Religion

Overview

A religion is "a system of social coherence based on a common group of beliefs or attitudes concerning an object, person, unseen being, or system of thought considered to be supernatural, sacred, divine or highest truth, and the moral codes, practices, values, institutions, and rituals associated with such belief or system of thought. It is sometimes used interchangeably with "faith" or "belief system"[1], but is more socially defined than that of personal convictions." In other words, a "religion" is a type of "faith" that includes social aspects.

Related Concepts

• Russell's teapot [W] is an analogy coined by the philosopher Bertrand Russell [W] to refute the idea that skeptics have the burden of disproof regarding unfalsifiable claims of religions.

Related Pages

• Religion is a philosophical concept.
• Most religion revolves around the idea of (or depends upon) the existence of one or more supernatural beings, most commonly a single being named God.
• Atheism denies the necessity for belief in a God or gods.
• Religion and science often come into conflict, despite not really being mutually exclusive
• Religion and atheism often come into conflict, for more obvious reasons.
• Some varieties of religion, most commonly extremist religions, arguably do more harm than good
• The Bible is core doctrine for Christianity, one of the world's most popular religions.
• Location-specific pages:
  • religion in the US
• Some specific religions:
  • Buddhism
  • Christianity
    • The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
    • Catholicism
  • Islam
  • Scientology

Reference

• Wikipedia
• Media Matters: religion-related media items
• Wikis
  • Religion Wiki(a): "for all religions and none"
  • Wikitheism
  • Christianity:
    • Theopedia: "an encyclopedia of Biblical Christianity"
    • Unfulfilled historical predictions by Christians (Wikipedia)

Achievements

• Has Religion Made Useful Contributions to Civilization? by Bertrand Russell

Best

• helps build community between its members, typically strengthening the larger community of which it is a part
• countless majestic cathedrals and works of art
• popularization of a number of generally good memes, including:
  • taboo against killing; the sanctity of (human) life (Judeo-Christianity)
  • taboo against lying (Judeo-Christianity)
  • "turning the other cheek", i.e. taboo against vengefulness (Christianity)
  • taboo against envious or jealous thoughts/behavior (Judeo-Christianity): helps to avoid the temptation to steal and also helps reduce friction between people of different levels of wealth
  • help the poor (Christianity)
  • respect for elders (Confucianism, Judeo-Christianity, others): supports parents in their efforts to impart good values to their children; supports the transmission of community history, so it can be learned from; helps prevent elder abuse
• popularization of memes useful within their cultural context:
  • taboo against stealing; the sanctity of personal property (Judeo-Christianity): some viable cultures don't/didn't have the concept of personal property, at least not to the same extent; results have been mixed

Worst

• The Inquisitions (Catholicism)
• Persecution of homosexuals and others with non-standard gender traits
• The declaration that rock music is the work of the devil (American Christian extremists, late 1950s)
• The burning of Beatles albums in response to John Lennon's off-the-cuff statement that the Beatles "are more popular than Jesus now" (American Christian extremists, 1966)
• Repression of women (most religions, throughout history)
• Repression of scientific progress
  • religion vs. science
• Sexual repression, including: repression of homosexuality and transsexuality [W] [1]; adverse control of heterosexual behavior between consenting adults; adverse control of non-interpersonal sexual behavior
• The destruction of countless works of art; examples:
  • The Buddhas of Bamiyan (Taliban - Islam)
• Countless instances of religious violence; examples:
  • the 2006 Mohammed image riots (Islam)
  • The 9/11 attacks are believed to have been planned and carried out by Islamic extremists (Al Qaeda)
• The Ku Klux Klan claimed to be a Christian organization (what was Christianity's reaction to this?)
• The Flat Earth Society
• Doctrinal arguments in support of slavery caused much of Christendom to support what we now know to be a great evil

Definitions

Jehovah's Witnesses

According to a flyer distributed in 2006 by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania (the mouthpiece of the Jehovah's Witnesses, an apocalyptic evangelical Christian sect):

