Guest Conor Posted January 16, 2000 Share Posted January 16, 2000 Okay, let me rephrase that, they are incapable of forming the phrase 'I exist' even to themselves. It is not a concept they are equipped to handle. ------------------ "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result" -Winston Churchill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zoom Rabbit Posted January 16, 2000 Share Posted January 16, 2000 Well, like I was getting at earlier; how would you prove such a thing? That's kind of my point...this whole 'aware of existance' thing is so subjective that even I can't buy into it. I mean, my cats are aware of themselves, seems to me. Otherwise they would forget to feed themselves, and they wouldn't spend so much time cleaning... ! ------------------ "The entire universe is simply the fractal chaos boundary between intersecting domains of high and low energy." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Nameless One Posted January 17, 2000 Share Posted January 17, 2000 Animals do have feelings and maybe even plants how knows. But some philosopher sad that the world is just what you fell so if any one is bleeding do death in front of you may think that he is felling nothing because you aren’t felling any thing but that is very weird. And I have a cat and he seems to be aware of him self just like yours cat’s Zoom Rabbit. And animals are intelligent I thing but some times they do thing and we say “how stupid is that cat“ or something like that but we humans also do very stupid things and perhaps the animals are smarter than we are we only use 10% of or brain. But monkeys use more of it. ------------------ May the force be with me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zoom Rabbit Posted January 17, 2000 Share Posted January 17, 2000 I was talking this over with a friend at work tonight, and he brought up the survival instinct as evidence of self awareness. Basically, when you threaten an animal, it runs away...to save its self. Some animals even exhibit strategic behavior in the process of saving their selves, indicating that there is more at work than the mere flight reflex. The cat that climbs the tree to get away from the dog is reasoning that by doing so, it is removing its self from the dog's range of attack. This whole process of thinking its way out of danger simply won't work if the animal has no notion of self; if it isn't aware of its self, what is it saving? You see? Now, I do think that there is an important difference between animals and humans. To my thinking, the animal works primarily from instinct...God's original programming, if I may be allowed to put it that way. The human, on the other hand, has realized the gift of free will...and is no longer bound by instincts. Humans are the only animals who intentionally ignore their own instincts; whether this is a good thing or not, I can't say. So why are we on this still? I thought we were working on a universal faith, not kitty logic. ------------------ "The entire universe is simply the fractal chaos boundary between intersecting domains of high and low energy." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Xx_Mentat_xX Posted January 17, 2000 Share Posted January 17, 2000 Wow, I've been meaning to get involved in a religious debate/discussion lately, but never expected to see one here. This is as good a place as any. =Þ Conor: "I say it is impossible for the truth to be unavailable. There must an uncorrupted version of God's Word to humanity." Most people that believe in a God would also believe that with that God, 'nothing' is impossible, I know I do. I can however state this much and feel that it is fact: No one will ever achieve total truth/knowledge. That would mean total enlightenment. "I believe the Catholic Church has it." Although that may never be known, it is however very likely. Concealing/Hiding books from the people has always been their business. I believe that we as indiviuals can only decode pieces of the great puzzle. That is why churches have congregations. Can one group/religion be totally correct? There are extremely intelligent people in ALL religions(including Athiesm), and what does that say? It says that not everyone can be right. Go into any church during service, and ask outloud,"Is this the TRUE religion?" The answer would most likely be yes. We can't all be right, therefore that means most of us are wrong, considering that most religions are very different. I think that an interesting experiment to do would be this: Seclude a young male/female from human socialism for the first 18 years of their life, and then one day free them into society. It would be interesting to see what/how they turned out to be. What religion would they become a member of, what social group would they belong to? Where would they choose to live their life? Most people, I believe, that believe in a certain religion, have also been a part of that religion since day 1. If not, maybe it was the only one that they were exposed/attended services to. What does this mean? It means that there is an awful lot of brainwashing going on out there. I myself was born into a Pentecostal society. After about 16 years of brainwashing, and not being permitted to question their doctrine, I left. How can the truth be found, without debate, disscussions, and arguments? Answer: It can't! I don't believe that one man can find the truth on his own, but I do believe that people should spend more time reading the books that make up their religions, instead of being forcefed bs without debate. There is too much of this going on, and it has since the beginning of time. I myself, tend to learn as much as possible from all religions, and take what I believe to be fact from each, and piece together this puzzle of infinite knowledge. I don't seek enlightenment, I seek the maximum amount of truth that one man can possible discover. I believe that the only TRUE church exists only in our heads. For in our heads, there is no with-holding of information, brainwashing, of ourselves. I apologive if I have mispelled or been unclear about something, it's afte 2am and I;m exhausted. Just call me out on it please, I love debating. ------------------ "Only a fully trained Jedi Knight, with the force as his ally, will conquer." -Jedi Master Yoda Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Jat`Kidal Posted January 17, 2000 Share Posted January 17, 2000 Conor, you`ve made my point, Animals have no way to show they are equal to us because they aren't. animals are not our equals. An advanced alien race would be technologically advanced and mentally evolved beyond us. So that shows that we would not be equal to them. Does that give them any kind of rights over us. I`ve read all the other posts since my last post and many interesting points have been raised about animals having souls, etc. I believe animals and all else in this universe is made of the same stuff!! Whatever it is inside us that makes us tick, is that same (energy) stuff that makes everything else tick. No matter what name you give to the spiritual aspect of all living things, like souls or whatever, at the end of the day, they must constitute matter and / or energy at some level or another. The thing that differentiates all living things is the level at which the matter and energy exists, which constitutes them. e.g human brains are larger than an eagles. We have more brain cells and a greater number of cell connections. Thus we are more evolved than them. And what of our souls, are they equal (the souls would probably constitute some very low energy level or something maybe!!) are all souls made of the same stuff?? Also, given enough time things do evolve to higher and higher level. Look at dolphins and the way they interact with us and with each other. I would say they are defiantly self aware. Then in so many years many animals of this earth may well have evolved to higher levels. Then what do we eat. Do we keep eating animals below a certain evolutionary line?? PS I`ve just read my post and it sounds like I`m asking all these questions to conor, all join in!! ------------------ "May the force guide us"..if there is such a thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Conor Posted January 17, 2000 Share Posted January 17, 2000 As for aliens, if they did exist (which I do not believe they do), they would be no greater then us. I think the universe was created expressly for us so I am not worried about aliens. No matter how fast their spaceships fly, they would not be superior to us. As for the soul, you believe it is made out of energy? I probably shouldn't say 'it' because I am my soul, so it should be 'he'. The soul is spirit, and transcends matter and energy. The soul will exist long after all the matter and energy in the universe is gone. I still have never seen any