Religion
posted by Connor | September 26, 2010
- Login or register to post comments
- Print this page
Delicious
Digg
StumbleUpon
Propeller
Reddit
Magnoliacom
Newsvine
Furl
Facebook
Google
Yahoo
Technorati
IcerocketSo I'm not saying there isn't a God out there, but after pondering and studying religion for a while I've come to the conclusion that Religion is a tool. If there is a God out there, we've completely blocked out any true meaning of them. In Roman days you had people who genuinely believed in Christ, who if were caught in Rome, were put to death in humiliating ways. Then once the Roman Empire started losing control of their vast areas, they took the books of the Bible that best suited them and created the Roman Catholic Empire, with the bible that we know today. It, perhaps subconsciously, became not only a war for the physical boundaries of the world. But a war for the very minds of their people. Now today we have countries founded upon, religion. and a big portion of the world growing up religious. We have governments who use religion as a tool, and we have people who are religious who basically limit their infinite potential. If you believe that your mind has infinite power and that there is some being who is indescribable, unexplainable, and so great that you can't even comprehend him, and if you cuss, or think about life from any other perspective, your going to hell. but at the same time he needs 10% of your paycheck. Doesn't that sound a little odd? I think almost every book in the bible is man made. Maybe at one point in early human history a God revealed itself, or perhaps God is just an idea a pantheism to our universe and how we originally lived, but then we took it wayy too far, probably rite off the bat, and created religion. I believe if there is a God, we are required nothing more but to live by a spiritually based relationship. I kinda believe God, is probably, just consciousness, a great consciousness. Perhaps all of our consciousnesses put together and then some. Like if you meditate and find your inner consciousness, it is seemingly divine. You understand, you know. that is all of it. I mean all religion is now is a tool to go to war and capture your mind in a non thinking shell. Limiting yourself as a servant to a God, instead of thinking for yourself, questioning God and living your own life. I think if there is a God, then ask all the questions you want and arguments discerning it. Because if there is a God, then there should be, somewhere in the universe an answer to that question. if God is real, then he created us in his own image, to think similar to him. We have the infinite potential and ability to create thought that in itself is quite impressive. So why would God want you to just stop using your brain and let yourself be enslaved to tons of rules etc etc. Idk I"m kinda rambling but there it is.
Comments
Yep
— Sep 26, 2010
I like to say religion is your way of relighting your connection to the divine. So I guess it's your choice of vehicle on the road known as spirituality. Some are big and obnoxious and others very simple. Licensed at baptism and refueled by communion we are called to share the road.
Here is an entertaining view of organized religion's effect on the world.
http://www.youtube.com/user/hitchenschannel?blend=1&ob=4#p/c/588891F1B35...
Live well. be free
zimij
I think exactly this all the
— Sep 27, 2010
I think exactly this all the time, and i think "God", is all of us, our collective psyche and consciousness, the mind is to the universe as the body is to the earth. Don't let silly things like religion pull you in, it is your own responsibility to expand your knowledge of your own universe, your own existence, get rid of the "I" and of the "self", get rid of time and religion and everything that restrains you, forget all of this and release yourself into the universe. I think we both share a very similar path my friend, and would love to continue this conversation
keep dancing
-A
Beyond self
— Sep 28, 2010
When we concern ourselves with bigger things due to a sense of responsibility to the whole(holy) vs the immediate self and wallet we run the risk of being diagnosed as unfit somehow. The $ystem needs to run those bigger things to maintain control.
Live well. be free
.
— Sep 27, 2010
I would be careful not to indict things which are manifestations of our own psyche. If you have a person who is deeply disturbed, their religion and government will be disturbed too. Religion is no worse than the people who create and follow it...And for that matter, atheists are responsible for the greatest mass deaths in history - Stalin, Pol Pot, Hitler, Mao.
My lack of faith in extremist religion no more puts me off God and the pursuit of the spiritual than the government in Iran or the US or Israel makes me believe people are incapable of ruling themselves.
Religion simply is an 'intermediary institution', like government, like associations, armies, and even groups of people. Throughout history, humans have been increasing the size of the groups they associate with, but in the end, the whole system will collapse back on itself and all these ideas will remain but vestigal structures, testaments to our newfound ability to self-govern, for in each of us, in ourselves lies the path.
Well said!
— Sep 27, 2010
Well said my friend check out my blog, "life is complicated" and give me some of your insight please!
