Religious nuts vs bolts

If that's an offer, sign me up.

Well, the clowns were in charge of my local station, that's for sure.

I thought you left? Sixty years ago we didn't have the medications we have today to treat schizophrenia, so people who heard any kind of voices were considered mentally ill. They weren't just hearing the voice of God; many were hearing the voice of the devil. When someone says they killed someone because God told them to do it, I'd say most would agree that they are a mentally ill person. But there are also many killers or other people who do bad things and say that the devil told them to do it. If a person hears the voice of God I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing if they're doing something positive with it. Sure there are people like Jim Jones who start crazy cults in the name of God, but they do not represent religion or Christianity as a whole any more than you represent all women or I represent all men.

I see what you mean but i was talking about fundamentalists guys that use violence to force their believes to anothers. Guys that always act in a extreme way.

At a certain point in your life you need to believe in something. These preachers fill that emptiness in many peoples lives. I don't think it's a bad thing for people who desperately need direction, reassurance and acceptance. It gives them a structure to live by and keeps them out of trouble. I believe that these evangles that where touched and inspired by God honestly believe it to be true. I think people do have callings. The problem happens when these same people start believing they are somehow chosen above all others and start decieving themselves consciously or subconsciously by using God as a device for their OWN benefit and doing things in his name. Scary.

I say we stick the crazy people and the evangelicals all in a room and see who has the louder voice telling them to do things =)

That is a really good question. In my opinion, 99.999% of the time, the "voice of God" people are ones who should be locked up, especially if they founded a religion. Its not that I don't believe in God. I just don't believe in the God that talks to people all the time. Here is a funny joke about that:

If someone says that God talks to them, we might consider them a prophet. If someone say that God talks to them through their toaster, we would probably consider them crazy. Why does the toaster make that much difference?

But how we know for sure that the remaining 1 percent are legit cases.
What if Buddha , Jesus , Mohammed and others were crazy guys?

Excellent point, Italian978. And substantiated by the fact that there are currently only about 52,000 institutionalized people in America.

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Yes, Earllogjam -- people ARE better off believing in something. Death is scary. Beliefs make it easier to live side by side with death.

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I agree, TB and JA -- I won't point any fingers, because that wouldn't be fair, but perhaps some religions would have never come to pass if the founder had gone in for a psychiatric evaluation when he first started preaching?

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And maybe fifty or a hundred religions never came to pass because the founder didn't have time to gather a following before being locked up...

Show me your dotted line and I'll show you mine.

There isn't one.

If a god exists, he doesn't talk to us. He works in mysterious ways, remember?

Here's what used to be considered "normal". People would read--the bible, works of literature, philosophy. They would look at the world around them. They would interact with other people, be sensitive to them and learn what makes them tick. They would spend time in reflection and contemplation--some of them called this "prayer". They would become wise. In so doing, they would arrive at a belief about what the creator of the universe intended, about what constitutes good and evil.

God didn't speak to people in words on a page; He spoke in the beauty of a flower, the plaintive cry of a newborn, the power of storms and earthquakes that needed respect. He showed us order and inevitability in the succession of day and night, and the progress of the seasons. He taught that bounty can be folowed by famine, and so to be grateful for that bounty when it occurs.

Religion was an organic part of life. It seldom needed to be spoken of.

Alas, in the modern era, we don't spend quite so much of our headspace in the physical world. In fact, life in our imagination seems much more real to us than the life we live on planet Earth.

As a culture, we are no longer grounded in fact. The most appealing fiction becomes the truth, the most appealing actor our president or governor. Gratitude for nature's bounty is meaningless when a Twinkie costs 29 cents.

The dividing line between fact and fiction has become blurred. God in my head? Sure. Why the hell not? No crazier than the Great Kazoo on The Flintstones. And The Flinststones are as real as the Six O'Clock News, are they not? They're both on TV.

No wonder our current culture creates more religious insanity. If you learn values from the dancing light box in the corner of your living room, then any loopy, unhinged thought that half makes sense is as good a philosophy as any. If it makes good television, it must be good.

As an athiest, I found I didn't need a god to come to a conclusion about what's good and bad, or about the purpose fo life. But I did need to go though the spiritual process of becoming wise through experience and reflection, just like they did many generations ago. The written and spoken word helped, but far more important was my lived experience and genuine spiritual connection with others.

If we no longer have that grounding to help us work out what's real and what ain't, then fantasy is just as real as reality.

HB8

P.S. Interesting thought: Atheists and theologians write books. Fundies start their own TV networks.

According to Genesis 8, verse15 God spoke to Noah. God also spoke to Abraham and to Moses (although it was from a burning bush- yeah, that sounds real and I'm Garson Kanin). In Genesis 3 we find God saying to Cain: "Where is Abel your brother?"

In the old testament at least God seemed to spend a great deal of time talking with all the stars. (amazing how he never seemed to talk with one of those many beget individuals)

Are you telling me God keeps an A-list? He's worse than David Geffen.

The saints truly hear the voice of God.

The insane only think they hear the voice of God.

HB,
A very profound post, HB. Some people say that one of the greatest gifts from the Jewish religion (cum Christianity) is the notion of a God that has no physical presence in the world. Having no icons to pray to and worship, God is driven into the abstract, rather than the immediately present God of the ancients dwelling in every tree and rock.