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by Mr. McClister on October 11th, 2006

Mr. McClister

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What religion (or lack of religion) do you follow and why?

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  • by Stableboy on October 16th, 2006

    Stableboy

    So here's a late response (I was off the grid, sorry): I think religion gets a bad rap. The root of the word (Latin "religio") means "to bind together", and the best definition I like is "that which joins the parts with the whole".

    Religion is about wholeness: its about realizing and expressing wholeness in life. None of us is separate from humanity, none of us is separate from the environment, from the ecosystem, from the infinitely interwoven complexity of life and natural process. And if there is a God in the traditional sense, we aren't separate from him/her/it either.

    But there's a problem with humans: we keep getting caught up in believing that we are separate little isolated packages of "self", and that makes us behave in selfish, unhealthy, and destructive ways.

    Religion is about undoing this nuttiness and awakening to our relationship with the whole. Different religions have different ways of talking about this "redemption": the reclamation of the part by the whole. Ultimately, true religion isn't about accepting a lot of superstitions or standing up for a complex set of ideology, its about being yourself in the truest sense -- which is connected to everyone else and everything else.

    I think you can be an atheist and still be religious: if you have an intuition of the interconnectedness of everything, or even just a conceptual understanding of the connections that science discovers, that's a kind of "religio". (Carl Sagan is an example of such a religious atheist. Maybe I'll come up with a live example after closing the browser :-)

    Just don't use it to beat people up with, please.

    Comments

    • This in no way answers the question...

      Mr. McClister

      by Mr. McClister on October 24th, 2006

    • Good point.

      Stableboy

      by Stableboy on October 24th, 2006

    • I really wish I could rate you because this is the most beautiful description I have ever read about what religion is supposed to be. Sometimes it feels like humans befoul anything we touch. Religion seems to be an early example of that.

      Darkling

      by Darkling on October 25th, 2006

    • Darkling: thanks for the note. Mr. McClister: you're right, it doesn't answer the Q. I think I forgot the question after reading all the anti-religion postings.

      Stableboy

      by Stableboy on October 25th, 2006

    • Logical, rational and quite sensible.

      Anonymous

      by Anonymous on March 11th, 2007

    • Nice answer, Hasntbeen. What happened? ;-)

      Marky Mark

      by Marky Mark on February 9th, 2012

    • This is the upside of religion. If that's all there was to the topic, we could rest easy. The downside is, of course, considerably darker.

      I suspect it was written to challenge the many one-sided anti-religion views on the question, and so it doesn't bother with the downside.

      And, while it is true that religion at its best is about the "enwholement" of life, the undertaking is distorted and thwarted by the fascination with mythology and the lack of disciplined and sound methods for getting the job done. In short, good intentions are hampered by a lack of understanding and effective tools.

      HasntBeen

      by HasntBeen on March 22nd, 2012

    • Nice one again HB.

      no_one_special

      by no_one_special on March 27th, 2012

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