i am also from a gulf country and a proud muslim!
Retired
retired moderator
#518 Old 13th Jul 2011 at 3:59 PM Last edited by kiwi_tea : 13th Jul 2011 at 4:15 PM.
Quote:
although we all now that only God knows when the Judgment day is.


...No. We don't. We don't even know that there is a god, let alone a Judgement Day. And I do mean WE.

CAW Wiki - A wiki for CAW users. Feel free to edit.

GON OUT, BACKSON, BISY BACKSON
Scholar
#519 Old 17th Jul 2011 at 10:22 PM
Quote: Originally posted by kiwi_tea
...No. We don't. We don't even know that there is a god, let alone a Judgement Day. And I do mean WE.


Stop Trolling Kiwi Tea! You already have your own thread! (Insert 'Get off my lawn' smiley)
Instructor
#520 Old 4th Sep 2011 at 8:12 PM
Okaii with those 21 pages
It's ridiculous -__-"
When you speak about a religion that ISN'T Christianity.
You're trying to make a war and starts by "Terror" O_o
This whole thread is offending when haters spread wth they wanna hear -.-
I mean Islam is not a bad religion. AT ALL
If you're Christian and you've read the bible,
Where does it says to hate muslims and judge them or the plane accident thingy?
Where does the bible say to hate and judge other people?
And if you're jewish you know that your god wouldn't let you hate on islam or even Jesus O_o lol
So why are you doing it? (Islam's haters)
In "Phalestine" Jews kill muslims almost every single day.
and how much muslims kill jews??
Count if you want 'cuz' you won't come up with a big number.
and if your an illuminati then you're freaky O_o
world renowned whogivesafuckologist
retired moderator
Original Poster
#521 Old 4th Sep 2011 at 8:16 PM
Instructor
#522 Old 4th Sep 2011 at 8:20 PM
o_o lol
Scholar
#523 Old 4th Sep 2011 at 9:14 PM
Was in this thread, there's any discussion about Buddhism? If not, then gosh! Am I the only Sims-Buddhist player?

Hey there! :)
Alchemist
#524 Old 4th Sep 2011 at 9:22 PM
Oh, my, there are STILL people who believe that 2012 crap?!

Evil doesn't worry about not being good. - The Warden, Dragon Age Origins
Lab Assistant
#525 Old 4th Sep 2011 at 11:26 PM
Quote: Originally posted by nonya0992
Wicca does not discriminate on sexual preferences.


But wicca is under neopaganism, which was already said?
 
Page 21 of 24
Back to top