Moving on from the commercial orgy of Christmas and whether it has lost its true meaning, well yes, it has undoubtedly changed and yeah, yeah ...and moving on Religion teaches us a moral standard and inculcates, even at a young age, the difference between right and wrong, a moral conscious and a moral compass. - Is this what we lack as a society? - Has Science and Atheism/Humanitarianism failed to fill a spiritual void? - If there is one defining feature with every modern civilisation, they were all built around a religious, cultural and behavioural standard that has even defined our laws. Are we in danger of losing touch with our spiritualism, do our religious standards keep peoples' behaviour in some form of check? - Are we mature enough individually or as a collective society do conduct high standards of moral and ethical codes without a religious framework? - Alternately, as a society are we not better off without a religious crutch?
ALL religions foster bigotry and hatred. We don't need religion to give us a moral compass. Far from it. Without religion no one would be bothered what happens when we die. Perhaps then heaven would be a place on earth. Religion is there only to control the masses by people only interested in their own power trip. There is no God. Religion is just the original form of Government.
Sums it up for me. For most religions there is an opposite & it fosters hatred. Jew v Muslim - Israel/Palestine. Catholic v Protestant - Northern Ireland. Muslim v Catholic/Protestant - Yugoslavia. Muslim v Sikh/Hindu - India/Pakistan. It's not that long ago that young Irish girls would be locked away in workhouses if they fell pregnant out of wedlock. Anyone seen the Magdalene Sisters? Ironically Mary Magdalene was the patron saint of prostitutes. Anyone who went to a Catholic school in the '70,s or '80,s will know what those ****ing nuns were like. Until recently Irish women would have to go to the North if they wanted contraception or to abort a baby. I've seen some of these things with my own eyes & I've no time for it. To me most religious festivals nowadays are just an excuse for a mass feed & a good piss up. The true meanings of which are lost in the mists of time. Will I celebrate Christmas? Yes, I have kids. Do I believe in God or Jesus? Do I ****. I've read parts of the bible & it's a work of complete fiction & utter ****ing bollocks to boot. If that makes me a hypocrite the I don't give a toss.
The authorities and their 'human rights' have given the religious minorities at the extreme end of each religious spectrum, way too much leverage in society. Many people following religions were suppressed by their own leaders for years, and the good old 'authorities' decided that was a breach of their human rights, putting their nose in where they were not qualified to do so. Iraqi's lived in fear, for example, now they have a warped version of freedom and their first instinct is to test it's boundaries, naturally. There are ways of teaching good behaviour and ethics without bringing up the parable of the good samaritan, so ideally the west eradicates religion completely from it's syllabus and redraws it's policies on education and human rights. We are evolving as a human race and there is no place for religion going forward, it's extremely patronising to the human brain, the most complex computer ever built to assume that without religion, people would not behave.
There has to be better way of living than the political/ religious route humanity currently takes - maybe a spiritual freethinking route is the answer albeit without the religious mumbo jumbo- dunno!... mankind also could do with scraping a few other ideologies too
NO. The less religion influences day to day life the better. Its hard to talk about religion without causing offence. Ricky Gervais summed it up perfectly People have the right to believe what they like, and I have the right to believe its ****ing ridiculous. It's 2014 ffs haway man!
Was that the 'Burning Bush' where the fruit burned your throat on the way down and caused hallucinations, making you think 'God' was yacking in ya lughole?
Nah, mate. "Life of Brian" when they first think Brian is the Messiah. Classic stuff. "I say you are the Messiah and I should know; I've followed a few". "Oh Lord, I am afflicted by a bald patch...".
Two things are true of all religions. One is sheer hypocrisy & the other is they all want your money.
Abortion is illegal in Ireland, north and south, to this day. Those requiring same must go to the British mainland.
There's no god until you're a goal down in an important match, 2 minutes left on the clock and you're scraping the barrel as a fan, desperate, so you turn to god... "FFS, God, please if you're up there, give us a late goal and I promise I'll never say anything bad about you again"... Two minutes later at full time... "That was your ****ing fault you ****er, **** you, prick, knew you didn't exist you absolute ****".
does modern Western Society lack religion? No it doesn't, It lacks morals and ethics. We don't need religion. You don't need to be a christian to hold christian values. But it's those values that is sorely missed in our society.