evidence that animals are in any way 'self-aware'. As for the survival instinct, I would contend it is just that, an instinct. They do not know why they must save themselves, but they will do their best. Humans can have some strange effects on animals though. Animals can get attached to humans, even sometimes save them from danger. Part of God's programming for certain animals perhaps? An interesting post Mentat, although I would disagree with some. "Concealing/Hiding books from the people has always been their business." I admit that statement has me perplexed. I have no idea what you are referring to. You say you take what you believe to be fact from each religion, but how do you know what is fact? It seems to me that picking and choosing from different religions has a very good chance of ending up with only what you like. You probably don't fit into this camp, but I think that if the truth is available it will be centered in one religion. Naturally there will be spillover into other religions, which accounts for the overlapping truths one sees. The only explanation I have for all the different religions is that at some point somebody made up his own doctrines and added them to the known truth. This could also have happened in my religion, but I see no evidence of such. As for the true church only existing in our heads, I say the true church only exists in God's Will. ------------------ "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result" -Winston Churchill [This message has been edited by Conor (edited January 17, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Xx_Mentat_xX Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 "Concealing/Hiding books from the people has always been their business." What I meant by this statement was that throughout history, the Catholics have seen to it that the law prohibited the public to actually read the bible, which is why it was in Latin. Only high-ranking monks/catholics were permitted to even read the book, thus meaning, they wanted the public to be ignorant, and just believe that what they said was truth. The public could have actually been put to death for reading the bible, or even speaking Latin. Of course, today, this may not happen to that extent, but I do believe that the Catholic Church may still withold books. Why? Maybe they are afraid that if someone reads these doctrines maybe even gospels, then it will in some way harm the Catholic church. It is a fact that the Catholics do have certain libraries that are not accessible by the public, or just about anyone for that matter. The Pope(and probably more than the present), have even called it,"heresy," to read these books/manuscripts. If this is something that any of you haven't heard of or believe it as opinion, so be it, but if you really want, I can possible gather a little evidence for you. Honestly, it frightens me that they have the power to keep certain books/manuscripts from the public. What are they afraid of? I do not wish to offend anyone that is Catholic, most of my family is, and furthermore, ALL religions have had there flaws, I know that mine does. "You say you take what you believe to be fact from each religion, but how do you know what is fact? It seems to me that picking and choosing from different religions has a very good chance of ending up with only what you like." Yes, that is exactly what it means. Individuals must find the truth for themselves, not have it forcefed into their minds. You have to ask yourself, what is a 'fact?' Fact: Anything done; a deed; event; circumstance; reality; truth. Considering that the above is the Websters exact definition of the word fact, then I honestly would have to say that anything could be fact. It's all about perception. What some people consider opinions or theories, others consider facts. There can be evidence found in anything, but I think that we as humans, must gather the most 'logical' explanations to ourselves, and use that as our own personal fact. ------------------ "Only a fully trained Jedi Knight, with the force as his ally, will conquer." -Jedi Master Yoda Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Darth Kurgan Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Actually, it is a myth that "humans only use 10% of their brains" or even 11% or even 20%. It's actually closer to 99%. At any particular moment, we may only be using a portion of our brain, but in a typical day, we use just about every portion of it. That is not to say we all store useful information in all 100% of it, or that we can remember everything that happens to us. They can verify this with scientific equipment to measure electrical activity, etc in the brain. If you would like, I can cite my sources. I have often read this myth about us only using a tiny portion of our brains in writings where the author is trying to prove we have "psychic powers" and other such stuff, by saying that those "gifted individuals" use the "unused 90%." These people would do better to say that it is the subconscious mind that "hides the secrets of the human psyche" instead of the brain, because they sound stupid when they say that, considering it is based on a faulty premise. Think about it.. when somebody gets shot in the head, the doctor doesn't say "Whew, he was completely unharmed, as you can see, because the bullet tore through the 90% of his brain that he doesn't use!" Most often, even minor injuries to the brain can cause prboblems(not always, but very frequently). Now tell me where you read that monkeys use more of their brains than we humans do. ; ) Another thing, you guys say "the only reason we don't know animals feel pain is because they can't tell us" Did you ever consider that perhaps they don't tell us because they don't experience it? I'm not saying that they do or do not for certain, I believe they DO in fact, based on observation. However, simply believing that they can't tell you, and thus don't, doesn't mean that they have those emotions, or even intelligence. It is still a belief then (unless you are basing it on some sort of evidence other than mere faith) that animals have emotions or experience pain, or are intelligent and self-aware as we are. Now, if you believe other animals have souls, are they reincarnated? Do they have to obey the laws of morality? Do they believe in God? Do they have intelligence? Do they go to heaven or hell when they die? Is it wrong for one animal to kill another? Not just humans here.. but what if a lion kills a zebra? Or a cat kills a mouse? Is that immoral? Let's not limit ourselves to animals here.. what about plants? Protists? Bacteria? Fungi? Do they have souls? Do they feel pain and have intelligence or emotions? Do they have religion? Kurgan [This message has been edited by Darth Kurgan (edited January 17, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Darth Kurgan Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Concealing/Hiding books from the people has always been their business. Really? I was not aware of that fact.. did you read that in some hidden or concealed book you found? Actually, I think this speaks more as an Anti-Catholic polemic than a reasoned statement of careful research. Protestants have long maintained that the Catholic Church had "fallen away from the truth of God" and thus maintained an anger and resentment historically to the Church. Muslims could say the same thing of Christians. They claim we "corrupted the truth of God's word" by attributing divinity to a human prophet, Jesus, and by rejecting the law of the Hebrew Bible. What I meant by this statement was that throughout history, the Catholics have seen to it that the law prohibited the public to actually read the bible, which is why it was in Latin. That is not altogether true. Latin was the official language of Rome, and the Church based in Rome wanted to have an official bible. Thus out of the canon that was chosen (the Catholic Church was not the first to choose a canon, the Jews did, long before the RCC did, and this was not considered censorship) and translated into one language (the original languages were greek and aramaic). The rational was that all the texts would be in one language, and by keeping it that way, it would be less likely for the meaning to change through multiple translations and have wild interpretations crop up. Once Luther and Elizabeth I broke with the RCC, they advocated the translation of the bible into other languages, and with different interpretations, and different canons, and now you have thousands of denominations of Christianity (for better or for worse). Is someone trying to blame the RCC for causing division among Christians? I wouldn't blame them for trying to keep the Good News in an uncorrupted form, yet that is what the Protestants did, was reinterpret the Gospel and thus pave the way to all sorts of