Would the world be better without religion?
I meant to put this up ages ago, but I never got round to finishing it til now.
This question managed to turn up on the facebook poll thing called ‘Your Say’ which I usually ignore because the questions are generally aimed at Americans, but this time I made the mistake of answering it and thus looking at the comments. Some of them were reasonable, people who had a grasp of the fact there are more issues in religion than religion itself, and others that were just idiotic quite frankly.
A sampling of comments, and the answers I would put if I could be bothered.
I said NO right away. If you don’t agree that is your problem, you will be judged by the eternal God of Heaven for your choice. And once you find out that there really is a God and it is too late, you will be wishing you had listened to all the people who tried to turn you away from the world and towards God. And if you DON’T believe it is true, then what is your purpose here on Earth?! If you think that you are right and that there is NO God, then what will it hurt if you believe anyway?! Because one day you WILL be judged and you will be sorry you didn’t listen. If you still don’t listen after this there is not much else to do. I have tried, and my Heavenly Father will reward me for that!
Ahh, the old ‘what have you got to lose by believing?’ argument, well, you can just lose your head, like this woman seems to have.
religion just creates division and war. languages do too
Well, to be honest it’s a hell of a lot more complicated than that. The rough division of the middle east into states that didn’t make that much sense didn’t help matters…and the British are to blame for that.
It would appear that religious countries are often the poorest and uneducated countries.
Ahem…UNITED STATES OF AMERICA! (although it is perhaps a it of an exception to the rule.)
If your religion says you are better or deserve more rewards than another because of the way you believe then yes, the world is better without your religion. If your religion says it is the only way to God then yes, the world is better without your religion. If your religion says it is okay to kill another because they do not believe the way you do then yes, the world is better without your religion. If your religion sets you above another human being then the world is better without your religion. If your religion is uplifting to all human beings then your religion is better for the world. If it doesn’t segregate. If it doesn’t abuse. If it allows all human beings the right to believe any way that they choose then the world is a better place with your religion.
Well, I think all religions have a spectrum starting from the whole’ we are the only way, we’re better than everyone else’ over to ‘I believe this, he believes something else, that’s okay, in fact that’s pretty cool’. You cannot generalise one religion and say, they ALL believe X. We’re human beings, we all differ in our thoughts. I can’t make out if this person wants religion or not, cause they’re living slightly coo-coo land if they think their perfect situation is going to happen.
I wish there was a choice of ‘irrelevant’ because the question is moot. Human beings will always create some sort of theism to rationalize the mysterious and the vast majority of humans feel the need to believe there is a purpose in their lives, that destiny and fate exist. The idea that there is an order to things gives them comfort. In regards to laws and ‘moral codes,’ many of the laws of God, no matter what religion we are speaking of, originated in small family or tribal communities to maintain order and public safety. Later, these laws were hijacked by local religions and cults.
I quite liked this one, not far from my own way of thinking.
I meant to vote YES for better without religion, because Christianity is not a religion. It is your relationship with God that matters. A world without HIM would not be better!!!
There were numerous ones like this who had voted to say the world would be better without religion because Christianity is not a religion, it’s a relationship with God. Ahem, can it not be both? Can religion not be a word meaning’ the collective term for people’s relationship with God’? See one of my previous posts for the difficulties in defining ‘religion’.
A general point often made: that religion isn’t the problem, it’s organised religion.
People naturally seek out others who believe in the same thing as them. Hence political parties, scientific endeavour, families, and all manner of other groups. I really don’t think you are going to stop people talking to each other. Organisation is natural.
There wouldn’t be any world without religion!
Nah there would be, it just wouldn’t be anything like this. Religious ideas have brought us to this point today (along with many other ideas).
There was numerous people putting up bible quotes and only those like it was really relevant and made an argument by itself, and then one guy put up this link, which I did have fun with: http://www.jesusdressup.com/.
