4 posts tagged “christian”

I was brought up in a christian household, for which many years this voodoo was fausted on me until my mid to late teens. It rarely ever made sense to me and even though for a brief period between 15 & 17 in which I fully embraced this myth I believe it was merely a survival mechnism until such time as I was able to leave the parental home.

my biggest concern with religion is its primary ownership of all that is moral and ethical. As a result my ethics were owned by my parents and religion of course. In other words I mean, in my mind, they OWNED morality. I was of course completely unaware of this for many years. Of course morality neither belongs to me, them or anyone for that matter.
 
As secularists or perhaps more accurately as agnostics, we give religion a distinct amount of breadth and authority when it comes to morality. In fact I would say that for most people whom religion is not an important part of their lives, would indeed equate religion with morality. They would even feel that religion plays an important part in the world at dampening down what in their minds could otherwise be outright immorality by the masses. Unfortunately for the most part agnostics are completely unaware of the contradictions that exist within religious texts, these include many hypocrisies within them as well. Religion has a history of brutality that has used violence as a means to controlling their subjects. Even Kings, Queens and governments rarely dared to criticise them, for fear of vicious retribution. Of course this has to a large extent changed in these more modern times, with the exception of Muslim countries for which retrograde religiosity is regretfully the current flavour.
 
We have of course secularism and rational thought to thank for the modern day western peaceful Christian demeanour. However religion is still viewed as the purveyor of all that is moral and as a result stultifies the growth of the human mind and experience. This is why the debating of Christians is generally a categoric disaster for them that use the scientfic method. Once you remove the agnostic view that possesses no answers, thus providing the Christian with an easy escape route, the debate becomes decidely rocky. Using empirical evidence to erode their mythologies, they will soon flounder and inevitably either close down the debate immediately, or, they become extremely angry. There is a third reaction of course, that of them completely agreeing with you. However this is most rare, having invested so much time and resources into such a myth, they are unlikely to change their view without a struggle.
 
As banal as these religious beliefs may appear to you and me, they do indeed influence the next generation negatively. If we allow our thoughts to be possessed by any mythology, rather than the evidence of science, how are we to ever know the truth? Nihilism is I’m sure a reaction to mythology, religion being a major part of that for most people, even for agnostics. Nihilism allows us to have no belief in anything because religion makes no sense in reality and offers no tangible morality. We thus become moral relativists, which in reality is a state of confusion for which there is no right or wrong, thus allowing the more extreme of mystics to have moral authority above us. This is why I feel strongly that good, honest, reciprocal and voluntary relationships with people are fundamental to our wellbeing.