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Religion IS crazy!

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FxTrader said:
People should devote some time to reading selected religious texts to discover for themselves just how extraordinary claims by delusional people can engender such strong faith in supernatural imaginings among deceived believers.
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Sorry I should have read your very good post before putting up my last.
 
explod, and FX, it depends entirely what you mean when you say 'God'. I use the word and you put your meaning onto my use of the word...but what did I mean?

When you use the word, you have your meaning, and I'm doing my best to understand what you mean by the word. It looks like you mean an imaginary being. I agree a lot of people use their mind to imagine a being, and this is pretty useless.... not necessarily harmful, but certainly useless. If that's what you mean, then that's altogether removed from what I mean. My meaning can only be described by negation: non-personal, non-being, non-material, not an experience, not even the much vaunted not love Agape, not human love, not separate, not this, not that and certainly not a figure in the sky wearing robes. You can't achieve it, you can't gain access, because the "you" (or self) lies at the threshold of what might otherwise be called unity consciousness, and there's no way you're going to entertain letting go of you, if even for a second. Why? It's terrifying. But I'm pretty sure you don't know what I mean by that, because all you have is what you've read in the newspapers and seen on TV.

If one was to read any of the texts or commentaries I posted, you need to know how to read them. That in itself is a skill - parsing the rubbish (and yes, there's plenty) from the useful stuff.

If I was a caveman living in the stone age, I would have scoffed at such things as atoms and molecules. How ridiculous! I only believe in woolly mammoths and a flat earth.

If you want to approach this from a scientific angle, fine. Think of an "event horizon".
 

While you seek to descend into a somewhat pointless semantic argument about what your particular use of the term God is not, I prefer the more common meaning assigned by the religious. Unity consciousness is yet another expression of vivid human imaginations masquerading as wisdom and is steeped in Hindu mysticism. While you may wish to engage in the mental gymnastics required to make sense of nonsensical metaphysical ramblings, I for one do not. Spare us the petty insults and Hindu evangelism please.
 

It's like talking to a petulant child. 100 Hail Mary's should fix you right up, lol.

You wouldn't even know the difference between a mystical experience and insight experience, would you? To you, that would be more "semantics". I guess this is why maths professors don't teach trigonometry to primary school kids. The gulf is too large.

I have no absolutely attachment to, nor investment in Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism or any religion, so feel free to criticize if you want.
 
Gringotts Bank said:
explod, and FX, it depends entirely what you mean when you say 'God'. I use the word and you put your meaning onto my use of the word...but what did I mean?
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God is very real in the minds of most people of religion. They can see his image in their minds and are reminded of that image when they see a crucifix (an icon) or a church, (again constructed as an icon)

Others feel a presence of others they are close to who have since departed and relate this to God.

As a youngster I did study the bible and for all points and purposes was preparing myself to be a Catholic Priest, hence my early studies of general metaphysics. In later life I attended uni and read the Greek and Roman philosophers then the Middle Ages and the Renaissance through to Modernism and Post Modernity. I understand the psychological aesthetics of religion and why it is made that way to shape and control the minds of people. The ceremonial backup is all part of the same.

So to crack a meaning of "God" the tenets are limitless, and again I would argue made that way in order to remain mysterious, allusive and beyond explanation.

Mentioned this on ASF some months back but a good example is "the Holy Trinity" which is made up of God The Father, God The Son and God The Holy Ghost equals in sum total "God". As youngsters we were made to understand that the Holy Trinity was one and the same person yet the Holy Son was sent down to earth to save us. Now for all the indoctrination that I had suffered I could never get my head around this one and looking back now was the beginning of my questioning the whole deal.

Now G/B you should have no problems in explaining to me your succinct idea of God or your god after which we can deal with the merits of it/him so to speak. I can assure that I will and can understand you.
 

Well, thanks for your intelligent response, firstly.

I tend to shy away from jargon, but I'll bring it out if i need to explain a point. When you say Holy Trinity, rather than Father Son and Holy Ghost, (to me that's too open to misunderstanding), I'd go with something like Observer (true Self), Process of Observation (mind which creates 'self') and the Observed (material world), where the self (ego) lies at the "event horizon", and the process of observation is the only way to know the Observer....if that's one's aim. Having studied the different religions, this seems to be the aim of all of them, even though modern religion seems to have become perverted beyond all recognition. On this point I guess I agree with what a lot of people are saying on this thread.

So in that last paragraph, the Observer (or even the light behind the observer) is what some might call God. That's not to say it's a "thing" watching your every move and judging....but instead pure conscious. By pure consciousness, I mean consciousness without mind. Since the mind rarely gets to switch off outside of sleep, we don't get to cross the threshold. The sort of interventions (and accidents) that have caused such a stopping of the mind historically are drugs, meditation, prayer (certain types only), dance, exhaustion and fasting, febrile illness, child birth, sex, stroke, sport, running.... and so on.

The most common experience is just that, an experience - The self is still present, and it experiences expansion, bliss, ecstasy, oneness with everything. The other type of experience is actually a non-experience, or "the end of all experience" because there's no-one left to experience it. The body and its senses are still alive and functioning, but there's no "owner". That's enlightenment, or christ consciousness or whatever the heck people want to call it.

The experience of oneness is relatively common. The end of 'self' is apparently very uncommon. When the self ends, you don't meet God, but instead God experiences itself in you. "You" never existed, except as an illusion of mind created by the senses.
 