beliefs. I do commend them on being scholarly, but they can't blame the RCC for what they did, can they? The RCC isn't perfect, the Inquisition was a shameful period in history. I think the problem there was with a marriage of Church and state.. leading to those who were religious heretics being seen as state traitors as well.. thus leading to executions for people who had a different interpretation of the Bible. There were also cases of Inquisitors who were deeply anti-semitic, and took out their hatred on Jews. Only high-ranking monks/catholics were permitted to even read the book, thus meaning, they wanted the public to be ignorant, No, the idea was to preserve the truth, not to hold a vast conspiracy against anyone. and just believe that what they said was truth. With so much illiteracy at the time, what did it matter if it was not in their own language? The Church wasn't at fault for the lack of literacy. Blame that on the scarcity of schools (outside seminaries and those for Aristocrats), and the lack of printing presses to spread written documents. Also blame it on the argarian culture that had little need for literacy. You assume that everyone COULD read the bible if they had it in another language besides Latin. This is not the case. The public could have actually been put to death for reading the bible, or even speaking Latin. Really? I was not aware of that either.. perhaps you can site me your sources. This sounds rather absurd. Of course, today, this may not happen to that extent, but I do believe that the Catholic Church may still withold books. Last I checked, they didn't have any books that others did not have. The Nag Hammadi scrolls have come out, and the Gnostic gospels can be picked up at just about any bookstore. The Dead Sea Scrolls have not all been released, but they are not being held by the RCC. That is like saying "Well the Jews have secretly withheld the stuff that Jesus wrote." Says WHO? I bet there are some hack Anti-Catholic writers on the net that would say anything, but can you site some scholarly sources that support your bold statements? Why? Maybe they are afraid that if someone reads these doctrines maybe even gospels, then it will in some way harm the Catholic church. It is a fact that the Catholics do have certain libraries that are not accessible by the public, or just about anyone for that matter. Can you tell me how you know this? I have heard about a secret library, which holds the secrets of Fatima, according to the Vatican website, but what makes you think that they, like the US Gov't is withholding some vital, damaging evidence from the public? If they were so intent on a coverup, why would they not simply destroy those documents? The Pope(and probably more than the present), have even called it,"heresy," to read these books/manuscripts. Which books/manuscripts are you talking about? I have not heard the Pope say that reading X books was considered heresy. Perhaps you can show me the Papal encyclicals, councils, or bulls that detail this pronouncement of heresy on those who read whatever books, and perhaps you could name the books we're "not supposed" to read. ============ Seclude a young male/female from human socialism for the first 18 years of their life, and then one day free them into society. It would be interesting to see what/how they turned out to be. What religion would they become a member of, what social group would they belong to? Where would they choose to live their life? Interesting, I have read about cases of "neglected children" who were raised by abusive parents and thus cut off from all human contact. They could barely take care of themselves and were not recognizably intelligent even at twelve years of age. However, once introduced into a loving community, they learned and matured at an accelerated rate and now would be considered "normal." However, you propose that these people would pick the "right" religion based on not having social conditioning. I would say there would be no way to say they would pick the "right" one anymore than anyone else. Their personalitiy, experiences, education, etc would all figure into their choice of a faith system, or none at all. It's also not an ethical experiment to test on a human being anyway.. Kurgan [This message has been edited by Darth Kurgan (edited January 17, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Watto T Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 My Friends: Getting to faith and religion, my personal faith is Christianity. I believe in the diety of Christ, and that His death on the cross at calvary was the payment of sin for every man. The Bible supports my belief, and I have a question for anyone reading this: "If you were to die today, would you be sure of whether you would go to Heaven or not?" I will be more than happy to talk this with you from an open Bible. --Watto T Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Conor Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 First things first, It would depend on my state of grace whether I went to heaven or not. If I had 5 minutes before I died, I would go to heaven. As for your statements, Mentat, about hidden documents, forbidden reading and heresy to read certain books, that is pure nonsense. Some prophecies haven't been released, and I am sure there is a good reason why. It can be heresy to believe what you read sometimes, but not to read it. You did know the only reason the Bible is here today is because the Catholic Church assembled it, didn't you? I am pretty sure it was the Council of Nicea in the early 5th century. The RCC spent a long time praying to the holy spirit and compiled all the hebrew and christian writings they felt were necessary for the Good Book. Fact is nothing about perception, everything about reality. Perception means nothing. We must look beyond deceiving perception. When you are doing math or science and want to find out the truth, do you reject the textbook because the information is being 'forcefed' to you? Religion is like math, the assembled truth gathered by 100 generations or more layed out before you, the greatest minds earth has produced imparting their gleaned wisdom to you. To think you can figure out the truth for yourself just by picking out what looks good (if I picked what I liked my religion would be very different, I believe what I think is right and I accept people know a lot more than me) is sheer folly as far as I'm concerned. That doesn't mean praying to God won't help you find the truth. My faith (as well as science strengthened by Wiz ) has told me God exists and is the Christian God. The rest comes from interpreting what He wants, and what better than the only church that has existed from day one of Christianity? Also, my religion has no flaws. It cannot if it is the truth. Only the people in it have flaws. A point on the inquizition. The Spanish government started it, organized it and ran it. The pope quickly saw the abuses happening and wanted to stop it, but Queen Isabella and her head inquizitor (forget his name) would not stop until they kicked the jews out of spain. The original goals were not nearly so evil. A lot of people (mostly jews, admittedly) were saying they were christian and practicing judaism. The original idea was to try to get them to stop claiming christianity. Obviously, this would never work and the abuses started immediately. ------------------ "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result" -Winston Churchill [This message has been edited by Conor (edited January 18, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Xx_Mentat_xX Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 First off, I want to make it very clear that I am not Catholic nor Protestant. I don't belong to any organized religion, and and never will. That being said, let's move on: Most of your questions are very easily answered, and most don't require much research other than just about ANY world history book. I do refer to world history books that are commonly found in any American High School(I can't speak for other countries). "That is not altogether true. Latin was the official language of Rome, and the Church based in Rome wanted to have an official bible. " We're not talking about the same time in history here. There were centuries when the Catholics did not allow the public to read the Bible or any other religious document for that matter. If you did read these documents in that day in time, and wasn't a monk or an official of the Catholic church, you were considered a heritic. If you were even found to know how to speak Latin, you were also considered a heretic. As we ALL know, heresy was punishible by 'death.' [The Human Experience: A World History - Page 100]: "The bishops met in council to discuss questions about Christian beliefs. The decisions they reached at