Philosophical question

[textualdeviance]

At the risk of setting a can opener on Cream of Worm Soup, there's something I've been curious about.

I know a lot of people on my flist here are religious, in various denominations. Not being actively into organized religion myself (though I was raised Christian) I'm curious about how liberal people of faith feel about that.

I understand that it's certainly not necessary to be conservative or reactionary in order to be religious, but I can't escape the fact that there are certain tenets, particularly in some denominations, which are pretty clear about things like the status of women and same-sex activity, etc. and I wonder how people reconcile that?

I know for some people I've talked to, they simply consider themselves Christian in its strictest sense-- following the teachings of Jesus. I can perfectly understand that. I believe Jesus existed, and I think he was a cool guy who had a lot of nice things to say. I don't believe he was the son of God, because I don't believe in a conscious deity, but I think he was generally pretty groovy. It's all the other stuff in the Bible that seems kind of extraneous to me, especially the teachings of Paul, and much of the old testament, and Genesis, etc. and I've wondered how people who believe in the rest of the Bible deal with some of the ickier stuff that's in there. In particular, I've wondered about people who belong to religions which, as an organization, are particularly conservative. To me, it's kind of like having a job, and then finding out your CEO donates to the KKK or something. I'd want out of that job, fast. I wouldn't want to be part of an organization whose leadership actively engages in things I seriously disagree with. Is it a matter of not having other alternatives (like not having another job to go to, for instance)? Or is it more of a desire to try to change the organization from within?

Related, I also wonder how people of faith deal with ecumenical issues. Most religions have some element of one-true-wayism in them, so I've often wondered how different denominations really feel about other faiths. Do they feel that the other people are just misguided, and will find the true way eventually? Or is it something more like accepting something like... God has multiple facets, and therefore any/all religions can be/are right at the same time?

My apologies if any of this comes off as asking someone to justify their beliefs. I'm just curious, really.

Comments

[thisside.livejournal.com]

My belief is that everyone gets what they have coming for them, and nobody knows what that is except God, which is all things to all people. God is so beyond a human's grasp that we have to fit him into whatever we're comfortable in dealing with him as, whether it's God, Allah, tree spirits, or our own personal spirits within. Therefore I believe that as long as you lead a good life you'll be rewarded in the way you want to be rewarded.

I think the Old Testament is simply a record of the Hebrew people, their laws, and their histories, and their lineages. I was struck when reading the Iliad and other ancient mythological works by the similarities in content (not the exact stories, but the types of things they talked about), and so that's what I think. The Old Testament is the way the world was back then. The only teachings I really try to hold to are Jesus's words. The rest of the New Testament is letters and writings by Jesus's Apostles and others in the church spreading their interpretations of Jesus's word -- and they certainly did have opinions. A lot of Christian rhetoric never came from the mouth of the man that we deified -- Christ -- and that bothers me.

I don't know if that's the kind of answer you were looking for or not. I really enjoy talking about religion and have lots of opinions/beliefs on the subject, so I can really get going. I hope you didn't mind.

[foxykc.livejournal.com]

Many people subscribe to organized religions where the thinking is done for them. "The paster said the other day..." To be honest, someone who has studied theology knows the "backstory" as it were, whereas most lay people do not.

What happens is that people very conveniently assume that the Bible is the involate, infalliable word spoken through human intermediaries. Therefore, an;ything relevant 2000 years go is relevant today. Tain't necessarily so, since times have changed etc.

What I want to know is why is it that the same people who decry same sex anything DON'T stone adulterous women because THAT'S in the same book of the bible.

It's a question of education. I believe people can be very good Christians in the "just read the red parts" sense of the word. That doesn't mean you have to buy the rest of the Bible. After all, Christianity is based on teh red parts. Granted, assuming Jesus existed, as a rabbi, he would have been intimate with the Torah.

The Torah does not seem to have impressed him very much, however.

[mrdorbin.livejournal.com]

So, at least for me, the short answer is that an organized religion (in my case, the Catholic Church) is, at its most fundamental, a community, and like any other community worth belonging to, it's extremely diverse. If you have very different opinions from the leadership of the community, you have two choices. You can leave the community, or you can engage it and attempt to change it from within. Where you fall on that spectrum depends on how attached you are to its fundamental principles, how committed you are to the people in it, and that sort of thing. The everlovelyandwise ladysisyphus was just talking sorta-about this in this post and commentary, and she says it better than me.

As for ecumenicalism, I believe that anyone who is following what is right is following God, whether they use that name for Hir or not. I may be an extreme case, but there's too much wisdom in other paths for me to think anything else.

(For the record, I separate my church membership from my faith, but that's a MUCH longer conversation.)

[kevswitchau.livejournal.com]

I'm a pagan, so it's a case of all religions being valid as long as they don't hurt anyone else.
Unfortunately, I've found that a lot of religions *do* hurt others, especially those that try to impose their own belief structure upon others. I was born a Christian, into a fairly cristian family (my Grandfather still thinks I am, but gods love him, at 88 years of age, it's just not worth the pain of telling him) but my parents are really open minded and accept that Christianity was not my path.
I prolly didn't answer any of your questions here, did I?
*LOL*

[dancingrain.livejournal.com]

:D

I am reconstructionist Jewish. Half my synagogue is queer and we have gender-neutral god language and folks (to a middling degree me included) are still pretty darn religious. Eventually perhaps the more traditional (*not* more "religious" IMHO) branches of Judaism will catch up.

♥ to my religion.

[digitallux.livejournal.com]

A can of worms, but one worth opening.

My religious background: raised a Lutheran, sent to a private Catholic school, Lutheran, Catholic, Southern Baptist and Jehovah's Witness in the immediate family. From that launch pad I studied many different paths including Witchcraft, Paganism, Buddhism, Theosophy, Edgar Cayce, Torkom Saraydarian and beyond. I settled on Science of Being.

My point of view: religion was created by man to control man. Remember, the shortest and most direct path between two points (such as God and 'man') is a straight line. No intermediaries. Most religions create a huge curve that delays people's Spiritual growth, most times intentionally. Plus many people do not want to think for themselves, or accept responsibility for their life. It is easier to turn to an organizied religion that makes the rules and then follow most of them, blindly. Certainly there are altruistic aspects to many religions with the aim being to help man know God. However, as FoxyKC pointed out, when one has spent a good deal of time studying the "backstory" of religion one gains a very different view of things.

Let me digress for a moment. It makes sense, from the standpoint of religion being made by man to control man, that most would not look kindly on homosexuality. Why? Because those unions did not produce children which would grow up tithing to the church. (Don't go jumping on me for over-simplifying this, there is only so much room on LJ) We can look at it from another angle. If God is omniscient, omnipotent and perfect and 'man' is created in his image ... then are not all homosexuals, bisexuals et al of God? It's not like they are a subhuman race or anything.

The problem (once again we are still dealing with my opinion here) is that most religions and people humanize God. They give him a personality with all kinds of preferences and whims. Think about it - God listens to all the prayers from all the various 'true' religions and acts on them? (That would be chaos) Why would an omniscient, omnipotent, perfect Being do the bidding of self-avowed imperfect beings? It's the cosmic version of 'Let's make a Deal'. Very illogical.

*getting off the soapbox* *grin*