Christianity is Anti-Hatred of People or Groups of People

[Dr.Henry_Killinger]

JWeinCom said:

So, unlike the person I was arguing before, you seem to be a reasonably intelligent person, and I think we could find some common ground.

I don't believe that believing Christianity in and of itself is a bad thing.  I think it's incredibly illogical, but I'm certainly not the final judge on such matters.  

What I have a problem with is organized religion which trains people to follow another person's interpretation of the bible (or whatever other religion) without question.  I would have absolutely no issue with religion under the following conditions.

1.  Children are, in so much as reasonably possible, not exposed to religious ideas until they are at an age where they are ready to analyze the ideas critically. 

2. Scriptural views are used by individuals to guide their private lives but are not used as a rationale for law or government policy.

3.  There are no humans who are claimed to be divine or to have a divinely inspired understanding of the bible.  People who have read the book more closely may of course argue their beliefs, but we shouldn't have figures like popes, priests, imans, or cardinals that are ordained and believed to be holy.

4.  It is acceptable for religious views to be questioned (respectfully of course).  

5.  People do not use any method, other than reasoned argument, to coerce any person to believe a particular religious views.  Tactics like excommunication, exile, fatwah, murder, disowning, and so on, are not used to coerce people into believing.

If these principles are met, I wouldn't have an issue with religion and the world would be a better place.  Would you agree to all, or at least some of those?

I agree with all of those principles. I think it would entail some sort of universal moral system that encapulates religion to keep it in check.

If I could summarize, the truest danger of religion is that it is authority not versed in logic.

It's different from illogical authority, because authority itself is illogical to a degree, it is just when people give power to something they believe in, but I digress.

The authority gives it power, but its lack of logic means that it virtually has no constraints. This is what causes it to be abused and abused proliferantly.

Science on the other hand is a comparable authority that is versed in logic. So abusing Science is much much more difficult because if you violate the logic, then you can no longer utilize it, so you are bound by the logic.

This is why religion has to be encapsulated in that moral system, which sets rules, the principles you outlined, so that it has constraints. While there aren't any truely universal morals, we could come close by criminalizing the violations of those moral rules, with the exception of 1 as enforcing it strictly might be to harsh. But that could be allieviated, by simply teaching children to think critically, a lot better than they do in US schools XD.

If we could do that, It would really end the "religion vs" debate and we could all finally move on.