Cyprus-Forum.com

[Tim Drayton]

I don't demand unquestioning faith. I don't care what people believe. If people choose to or otherwise not believe in God that is there prerogative.

What has science told us? It has provided us with a reasonable estimation as to when the universe was created and that it started with a big bang. That is all.

Science has only ever told us two things? Are you serious? Well, science has also established that combustion is a chemical reaction between the carbon in solid matter and atmospheric oxygen, in rejection of the phlogiston theory. That makes three. You think the list stops there?

Of course it doesn't, we can talk about aerodynamics and the Bernoulli principle but what has that got to do with religion being the curse of humanity?

Nothing, but it has everything to do with you asking the question 'What has science told us?' and then saying 'only two things'.

I don't think anything else that science has told is relevant and when or how the universe was created is not relevant to this thread either.

WHY are (or not) religions the curse of humanity?

There is a good old Cyprus forum tradition whereby threads move off in a tangent, and this thread started to develop into an attack on atheists and I as an atheist moved in to defend my world view.

[Maximus]

Who attacted Atheists?

I would say the atheists are more aggressive.

[Tim Drayton]

Why are religions the curse of humanity?

Well, if people go off and practise religion by themselves without bothering anybody else, do not try to forcibly impose their beliefs, values and moral code on others and are tolerant of those who think differently, then they are not much of a curse.

Sadly, this has not always been so. Leaving to one side the obvious example of DAESH who are committing heinous crimes in the name of religion, consider the case of Galileo, a scientific genius who invented the telescope and began to make observations of the celestial bodies which provided empirical evidence in support of the heliocentric theory of Nicolaus Copernicus. However, the Catholic church opposed the views that he began to promote, since they clashed with the church's own dogma, based on a world view for which there was no empirical evidence and which was simply imposed from above. The church declared heliocentrism to be heretical and Galileo was forced to retract his views, not using rational arguments, but simply by threatening him with torture. The church thus wanted to keep humanity backward and ignorant, and thus in its clutch, and held back the development of science and technology to the detriment of humanity. This, I would suggest, is one example of religion being the curse of humanity.

Here was the 'evidence' presented by the church against heliocentrism:

1 Chronicles 16:30
Fear before him, all the earth: the world also shall be stable, that it be not moved.

Psalms 93:1
The LORD reigneth, he is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed with strength, wherewith he hath girded himself: the world also is stablished, that it cannot be moved.

Psalms 96:10
Say among the heathen that the LORD reigneth: the world also shall be established that it shall not be moved: he shall judge the people righteously.

Psalms 104:5
Who laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be removed for ever.

Ecclesiastes 1:5
The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.

[Tim Drayton]

If you look at page 8 of this thread, you will see that it was a certain Maximus who first invoked cosmology with the following question, obviously directed towards atheists.

"What created the big bang? This explanation of what created the universe starts a time = 0.

Something was created out of nothing?"

[Tim Drayton]

I see that earlier on page 8 the same Maximus, in asking:
"If that is the case then who or what created the earth, the cosmos and the physical laws that bind it all together?"
attacked the position adopted by atheists, using an argument that I started to address on page 5 of the thread "Year 5775 - and so the Choirokitians did not exist", by summarising it thus:

"Your thesis is:

1- Everything that exists has a creator.
2- If a world view cannot explain who created anything and everything, it is wrong."

Now the same Maximus is complaining because atheists have addressed this argument!

[miltiades]

Daily massacres by savages, religious I might add, from Nigeria to Iraq, Syria and Yemen. All dying to meet their "creator".

What drives men and occasionally women, mentally brainwashed, to take their own lives and those of many innocents , could religion have a relevance here?

Any suicide attacks by the enlightened ones ? NEVER !

[supporttheunderdog]

Hitler was Christian (Roman Catholic) and he also wiped out a lot of Christians.

There, you have it, Maximus!

Roman Catholicism is the evil constructed to destroy pragmatic religion (Hellenic Orthodoxy)! Catholicism is a continuation of what the Romans started which was to wipe out Hellenism.

All the other spurious Christian faiths (Baptists, Protestants etc) have been latter-day, mere attempts at trying to reduce the negative effects of Roman Catholicism (and all failing miserably with only a few finding the real path back to Hellenic Orthodoxy).

An example of dismissal of other belief systems when there is no evidence that "Orthodox" beliefs have any more validity. I would say the dismissal is more connected with GiG's own Hellenocentric world view, seen with the aid of rose tinted blinkers....

