Organized Religion is a joke

Carbon System I am with you.

I live in the Middle East and I am constantly amazed that so many intelligent and otherwise normal people from around the world waste so much of their time on religion.

Re: Organized Religion is a joke

Would you prefer disorganized religion?

Re: Organized Religion is a joke


Sad but true!!!

I believe that the majority of people who don't belong to any specific congregation and who never set foot into a church except for a wedding or funeral, yet still have a strong belief in a higher power and govern their everyday actions accordingly, are much more likely to go to a heaven (if there is one) than the people that attend church functions on a regular basis but it is done in a manner to fool the public, and in the process, themselves. Those phonies will burn in hell. (if there is one)

I am in agreement with you gus, except for part about the others burning in hell.

If they go to church and all that stuff, just out of habit, or it's expected of them, that isn't so cool, but unless they are commiting some evil, why should they go to hell?

The ones that are apathetic church goers and who rag on non-church goers are just one of those inconveniences of life.

The phonies though, who actively lay a guilt trip on you and go around being an evil doer in private, I don't know, they are wrong.

Yes, you bring up some good points where people can get unbalanced. But the spiritual paths of the world also can give us much wisdom and tools to live at peace if we look for it. Just as water and air are life supporting, they can still kill us if we ago to extremes with them. True spirituality has no such limits, but man made religions do have limits. Every religion was made by man and as such every religion is imperfect as it is run by man. Despite these imperfections, each religion also has many "perfection's" within it as well. We can still be open to peace generating tools from any of the religions and spiritual traditions that are available to us if we are serious about being at peace. This requires us to run our life by truth and not by prejudice.

I was at a religious discussion one time where the group was composed of a wide spectrum of believers and non believers. One atheist said he ran his life by the golden rule. Another person piped up that the golden rule came from the bible, which made the atheist wince. The atheist seemed to take pride in his self sufficiency and did not like to run his life by anything that came out of the bible. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said: "Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them" (Matthew 7:12). Nowadays this verse is commonly referred to as "The Golden Rule," and is more commonly quoted as: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Now, whether you believe in God or believe in Jesus or are an atheist or Buddhist does this wisdom not apply to you? In this case, you can adopt a peace generating tool from the Christians and apply it to your life irrespective of your religious beliefs or lack thereof. Wisdom for living a life at peace is all around us for the taking. But many of us get blinded with labels and personal prejudices. As such, I practice from many religious and spiritual traditions without problems or prejudices and readily look for such gifts irrespective of what label they come under - on the contrary I am most grateful wherever I find them.

The Muslims have a practice of praying five times a day to Allah. For those that do not know, Allah is the same God of the Jews and of the Old Testament that the Christians worship. The Muslims pray at sun up, when the sun is at its zenith at noon, when the sun is part way down in the afternoon, when the sun sets and when they go to bed. Even though I am a Christian and not a Muslim, I borrowed from the Muslim's prayer schedule to use as a reminder for my own prayers. If you are an Atheist you can borrow the Muslim's prayer schedule to be mindful of "gratitude" in your life - you can commune with the universe for all the good that that has been given to you at these same prayer times the Muslims use. If you do not want to develop a practice of gratitude, then what about using it as a reminder 5 times a day to relax your breath, practice mindfulness and bring your thoughts back to the present moment? When you have come to a point of gratitude for being able to open your eyes in the morning and being able to take a breath of air everything else is just gravy so to speak. Gratitude plays an important part with finding inner peace, just as being mindful of the present moment and being aware of anything that causes this mindfulness to wander.

A group of Catholic nuns has a motto of "Charity, Simplicity and Humility." Are these not all qualities we can benefit from whether Jew, Protestant or Atheists? If we think not, then what about developing peace from the opposite end of the spectrum by using Selfishness, Complex Living and Pride? Well, all these qualities whether they be the first group or the second are needed for a balanced life. The key here is that of balance and not to get too far in the extreme territory - for even though water and air are life sustaining necessities, too much of them will still kill us. The point I am trying to make is this; no need to discriminate or form prejudices against other religions - just take what you can apply from these spiritual traditions and use it in your own life to develop peace and contentment within yourself - all it takes is being honest, open and willing.