• True Religion:
  • Practices love: "True worshippers are 'no part of the world', are not divided by race or culture, and display 'love among themselves' (John 13:35; 17:16; Acts 10:34, 35)... Rather than killing one another, they are willing to die for one another (1 John 3:16)"
  • Trusts God's word: true religion bases its doctrine on God's word, not on tradition or the commands of men
  • Strengthens families and upholds high moral standards: husbands must "love their wives as their own bodies", wives must develop "deep respect for their husbands", children must "be obedient to their parents", and "those entrusted with positions of authority must have exemplary morals". A "true religion" encourages or requires all of these.
• False Religion:
  • Meddles in war and politics: quotes the journal Asiaweek (ceased publication in December 2001) as saying "...power-hungry leaders are cynically manipulating people's religious sentiments for their own needs." Contrasts the words of an unnamed "prominent religious leader in the United States" who said "You've got to kill the terrorists before the killing stops. ... Blow them all away in the name of the Lord." with several Bible quotations: "If anyone makes the statement 'I love God' and yet is hating his brother, he is a liar." (1 John 4:20) and "Continue to love your enemies." (Matthew 5:44).
  • Spreads false doctrine, which apparently means teaching that the soul does not die, or does not die under certain circumstances, and thereby extracting money from their followers to help ensure this reward. (Apparently what really happens is that the dead will be resurrected, as taught by Jesus (John 11:11-25), so no afterlife is necessary.)
  • Tolerates immoral sex, which apparently means homosexuality and gay marriage, as well as tolerance of child abuse

Links

Facts & Data

• American Ethnic Geography: maps of United States church membership by county
• God and the Brain: "Is Belief a Psychological Condition? A collection of grest articles on the subject."

Religious POV

• Inclusive, Questioning & Explorative
  • beliefnet
  • The Ekklesia Project
• Dogmatic
  • Answers in Genesis: "Upholding the Authority of the Bible from the Very First Verse"
  • Christian Answers: "biblical answers to contemporary questions"
    • Secular Humanism as defined from a Christian perspective
  • Why Won't God Heal Amputees?: disjointed dogmatic babble posing as rational exploration? Arguments against religion? Can't quite tell from a quick skim.
• Extremist
  • Westboro Baptist Church
• Philosophical Issues
  • Problem of evil (Wikipedia)

News

• 2006-11-12 Sir Elton: Ban organised religion: Elton John suggests a ban on organized religion, despite being an admirer of the teachings of Jesus Christ
• 2006-11-11 Archbishop attacks public atheism: Dr. John Sentamu, Archbishop of York, condemned what he called the systematic erosion of Christianity from public life. The phrases "intolerant public atheism" and "intolerant faith position" are mentioned.
• 2006-09-27 Societies worse off 'when they have God on their side': "In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in the prosperous democracies."
• 2006-09-13 Muslims and Christians 'allies': Dr. John Sentamu, Archbishop of York, says British Christians should see Muslims as allies in the struggle against secularism. (Likewise, proponents of the Enlightenment may see Christians and Muslims both as enemies...)
• 2006-06-12 Using Children as 'God's Army'