[supporttheunderdog]

It's very short-sighted to "curse" religion because the belief system you revere today is the product of religion.

Like I said earlier, the ancient gods and their habits have been influencing philosophy/ethics/morals and science, from early on to this day (with doses of evil injected by the Roman Catholic "Church" and Islam some centuries after inception).

Greek/Hellenic Orthodoxy carries with it all the goodness the ancient philosophers initiated (on which our Western laws are based) - to which has been added over time by wondrous individuals like Epictetus. You need only abandon the brainwashing the Catholics spread which has done so much harm in turning people against their spiritual enrichment, as found in Orthodoxy.

That might be the case but it does not alter the irrefutable fact that ancient man created god.

Indeed. I would definitely say that the ancient gods are the creation of man, reflecting human foibles, and since they do not exist they cannot have influenced man's thinking, Rather men have changed how they think about gods. That even exists in Orthodoxy where tenets of the church were set over a series of seven Councils from about 325 to 787, and where the primacy of Constantinople was largely a political construct to reflect Byzantine Imperial structures, rather than any reason connected with Christianity itself.

There is otherwise a Dichotomy in the argument in that according to Judea-Christian teaching the Greek gods are false, so if one is Christian one is likely committing heresy by claiming these gods exist..

[Paphitis]

It's very short-sighted to "curse" religion because the belief system you revere today is the product of religion.

Like I said earlier, the ancient gods and their habits have been influencing philosophy/ethics/morals and science, from early on to this day (with doses of evil injected by the Roman Catholic "Church" and Islam some centuries after inception).

Greek/Hellenic Orthodoxy carries with it all the goodness the ancient philosophers initiated (on which our Western laws are based) - to which has been added over time by wondrous individuals like Epictetus. You need only abandon the brainwashing the Catholics spread which has done so much harm in turning people against their spiritual enrichment, as found in Orthodoxy.

That might be the case but it does not alter the irrefutable fact that ancient man created god.

Indeed. I would definitely say that the ancient gods are the creation of man, reflecting human foibles, and since they do not exist they cannot have influenced man's thinking, Rather men have changed how they think about gods. That even exists in Orthodoxy where tenets of the church were set over a series of seven Councils from about 325 to 787, and where the primacy of Constantinople was largely a political construct to reflect Byzantine Imperial structures, rather than any reason connected with Christianity itself.

There is otherwise a Dichotomy in the argument in that according to Judea-Christian teaching the Greek gods are false, so if one is Christian one is likely committing heresy by claiming these gods exist..

Yes but at least the Greek Mythology among others such as the Vikings etc were very interesting.

The Ancient Greeks never rammed it down anyone's throat or start religiously driven wars. They also had the right balance between their belief and Maths and Science and have contributed an enormous amount to the advancement of man. Who can deny this?

[Tim Drayton]

It's very short-sighted to "curse" religion because the belief system you revere today is the product of religion.

Like I said earlier, the ancient gods and their habits have been influencing philosophy/ethics/morals and science, from early on to this day (with doses of evil injected by the Roman Catholic "Church" and Islam some centuries after inception).

Greek/Hellenic Orthodoxy carries with it all the goodness the ancient philosophers initiated (on which our Western laws are based) - to which has been added over time by wondrous individuals like Epictetus. You need only abandon the brainwashing the Catholics spread which has done so much harm in turning people against their spiritual enrichment, as found in Orthodoxy.

That might be the case but it does not alter the irrefutable fact that ancient man created god.

Indeed. I would definitely say that the ancient gods are the creation of man, reflecting human foibles, and since they do not exist they cannot have influenced man's thinking, Rather men have changed how they think about gods. That even exists in Orthodoxy where tenets of the church were set over a series of seven Councils from about 325 to 787, and where the primacy of Constantinople was largely a political construct to reflect Byzantine Imperial structures, rather than any reason connected with Christianity itself.

There is otherwise a Dichotomy in the argument in that according to Judea-Christian teaching the Greek gods are false, so if one is Christian one is likely committing heresy by claiming these gods exist..

Yes but at least the Greek Mythology among others such as the Vikings etc were very interesting.

The Ancient Greeks never rammed it down anyone's throat or start religiously driven wars. They also had the right balance between their belief and Maths and Science and have contributed an enormous amount to the advancement of man. Who can deny this?

I agree that if you have to have 'theism', then polytheism is preferable over monotheism because the former has always seemed to be more tolerant and open to experimentation with new ideas, but let's not go too far. The era of atheism is fast approaching, if it is not here already.