Honour Killing?

I have to take religions as I find them, not what I am told they really stand for. And to me, they pretty well all seem tarred with the same brush. They exist in order to exert power and to ensure their own continued survival. It would be quite interesting to discover what Jesus might think of the present-day Christian Churches, their schisms, their wealth, their hierarchies.

I became sceptical about the Christian Church about 60 years ago when I was taking confirmation classes and nothing I have seen, heard or read since has convinced me that religion has any value for me.

If other folks want to have a religion, that's their right. I just wish that they would recognise that they (like I) just might be wrong.

Ken

Dear Ken,

I have stood back so far from this done in the name of religion business. For what purpose can any religion exist? For the simple minded, perhaps like support for a football team, it allows a sort of fascism to become accepted. For the extremist it can be twisted to allow murder, or any amount of heinous crime. Are such people the exemplars of the real message of any given religion? I think not ...

To my mind, the purest interpretation of any religion does not take a huge amount of analysis to work out that it exemplifies humane kindness and charity of spirit. It is in this light that I can easily say that for myself, I have problem accepting the personal spiritual strength that can be drawn from Christianity. I am no Saint, and fail as any human would, but draw strength from the liberal and kindly moral guidance that can, with a certain applied intelligence, be taken from the Christian Church.

No! I am not going evangelise, but neither am I going to see the Church besmirched in the way it has been as being a supporter of evil in the sense that the best of the Church could not possibly support evil in its true mission.

George

KenM. Just like there are different people, there are different Churches. Good ones and bad ones.

Hey, even in Pauls letters you see good ones (e.g. the Ephesians) and bad ones (Corrinthians).

The thing is to know the good ones that are Biblically-based and don't add or take away from the teaching.

Andrew

I suppose that if a Martian were to beam down to earth one Saturday afternoon from 3pm onwards, and look at the behaviour of soccer hooligans (all of whom would claim to be the loyalest of fans) and even some players, he would go away again at 5pm with the conclusion that the whole point of soccer is drunkenness, abuse, insult and violence.

Would that be a fair or correct view of soccer?

quote:

Originally posted by GFFJ:
Dear Ken,

I have stood back so far from this done in the name of religion business. For what purpose can any religion exist? For the simple minded, perhaps like support for a football team, it allows a sort of fascism to become accepted. For the extremist it can be twisted to allow murder, or any amount of heinous crime. Are such people the exemplars of the real message of any given religion? I think not ...

To my mind, the purest interpretation of any religion does not take a huge amount of analysis to work out that it exemplifies humane kindness and charity of spirit. It is in this light that I can easily say that for myself, I have problem accepting the personal spiritual strength that can be drawn from Christianity. I am no Saint, and fail as any human would, but draw strength from the liberal and kindly moral guidance that can, with a certain applied intelligence, be taken from the Christian Church.

No! I am not going evangelise, but neither am I going to see the Church besmirched in the way it has been as being a supporter of evil in the sense that the best of the Church could not possibly support evil in its true mission.

George

Hi George

I too get irritated by the blanket dismissal of religion on these grounds, and I agree that we need to distinguish between the ideals of religion and the atrocities committed in its name. Still, I wonder if this is in danger of becoming a glib response to a glib accusation - after all, Jesus himself is reported to have said "by their fruits shall ye know them", or words to that effect, in another language. Again, one could say the same thing about Communism - the ideals were fine and admirable in the abstract, but once we got our grubby hands on them...

This makes me wonder if there is something intrinsically dangerous about *any* ideal - no matter how noble it may appear at first sight. Maybe our fallible human nature is best kept away from such dangerous ideas, which lure us into thinking that any sacrifice will be worth it, just as long as we can bring about "heaven on Earth", or whatever the ideal prescribes.

Like you, I'm not trying to convert anyone (God forbid!!) but I think that the above line of thought accounts for the appeal of Buddhism, which insistently rubs our noses in the here and now, with all it's mess and disappointment - and then makes the (apparently) surprising claim that just this mess is already the state of enlightenment, if we could just bring ourself to realise it. I'm sure that some presentations of Christianity (and the other great religions) make the same point, so I'm not claiming it's exclusive to Buddhism. But I think it's the key point that's lost when one is seized by an ideal, and becomes prepared to do anything in its name.