More petty insults, I will let others judge who is being childish here. You quote Hindu teaching but have no attachment to it? Clearly you do else why reference it. Why not debate the subject instead of engaging in personal attack? Whatever the case I will not oblige your desire to trade insults.
 

Look: I understand why you're critical of religion because I am too...all of them. It seems like 99% of people who practise something are doing it the wrong way, particularly the Muslims, Catholic Christians and Hindus. Sometimes I think Buddhism is on the right path but I've seen so much rubbish there that I doubt its future also.

All I'm saying is, rather than focus on the 99%, look at the 1%. The only reason I started up is because everyone in the world already knows Islamic terrorists are nutcases... why go on with it? It's so boring after a while.
 
Gringotts Bank said:
All I'm saying is, rather than focus on the 99%, look at the 1%. The only reason I started up is because everyone in the world already knows Islamic terrorists are nutcases... why go on with it? It's so boring after a while.
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Okay, so down to 1%, must be near to where you are coming from now.

Have you read up on Theosophy, this is the direction I took as a result of studying crowd behavior as part of a research project in my profession back about 1982. I was at the time in charge of keeping an eye on investigations into Scientology which was against the law back in those times too. It also released me from the guilt of turning my back on religion.

At the heart of such branches we find that there is a mental connection between beings, call it telepathy if you like but a very good study is a book called the "Intuitive Edge".

My point is that there is scientific physical evidence to back what some describe as a spiritual connection. This fact is why some, not conversant with the science are convinced of higher beings and miracles.
 
Ruby said:
I have been watching the charade presently happening in Rome - otherwise intelligent, well-educated, normal people kissing cardinals' rings, waiting to grovel at the feet of their new leader........
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Yes, it’s pretty damn silly alright. Religions cling to pomp and ceremony and ridiculous rituals because without them they’d have very little else.
All those millions of people whose eyes virtually glaze over with adoration for the pope - I wonder if they’ve ever stopped to ask themselves if he’s ever done anything truly worthwhile for his fellow human beings.
Has he ever done the sort of thing that Mother Theresa did, or Fred Hollows or anyone else whose gone above and beyond the call of duty to help people? Has he ever got his hands dirty during a natural disaster, as did the 20 thousand or more volunteers who helped clean up Brisbane after the floods in January 2011? Do you ever see a pope on the front line helping people in areas devastated by earthquakes or cyclones?
Why the heck do so many people put religious leaders up on a pedestal and worship them as role models? If they were truly great men, then OK. But they’re usually not – so why the hero worship for some old bloke who, underneath the silly costume and the ridiculous rituals, is just another person like the rest of us?
 

"The Intuitive Edge" sounds interesting, but there's not a single review on Amazon. Makes it a bit hard to get the gist of it.
I could do with an intuitive edge right about now. $$$$
 
I was somewhat amused and bemused to read that all the cardinals entering the conclave to elect the pope had to swear a vow of secrecy and THEN had their mobile phones taken from them.

It sorted reminded me of the scene from the movie A Few Good Men when Kaffee (Tom Cruise) is questioning Col Jessup (Jack Nicholson) about Santiago being moved off the base and says something like - If you gave orders that Santiago was not to be touched and your men ALWAYS obey your orders, then why did you think it necessary that Santiago be moved off the base for his own safety?
 

hehe, that's quite funny Bellenuit!
 
bellenuit said:
I was somewhat amused and bemused to read that all the cardinals entering the conclave to elect the pope had to swear a vow of secrecy and THEN had their mobile phones taken from them.
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They also took a vow of celibacy and yet seem unable to keep their hands off children. I guess one can understand their concern that the vow of secrecy may not be followed either.
 

Are you serious bunyip? Are you honestly asking that question? This has to be my nomination for the most absurd comment on ASF so far in 2013.

You are comparing the life work of the current pope to a weekend of shoveling and hosing by some volunteers swept up in a feel good moment.

Duckman
 
McLovin said:
They also took a vow of celibacy and yet seem unable to keep their hands off children. I guess one can understand their concern that the vow of secrecy may not be followed either.
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They also took a vow of poverty, and look at the opulent luxury the pope lives in .
 
Hello Duckman, it's not for me to interpret Bunyip's meaning, but I didn't take it as a simple comparison between the life's work of the new pope and a single collective action to help a community in a time of great need.

I'd have thought, and Bunyip you might like to clarify this, he was more thinking about actual 'hands on' giving to his community on an ongoing basis, as distinct from existing in the rarified atmosphere of the upper echelon of the Catholic church. Apparently Pope Francis has caught the bus a few times and has cooked his own food. I'm not sure how that renders him of service to his flock.

But then, my musings are bound to be tainted by my distaste for religion, and especially all the pomp, pageantry and ceremony of the extremely wealthy Catholic church which seems to maintain their outdated traditions whilst closing their eyes to the hideous abuse of children by so many of their members.
 

Hi Julia

I can understand people looking on at this process in bewilderment. However, in a world that is increasingly superficial and shallow, what is wrong with maintaining time-honoured and established traditions?

As far as Bunyips comments are concerned, I think it is quite clear what he meant - he asked if "he had ever done anything truely worthwhile for his fellow human beings?". He then went on to suggest that the contribution made by volunteers cleaning up after the floods are more worthy than what the Pope has ever achieved.

The Catholic Church will never win. It is interesting to note that even on this forum there are people that are more than happy to ask for and accept the prayers of others in times of despair and trouble, only to scoff and sneer at those same beliefs when the storm has passed.

Cheers
Duckman
 
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