these councils came to be accepted as doctrine, or official teachings. The points of view the councils did not accept were considered heresy, or false doctrine." ANYTHING that a person did in those days that was considered heresy was punishible by death. To go even further, there was even a movie awhile back that was based on the with-holding of religious information by the Catholic Church called,"Name of the Rose." "With so much illiteracy at the time, what did it matter if it was not in their own language? The Church wasn't at fault for the lack of literacy. " I don't believe that at all. Many times had the bible been translated, why wasn't it at that time. Seems awful fishy. How are you so sure that the church wasn't at fault for the lack of literacy? "You assume that everyone COULD read the bible if they had it in another language besides Latin. This is not the case." I did not assume that, and it would be very ignorant to assume so, considering that MOST people were illiterate at that time in history. Not EVERYONE, but MORE. "Last I checked, they didn't have any books that others did not have. " If they were with-holding information like they HAVE been known to do, do you think it would be public knowledge? That's what is scary. "I bet there are some hack Anti-Catholic writers on the net that would say anything, but can you site some scholarly sources that support your bold statements?" Your definition of fact is alot different than mine obviously, because I see that 'scholarly sources' are VERY often as brainwashed as anyone else. We can easily get into a debate about who can prove what, but in reality, neither of us can prove anything that we've said, to be fact. It will only be fact to the person who believes it. You can quote scriptures, and you can quote scholars, but neither can ever be considered fact. A fact is a word, and thats the biggest problem with religion(sources). I tend not to rely on a source just because he has been schooled on a certain subject, anymore than I would rely on a history teacher who gives his opinion a little too much. Thats why these types of debates are endless. There are educated people on ALL sides, that use sources that disagree. The total truth can never be found, and that seems inevitable. "I have heard about a secret library, which holds the secrets of Fatima, according to the Vatican website, but what makes you think that they, like the US Gov't is withholding some vital, damaging evidence from the public?" Because they have done it before. ------------------ "Only a fully trained Jedi Knight, with the force as his ally, will conquer." -Jedi Master Yoda Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zoom Rabbit Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Hmm...a theological debate with a Mentat? Now there's a windmill I hadn't considered tilting before... Unfortunately, Mentat, it would seem we don't have a whole lot to debate about. I agree with a lot of what you're saying. Like me, you seem to come from the position of, "Oh, come on. You can't possiblty tell me that you're right and everybody else is wrong because God told you." I've been going to great lengths to phrase it more gently than that, but that does pretty much sum it up. Well, guess what. I am enlightened, and God has told me that we're all right...and we're all wrong. Now what do I make of that? I think it means that if we take all our our human experiences on this matter and find where they coincide, from as many different cultural and linguistic points of view as possible...then just maybe we might have access to enough of the facts that we can think about starting to get some resolution on this truth thing. Until then, we're just a lot of clever monkeys who think they know where the banana tree is. Now, before the rest of the believers come crashing down on me like hungry rancors for this utter heresy, let me say that until we do finally evolve to the point where we can all conceive of the truth together, our best way of getting to God is through religion. We all have this psychological need to find God programmed into us; I say that faith is the key to being happy, and Wiz talks of a God-shaped hole in the human psyche. Our friend TAF has, I believe, recently discovered this inner need. Well, religions are the cultural systems that we have developed over the years to help us fulfill that need. Since there are so many different kinds of people, and so many differing worldviews at work, it is not surprising that those religions are each different as well. But, wait! What about truth, Zoom? Isn't there one, final objective truth? Doesn't one of these religions at least have it right? Well, yes, there is a final, absolute truth. I've been trying to make this point over and over again on this forum--let's see what luck I have tonight; the final truth will not fit in our minds. It deals with all of reality, and our point of view is limited to just what we can gather with our senses during our lifetime (and understand with our brain.) Since we render our thoughts in words--whose nature is so flexible and subjective as to be ultimately deceptive--we will never be able to handle enough information to get a full picture of the final truth. Taking this into consideration, what do you think the chances are that one of those religions has all of the truth bound up within its worldview? I'll leave that answer to the reader... Can we get to the truth? Sure. Pick a religion. Learn faith. Meditate and be a good person. God will eventually show you as much of the truth as you can understand, and we'll see if you have any more luck putting it into words than anyone else ever has. (Just for the record, I did not choose to accept religion until after I'd witnessed that truth for myself. Then I rethought my anti-religious prejudices by seeing that in each of them there was a precious vision of God's final truth...although none of them had the full of it.) Yes, I am Christian--barely. I had a guide on that treacherous path, the soul of a Jewish mystic from about 2000 years ago. He taught me that the quickest and best path to reach God's grace is love. For that reason, I feel that Christianity has a lot of fundamental insights to contribute to our species' quest for the final truth. So anyway, welcome to the table, Mentat. Got something on your lip, there... ! ------------------ "The entire universe is simply the fractal chaos boundary between intersecting domains of high and low energy." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Xx_Mentat_xX Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 The Human Experience - A World History: Page 256: "Wycliffe's most revolutionary act was translating the bible from Latin into English so that the common people could read it for themselves. Such an act made it more difficult for the church to keep its monopoly on religious truth." Page 256: "Faced with the possibility of a full-scale rebellion against the Church, the Council at Constance in 1415 called Hus before it to defend his views. The Council gave the Czech reformer a promise of protection. It later went back on its word and had Hus burned at the stake as a heretic." People can call me Anti-Catholic all day long, but I am not. All I am saying is that the Catholics were known to keep the public ignorant of the truth, or even a chance to pursue truth. The only way to even read the bible at one time, was to become a monk. Even Martin Luther was a Catholic monk at one time, where he was 'allowed' to read the bible. The Inquisition is FAR from the only bad thing that Catholicism has brung about. Ever heard of Indulgences(Documents issued by the church that freed their owners from time in purgatory. Ever heard about a Pope needing money to build a chapel, so he had thousands of people line up to put money into this cup. If the coins made a sound when they hit the bottom, they were told they would go to heaven. The Catholics have burned hundreds of people in the past for what they called heresy, which was nothing more than opinions or pursuit of personal truth. Joan of Arc ring a bell? Although the movie 'The Messenger," is somewhat innacurate, maybe you people should go see it. It's very interesting how having an opinion or believing in something else was punishable by death. Many people in my own family are Catholic, and not even they deny the facts. Sometimes word of mouth can be factual, not only literature. The point is that, if something was corrupt in its earlier stages, chances are it is corrupt even today. They did indeed with-hold information, and I'd bet my life, that they still practice this concept. ------------------ "Only a fully trained Jedi Knight, with the force as his ally, will conquer." -Jedi Master Yoda Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zoom Rabbit Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Well, I, too like Catholicism. The church today is a gentle influence on the world; a bit close-minded maybe (some, not all), but for the large part they try to bring a straightforward tone to Christianity as a whole. History, though... The Crusades. Whose idea was it in the first place to send ill-equipped and brutal European mercenaries crashing through Asia Minor into the Holy Land? Pope Something. The Native Americans. The Aztecs and Incas would doubtless have horrifying tales to tell of their treatment at the hands of "loving Christians," but they cannot. They were killed, their culture was destroyed and even their records were burned for being pagan in nature. I don't wish to Catholic bash, so I will point out that these atrocities are in the past and leave it there. We should all learn a lesson from it though; good intentions can actually lead entire religions astray. If we don't learn from that history, then the cyclical nature of reality will cause it to happen again. This is just God's way of saying, "This is a quiz. What did you learn?" ! ------------------ "The entire universe is simply the fractal chaos boundary between intersecting domains of high and low energy." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zoom Rabbit Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Musical Soundtrack to Zoom Rabbit's Quest for Final Truth: "Seeking the Shabdic Key to the Atman" <font size=1>(120 minute cassette tape)</font> Side One: The True Value of Faith 1: "Pure and Easy" by The Who 2: "Shanti/Ashtangi" by Madonna 3: "The Voice" by The Moody Blues 4: "Chariots of Fire" by Vangelis 5: "Seven" by Prince 6: "Only If" by Enya 7: "The Mystic's Dream" by Loreena McKennett 8: "Ray of Light" by Madonna 9: "Zarabanda" by Adiemus 10: "The Eyes of Truth" by Enigma 11: "Let's see Action" by The Who 12: "Secret Separation" by The Fixx Side Two: Seeing and Understanding the Elephant 1: "Sugar Magnolia" by The Grateful Dead 2: "Change the World" by The Offspring 3: "Wild, Wild Life" by The Talking Heads 4: "Beyond the Invisible" by Enigma 5: "Sky Fits Heaven" by Madonna 6: "Rain Dance" by Adiemus 7: "New Horizons" by The Moody Blues 8: "Green and Blue" by Deep Forest 9: "Anywhere Is" by Enya 10: "Silent Warrior" by Enigma 11: "Baba O'Riley" by The Two 12: "Built for the Future" by the Fixx 13: "Out From The Deep" by Enigma Any person's spiritual or religious quest for the truth can be described as a life process. In a completely subjective attempt to illustrate some of my own experiences of that process, I have paraphrased by choosing musical pieces which reflect the emotional context of my passing life. Either that, or they're just some trippy songs that sound cool together. ------------------ "The entire universe is simply the fractal chaos boundary between intersecting domains of high and low energy." [This message has been edited by Zoom Rabbit (edited January 18, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Darth Kurgan Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 I don't wish to Catholic bash, so I will point out that these atrocities are in the past and leave it there. We should all learn a lesson from it though; good intentions can actually lead entire religions astray. Your last line is true in some ways. I believe you mean to say "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" meaning even if you PLAN to do good every step of the way, you can still end up doing harm. However it would be wrong to say that simply wanting to do right (which is natural) should always lead to evil ends. Otherwise.. what's the point? The Crusades were I think fought for more political reasons than anything.. Islam was seen as a threat to Christendom in general (they would control large numbers of formerly Christian-controlled lands and wealth). The "reason" given for fighting the crusades was to save Christians in those territories from persecution at the hands of Muslim Turks and to allow pilgrims to visit Christian Shrines unmolested. The problems lay in the miscalculations of the strength of the Muslim armies, and the incredible cost involved in traveling to the Holy Land. Some of the crusaders, if you recall from history, just wanted an excuse to go to war. They said "I'll need a big army to save those poor Christians" then some of them would just take that army and conquer some land.. and set up shop, never even getting close to the places they swore to protect. How is that the Pope's fault? Good intentions, failed because of overwhelming odds and some corrupt individuals. If we had won, history would have had the opposite opinion of them. Imagine if we had won the Vietnam War. History would have seen it as a proud stand America made against the Evil Empire of Communism. This was not a "war of genocide" that was designed to kill all non-Christians or anything of that sort, although some military leaders seem to have decided to do that on their own. It could be compared with the various incidents like the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam. Some like to place the blame for various rapes, murders, pillaging solely on the Christian soldiers (many of whom abused religion as an excuse for bloodlust, etc). Atrocities were committed on both sides, and in the end, the glorious goal being lost in the grime of war, it was a dismal failure. Christians and Muslims today will tell you so. While it doesn't make it right, consider that this was the way wars were fought in those days (many are still fought this way if you read the papers). War is hell, pure and simple. Do past crimes invalidate a system? The NOW (national organization of women) claims that we must get rid of the "traditional family" because they see male household heads ("fathers") as being the culprite of the greatest crimes against women. They use the same logic that those who attack religion use. Does that mean we should ban those institutions? (the family is an institution) I ask you, if this is true, then just about every religion out there has some skeletons in their closet. Persecution, "close-mindedness" (really, does this even apply to religion? if something is true, wouldn't it be stupid to say it was anything else if you believed it was?), genocide, etc. And not just religious authorities.. how many millions have died because of Communism? How much pain and suffering has the United States caused in its history of "freedom" against the Mexicans, the Native Americans, the Cubans, etc. How many died in the Cold War over Western vs. Eastern ideologies? What about the Imperialism and cultural genocide of the British Empire and later the North American "Empire" in the last few centuries? I rest my case. Jihad, means "crusade" and it is part of Muslim doctrine. Most modern day Christians, and Muslims today would interpret that as meaning spiritual, not temporal warfare (and they remember the failure of that mode of thinking in the past). Perhaps that is the reason some choose to be nihilists and reject all previous philosophies, religions, and ideologies, and simply start from scratch. Sadly though, many decide to "pick and choose" and look at history through corrective lenses.. forgiving the sins of some, while holding grudges against others. I don't think we really have any "golden age" or "utopia" in the past.. nor do we have one today. Just take a look around you.. how many corrupted officials, hypocrites, and fools do you see running every institution and political body? Perhaps that's the beef some folks have with "organized.." anything (not just religion or government). Too many cooks spoil the broth? Of course the other alternative is pure anarchy. Is that really any better? No matter how you slice it.. humans are fallible. Just big groups of humans who work together for a long period of time tend to build up more mistakes. On to Catholicism.. I suppose we could be ranting about "the Jews" or something but that wouldn't be politically correct. In the end, I don't see how much worse the RCC is than any other Church as far as past crimes or misunderstandings. That doesn't excuse them.. but then it doesn't absolve everyone else either. There were plenty of other missions to Africa you know. Singling out one faith as a scapegoat for all our problems doesn't really help (unless you're trying to make your own faith look better by belittling someone else's). You might as well condemn all of science for the Eugenics movement (and Nazism), the Atomic Bomb (and the arms race), or chemical warfare. Perhaps it is not the institutions themselves that are evil (although you could make a strong case for that being the case with Nazism), but the evil that lies in the hearts of men that causes them to become corrupt. Kurgan [This message has been edited by Darth Kurgan (edited January 18, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Conor Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Mentat, wherever you get your information is unbelievably, totally wrong. It has never, ever been considered heresy to read the Bible, and the church can most definitely not be blamed for illiteracy (most of the people in the world are still illiterate. Who are you going to blame for that?). Do you have any idea how difficult translating the Bible is? It took St. Jerome (I think that was his name) years to translate it into latin. Do you think everyone was reading english? There were 100s of different languages scattered all over the Roman Empire. The RCC wanted there to be a single, universal translation so that no mixups could occur. Either latin or greek was the only language acceptable, and the church chose latin as it was the most widespread written language. Salvation is the church's business. They would have dearly loved if everyone could read the Bible. I suppose you have never been to a Catholic mass. In it there are readings from the Bible, and have been for nearly 2000 years. Oral teaching was the only way to get the message across, as the Bible didn't even exist in present form until the 5th century. As for indulgences, few people understand them (I am still a bit unclear on them too), but there is nothing evil about them. The big beef Luther had with them is that in his time they were being abused rather badly. Very badly in fact, and he was perfectly right to object strongly to how things were being done. What he was wrong in doing was rejecting the church for his own interpretation of the Bible, and a faulty one I might add. He even removed some books from the old testament for his Bible because he didn't like what they said! There is only one correct interpretation of the Bible and I believe the Catholics have it. Actually, finding your own personal truth almost always results in heresy, as anyone who says they are catholic and rejects church teaching is a heretic. It was burning them for it that was wrong. Of course, it was people that did the burnings. Flawed, evil people that can have no bearing on the truth of the church. Don't ever think that politics didn't play a role either. I'm sure it was far more relevant that Joan of Arc was a French revolutionary who fought the English, as she was burned by the English (churchmen or not). Now, the Crusades. The Crusades started as a counter attack. The Mulims had taken Jerusalem and the Christians therein. At first a monk or hermit (forget his name, maybe he was both) lead an army of lightly armed peasents to be promptly slaughtered. Then Pope Urban II gave his famous speech that spurred the entire continent to war. The Crusades would have been a high point in history if it wasn't for the greedy generals leading the army. They decided to stake out land that wasn't theirs and other idiocies. They handled things so badly that within a few hundred years Saladin was marching on Europe. The only thing the Crusades actually accomplished was holding the Muslims to Turkey. It can be argued factually that without the Crusades and the the battles fought Europe would have been forcibly converted to Islam (much the same thing is going on in Sudan right now). Native Americans. It was the Spanish soldiers (Conquistadors (sp?)) that massacered the Central and Southern American people, and made them slaves (and also secular forces and reasons behind the treatment of the North Americans). The Bishops over in Europe did not want the people to be treated so badly. They wanted to welcome them to the Christian fold as equals. They knew very well slavery and slaughter were no way to convince people you are the official religion of a loving God. It has happened that Christians tried forcibly converting other peoples, and it is a black mark on history that governents, bishops and even a few popes thought they needed to force God's hand. Possibly the biggest example of Christian forced conversion (by yet another secular source) is the mass conversion of Russia in 988. After the Russian king (I think he took the title Czar, a shortened version of Caesar, soon after), one Vladimir (I think), decided that of all the religions Orthodox Christianity, based in Constantinople, was the most appealing. He then converted everyone in the country in a remarkably short time. There were definitely deaths involved. ------------------ "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result" -Winston Churchill [This message has been edited by Conor (edited January 18, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Darth Kurgan Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Conor, I'm glad I'm not the only one sticking up for reasonable historical criticism. You refer to "Walter the Penniless" the guy basically "started" the idea of the Crusades to save the Holy Land. Simply disagreeing with Church teaching is not heresy. People debated and disagreed within the Church all the time! It is preaching that heretical belief that is what makes one a heretic. You can keep your beliefs to yourself, but as soon as you profess that this is what the Church teaches, when it is not, that's when they kick you out. No, the punishment for heresy is not execution, although I'm sure some folks got that wrong (in their zeal to kill revolutionaries and Jews) and decided to do it anyway. Lynch mobs are not a nineteenth century invention. Excommunication isn't permenant either. One can recant their heretical beliefs and confess their sins (such as perverting the truth of God's word) and be forgiven, thus becoming a full-fledged member of the Church again. I think of the Inquisition as I think about the Communist witchhunts in this country. The intentions were good: root out possible traitors and spies for the Soviets that were hiding out in our country. The results however ended up such that people who had relatives who were communists (but definately not spies) and many who were simply unpopular, and thus easy targets for lies were fired from their jobs and publically humiliated. Of course nobody was executed for this, but you can see similar problems with a good plan gone bad. Some spies were caught, but alot of good people were punished unnecessarily or unfairly. In the same way, the Inquisition was designed to root out heretics who were perverting the faith, but the plan ended up being corrupted and caused more harm than good, by allowing Inquisitors to abuse their power and go after people they didn't like, and use excessive force to achieve their ends. Don't think that just because a Church has authority in government that it will be the only one to persecute either. In Communist states where the official ideology is Atheism, ALL religious groups are persecuted.. those that disagree with the rulings of the state, all the more so. For example in China, there are two Catholic churches.. the "Peoples" Church which is government sponsored (which doesn't make a whole lot of sense within an atheist system, but they must recognize that some still cling to their beliefs in spite of persecution) and then there is the "underground" Church, which is in full communion with the Pope in Rome and the rest of the RCC in the world. However, the gov't refuses to recognize the underground Church, and tries to suppress it, whereas the other Church enjoys protection and sponsorship, as it "supports" the status quo. Mentat basically says: I don't mean to Catholic-bash, but here I go Catholic-bashing! ; P If all you are going to do is attack other people's beliefs, what is the point of this discussion? To dissaude someone from their Church because of the hatred you harbor for them? I don't understand your point. I haven't been attacking your personal beliefs have I? I think I've established that nobody can say their tradition is perfect in any way. Is this your point, to establish that all traditions are wrong? What if everyone is withholding information? How would you know? You might as well trust noone! They are all probably "brainwashed." Now that, should scare you. With that worldview anything is possible. Your definition of fact is alot different than mine obviously History is about interpretation.. we are both interpreting history. You are interpreting certain events as confirming your negative attitude towards certain groups, while you ignore other things that disagree with your opinion. That is what historians do.. they interpret events in such a way as provides meaning for them. Historical revisionists are those who interpret history in a DIFFERENT way to make money (j/k, but you get my point). However, facts do support certain interpretations more than others. Some interpretations are also heavily biased. A fact is something done (meaning, something that is known to have happened, like I just dropped that glass.. the glass dropping is done) or