Regards
Nigel

quote:

No! I am not going evangelise, but neither am I going to see the Church besmirched in the way it has been as being a supporter of evil in the sense that the best of the Church could not possibly support evil in its true mission.

George,
Who has ben besmirching the Church in this way? I can't see any example in this thread. Individuals or groups using their religions as an excuse for evil, yes, but not the religions themselves.
Ken

Dear Ken,

I am not going to bandy about with accusations, and I suppose my use of the word besmirched was too strong in the context of this particular thread, but really my point is this.

Individuals can easily see through the "institutional aspects" of the major religions, and work out what the "thrust" of it is. Thou shall not kill, seems an immutable law in the Christian Church. There are many doctrinal aspects which are real enough, which one may well think of as being plain daft, and applied at a later stage by scholars, such as the whole thing with the Roman Catholic view of contraception. In light of the need to control world population, which given the wonders of modern medicine is not constrained by the forces of nature, then I think it reasonable to take a personal view on how seriously to take the Church Dogma on it.

I doubt if the result of that would be eternal damnation!

What does get me is that those who, for whatever reason, do not want to confront the deep questions posed by the major religions of the world, then have a tendency to damn religions for what is done by those who profess to do extreme and hateful things in the name of this religion or that. It seems like an attempt to muddy the water, by putting together two quite discrete issues.

What is the reason for a given religion, and what evil may be done by evil people, who claim to act in the name of that religion.

So perhaps, particularly in the context of this thread, I was too strong, but as the point does not fit any poster here, it is also clear that no poster should feel that I am pointing this out directly to him or her.

ATB from George

George,
Thank you for clarifying that. I agree fully that the basic tenets of all major religions (at least, the ones with which I am familiar) are admirable. I took issue with your "besmirched" post becuase it was addressed directly to me.
May we now consider this particular point closed?
Ken

Dear Ken,

I hope we can call that "closed." No, I was wrong in the way I responded. I did not express well what I was trying to say, and you were quite right to cause me to clarify. Sorry for that.

George

quote:

Originally posted by Andrew Randle:
Just like there are different people, there are different Churches. Good ones and bad ones.
The thing is to know the good ones that are Biblically-based and don't add or take away from the teaching.

How do you rationalise the vast wealth & hypocrisy of the Catholic Church; surely they could end hunger single handed?
What about the CC in Africa spreading mis-information about condoms due to dogma, & resulting in many more infections & deaths due to HIV.
For me Nigel has hit the nail on the head ...

... the ideals were fine and admirable in the abstract, but once we got our grubby hands on them.

555,
Yes, there is vast wealth and vast hypocrisy but there is also a vast amount of good done by the Roman Catholic Church. I don't find it possible to generalise, even as a non-believer.
Ken

I agree generalisation is unhelpful & of course churches do good work.

However of the two examples I gave:

Wealth/poverty hypocrisy is at the core of most Christian churches,
so it's widespread & not really a generalisation.

The African Catholic church's condom misinformation campaign had a massive effect on the number of AIDS deaths in Africa & was a specific event.

I think this unacceptable behavior & hypocrisy merits a challenge,
partly because of the self perpetrating nature religions.

IMO the sum of good/bad effects of religion on humans & the planet is negative.

.............. and back to the original story where the girl was murdered by the father for loving an English soldier, hey thats not enough the girls mother has now been murdered........................

Story

That is a truely shocking & terrible development.

Equally shocking is almost 700,000 Iraqis have died since the American-led invasion of 2003. According to British medical journal Lancet, as of October, 2006, it was thought that 654, 965 dead was an appropriate estimate, with a range from a low of 392,979 to a high of 942,636.

Dear All,

I really do not know what to add or say in response to the article.

I will ask a simple queation to which there is no simple answer.

Why is it that in so many Patriarchal Societies men are terrified of women such that murder is more acceptable than admitting you may have a problem.

Is male vanity that fragile in these societies?

To actively seek out and murder your wife (allegedly) after you murdered your daughter is beyond my comprehension.

regards David

David

Clearly it is complex but I would say that it is purely about Control and dominance. Everything is black and white unlike in many societies/religions/belief systems where there is grey. Grey is harder to control.

Diccus