[Dyothelite]

Originally Posted by catholiboy

I'm fully well aware of this fact. I was simply making the point, however, that the concept of the divinity of Jesus was well underway 200 years before the Nicean council.
Have you heard of the Q Document?

Right on, but formal declarations about what that meant were never formalized until the Councils.

Sure it was written that he was the Son of God..... but that statment had to be fully defined and justified as a real concept.

[Dyothelite]

Another thing that is important is to be able to define what it means to be united with God. If a swami in the mountains reaches enlightenment what is he acheiving? If you define it as reconciliation of his human mind to a universal conscioiusness then the distinction between one enlightenmed master and another becomes vague.

I always like to say.... in all my historical research....Jesus was the best that ever did it. No one in any culture is credited with being so adept after coming out of the desert (or bodhi tree...etc etc), and have so much ability just a year into his ministry. Atleast from a historical research aspect this statement is verifiable true.

[Buffy]

Thwack! Down boys!

As starter of this thread, I'll now clarify what I think should and should not be discussed here, so please understand these guidlines:

1) That different religions have conflicting beliefs is a *given* in this thread, so please heed the calls *NOT* to argue which is "the one and only truth." We'll deal with that elsewhere.

2) This thread is about how we *deal* with these conflicts, both philosophically and practically. In order to do this, you need to take a hard look at the *implications* of what various religions say should be done with non-believers (religious or not), and in many cases more importantly, how conflicting interpretations of how the world works cause conflict in resolving social and political issues. This is where the discussion can get uncomfortable, because the actions or dictates are in many cases a violation of other precepts of these religions at the simplest level and cause major policy conflicts or even wars at the more extreme.

3) The reason this thread was started is to deal with the fact that this issue is *avoided* because it creates moral quandries about commonly accepted values. Unfortunately the most common response to the issue (and we've seen *a lot* of this in this thread) is to admit that there's conflict but argue that there are no problems to deal with, in most cases by quickly turning the issue into "its all the atheists fault" and tacitly saying "all us religions have to fight against the God-haters." This desire to switch topics is indeed avoiding the topic, and some of the flaming above is justified (just turn it down folks).

4) The definition of "Religion" is a subject of debate in other threads, and should not be continued here. I will note though that CWes' and Pyro's point of Religion vs. Human Philosophical Interpretation Of It was actually dealt with earlier in the thread between me and South, and this is in my view another example of AVOIDING THE ISSUE. SO, "Religion" here is defined as any personal belief system that has a major sociological impact--that is, its got a big enough following so that the conflicts addressed herein have a significant impact on society. Thus, its important to realize that while specific instances can certainly be discussed here, the issue is really the phenominological problem of reconciling a group of possibly completely undefined religious philosophies that are adhered to by large groups as "incontrovertable truth."

5) Another way to avoid the topic of this thread is to claim that its all simply about abstract beliefs and that the conflicts have no sociological impact whatsoever. The fractious nature of the major religions can be interpreted as minor, but Martin Luther's 99 theses caused wars. Dismissiveness of mainstream Evangelicals toward Pentacostals may seem minor to the wars now going on between Sunni and Shi'a, but both rend families (not all, but enough to measure epidemiologically). (As an aside, a facinating recent documentary on the conflicts within the California Evangelical church was the topic of a documentary on Lonnie Frisbee concerning the splits in key Evangelical groups in the 60s and 70s: keep checking the link, as it may become available over the internet).

6) Conversely, a listing of the conflicts doesn't help, because what I would like to see talked about here are 1) the *nature* of the problems, and 2) what we can *do* about them. You're welcome to use examples--I argue its essential--but again, listing them is not the *point* here.

So, to comment on an earlier point made by CWes:

Originally Posted by cwes99_03

That is not the point of this thread. The point of this thread was to determine if one's religion believes anothers is false, not to debate why one's religion feels that way.
...
Do other religions hold fast to the teachings of their holy men and holy writings? Possibly. Does this make them right? No.
...
I would expect any true believer in their religion to say the same things about their religion. That being that 1) their god(s) is the rightful ruler of all things, 2) that their holy writings show the way their god thinks and wishes their followers to think, and 3) that one must woship in accordance with their god's wishes to be considered a worshipper of that god.

This simply sets up the issue posed in 1) above, and is not the point of the thread. The fact that religions have conflicts comes from the fact that they *do already* have conflicts, and although it may be germaine to backing various theses proposed here, the actual "reasons" why one religion logically argues the fallacy of other religions is not the *goal* here. The issue is dealing with the the social impact of the fact that these arguments *exist at all* and are used as a weapon to draw adherents from one group to the other and maintain societal power which promotes those groups.

So the conclusion:

Originally Posted by cwes99_03

Thus the only resulting question to be asked is which one is right?

Is very wrong. I don't give a damn why someone thinks their religion is the only true one. What I want to know is what are we all going to do about it given that absolute religious beliefs cause obvious conflict. If you want to argue that the only solution is for everyone to convert to a single religion, that is a perfectly reasonable answer, but it will beg explication for how that is going to be carried out without a huge cost to society and with much more specificity than "it will just take a really long time," or "the Apocalypse will take care of it."