"logic takes you from point a to b, when imagination can take you anywhere."~ Albert Einstein
~It took me a long time to get back on the train~
"the definition of insanity:
— Sep 27, 2010
"the definition of insanity: repeating something expecting different results"
-Albert Einstein
We know religion doesn't work, government is corrupt, society is misleading, so why do we keep on with this continuous paridigm of insanity?
We need to get out
-A.a
yeah your right. It's like
— Sep 28, 2010
yeah your right. It's like perhaps deciding to rule each other is a step in a sort of evolution of our minds in becoming able to rule ourselves. or perhaps Government is a mistake that people in power don't want to leave behind. Or move passed.
Govt power
— Sep 29, 2010
Seems to me the power holders live in such fear of losing it they become and maintain the psycho-path. Sad indeed.
Live well. be free
Everything is a tool, after
— Sep 27, 2010
Everything is a tool, after all that was one of the supposed great leaps in mankind, the difference in homo sapien and homo neanderthal, when it was learned to use tools, for building, for protection, for hunting, and for learning..
Listen to Tool, at least one entire album, absorb the messages, think about why their name is "Tool", come back to me with your thoughts.
-A.a
Religion, bad?
— Sep 27, 2010
While it is undeniable that many religious bodies have used their faith to justify war, mind-control, and many other forms of oppression, "agrainofsand" is right in saying that these are only a few examples of the very diverse world of religion.
It is the job of individuals to decide how much to involve (or separate) themselves in whichever religious body(s) they choose to explore, and just because many people have been jaded by the idea of religion, does not mean that it has not transformed the lives of countless people for the better.
For every religious extremist who kills in the name of their God, there is an MLK, a Dali Lama, and a Gandhi who inspires millions and uses religion to make peace.
I guess it might sound like im playing devil's advocate, but i think that there is something very valuable about the collective spiritual experience, and the fact that our western religions have soured that idea for so many people with their corruption and limitations is really sad.
and Individual spiritual path is great, but think about how much more limited it would be if there weren't others to share it with!
religion in its pure form can be a beautiful thing, and one might argue that many aspects of this very website function like a religious body-
peace be with you all!
“No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.” -Albert Einstein
I'm saying Religion is
— Oct 13, 2010
I'm saying Religion is generally bad. Not spiritual personal relationships with spiritual deities.
nike dunks
— Sep 27, 2010
My take at the moment is that we are establishing across a network that god is nothing more than our very own self, the auto-dreamer, beyond beliefs. The 10th and lower percentile of brain capacity that constructs a reality that we wake up to in the morning. We evolvers (and many others, btw) are engaged in the sacred activity of breaking our normal routines. Exactly how we do that is up for individual debate. But the job now is to do it collectively, and that's where the network comes in handy. All we are is now, but the illusion of now has infiltrated the illusion of past and future so completely that we... what?
fill in the blank.
Fellowship
— Sep 27, 2010
Fellowship is a primary goal of many religions. The Church of the Brethren, an off shoot of the Swiss Mennonite sect of the 1500s, are themselves 300 years old. Here in Lancaster, PA I've had the privilege of volunteering to help with their annual Brethren Disaster Relief Auction for 7 years, and find some very gentle people. They follow Christ's tenant of non violence and generally claim conscientious objector status when it comes to war. They are hard working and love to eat.
This evening I was invited to join a work trip to New Orleans in January. They will be ending their 5 yr run in that region and continue in Haiti. I've been to the Dominican Republic and Guatemala with COB groups and loved it.
Having grown from rural farming communities the local church is experiencing a change due to young adults getting educations and moving away leaving voids in the Sunday school teacher department. I suppose anyone with a heart for children could do lots of good in this world if they had an interest in helping families learn how to love one another and stay together. I might talk myself into this yet. After being married for 23 yrs I might have something to offer.
If you're still with me here, you might like to know this little tidbit. A new pastor is starting in October. He was in the DR with when I was diagnosed bi-polar after a sleep deprived week when I wept and broke down when seeing our culture sold to the third world and we don't even teach them where trash belongs . Yeah...hospitalized, drugged, and later diagnosed. I refused the prescribed seroquel(highly abused drug in prisons) and opted for walnuts. Thank You WWW.
That is a small glimpse at what they see as the body of Christ. Working together, living together in peace for a good cause. I just hope they can stabilize their core in these trying times. Many have gone out to the mega-churches in the area, and the elders are...well, elderly now. I wonder if they can be saved.
