Re: Religion gone crazy!
I completely disagree that religion is a prerequisite for having a decent moral compass.
One saying, which I think comes from the Bible, though, is "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
Pretty much covers most things really.
I don't care if people want to go to a church, sing songs, pray, chant, etc, (even taking communion which seems pretty silly to me). But I do object when those people tell me I am missing out, living an immoral existence, or otherwise failing to appreciate the reality of life, if I don't want to do the same.
And to those ghastly people who so persistently come knocking at the door, especially when they trail little kids with them, I'd suggest they spend their time more constructively. Might just 'accidentally' let the dog out next time I see them coming.
Ah yes, the door knockers....Jehovah's Witnesses mostly - the same religion who will let their loved ones die, rather than allow them to have a life-saving blood transfusion.
I once asked them if they believed in the well known bible quotation of 'Do unto others as you would have them do unto you'. I told them that my interpretation of this was that we should treat others with the same consideration we expect ourselves.
As you'd expect, they said yes, they very much believed in treating others with consideration.
So I said "OK.....some of the people whose doors you knock on may be night shift workers who sleep during the day. Some of them may be parents who are exhausted after being up all night with a sick child. Some of them may be family people in the middle of a family reunion with loved ones they haven't seen for months or years.
Some of them may be sick, or old and frail, or in the middle of some personal crisis, or grieving over a death in the family. Or whatever.
And you people, completely uninvited, come knocking on their door, waking them up or disrupting their lives, so that you can give them your completely uninvited views on god and religion and on how they should be running their lives.
Now, do you really think you're showing consideration for other people? Is that the way you'd like to be treated yourself? What if each one of these people whose doors you knock on, were to come uninvited to your house and knock on your door and start asking you what you think of the world, and giving you their views that you never asked for. Would you perhaps consider their behaviour to be inconsiderate?
Generally they don't have very good answers when confronted in that way.