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You're missing: - These myths are the only ones we believe. The other ones are false and harmful. - There is an invisible man who created everything and sits

You're missing: - These myths are the only ones we believe. The other ones are false and harmful. - There is an invisible man who created everything and sits in judgment of all of us for the purposes of what happens to us in an afterlife that nobody has been able to observe. - Follow us so that he does not judge you unfavorably. The problem with the Bible is that the main character is God, and so everything that happens in the book affects him. The lessons do not give proper ethical cause and effect reasons for why you should do or not do something except that God is displeased with your humanity. Churches can add to these lessons and actually teach ethics, but they originate with the idea that a perfect being is really bad at creating perfect beings. Despite how many churches start having pastors with spiked hair and jeans and sneakers and tattoos, THAT does not change, and it's fundamentally ridiculous and harmful.

f38zf5vdt 6y ago
This is a strawman for what you believe all religious organizations to be. In fact, you don't even need to be a religious organization to hold such beliefs. See: Alcoholics Anonymous. The problem that religious doctrine seeks to address is one of how to preserve our sanity when we're inexplicably stuck on this rock together. Science doesn't seem to have any good explanation for why we're here either -- just that we exist and the universe has for a long time too. There a multiple colliding personal beliefs of individuals on things like: fairness, justice, or whatever a favorable outcome socially even might be. I think it's fine that people might seriously study the mythos of Greek, Abrahamic, and Eastern religion together. People are born without a purpose other than survival and it is perfectly normal, if not recommended, that they maintain a healthy curiosity about the meaning of their existence. The alternative, unless I'm mistaken, is nihilism.
- coliveira 6y ago
  But you don't need religion for that. The ancients already knew this by creating the arts as an expression of humanity looking for its meaning. My opinion is that modern humans debased art and nowadays have difficulty finding things that are meaningful. Religion and superstition, on the other hand, have maintained their focus.
- gumby 6y ago
  > In fact, you don't even need to be a religious organization to hold such beliefs. See: Alcoholics Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous is an explicitly religious organization is it not? To me they certainly cast themselves so strongly in that manner that to claim they are a not is to make a distinction without a difference. Note: I have not attended ?A itself but spent time with adjacent ?anon groups designed to support people whose friends and family members are struggling with addiction. The messages I received were, to me, pretty hard core religious, and one specific kind of religion in particular.
- MisterBastahrd 6y ago
  It isn't a strawman. It is a fundamentally accurate description of the major Western religions. The kind you would go to a church to.

f38zf5vdt 6y ago

This is a strawman for what you believe all religious organizations to be. In fact, you don't even need to be a religious organization to hold such beliefs. See: Alcoholics Anonymous. The problem that religious doctrine seeks to address is one of how to preserve our sanity when we're inexplicably stuck on this rock together. Science doesn't seem to have any good explanation for why we're here either -- just that we exist and the universe has for a long time too. There a multiple colliding personal beliefs of individuals on things like: fairness, justice, or whatever a favorable outcome socially even might be. I think it's fine that people might seriously study the mythos of Greek, Abrahamic, and Eastern religion together. People are born without a purpose other than survival and it is perfectly normal, if not recommended, that they maintain a healthy curiosity about the meaning of their existence. The alternative, unless I'm mistaken, is nihilism.

coliveira 6y ago
But you don't need religion for that. The ancients already knew this by creating the arts as an expression of humanity looking for its meaning. My opinion is that modern humans debased art and nowadays have difficulty finding things that are meaningful. Religion and superstition, on the other hand, have maintained their focus.
gumby 6y ago
> In fact, you don't even need to be a religious organization to hold such beliefs. See: Alcoholics Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous is an explicitly religious organization is it not? To me they certainly cast themselves so strongly in that manner that to claim they are a not is to make a distinction without a difference. Note: I have not attended ?A itself but spent time with adjacent ?anon groups designed to support people whose friends and family members are struggling with addiction. The messages I received were, to me, pretty hard core religious, and one specific kind of religion in particular.
MisterBastahrd 6y ago
It isn't a strawman. It is a fundamentally accurate description of the major Western religions. The kind you would go to a church to.