Imagine.
Live well. be free
Thy Name...
— Sep 28, 2010
"God's last name is not dammit" Chinese proverb
"God's first name is not "God", dammit!" Tony Clifton
Lesmanaste,
Rob
http://blissings.com
.
— Sep 28, 2010
You assume the universe isn't already conscious. Which, to me is untenable. This means that consciousness is an emergent property, which at some point along the course of evolution, it appeared in life (vegetable, or animal, its your choice I guess)...but good luck pointing out an organism before which everything was not conscious.
Does that not imply dualism? If so, I can't support it.
Although the way you use colonization is interesting. I assume you meant like physical moving to other locations, but colonization in the postcolonial sense, as an appropriation would be interesting. Our anthropocentric view of what consciousness is (exclusive to humans and sometimes animals and sometimes plants) moving into other realms and declaring itself by placing the 'flag of consciousness' on that primordial rock we deny consciousness to...is in fact a form of ideological colonialism as well. We are making our mark on the 'primitive' universe.
I don't think its so simple, though. And its likely a result of our bias on consciousness.
.
— Sep 28, 2010
Right, your arguments go right back to what I was saying. I am finding fault with that emergent property of consciousness as you put it (or I did actually, you put it as 'first cause', but we're getting at the same thing).
My point is that our idea of what we agree as 'consciousness' is in fact flawed and anthropocentric. While I tend to agree with your 'hierarchy of consciousness' idea, I take it to both extremes -
on the small scale, how can you say an amoeba doesn't have consciousness? A virus? An amino acid? A rock?
On the larger scale, how can you look at the universe, and not see a 'conscious', perhaps in a more complex fashion than we can conceive, 'being' if you will. Perhaps the universe acts with intent in the same manner as we do.
Our prejudice extends to other levels - like technology. How many of you think your computer is conscious? I, for one, think that at some level I cannot understand (which, by the way, is a prerequisite for discussing others with subjective experience as basic philosophy of mind problems illustrate), computers are conscious, as are calculators, circuits, and so on down the line. They function (currently) on a more deterministic (predictable/'ordered' [again, order is based on our conceptions]) level than we think we do.
After all, there is no chaos, just levels of order we do not understand. And who is to say things like fusion, plate tectonics, physics, gravity, and planet formation is not a form of consciousness? It all comes back to definitions. Consciousness seems to be self-organizing, that may be its primary characteristic. It experiences subjectively, as we are so proud of. But who are we to say the Earth, the universe has no subjective experience just because we cannot fathom a greater mind than our own? Our nervous system evolved to better model reality. Wouldn't the best (and ONLY) legitimate model of reality NECESSITATE a subjective experience? Basically, aren't we, and all of our subjective glory, just another smaller facet of the great subjectivity? How does objectivity exist without subjectivity? Are we to say objectivity did not exist before humans could perceive it? All this gets back to the question of is there really 'something out there'? You say you are not a dualist, but in the way you imagine consciousness you necessitate a dualist interpretation at some level.
yeahh I aree, I think
— Oct 13, 2010
yeahh I aree, I think Computers are a sort of life we created. Same with synthetic life. We can now "grow" computers with such things as carbon nano tubes. I think computers seem unconscious because they are retarded. "intellectually impaired" (So I don't offend any computers out there" xD But yeah I think like think about how long it takes you to process a thought. and then u sit at a computer and you have to kinda slow down what you want to do to let the computer stay caught up. I think For instance the TED super computer, or up upgrades to computer intelligence will eventually lead to some sort of noticeble consciousness.
By the way in my Blog, I was
— Sep 28, 2010
By the way in my Blog, I was saying Religion is wrong. A spiritual friendship with a perhaps existent or non existent God is perhaps better. And what I meant about consciousness is basically, if there isn't a such thing as consciousness. Then in a sense one would have to think that the whole universe and everything in it, is a projection of the mind. Because I feel consciousness, or a mechanical consciousness if I am only a highly efficient natural super computer. But I am not able to fully perceive another persons consciousness. so therefore in reality you and I only know that we are existing. But if you believe in a sort of collective consciousness then you are believing that your friends and your planet and everything around you is existing?
