From: Grant Callaghan (grantc4@hotmail.com)
Date: Sun 08 Dec 2002 - 03:35:23 GMT
>
>Just a thought from a lowly college prof: there has always been a
>difference
>between "religion" and "spirituality." Francis of Assisi was spiritual
>first, but given the time in which he lived, did his best to assuage the
>Church. Churches are institutions, and as such, do indeed exist to
>perpetuate themselves.
>
>Religion was the primary enforcer of social norms for centuries in Europe
>and
>the East. Has that changed? Isn't the Islamic jihad a recursion to that
>attitude?
>
>maryly
I was wondering how you define spirituality. Does it mean you think the
body has a spirit that lives after the body dies or that it embodies the
concept of morality that guides the body through life?
I think the idea of religion defining morality and social norms is coming to
an end. A lot of the religious view of such morality was based on "what God
wants" and would therefore imply that there is a God that wants people to
conduct their lives in a certain manner. I think of it as the white haired
old man in the sky who spends his days worrying about how we dress and
fornicate syndrome.
As a person who doesn't believe in a person called God, I have trouble
accepting such a God as the arbiter of my morals. I can find plenty of
moral ideas to follow that were not handed down to me by a higher authority.
They are dictated more by logic than be spirituality. For the most part
then can be reduced to the concepts that the means we use shape the ends we
get and any transaction between two people or two groups of people should be
based on a winning solution for both parties. There are only four logically
sane outcomes to a transaction and these are (1) I win, you win; (2) I win,
you lose; (3) I lose, you win; and (4) we both lose. Of these, only number
one is sane, the rest are insane.
Even the idea of "enforcing" morality is false in my estimation. To
"enforce" means to use force to achieve the goal of making someone adopt
your idea of what is right and what is wrong. This changes from culture to
culture and religion to religion. You should not be in a position to force
me to adopt your standards or ideas of right and wrong. I should not be
forced to believe in concepts such as "original sin" or "we must fear God."
To my mind that is an insane proposition. It is based on a philosophy of
you win and I lose in the argument on who is right and who is wrong. If I
don't agree with your concept, I should be "forced" by the church to adopt
it. That is how religion "enforces" morality. Morality then becomes what
the church says it is.
I feel that my concept of morality is as good or better for my life than any
church's concept. Therefore I don't see how than can force me to accept
theirs. The people who set up the government of this country created the
separation of church and state for this very reason. When members of one
religion tries to tell the members of another religion what to believe, it
leads to war and war is itself insane.
The wars that have devestated Europe and the middle East for centuries, yea
milliniums, were more often brought on by one religious group trying to
dictate mores to another than any other cause. Just look at the Serbs and
Kosovars, the Catholics and Protestants of Ireland, the Moores and Catholics
of Spain, and the Spanish conquistadors who wiped out the religions of
indiginous people in Mexico, Central and South America as well as the
Philippines. Untold millions have died for the "enforcement" of moral
values by one group over another. It's not something I think the world
should continue to allow. They claimed they did it for "spiritual" reasons.
The cry of the Spanish was "The sword and the faith." You can put me down
as a person of little faith from a religious point of view. My faith, in
fact, is downright nonexistent.
Cheers,
Grant
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