Is religion still relevant in modern society?

[theprof00]

padib said:

theprof00 said:

padib said:

@bolded Of all people I was expecting you to see through it. I like your posts and they are very intelligent. Now, have a take at incest, I'm curious.

 

Remember: "The difference, by the way, of all those things you listed, is that homosexuality is with two consenting adults, and everything else is people taking advantage."

Also: Who judges useful? "You teach kids useful skills and information. " On this thread you might judge it one way, but when it matters, things are taught in school that don't need to be taugh. Are they yet at the point where homosexuality is encouraged in schools? I thought I heard that some time. Is that useful? Teaching religion,  is that considers useful? Who's the judge?

@2 So much for religion? But you said Shinto is a belief?

@3 No, I understand no hard feelings. But that's why I'm saying it's not one way or the other, it's both. Actually, you're breaking it to yourself, because you seem to want just one of the two (if I understood your position in this thread right).

I personally don't care if two consenting relatives engage in incest. It is not my position to judge those people, nor am I going to pry. I think it's gross, but I'm not going to say people should go to hell for doing it. You talk about how successful empires were built on religion. 90% of those empires were also incestuous.

Useful skills. How to weld, how to sell things, psychology, computers, scientific method, logic. I could create a curriculum right now that has no morally ambiguous problems and yet is capable of helping kids learn, and love to learn. You also have your specifics wrong. Nowhere is homosexuality encouraged. There is no group out there being like, hey kids go have homosexual relationships. There is possibly teaching acceptance, which is related but different. TEaching religion is like teaching history. Religion should be an elective though as it has nearly no bearing on getting a job, which is the most important thing...now, culture class could be an option. But I would say it should be one class that teaches the aspects of all religions and cultures and assigns readings. A whole class on Christianity should not be a mandatory thing. In my experience in catholic schools, the religion teachers were the worst of all of them.

Being Shinto is like believing in ghost or aliens, or being athiest and celebrating Christmas. EVERYONE celebrates Christmas, but not everyone is Christian or Catholic...but, it's a religious holiday, yes? No. It's a socio-cultural aspect. Shinto is much the same. There is no praying to anyone, there is no moral guideline for the most part. It's like believing in fate. Fate is not a religion, but it is a belief system.

I want the diplomatic solution. But unfortunately, like I said with the malcolm X analogy, until radical Christians understand that we aren't going to take their crap, there can be no peace.

@Shinto It's like believing in fate, but it has deities? You just want to liken Shinto to atheism so you can show that atheism is positive for society. You will spin things and paint them in any way to show that atheism is a good thing and religion isn't. But prof, I thought you were more learned than that. Why negate all the positive things religion has brought (or ignore them), yet bring in things that areligion (or beliefs you prefer to liken to areligion) has. Whether Shinto is a religion or not, it doesn't matter because the point you're trying to make is that a belief with 0 passion (like of what I understand here in Shinto) is what can drive a society forward.

@bolded Again, you show that your view is single-sided, though we had just seen earlier that evil was in the heart of man (atheist or religious). Yet you prefer to peg (not religious people) radical Christian as the evil ones. Again, this is proof that this debate will go down the dumpster sooner or later because I'm trying to show that there is evil in all areas of life (religion and areligion), but you're trying to stick it to religion, nay radical Christianity.

With such one-sided vision, how can discussion be made? Can I trust your judgement? You seem to have lost trust in mine because I went really far in my train-wreck description (I must have shocked some), but you I thought would understand I couldn't possibly be serious. However with most folks on your side of the fence (the 4 walls of secularism), there is no balanced view. It's "Religion is evil", period. Though history shows otherwise, you won't look at it. *Clap*

No I didn't say religion didn't do good things. Early life thrived upon religion because as I said with my first post, it gets people to become civilized. But I wanted to make the point that religion isn't the sole necessitator of civilization.

I'm looking at the big picture. I'm looking at the times. In these specific times, religion is choking progress. At other times, religion buoys survival and drive. Right now, in context, the main threat is radical Christians. It's not that I don't want to see both sides, it's just one side called reality. Reality right now has radical Christians preaching hate against other religions. Reality right now has religious people in places of power who shouldn't be there. Do you agree with mormons? They are tax exempt. Why the fuck should that exist as a rule? The whole purpose of tax exemption is that they are separated from the state, but they are not. They hold seats of power. They pass pro-mormon legislation. It's madness.