Religion = Philosophy + Government
— Sep 28, 2010
Religion is truly an ugly beast. It just goes to show that absolute power corrupts, absolutely. I shunned Christ for the longest time because of Christianity. Religion is when corrupted people put government and hierarchies into what was originally a good idea. Christ did not want to be idolized and I doubt he said "no one comes unto the father except through me."
As for God, it does seem more like a metaphor. It's hard to define. God is the love you feel for another person as well as that person themselves. God just is and beyond that, let it be. Accept that we are not meant to know WHY in this era of human existence, but it does seem God is letting us know HOW.
It's not religion that is
— Sep 28, 2010
It's not religion that is bad (no matter what the faith), it's the Church that deserves every bad rap you can imagine and then some.
http://www.discount-coach-outlet.com
— Sep 28, 2010
ugg boots outlet clothes shop ugg ugg boots sale uggs online a bathing ape cheap ugg boots uggs sale winter boots ugg boots sale ugg ugg boots for sale coach bags uggs sale mbt shoes sale cheap nike shox nike dunk shoes chanel purses gucci handbags jordan shoes vibram hip hop clothes uggs boots bapesta cheap uggs uggs online uggs outlet discount ugg boots sale uggs mbt shox shoes cheap uggs chanel handbags ugg store ed hardy coach handbags gucci outlet jordan basketball shoes vibram shoes uggs sale snow boots uggs for sale uggs on sale ugg boots ugg outlet discount uggs winter boots sale ugg boots chanel ed hardy clothes coach outlet stores nike sb shoes ugg boot bathing ape Air jordan ugg boots ed hardy clothing love kills slowly coach outlet nike dunk bape uggs uggs outlet nike air jordan vibram five fingers uggs outlet ugg boots winter boots Christian Audigier coach store dunk shoes bape shoes air jordan shoes vibram fivefingers mbt shoes cheap uggs nike shox chanel handbags uggs outlet ed hardy outlet dunk shoes
A History of God
— Sep 29, 2010
Nice post. You may be interested in checking out the book "A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam." I'm reading it right now and so far it is really interesting. It starts with religion at the beginning when paganism was starting to lose it's strong hold and goes through the origins of Judaism, Christianity, Islam and all the sects that have branched off, including mysticism, the religion of the philosophers, and even goes into Eastern religions such as Hinduism. The author was a nun for seven years and it's interesting to see her perspective on how religion has always been created and evolved according to what society needs at the time. She documents the fact that the bible was edited many times once people in power decided they needed to change the people's faith.
I decided to read it because I wanted to be better informed when I'm having discussions with people who are positive that THEIR religion is the true religion and the only way to God. I doubt that many people even understand where their religion came from, let alone all the others in the world..
That sounds interesting I'll
— Sep 29, 2010
That sounds interesting I'll look that up. But it definitely makes sense
Idk I'd actually rather live
— Oct 13, 2010
Idk I'd actually rather live a non safe life. Lifes about the complete randomness that is life. our planet could be destroyed by a meteor rite now, wed all be dead. But that's not safe, it's life, that is our universe. it's all about yin and yang in my opinion. Life and death black and white good and evil. Order chaos,non can be present or exist without the other, death is only the flip side of life, death can't exist without life, death is also just the flip side of life, most likely neither are the end. the universe is the biggest thing we know. If it's really the universe then it must be perfectly sustained. It doesn't waste it recycles. But anyway back to the point, I'd rather wake up every morning and go outside not knowing what may behold me this day. Lifes about the crazy dangerous adventures. Life isn't safe. safe is something modern society created. Also with Yin and yang, think about this. Order and chaos. Or order through chaos.
And yeah about the thing
— Oct 13, 2010
And yeah about the thing with Jesus trying to resolve the abramic patriarch mentality, I agree with that. I think whether Jesus was God or just man. He definitely had a very pure spiritual view of the world. And understood a better spirituality then what had been taught. I kinda personally think, that becoming pure is alot about getting to you know yourself and become lucid with your surroundings. For instance, we have the subconscious. It is the divine spirit that lives within us or the divine consciousness that is us underneath all the mechanics. We are sort of seperated from that divine consciousness. I think Things like Lucid dreaming and personal autonomy, meditation etc, ate methods for us to travel the labyrinth that is our mind. and sort of become one with our divine selves.
ответ на этот пост
— Oct 22, 2010
Я советую [url=http://www.bustrans.com.ua/category/4]прокат автобуса[/url] компаниям, которые организовуют транспортированием.
