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I like your suggestion but for many people, such as myself, church is probably not a solution. It's not that I don't think that religion provides community or
by Lio 6y ago
I like your suggestion but for many people, such as myself, church is probably not a solution.
It's not that I don't think that religion provides community or a decent ethical foundation. I just don't believe in the supernatural or any belief system that requires the breaking of the Second Law of Thermodynamics without any explanation of how.
Still the social aspects of religion are interesting. What does "more church" look like if you're an atheist? More participatory sports clubs maybe? Or, more things you can walk to and do regularly with the same people in general?
- warent 6y agoI think you misread their comment... They're saying we should rethink housing priorities rather than look to church. EDIT: I see the confusion now, it is actually ambiguous, maybe you read it right
- vmception 6y agoI get a kick off how consciousness is simultaneously fungible, able to react to stimuli without a nervous system, and ephemeral, with no ability to quantify any of that at all Even the unorganized religions rely on this trichotomy without any explanation or coherence I would be open to any outcome, just quantify the rules and mechanisms
- viraptor 6y agoThere are some secular church equivalents as well. For example https://www.sundayassembly.com/ https://www.sundayassembly.com/ for people who want some celebration and community, but don't care about the religious aspects. Otherwise as you mentioned, some hobbies are my church. Local coworking is my church too.
- dnndevem 6y agoThere is no 'more church' if your an atheist. Social aspects of church are no different than that of a sports club, etc... Church is foremost for worship and social second, third, etc... Some people are not particularly social at church and thats ok. What makes them happy is fulfilling a spiritual need.
- im3w1l 6y agoMaybe it's just me but I tend to lose interest in sports. That presents a dilemma. Either you have to attend something you are not interested in, or you stop hanging out with the people.
- dnndevem 6y agoLike most things in life: You must be motivated by a need or really enjoy it. As you, sport do neither for me. As you get older working out will be more of a need and you find a good group of workout buddies and maybe a friend or two.
- smolder 6y agoChurchgoers get moral guidance and philosophical discussion, communal introspection, and everyone knows they should go on their best behavior, bringing love to the congregation. Those things are fairly unique to places of worship, but there needn't be actual worship of God for them to exist, and that's something atheists tend to miss out on since not many other social groups/clubs have those qualities.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- psyc 6y agoIf you really want to get to know your fellow church goers, you’ll have a hard time passing as an atheist for long. Sooner or later you’ll be asked to lead a prayer, give ‘testimony’ to when you ‘got saved’, be tested on your working knowledge of the Bible in some way. And at a catholic church, there’s generally less close community beyond glad handing, but there’s a lot of ritual and recitation you’re expected to follow along with. On some level true believers will always be pinging you to determine your authenticity.
- have_faith 6y agoThere is Sunday Assemble, which attempts to replicate the church like experience in a non religious way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday_Assembly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunday_Assembly
- IIAOPSW 6y agoThe church of meetup.com
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- smolder 6y agoI had been to a service, I think at a unitarian universalist church, which was accepting of atheists. As I remember it, it can still be a bit awkward with references to God being common, but you wouldn't be unwelcome on principle.
- dnndevem 6y agoI dont know of any place of worship (christianity in particular) that is unwelcome to atheists. unitarians simply take the parts they like from every religion to form another.
- etrautmann 6y agoHaving grown up in the Unitarian church, It’s more that Unitarians don’t tell anyone what to believe and everyone in a UU church might have different ideas.
- ChrisMarshallNY 6y agoHow about work in social services? Not the LCSW kind; the "volunteer to be of Service to society" kind. WFM. YMMV.
- jtbayly 6y ago> I just don't believe in the supernatural or any belief system that requires the breaking of the Second Law of Thermodynamics without any explanation of how. Like the spontaneous generation of life that continuously grows more and more complex?
- gbrown 6y agoThat’s not a violation of thermodynamics at all, since the earth is not a closed system, and it’s also about averages. You can have local fluctuations.
- jtbayly 6y agoWell my fellow fluctuation of highly organized atoms, take luck. Let me know when somebody can explain how everything works without positing a magical thing we can't see, measure, or touch.
- gbrown 6y agoHmm, I’m not sure I understand your point. Scientists explicitly try to avoid positing magical things, and even when things get into the realm of untestability at our scale, it’s hedged: “Here’s a cosmological model that might be true given our current data” Vs “Here’s a magical anthropocentric religious explanation for anything I can’t immediately explain”
- jtbayly 6y ago"Here’s a cosmological model that..." requires a magical explanation for anything I can't immediately explain. Let's call it... say... dark matter?
- gbrown 6y agoYou’re revealing your ignorance of modern physics, as well as some pretty astonishing hubris. You’d compare dark mater, which has numerous possible explanations all of which are in search of empirical tests, to the panoply of human religions?
- GuB-42 6y agoI don't know how it might be called in the US but in the town I spend a good part of my childhood, we had a sort of hub for clubs. Sports, craft, games, etc... it hosted scheduled activities like workouts, helped organize event like trips, there was a room with a piano where lessons were held but was otherwise freely accessible, a small library, a bunch of chessboards from the chess club, again, freely accessible, etc... A lot of activities were aimed at kids but it spanned all age groups, including elderly. Of course, it created a strong, unreligious community. Unfortunately, as it is often the case with these organizations, the few key players lost interest and no one took over, so while it still exists, not much remains.
- throw0101a 6y agoSoup kitchens? Many are run by religious institutions but you don't necessarily have to subscribe to all the ceremonies and such (there may be a perfunctory prayer at the beginning of the shift). Plenty of secular NGOs. User groups (Linux, BSD). If you're into photography: photo walks.
- AtlasBarfed 6y agoChurches have been replaced by political party affiliation, and services are conducted virtually via the party-affiliated media TV networks.