something true. An established fact is something known to be true. It is a known fact that the majority of people living in the Middle Ages in the West were illiterate (meaning they could not read or write to save their lives). This does not mean ALL people were that way, of course, just like in every age, the rich and privilaged had certain benefits most people lacked, like literacy, but that's a tiny percentage. The rich would have been already able to read Latin had they been schooled in the West, by all reasonable assumptions, so what would it have mattered? The only true benefit of translating the bible into other languages other than Latin at the time would have been to allow poor clergy that did not have a grasp of Latin would have been able to read the bible. It was not a crime (punishable by death much less at all) to read the bible! Show me where I can read more of this "Human Experience" and your history text(s). One thing about critical scholarship (and perhaps this is what you eluded to with your "brainwashed" rant) is that when you read something, you must consider "who wrote it" and "who benefits." While it is undeniable that the RCC has made mistakes in the past, exaggerations or outright lies are not acceptable. I would be forced to conclude if someone wrote lies about the Church, then they would be anti-catholic. Just as if someone wrote a book about how women were evil, you would be forced to conclude the author was not a woman, and in fact hated women. You claim that "we all know heresy was punishable by death" this is not true. For centuries within the Jewish community, vast differences in belief were tolerated, the same is true of Christian communities. The officials and leaders in both groups assembled many times to come to a consensus on the doctrines of their faith. Finally a canon was layed out. Thus the faith had become ordered. "Heresy" was when a person of that established faith taught something to others that was considered contrary to the group's teachings. Thus if you were a Catholic Christian who taught that we are reincarnated, you would have been labelled heretical by Church leaders, and possibly investigated. The punishment for heresy was EXCOMMUNICATION. This is not execution, it is being "cut off" from the community of faith. In other words, you aren't allowed to recieve the sacraments, or perform clergical duties, etc. It is the Church's way of saying "we have nothing to do with this guy." The Temporal Authorities, that is the Holy Roman Emporers, Kings, etc, were the heads of gov't. The Popes and bishops were the heads of the faith. Europe was overwhelmingly Christian at this time (later Muslim influences would take a large portion of the world), this meant the state religion of many countries was Christian. If you rebelled against the state Church, the temporal authorities would investigate. Thus, you could also be punished by the King for treason, perhaps, but not always. This probably led some to think that mere heresy would be punished by death. I would interpret this Church-State marriage as a system of Checks and balances. The King would inrich the Church with protection and lands, and the Church would provide care and faith teaching to the people. The Church could excommunicate the King, etc. It was not a perfect system, as either party could be corrupt, or have too much power, thus effectively running the other. I think most Americans would disagree with this system today, but mostly because they would, if they were not of the ruling faith, not wish to be ruled over by somebody who had different beliefs than their own (and who possibly might persecute their faith). Even today, illiteracy is still high in the world. How is this the Churches fault? You might as well blame the Monarchs, or the weather. I think this is just some Christian-bashers wishing to scapegoat the Church for one more thing, to further discredit their message. "The Catholic Church is inherently evil" is not a fact, it is an opinion (and a hateful, ignorant one at that). Just because somebody says it, for all we know they are a "brainwashed" person as well. Why trust any opinion? Look at all the good the RCC has done throughout the ages.. caring for the poor, the sick, supporting widows and orphans, educating, spreading the Good News, settling disputes among warring nations... Isn't that a more balanced view than simply focusing on some stereotypes and past crimes? I don't see your logic at all I'm afraid, as it seems all you want to do is pick and choose with your historical perspective, and then rant and attack what you disagree with, while ignoring anything positive about the subject of your venom. The point of this topic was to try to sort out what faith, if any, was closest to the truth about God (assuming we believe in him). Perhaps your point was to try to discredit the Catholic Church by attacking them on various topics, thus establishing that they were NOT the true faith. If that's the case, just say so, and be done with it. However, that doesn't mean others won't disagree.. I question your motives, and the way in which you arrive at your conclusions. (whew, I keep getting backlogged with these messages.. oh well, keep the topic going!) PS: If anyone simply wants to attack Catholics and all they believe in, I would refer you to a counter-point site: http://www.catholicleague.org/ I do not agree with all that they say, in fact, in many ways I disagree, however, they do adress many of the issues that Anti-Catholic bashers tend to harp on, and they offer counter "bashing" (if you will) on those who attack Catholicism. They operate on the same principles that groups like the ADL (Anti Defamation League) do. Believe me, on the 'net there are many people on BOTH sides of that issue. For the purposes of this discussion, I think we should try to keep it more civil than that, don't you think? (I just have to keep adding stuff don't I?) A great critical scholarly source is Lies my Teacher Told me, which my brother lent me a copy of recently, and I have had time to pour over at great length. It tells about how the American public schools have been notorious over the years in approving textbooks that print alot of propaganda, half-truths, outright falsehoods, and exaggerations, rather than report history as scholars know it to be. For example, they cited textbooks that pointed out how "lazy" and "stupid" freeblacks were, and how they ruined the South economically. They talk about how Woodrow Wilson was this great peaceful, cosmopolitan president, when in fact he was anything but in his foreign policies and strategies. They talk about how Christopher Columbus was this religious, idealistic man, the only one of his time to believe the world was round, who set out to peacefully enlighten the Indians with western philosophy. However, as history tells us, his actions were the complete opposite of this trite oversimplification of this man. For these reasons, I would question the source (always question the source!). It's like Christians who use the bible to discredit other religions that are wholly different from their own. Sure that works fine for them, but aren't they assuming their source is correct? The Bible was written by Christians and Jews, so of COURSE it will tend to side with their sympathies. If one were to use the Koran or the Bhagavad Gita, or some other religious scriptures to attack Christianity, the Christians would cry "foul!" Consider the source! American textbooks tend to be written by those who support the status quo in that particular region of the country. They support those currently in power, and they pick their heroes and villians from history based on their own political agenda. Consider this, you are a Jewish writer who's parents survived concentration camps during WWII. You are commisioned to write the section on Hitler and the Nazis. Are you going to write that "Hitler was a man of genius who helped better Germany's economy and strengthened national pride, while bravely fighting for lost territory that was rightfully Germanys"? Think about it. Or what if you were a practicing Lutheran. How would you cover the Protestant Reformation? Would you write that "a bunch of wild-eyed heretics tore up the true Gospels and made up their own religion, leading many Christians astray"? Chances are you'd write what those higher up told you to write for the masses (propaganda) or, if you had that much influence and money yourself, you'd write what would best further your own politics (more propaganda). It's like newspapers owned by big corporations or news media. Have you ever seen a News Program on the major networks attack General Electric? No? Why do you think this might be? If all your sources are Anti-Catholic sources, then of course you'll get negative remarks about them, and if you are Anti-Catholic