This is your brain on religious fundamentalism

[SpencerH]

Back to this egg thing ......





Since it's way more humorous/humorous (damn I have a lot of trouble with english v mer'can) than discussing religious wackos.

[MrFun]

Re: This is your brain on religious fundamentalism

Originally posted by Berzerker
Hmm...yesterday some Al Qaeda guy said the hurricanes were sent by Allah to punish sinful Americans (what a surprise) and tonight (surprise) a state senator from Alabama, Hank Erwin (R), said the hurricanes were sent to punish sinful Americans.

I've said it before -- we have a segment of population here in United States where Christian fanaticism has similar slant that Islamic fanaticism has in Muslim countries. And the irony is that these two similar groups HATE each other.

[Sava]

MrFun got me thinking... I don't understand so called "moderate" religious people. I mean, if these people don't believe in the Bible (or Koran or Torah) literally, then they are really Deists, and technically not Christians/Muslims/Jews. Why don't they just break away from the nutjobs and proclaim that they really believe in God and not the myth and literal interpretation of the respective religious texts?

My mom is like this. She doesn't believe in the Bible at all. She doesn't even believe in God 100% for sure... but sometimes (she says) she talks to "God". When we have talked before, she sounds very agnostic about belief in God, but when she talks about faith, she sounds like a Deist. But yet, she identifies herself as Orthodox.

You know... when people (religious fundies especially) tout statistics like XX% of people in America are religious... I wonder how many of those people are actual hardcore believers in religion, and how many people would be classified as Deist if interviewed about their beliefs.

I would be interested in learning the results of such a study.

[MrFun]

Take a theology class and report back to us, Sava.

[Urban Ranger]

A Deist believes in a non-interventionist god.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
A Deist believes in a non-interventionist god.

yes?

and?


cows go mooooooooo

[Berzerker]

My theory is that God is setting up the religious hypocrits by allowing disasters to occur naturally. When they get to the pearly gates He will show them how many times they invoked His name in vain and show them how they set themselves up as their own gods.

Very well put, but I just realised I'll be with them. I'm in the habit of presuming to know what "god" wants.

A Deist believes in a non-interventionist god.

Would that include a belief in some entity responsible for the really big picture but doesn't micro-manage the resulting processes?

Its curious how religious fundamentalism shares the paganistic belief in a god or gods that are responsible for weather. A few millennia ago they'd be blaming Poseidon for the storms...

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Berzerker
Would that include a belief in some entity responsible for the really big picture but doesn't micro-manage the resulting processes?

Certainly, since an omniscient God would know the outcome of his plan of course. So, Carla del Ponte could also get a non-interventionist God to Den Haag.

Its curious how religious fundamentalism shares the paganistic belief in a god or gods that are responsible for weather. A few millennia ago they'd be blaming Poseidon for the storms...

and throw philosophers over board.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Berzerker
Would that include a belief in some entity responsible for the really big picture but doesn't micro-manage the resulting processes?

That's pretty much it. Some super duper being who started the ball rolling, then went to sleep or something.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Wernazuma III
Certainly, since an omniscient God would know the outcome of his plan of course.

I am not sure if Deists believes in an omniscient god. Omniscience is certainly very problemetic for a theologian.

[Mr. Harley]

Sava - I think there are three different factors in your equation. First of all, most religions indoctrinate children, the degree of which is determined by, if you wish, how "fundamentalist" or how ethno-socially identified it is. I was raised Catholic, and will always be an ex-Catholic, even though I have more or less left the Church - and I still follow it's internal politics hoping for something approaching moderation. My wife's resurgent spirituality has shown itself by returing to the religion of her youth, Judaism, even though she has certain Buddhist leaning. That covers both examples I've given.

Secondly, people have a desire to socially fit in, and thus often remain a member of religious groups you've mentioned for exactly those reasons. In some areas of the world it is almost a requirement, including certain Bible Belt small communities in the USA, and in certain Moslem countries. However, in most of the USA they are comfortable with it, and never underestimate the power of being emotionally comfortable with something.

Lastly, believing in a Deistic God provides very little comfort. Especially when the existance of a Deistic God does NOT presuppose eternal life. People want a Theistic God in their life, especially when everything seems to be going bad, and when they lose loved ones. We really don't want to be an organic computer without a warranty, guananteed to wear out in roughly a century or less. That is why so many people hold on, or their families hold on, for those last few brutally expensive months before they die. It can be terribly hard to let go. And we don't want our death to be flipping the switch, for eternity.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Sava
yes?

and?


cows go mooooooooo

And dogs fly upside down and backwards

You may have noticed a non-interventionist god is at odds with orthodox beliefs in Christianity. The only people who come close are the very liberal ones, i.e. those see the bible as only a moral guide.

[DaShi]

UR, what is your source on all this knowledge you profess about what Christians believe, especially the very liberal ones?

[Sava]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


And dogs fly upside down and backwards

You may have noticed a non-interventionist god is at odds with orthodox beliefs in Christianity. The only people who come close are the very liberal ones, i.e. those see the bible as only a moral guide.

I believe you are confusing the word "orthodox"


I'm referring to "Orthodox"... as in Serbian Orthodox church...

not orthodox (lower case)...

and I can't speak to the official position of the church or their teachings, only to the beliefs of all the "Orthodox" people I know... who generally believe in a non-interventionist God


and regardless...

whether or not non-interventionist God is at odds with "Orthodox" beliefs is beside the point... in fact... that WAS my point... my original point (from my first serious post) was that most people tended to have Deist beliefs WHICH ARE AT ODDS which the teachings of the respective denominations they align themselves with.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Sava
whether or not non-interventionist God is at odds with "Orthodox" beliefs is beside the point... in fact... that WAS my point... my original point (from my first serious post) was that most people tended to have Deist beliefs WHICH ARE AT ODDS which the teachings of the respective denominations they align themselves with.

Originally posted by Sava
I mean, if these people don't believe in the Bible (or Koran or Torah) literally, then they are really Deists, and technically not Christians/Muslims/Jews.

Well, you originally claimed that Christians, etc. who don't follow a literal, inerrant interpretation of the bible (etc.) aren't really Christians but Deists. My point is most of them do believe in an interventionist god - otherwise what use is praying? - and aren't Deists.