The West Killed God

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DebbieSG said:




thanks Co'S! and hush, Diamond :)
im only here to-
wreak occasional havoc
create dialouge
and
to
test the thresholds of humanity w idiotic posts.

thank u
db3
:angry:
 
STING2 said:
Sure, the fact that I have 3 Scientist in my family does not mean anything?!?!?

That only represents your experience though - your personal experience doesn't allow you to make a generalisation about scientists as a whole. I could just as easily say that I have three friends who are studying science or working in scientific professions and none of them believe in God, therefore scientists don't believe in God. Clearly that's not an accurate statement if we consider all scientists, but it's accurate as far as my experience is concerned. You just can't use your own limited experience to make sweeping generalisations - it's just your personal experience.
 
Fizzing,

Did it ever occur to you that my family members who are Scientist have hundreds of colleages that they have worked with for decades and know very well? Thats a far more accurate representation that than Skeeks from the NAS. Its not my personal experience, its the experience of Scientist who have spent their lives in that field. 3 Scientist who are apart of my family. So ummm No, my points are valid and I will continue to express them.
 
STING2 said:
Bonoman,

Sure, the fact that I have 3 Scientist in my family does not mean anything?!?!? The fact that Skeek decides to site a poll of the NAS but neglects to tell us it was only their Biological and Physical Science department representing less than a 25% of the NAS and that of that only half of those people who got the survey even responded to it, and this is supposed to be a representive sample of what all Scientist on the planet believe. Facts?! More like a distortion of the facts which anyone who has studied statistics will know.

By the way, I'd like to inform you than an Aunt is not and in-law.

I guess you never studied Irish history in any sort of depth. I was refering to the practices of the Catholic Church and that in Ireland, things were very different from the way they were in Rome. Pagans and Catholics often worshiped together and were accepted into the Catholic community with their beliefs intact. The Celtic Cross is a symbolism of the unity between the Pagan community and Catholics in Ireland. This of course would not be proper to have done back in Rome. The Irish have always bucked the trend and tradition when it comes to everything to do with the Catholic Church. Irish immigrants to the USA freely married people of other faiths and so on, despite the fact that this was rare if non-existent in other places. It just goes to show that this whole idea that people did not have freedom of thought back then is rubbish.

Man do you ever need to take a anger managment course. Sorry if I never studied my Irish history. I just live there. I was only asking a question. Then you wonder why so many ppl attack you posts. FUCK.
 
STING2 said:
Fizzing,

Did it ever occur to you that my family members who are Scientist have hundreds of colleages that they have worked with for decades and know very well? Thats a far more accurate representation that than Skeeks from the NAS. Its not my personal experience, its the experience of Scientist who have spent their lives in that field. 3 Scientist who are apart of my family. So ummm No, my points are valid and I will continue to express them.

Hold on a minute, I didn't say your points weren't valid, I simply said that your personal experience isn't necessarily valid to make generalisations about all of society. If you want to talk about your experience of the world (and the experiences of your friends or family) that's great and I'm sure everyone here welcomes your contribution to discussions, it's just that you can't claim personal experience is a valid way of making generalisations about all of society in the way that a poll or survey might be. I'm not saying your points of view aren't valid, simply that they're just that - a point of view, not necessarily an observation that's true of an entire society.

Anyway, let's get back to the topic, which is far more interesting than this little diversion :)
 
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I like this question......

I have no stats to quote, only my personal experience. God is not dead......

We have separated ourselves from God. More and more I believe that as a "society" we are moving further and further away from God.

I am not in a condition to expand on this right now.......but I remember growing up and being able to spend time with my family on Sunday. Every Sunday because the stores were closed. You may think this is a silly piece of evidence for me to be focused on, but that time spent was very important and I wonder how much better off our children would be if there was one day a week when families could be together. It may sound silly, but spiritually, religiously, that day in my mind was a statement. It was a societal statment.

Just my .02

Peace
 
STING2 said:
Bonoman,

Sure, the fact that I have 3 Scientist in my family does not mean anything?!?!? The fact that Skeek decides to site a poll of the NAS but neglects to tell us it was only their Biological and Physical Science department representing less than a 25% of the NAS and that of that only half of those people who got the survey even responded to it, and this is supposed to be a representive sample of what all Scientist on the planet believe. Facts?! More like a distortion of the facts which anyone who has studied statistics will know.

Well, the source I have said all the members were surveyed and presented the numbers. I didn't neglect to say anything. You may have neglected that I'm just a high school student using what I have. I'm trying not to be, but I find myself a little offended to find myself accused of skewing facts. It seems to me that you are being less rational and more stubborn about things, but that's just how it seems to me and has no bearing I'm sure on reality. I would advise a chilling out. And in the meantime I'm not going to post on this subject anymore, because it will probably just cause people to get crabby. Peace.
 
SkeeK said:


Well, the source I have said all the members were surveyed and presented the numbers. I didn't neglect to say anything. You may have neglected that I'm just a high school student using what I have. ............ And in the meantime I'm not going to post on this subject anymore, because it will probably just cause people to get crabby. Peace.

DO NOT STOP POSTING!!!!!!

You are using what you have and us old conservative types are always crabby!!!!!

:sexywink:
 
Dreadsox, when I said I was going to stop posting I was only referring to the whole religious scientists issue because it doesn't seem to be going anywhere except in circles of increasing pointlessness.

Thanks for mentioning stores being more and more open on Sunday... that's a very good point I hadn't thought of.
 
SkeeK, I was watching some show on the CBC, and a person said that in Nova Scotia (I think it's NS), stores are still closed on sundays and they were pissed off that every other Canadian could walk into Canadian Tire on a Sunday, but they couldn't. I found it kind of interesting, so I guess regional differences also play a role.
 