Now, I'd *LOVE* to hear some discussion about this "what we do about it" issue, which has yet to really be addressed in this thread at all. Please try to keep in mind these points because its way to easy to just avoid this really difficult issue that's extremely relevant to many of the major issues of our world societies today.

Thank you for your cooperation,
Buffy

[hallenrm]

Dear Buffy,

I can really appreciate your post above. But, if such are your concerns for initiating this thread should it not be more appropriatly located in the Social forums rather than the Theology forum.

That's only a thought!

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by hallenrm

...if such are your concerns for initiating this thread should it not be more appropriatly located in the Social forums rather than the Theology forum....

Are you wanting to avoid this subject hallenrm?

I could put it anywhere, but the way we use the Theology forum here its perfectly located.

Furthermore, have you considered the fact that the solutions I'm trying to drum up here might in fact relate to changes in religious beliefs themselves, even if you want to insist on constricting the definition of "Theology" into a tiny rigid bucket?

Since I started this thread months ago, I've had some interesting discussions with a friend of mine (an Presbyterian Minister) who is a professor at the Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, CA. This is actually quite a hot topic among theologians these days...

Who me?
Buffy

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by Buffy

Thwack! Down boys!

Yes Mam.

Originally Posted by Buffy

Now, I'd *LOVE* to hear some discussion about this "what we do about it" issue, which has yet to really be addressed in this thread at all. Please try to keep in mind these points because its way to easy to just avoid this really difficult issue that's extremely relevant to many of the major issues of our world societies today.

Thank you for your cooperation,
Buffy

Last night I listened to author Joel Garreau talk about his book Radical Evolution for 3 hours on the radio, and if I understood him correctly, his answer to "what do we do about it" , is wait for the believers to die out. As people are born into a reasoning world, it is what they know and so what they practice. Perhaps only time will tell.

Radical Evolution:The Promise and Peril of Enhancing Our Minds, Our Bodies -- and What It Means to Be Human by Joel Garreau
http://www.garreau.com/

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by Turtle

Last night I listened to author Joel Garreau talk about his book Radical Evolution for 3 hours on the radio, and if I understood him correctly, his answer to "what do we do about it" , is wait for the believers to die out...

Defeatist pessimism does no good, and methinks he will be waiting with Didi and Gogo for a very long time....

Let's go. Yes, let's go. (They do not move),
Buffy

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by Buffy

Defeatist pessimism does no good, and methinks he will be waiting with Didi and Gogo for a very long time....

Let's go. Yes, let's go. (They do not move),
Buffy

Actually, Garreau painted himself an optimist in his radio interview, and I haven't read Beckett's work to offer any commentary on it. As for myself, well, I think I have made clear that I will go the way of challenging the weak foundations of religious belief, and that without such challenges little will change.

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by Turtle

Actually, Garreau painted himself an optimist in his radio interview

Not surprising, but personally it sure sounds like "Stay the course" to me!

Originally Posted by Turtle

As for myself, well, I think I have made clear that I will go the way of challenging the weak foundations of religious belief

That's fine, its just off topic here except insofar as to use it in some very relevant way to back up Garreau's "option" (or dare I say, "non-option" as seemingly advocating inaction).

My reference to Beckett really is based on the notion that while--in addition to other similar reasons--religion continues to be central to political power, we will not see any general decline and disappearance of religion over time. I know you'd like it to "just go away," but doing so does require action, not inaction, and action has consequences: As has been shown in these and other threads, active change or diminishment of other's religions tends to have the opposite of the intended effect. If you don't like your daughter's boyfriend, telling her to get rid of him will have the opposite effect, even if he's a Meth-dealing Hell's Angel. Pretty much the same with believers in particular religions. It is possible to convert people, but its not necessarily under your own control.

Do you have some suggestions about how to convert people? Note that while the discussion of "atheism is not a religion" is not relevant here, the notion of "conversion" to *any* other belief system is critical to any argument like the one being hinted at here. As with any well-subscribed belief system, there will be defenders of the faith that you are converting people from, and as a general rule, those defenders will use any means necessary to avoid losing believers. Although it may be possible to convert individuals using a specific methodology, you must still deal with the conflict between groups in avoiding any loss of members. Have any ideas about that?

Habit is a great deadener,
Buffy

[catholiboy]

Originally Posted by Buffy

Now, I'd *LOVE* to hear some discussion about this "what we do about it" issue, which has yet to really be addressed in this thread at all. Please try to keep in mind these points because its way to easy to just avoid this really difficult issue that's extremely relevant to many of the major issues of our world societies today.

Thank you for your cooperation,
Buffy

Has the option that there is NOTHING we can do about it occured to anyone here?

As long as the individual exists, there will be an incredible diversity of opinions. As long as everyone on the Earth doesn't follow scientism, there will never be one unified theory. There CAN never be one unified theory. As long as philosophy is a practice, and as long as Atheism/Theism just uses philosophy as another tool to "prove" their religion, philosophy will continue branching out until it's basically just a syndrome of beliefs, none of which can be reconciled with eachother, none of which can ever agree, and which will exist forever in concept and be taken up by the later generations. And where there is difference, there can only be narrow-minded conflict.