Contradiction

I'm on a Democrats board online. In my profile, I list (some of) my reasons for being a Democrat, as well as my hobbies and what I'm doing with my life. Today, I received this (unsolicited) message. His text is italicized:


I tend to side with Carlin on the question of religion. Though there are wonderful philosophies to be found in the bible, there are many truly awful ones too...and any institution that threatens non-believers with eternal damnation is inherently intolerant (and non-liberal).


I'll agree on this one. However...


I gotta call you on this: "well-thought-out beliefs" is a contradiction. "Thought" is a process of using facts to come to a conclusion; "belief" is a conclusion based on little or no knowledge. ("Faith" filling in the gap, much like with the rationale for war and tax cuts for the wealthy.)



No, actually. My religious faith (as well as my faith in other things) is entirely interdependent on my ability to think through available information to logical conclusions. I’m interested in where you got your helpful taxonomy of word breakdowns. Thoughts, when extrapolated to their fullest means, become beliefs quite frequently. In grade school, I learned how the earth revolves around the sun, creating seasons and alternating patterns of light and dark. Extrapolated, I now believe that when I go to bed at night and it is dark, the next day, with predictable accuracy, it will be light again. Maybe a weak example, but there are many others.


Without going into a lot of details with a total stranger who feels the need to question the phrasing of others, I've gone through enough research and thinking to discern that 1.) There is a God 2.) I am not God. 3.) Jesus Christ is/was the only Messiah, was crucified and raised from the dead. If not, it's the greatest hoax in history.


After all, what is the worst sin a person can commit according to Christianity? Non-belief. We're "fallen" in the first place because humanity ate from the "tree of knowledge." Hitler could've repented in the bunker and gotten into heaven, but a kind and generous agnostic will burn for eternity? Religion, like the current administration, fears knowledge and dissent... which goes against the spirit of liberalism, which celebrates those things.


Hey, careful. Lumping in all people who believe in anything with fundamentalists who use misguided religious beliefs as weapons of oppression is, as you said, like the current administration. Separating equality-minded, liberal government-oriented into the "have" and "have not" camps of religion isn't just incorrect, it's dangerous to the political orienting process. Many religions, including mainstream Western ones and nearly all Eastern ones have the firm belief that knowledge, dissent and religion are compatible. Where else would the Three Questions of Judaism, the scholarship of the early Catholic church, and the tradition of learned Buddhist masters have come from, if not from a faith rooted in the idea that humans are separated from non-human entities by their capacity for abstract thought?


And in most Christian sects, there is no "worst sin." That's a fallacy. As for if Hitler could repent of his sins and sincerely believe and whether or not that's "fair," that's a tired argument based on the assumption that any all-supreme deity wants to separate people out and damn them, which is ultimately very silly and makes absolutely no sense. Does it matter that Hitler would be acceptable to God in the same way Mother Teresa would be? Should it matter more to Mother Teresa or Hitler? Can one ever be truly sorry for the things one has done, whether they are acceptable in the culture or not? Moving in that vein, we're getting into Sarte and essentialism.


Check this out and see what you think: http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/m_m_mangasarian/truth_about_jesus.html
Let me know what you think, and feel free to put me in my place! Write me at: (e-mail address deleted)


While the prose style is interesting, many of his facts are flat-out incorrect. The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke are consistent with the place and time of Jesus’ birth, within a few years. Most scholars agree that Jesus was born in late October, since the Aramaic word for sheep used in all three gospels specifies a sheep of a certain age, which would be impossible at any other time of year due to historically documented, centuries-old breeding and shepherding practices. The mathematical probability of one person fulfilling all the prophecies written out in the Tanakh (“Old Testament”) is approximately 1 in 580,276. Your odds of winning a national lottery are higher, since that seems to be an analogy familiar to most.


What I find particularly interesting is the need of people to run around and “debunk the myth of Christianity” and to bombast those who profess a Christian faith. Truthfully, would you do the same thing to someone who professed to be religiously Jewish, or Shinto, or B’Nai B’rith? Other than the bad example set by those professing to be Christian, what is it that bothers you so much about me, a random stranger, that you felt compelled to write?


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So the question is, why do people feel the need to categorize and divide? What purpose is served by dividing religious from non-religious, monotheistic/poly- or anti-theistic, Democrat/Republican, Christian/Jewish, male/female, straight/gay, left/right, et cetera, ad nauseum, ad infenitum?

Aside from the basic helpfulness of matching, why? Just...why?