Religion?s importance to society has decreased significantly since the Feudalism of Western Europe. The political power and influence of the church as a controlling organization has decreased dramatically. Less people in the West follow the traditional Christian methodology, but many new beliefs and non-beliefs flourish due to individualism, rationalism, and liberalism. The organized church has lost importance, but personal spiritualism in various forms is probably as important as it ever was. The West has not killed God, but it has certainly altered His place in our society drastically. In the future it is possible religious importance will decrease to the point of God being considered dead, but scholars have argued back and forth and it is impossible to say definitively.

Questions? Comments? Snide Remarks?
 
I must say whether or not you think religion is losing its power on people, organized religion today is much closer to how God would want it to be. it is truer to itself.
 
SkeeK said:
I must say whether or not you think religion is losing its power on people, organized religion today is much closer to how God would want it to be. it is truer to itself.

Hmmmm....

How so? I would have thought just the opposite.
 
Well for a start there is much less killing in the name of God these days than in say the crusades. And sure you hear about all sorts of corruption in the church, but I would be surprised if it isn't uch less corruption than it was when the church was collecting tithes from everybody... though i don't really have anything to back that up.
 
SkeeK said:
Well for a start there is much less killing in the name of God these days than in say the crusades. And sure you hear about all sorts of corruption in the church, but I would be surprised if it isn't uch less corruption than it was when the church was collecting tithes from everybody... though i don't really have anything to back that up.

Are you referring to Christianity only or all world religions in regards to the reduction in religion-driven killing?

I would agree that that organized religion has less of an impact as a socio-political body than it did centuries ago. Corruption has taken different forms ? formal indulgences are no longer sold (at least not to my knowledge) but the unscrupulous will still try to tie salvation and forgiveness to donations.
 
i was expressingly talking about christianity there, i should have specified. I have always thought organized religion seemed much more like a political power/money hungry organization than it really should be. But I do think it is less of that now than before.
 
SkeeK said:
i was expressingly talking about christianity there, i should have specified. I have always thought organized religion seemed much more like a political power/money hungry organization than it really should be. But I do think it is less of that now than before.

Well, I think you are correct on this in that organized religions tend to focus on the bottom line (members, contributions, maintaining order) than on the spiritual growth of the individual members.

I think there are plenty of people who identify with a church body rather than identify with Jesus Christ - in effect making it part of their cultural identity, not their faith.

Think of some of the great cathedrals around the globe. Then ask ?when was the last time someone came to faith in this building??
 
Here's my opinion on it all, and I apologize if I rehash what anyone else has said already. I hate waiting for this stupid modem to download the entire thread, so I kind of rush past it. :p

First off, I don't believe that the West ever "killed" God. What *is* being killed is our romanticized view of history. In other words, we, as a (post)modern society, have constructed our view of what is "past," whether that "past" is accurate or not.

What has always disturbed me, as an example of this historicism, is often how people will look back admiringly to the 1950s as this semi-utopia before the "dystopia" of the 1960s and beyond. The reality? The only thing that really was that different between the 1950s and later decades was the level of media representation, with the 1950s emphasizing on moralist family sitcoms ("father knows best") and the subsequent destruction of that fiction through the unavoidable reality of political assassinations, race riots, and the then-seemingly unending Vietnam War--all, for the first time, being broadcast nationally. As a result, some people seem to get nostalgic for the "simplicity" of the 1950s. In reality, what they really miss is the blissful ignorance; the days before the media bombardment that forced us to view reality.

Media is what influences our worldview, and reality is irrelevant. The same goes for our views on religion and the seemingly "distant" past of the Middle Ages. How do we envision the Middle Ages? Probably the way we were exposed to it via the cinema; some kind of "Braveheart" / "Robin Hood" hybrid perhaps. The reality? Europe was controlled by a small percentage of people with immense wealth and power, while the rest were enslaved under feudalism, kept uneducated and ignorant. But what was the device to keep this system intact for nearly a millennium? Christianity. Who were the clergy in the Middle Ages? Nobility. The papacy was a position that was bought and sold, and was viewed as another worldly kingdom. People were "religious" because they were frightened into belief--the only way the nobility could force people to live in such utter poverty and, at the same time, actually work to make the nobility even wealthier. Ever wonder why so many medieval Christian cathedrals are just so damn lavish? And do you ever wonder why they resemble imperial palaces of the same era?

What "killed" Christianity? Christianity killed itself by betraying its core values, and people were unwilling to continue with its hypocrisy. The first time people started to realize that there was something wrong with Christianity was the time of the bubonic plague (the "Black Death") epidemics of the 1300s and 1400s. People simply started losing their faith, and it later led to the Reformation in 1520. With all the subsequent fighting that ensued, Europe's religiosity never returned, and America shared a similar fate in our nation's founding. Our Founding Fathers, contrary to religious right propaganda, were children of the French Enlightenment: agnostic unitarians and deists. With the "Great Awakening" of the 1830s, however, Calvinist Protestantism exploded, and reinvented history, creating the myth that our Founding Fathers were devout Christians--a romanticized view of history.

This is what it utterly perturbs me how people try and portray the present as being "exceptionally evil," particularly since we probably have the most peaceful, tolerant, and, dare I say, "Christian" society that we have ever had throughout all of history. The day we abandon the historicist romanticism that has plagued us for all of time is the day we can finally stop putting so much guilt on ourselves; we are the first society to really actually care about integrity and "the Truth" after all.

So, no, the West did not kill Christianity at all. Cultural romanticism of the past has made us think we have.

Melon
 
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