yourself, you will tend to agree with those sources, because they confirm your personal biases. Kurgan [This message has been edited by Darth Kurgan (edited January 18, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Conor Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 I'm sorry, I was just rereading your post, Mentat, to see if I missed anything and I have a couple more points. You said it was heresy to SPEAK LATIN!!!!????? Are you making a joke? As for 'In the name of the Rose': If you are getting your info from Hollywood movies that is pretty silly to begin with, you might as well read the book. My mother read it and she did not like the way the movie interpreted it. At some point an English translation was necessary, as it was replacing Latin as the dominant language. That doesn't mean very many more people would have been able to read it though, if it wasn't for the printing press. Without that, there was no possible way to distribute the Bible. So it was not the fact that more people were able to read the Bible (a higher percentage were literate, but still nowhere near everyone), but the fact that the printing press came out that started getting it to more hands. Yes, different interpretations came out then, as they had been coming out for millenia. The new ones weren't any more accurate than the faulty old ones either. ------------------ "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result" -Winston Churchill [This message has been edited by Conor (edited January 18, 2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest wizzywig Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Watto T, my friend! Long time no post! (At least around these threads.) Good to "see" you again! --wiz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Darth Kurgan Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 One more thing, I personally believe the only way you can reconcile ALL religious traditions into one big uberbelief is to dillute many of them to the point of meaninglessness. Choosing a religious faith, or none at all, is a matter of conscience, and I believe a person should seriously consider the options and cosequences of this. I have heard folks on here say "you were brought up in it, so you believe it." This may setup an "establishment bias" in a person, however, this is what determines your worldview. This is something that cannot be overcome, IMHO. For example, let's say you are born in India, into a traditional Indian family, and you are raised a Hindu. When you are older, you get the opportunity to visit the United States, and go to a Pentecostal revival. You like what you see, and your impression is that this is more true than your old faith, and after much deliberation, study, and pondering, you decide to convert. However, you will interpret this new faith within the WORLDVIEW of your old faith, regardless of your conscious thought. It is like learning a second language. No matter how familiar you become with it, you will constantly think or refer back to your old tradition, even if you use the other one more. The past cannot be completely forgotten, because it is a part of us. Thus everyone by this definition is "brainwashed" in some form or another. Even if you grow up in an Atheist household, you are "brainwashed" by this Atheist worldview, just as you would be brainwashed by any worldview projected by your parents. People like to be able to say they decided for themsevles what faith they believe in, which is fine. I support that. However, insisting that anyone who accepts the belief system they grow up with is merely brainwashed, first assumes that the faith tradition they were taught was WRONG, and that they accepted it blindly. It also does not recognize that human nature grows into a worldview and then uses that throughout life. It is the preception and truth that keeps us going! =================== Thus, again we come to the question of, which faith, if any, is the correct one? When I ask this question, I am speaking of ALL faiths, not simply those "organized religions" out there, or Joe Schmo with his copy of the Bible and the Bhagavad Gita picking and choosing what he wants to believe. Of all the faiths and religions and beliefs in history, which is the true one (or most true), if any, and why do you think this? Thus far all we've heard aside from Catholic bashing, is people saying Christianity this, Christianity that. WHY? That's the meat of it. Keep in mind that everyone who believes sincerely in their own religion will say that their faith tells them it is true, so this can't be the sole determining argument in this debate. The other conditions, which I think were resolved in the "Does God Exist?" debate were that: 1) Simply because a large number of people believe something doesn't make it necessarily true. 2) Just because a tradition has been around a long time does not necessarily make it true. 3) Just because a few kooks or hacks came out of a certain tradition does not mean the entire system is inherently incorrect, these could just be coincidences or heretics. 4) Simply believing your faith is true blindly does not make it true either (evidenced by the vast number of wholly different faiths in the world who claim to have the truth by faith). So what criteria should we use to determine a "true" faith or belief system? Can we create any? Some have suggested using the "overlaps" or similarities in religions. I would be curious to know what similarities are common to all religions, because I was not aware that any existed universally. And about constructing a "new" religion based on the "truths" of the old, how would you go about determining which truths were "right" and which should be rejected? If the old faiths were true, then wouldn't creating a new faith violate those inalienable truths? (assuming the old faiths were true to begin with) If the old faiths were wrong, wouldn't using their beliefs in a new religion be just as wrong? Kurgan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zoom Rabbit Posted January 18, 2000 Share Posted January 18, 2000 Jeezix, Kurg! Lay off! If you're directing all that at me, that is... In my post, one might have gotten a lop-sided view of my opinion because I was discussing only what the Catholic church has done. Obviously, all of the atrocities in history were committed by someone, and we're all to blame. That's why I also point out that we should learn from them...which is quite different than holding grudges. I'd be happy to discuss the theology overlaps I mentioned with you, but first I need some assurance that this is a positive discussion I'm engaged in. "...Ask the elephant. He'll tell you." ? ------------------ "The entire universe is simply the fractal chaos boundary between intersecting domains of high and low energy." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ikhnaton Posted January 19, 2000 Share Posted January 19, 2000 I'm coming out of retirement to post this one thing. Kurgan, all of your arguments are based upon a judgement of an action committed by a person who happened to be a Catholic. That is an erroneous and fallacious way of thinking. You do not judge a Church by the actions of a few misguided individuals. When looking at a Church, you look at their teachings, their doctrines. You don't look at a bunch of people as say "X church is no good because I've seen certain members do such and such." You look at the doctrine and decide which church is right and wrong. On the issue of which church, you need to first look at who founded it. If there are conflicts, you look at the marks of the church. It is a fact that the Catholic Church was founded by Jesus Christ, who is God. Some other denominations seem to think that their church was founded by him yet remained hidden. Well, Jesus has some things to say about that, but I won't go into it. What do you do? You look at the Marks of the church. The Catholic church has 4 marks: One, Holy, Catholic (Universal) and Apostolic. It is the last one which is most important. It basically means that the church of Christ is the church of Peter the apostle. Which church has an unbroken line of succession to the apostles? The Catholic church. Which church has never changed its doctrine? The Catholic church. (And don't even try to give me examples, because I know the ones you would bring up are not doctrine, but disciplines, which can and do change, but doctrine remains the same). Well, that is all I have to say for now, but I really think you need to rethink your reasons, Kurgan. How would you like if I judged your church as bad because I thought you were a jerk? You are doing the same thing. People may be bad, but the Church is Holy. ------------------ There is no spoon... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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