Question for Liberal Heathens

uscitizen said:
How many people would go to church if there were no heaven (reward) or Hell (punishment) involved ?
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If you have to sell your religion, with the threat of punishment in the afterlife, there's something wrong with your church or religion.


I seem to remember the churches I went to as a youth stressing living good moral values and doing good deeds on this earth - and that was suppossed to be its own reward.
 
Cypress said:
If you have to sell your religion, with the threat of punishment in the afterlife, there's something wrong with your church or religion.


I seem to remember the churches I went to as a youth stressing living good moral values and doing good deeds on this earth - and that was suppossed to be its own reward.
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You had some good churches then Cypress. Mine just taught fear and hatred of those different from us. When I was a child they taught us all Catholics were gambling idol worshipping sinners and going to hell, Baptists as well for dancing, and Methodists for drinking, etc. The best I could figure out only the 40 or so in that particular building were going to heaven :D

Oh and Damo as a captive child prisoner in church, you cannot leave, you have to endure the religious hammering.
 
uscitizen said:
How many people would go to church if there were no heaven (reward) or Hell (punishment) involved ?
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That's a good question. Personally, I believe that a lot still would, though not so many nor so often as do now. People have a natural curiousity and sense of awe that leads to, for lack of a better word, "spiritual" conclusions. People have a lot of other natural traits too, though.

Clerics are people, just like everyone else. It's perfectly natural for them to try and exert control and establish authority. That's what people do. We call it by a lot of names, ambition, dedication, and passion among them, but it all comes down to trying to control the actions of others, to guide their decisions according to your own principles.

I believe that's where the carrot and stick of heaven and hell came from. You can get people into the pews -- or into the church, for the Orthodox -- more easily through fear than any other emotion.
 
Cypress said:
If you have to sell your religion, with the threat of punishment in the afterlife, there's something wrong with your church or religion.


I seem to remember the churches I went to as a youth stressing living good moral values and doing good deeds on this earth - and that was suppossed to be its own reward.
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Beware of anyone who tells you to fear God. That's a really bad sign right there.
 
OrnotBitwise said:
That's a good question. Personally, I believe that a lot still would, though not so many nor so often as do now. People have a natural curiousity and sense of awe that leads to, for lack of a better word, "spiritual" conclusions. People have a lot of other natural traits too, though.

Clerics are people, just like everyone else. It's perfectly natural for them to try and exert control and establish authority. That's what people do. We call it by a lot of names, ambition, dedication, and passion among them, but it all comes down to trying to control the actions of others, to guide their decisions according to your own principles.

I believe that's where the carrot and stick of heaven and hell came from. You can get people into the pews -- or into the church, for the Orthodox -- more easily through fear than any other emotion.
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Yes Ornot some would still go and mostly for the right reasons I think.
Most people also have a need to explain the unexplained. We are almost past the evil spirits causing problems stage of development, but how far can we go ? Do you think there is an inherent limit to how far we as humans can progress ? due in part to our relatively short lifespan.
 
uscitizen said:
Yes Ornot some would still go and mostly for the right reasons I think.
Most people also have a need to explain the unexplained. We are almost past the evil spirits causing problems stage of development, but how far can we go ? Do you think there is an inherent limit to how far we as humans can progress ? due in part to our relatively short lifespan.
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Progress is a Bad Word. I don't use it if I can avoid it. :)

I think there are some limits, yes, but figuring out what they are isn't easy or straightforward. It's especially difficult because any discussion of where they lie gets all emotional almost immediately.

If we ever exceed those limits, whatever they are, we'll no longer be humans but rather something more. Or less, if you swing that way.
 
Ornot, so you do agree there are some limits to how far we can go? Yes many variable directions are out there, and sometimes for a time we seem to go where we have already been and found not to work too well.
 
uscitizen said:
You had some good churches then Cypress. Mine just taught fear and hatred of those different from us. When I was a child they taught us all Catholics were gambling idol worshipping sinners and going to hell, Baptists as well for dancing, and Methodists for drinking, etc. The best I could figure out only the 40 or so in that particular building were going to heaven :D

Oh and Damo as a captive child prisoner in church, you cannot leave, you have to endure the religious hammering.
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My family went to Quakers. They never tried to scare anyone with stories of hell.
 
I look back on my parential enforced religious pressures as child abuse.
It would be legally so in any other venue except religion.
 
Augustine said:
Again, I am in no way implying that all liberals are heathens, but the liberals who are heathens are without doubt the most hostile toward Christians.
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I am not hostile until they get in my business...then it is a matter of self preservation.
 
froggie said:
I am not hostile until they get in my business...then it is a matter of self preservation.
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Hi Froggie!

I bloody well can't stand the lot of them. There are a few exceptions though.

As for the "question", for a spouse, there's always divorce. Children you love unconditionally. I would be very sad for whatever trauma they went through that brought them to that though. In my personal experience, anyone I've known who became born again, went through a terrible tragedy which preciptated it. Some turn to drugs, some to therapy, some to religion. I've understood them and kept the friendships. Married to one? I don't see that as being in the cards.
 
I absolutely agree!

Everyone one of my family members who have joined the fundamentalist had bad marriages.

All of them tried to find the Lord to help save their marriages...it only helped in one case.
 
You guys make fun of Christians all the time. But if your child or spouse became a fundamentalist Christian, would you ridicule them?

Not ridicule. I rarely ridicule Xtians, unless they are puffed and inflated with righteous indignation.

I would go into great detail challenging their mental health problem, and attempt to resolve it for them.
 
AnyOldIron said:
You guys make fun of Christians all the time. But if your child or spouse became a fundamentalist Christian, would you ridicule them?

Not ridicule. I rarely ridicule Xtians, unless they are puffed and inflated with righteous indignation.

I would go into great detail challenging their mental health problem, and attempt to resolve it for them.
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British humor! I love it...
 
maineman said:
my son is the church choir director. both of my two youngest children have spent years as acolytes. I am a deacon. I never make fun of Christians.
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You're such a mason, aren't you. The churches are rife with them. It's the whole "being in the authority chain" thing.
 
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