One time I asked an old Catholic priest if he ever studied about Buddhism when he was training in the seminary. He scowled at me like I was the devil shaking his head and quickly walking away from me. If he was a little more open minded to finding inner peace he might have been able to adopt a few peace generating tools from the Buddhists. Many monotheists believe that Buddhists worship the Buddha like he was a God / god. Well, some do, the misguided ones, but the Buddha was just a human, like the rest of us. Some misguided Christians worship the Pope or a favorite saint, so this worshiping of humans is not limited to the Buddhists. Before leaving his family and princely life for that of a renunciate, the Buddha was Prince Siddhartha of India. Some of Siddhartha's concepts were borrowed from the Hindu's. He added a few things and now other spiritual practitioners are borrowing them from him. Catholic priests are not exempt from being at peace either as the recent headlines shows. With just a little open mindedness, that old priest could have made use of many easily adopted peace generating tools from Buddhism. If you look into your own life, you will see anyone can make use of these 3 pillars of Buddhism that are common to all schools of Buddhist practice. Such tools are available to all irrespective of their religious beliefs or lack thereof. What is stopping you from your life of inner peace?

1- Practicing mindfulness and meditation to develop peace and self awareness of our own true nature.

2- Accepting the liberating wisdom of impermanence and practicing non-clinging and a lessening of craving and desires.

3- The development of compassion for others.

The Gnostic gospel of Thomas was not included in the New Testament due to prejudice. Gnosticism was persecuted at that time and the bishop in charge of what went into the bible only wanted 4 gospels in the new testament. The reason the bishop liked the idea of 4 gospels stemmed from his predisposition with the number 4. There were 4 seasons, 4 directions , (north, south, east and west), the human body had 4 limbs and so on. Jesus' quote in Thomas's gospel sums up man's quest for enlightenment very succinctly in an almost eastern like fashion.

"The disciples asked Jesus, when will the kingdom come? Jesus replied, 'The kingdom will not come by watching for it. It will not be said - look here or look there. Rather, the kingdom of heaven is spread out upon the earth and men do not see it."

The seeds of enlightenment are all around us - we only have to seek the truth and come to peace within to realize this if our guiding light is truth and not prejudice.




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This is not from the christians. This is just the christians version of a social truism. A social rule that governs our behaviour as a group creature and prevents the breakdown of the pack.

To be honest, I would prefer none at all.

If a good piece of moral advice, or a good rule to live by is in the bible, I have no problem living by it. The bible is nothing more to me than any other book. I won't look at the bible and say "I don't believe a word of this god stuff, so I refuse to believe anything written, like the golden rule."

That would make no sense to me, the wisdom came from normal men like all of us, writing it to control thier people, maybe to help them create peace in the masses. Good advice is good advice, no matter how old it is.

barnoon wrote:



Hmmm. Funny, I recall the bible saying love your neighbor as yourself. Sounds like, do unto others to me.

There are a number of religions that are "disorganized", Shinto (Japanese) comes immediately to mind. The problem seems with the organized types, that demand "commitment".

It would no doubt be a good thing if all people practiced religious tolerance. That is the main downfall of this world.

Amen to that Sunlover! It's ok to have differences in religious views. It's not okay to attack others verbally, physically, etc., because of those differences.

This more or less goes against the whole Christian dogma though. If you are involved in a religion that believes that everyone not subscribing to your theories can't be saved and gain admittance to heaven, then it sort of puts the task to you to evangelize and, if necessary, point out the flaws in other religions in order to convert people.

Thus if you fail to do so, and simply accept that people believe differently from you and that you have no right to argue their beliefs you essentially condemn them to "hell". Also you fail in your obligations to the religion you follow. A beautiful catch-22, really.

Not so Questioner,

What the Bible and Christ's teachings tell us that we are to tell of Christ but if we are rejected, we are to stop doing what we are doing.

Christians have neither the right nor the authority to condemn anyone to hell.

Right, and that's God's job should you all fail. that was more or less my point. Also, I can't really recall where in the bible it states that it's ok to give up. Can you point that out? (not trying to bully, seriously curious here).

I can't stand organized religion. Mainly because they tell you if you don't join, you're doomed. My church is nature. My God doesn't care where I praise him. His House is everywhere.

Questioner,

If you mean by give up, stop telling them what they don't want to hear, I will have to look it up.

It IS NOT God's job that we should all fail! God wants us to do the right things and to be with Him always. He's not sitting up there in heaven poking pins in voodoo dolls. He gave us a free will to make our decisions.