Criticism of Religion

• 2006-12-05 When Atheists Have Their Say by Matt Arnold (blog entry with comments)
• 2006-11-24
  • The Alpha Male Monkey In The Sky
  • Beyond belief: "What is belief? Is absence of proof the same as proof of absence, or is it just as misguided to disbelieve something without evidence as it is to believe in it? In this article we explore the touchy issue of dogmatic belief and try to establish why atheism is not just 'religion for the nonbelievers'."
• 2006-11-14 Faith Won't Heal a Divided World by Sam Harris: "It is worth observing that religion is the one area of our lives where faith in dogma – that is, belief without sufficient evidence – is considered a virtue. If such faith is a virtue, it is a virtue that is completely unknown to scientific discourse. Science is, in fact, the one domain in which a person can win considerable prestige for proving himself wrong. In science, honesty is all. In religion, faith is all." ... "It would, of course, be absurd to speak of 'Christian physics' or 'Muslim algebra.' And there is no such thing as Iraqi or Japanese – as distinct from American – science. Reasonable people really do have a monopoly on the truth. And while they might not agree about everything in the near term, common ground surrounds them on all sides."
• 2006-05-24 How do you prove Jesus existed? CNN article about an Italian man who is suing the Catholic Church to prove the existence of Jesus (with reader comments)
• 2006-05-16 Why Religion Must End by Laura Sheahen, Beliefnet (original is much more cluttered)
• 2006-03-05 The Book of Bart: "In the Bestseller 'Misquoting Jesus,' Agnostic Author Bart Ehrman Picks Apart the Gospels That Made a Disbeliever Out of Him"
• 2006-03 Killing the Buddha by Sam Harris: religion stands in the way of rational discussion of belief
• The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris: ISBN 0393035158 (hb) ISBN 0393327655 (pb)
• Islam: The Religion of Peace (Believe It Or Else): not sure how rational this site is, but it certainly presents food for thought
• Exposing Religious Error and Deception: bizarre, disjointed criticisms of Christianity (by someone apparently named Seven Star Hand) which nonetheless seem to make a few useful points... but mixed in with all kinds of bizarre nonsense...

Experimental

• WikiWrit: "The Holy Book Anyone Can Edit"

Related Articles

• Many religions (notably, most fundamentalist Christian varieties) tend to be pro-life, anti-contraception, and anti-sex-education, and in general have strong opinions about reproductive issues.
• religion vs. science
• prayer in public schools
• It is often argued that the USA is a Christian nation
• Creationism and intelligent design are two attempts to explain the creation of the universe in a Biblically-correct way

Related Concepts

• Providentialism is the belief that God is actively directing the affairs of the world, e.g. through the actions of 'chosen people' whom God "provides" for such purposes.
• Blasphemy
• Heresy

Problems with religion

Woozle makes some points

• The chain of reasoning in many religious arguments vanishes into a black box, usually with the inscription "God says" on the outside. Even with churches like the LDS which admit the possibility of individuals communicating directly with God in order to get a better understanding of what God means, you are still either (a) forced to admit belief in God (can't communicate with something you don't believe in), (b) argue solely from existing religious doctrine, or else (c) have the validity of your arguments denied (your argument isn't based on God's word, so your premises may be wrong). In order to take part in the discussion, you have to admit to belief in God -- which is basically conceding the argument. In other words, the whole thing is a circular argument based on the infallibility of God.

• Belief in absolutes (moral absolutism and the infallibility of God) can be used to justify extreme measures. If your faith's doctrine tells you with absolute, unquestionable certainty that what someone is doing is absolutely wrong regardless of circumstance, that removes most or all of the uncertainty and allowance for mistake (perhaps there are extenuating circumstances; perhaps your belief that their actions are wrong is incorrect; and so on) with which most people operate when deciding whether to take action against someone.

• Because of the belief in absolutes (which allows for a great deal of preci and the black box nature of basic religious doctrine, it is extremely easy for someone who is both unscrupulous and power-hungry to manipulate those who have been raised and trained in the validity of such thinking.

• If absolute truth can be had by speaking with God (as allowed by some faiths, but not all):
  • If you believe that God has spoken to you, how do you know that it is really God? (How can you tell the difference between the "real God" and an extremely advanced but non-divine being who isn't entirely honest?)
  • If someone else claims God has spoken to them, how do you know they are not lying (or else deceived, as above)?

Quotes

"When one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called Religion." – Robert Pirsig

Trivia

• Contrary to a popular saying, there are atheists in foxholes. [2]

Satire

• Creators' Rights: underscores the "Millennium" in "Digital Millennium Copyright Act"