How would the human race be without religion? I don't think we would have been that much better, religion would be replaced by some doctrine of some kind, the outcome would have been just the same.
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In reply to KaWai:
D.W. GRIFFITH'S - HOLLYWOOD 1916
....I'm not so sure we need RELIGION ? .... most of it is negative anyway :
Wars, hatred , blood shed, totally intrusive rules and regulations, absolute INTOLERANCE towards human beings who are different, lack of humility, revenge killings, honour killings, lack of respect for other people's way or style of life, lack of self-criticism , lack of respect for women's rights, lack of respect for gay's rights, lack of sense of what it means "LIVE AND LET LIVE ', lack of respect for the animal kingdom, lack of interest in our planet, lack of interest in helping the poor, lack of interest in helping the sick, the less fortunate, to intrusive in the matters of education, to intrusive in the matters of governing, lack of respect for individual's
free spirit, lack of interest in the matters of what really , really matters ! ... then I say ... very loudly and clear ... NO THANK YOU VERY MUCH ! ... and keep religion as far away as possible, and as far way from children's formal education .... because it just means...:TROUBLE, IGNORANCE and BIGOTRY !
But I do believe that what we may need, indeed , should anyone be interested then, that is certainly .... SPIRITUALITY !
JUST PURE SPIRITUALITY ... as in PEACE ... with inner peace I believe then comes OUTER PEACE !... all very debatable because after all everyone is different ! :):) .
Tolerance, one of the buzz words of today, is over rated, over used and over exposed. The basic essence of the word has been lost and now means everyone should be able to do whatever he/she wants without consequence. I've watched the term tolerance umbrella the mindset that now I can do whatever I want and nobody can say anything or I can scream - intolerant. ie) If you don't endorse my choice, behavior, vice - You're intolerant.
Since we are posting under a religion thread, I'll tie it back to this. Tolerance is meant to allow for differences not to eliminate right and wrong. The basic essence of religion is that there is a right and wrong. Wickedness never was happiness. There is a supreme creator.
Two asteroids colliding can not create order.
Think of order as cycles or rhythm. There is the cycle of life, seasons, moon, economic, crop, age, day, week, month, year, rise and fall of empires, cycles within the body, respiratory, circulation, etc. and the body even heals itself. This world is not random. It is organized. Somebody is responsible for that order.
Peace comes from finding your place in that order. Peace comes from choosing right principles and striving to improve oneself. Spirituality comes when we connect with the supreme creator on any level.
The creator of this world does not condone wars, hatred and blood shed. I think it is the "beast" as you put it or the natural man who is not choosing the right nor connecting with deity that is the problem. The complete lack of spirituality.
I believe this is a world that desperately need true religion, peace, hope and spirituality. I don't think they can be separated from each other. They are all part of a whole.
Ahem, dare I add Merry Christmas.
In reply to mmbbaa:
The cycles of life that I am now looking at out of the window I can see have come about from the rotation of the earth and how it goes around the sun once a year.
what is spirtuality? How do I know when I am experiencing it?
In reply to Karl Fuler:
I'm interesting to know what does spirituality mean to .... for example you, Karl, how would you personally image it to be ? what does it entail in you opinion ? apart from the fact when you say ' How do I know when I am experiencing it?.....because I can understand what you mean ....
In reply to Galileo's Universe:
I consider myself to be a romantic. At this moment I believe that the talk of spirituality is really that of romanticism i.e. the fantasy notions of the appreciation of our life experience.
From my experience of people in the fashion and music worlds, in general, the higher the ranking the more baseless garbage is spoken about spirituality.
In reply to Karl Fuler:
YES indeed ! SPIRITUALITY is a very big question as put by mmbbaa , not easy to pin down because it is a different feeling to every individual. Having said that .... spirituality, I believe, is about GOODNESS, and that is what keeps us in balance . But goodness is not neccesaryli about the big details but just about the small details or deeds of no great INPACT ! , as I see it ... For instance I can never understand people who are so keen to go to foreign lands ( and that is good by all means, whatever people may think helps to improve our world ! ) .... to go to do some charitable deeds .... but then they have no interest or urge at all in helping their immediate neighbour in need, perhaps because it doesn't sound so immediate or ' great ' enough' or heroic enough ,or to much of 'unnecessary' trouble, whether consciously or unconsciously .
Spirituality means , I think, to be in harmony with Nature, to respect what is there for us to enjoy it and to know that it is not our personal PROPERTY with the right to dispose of as we want or whimsically wish , because to put it simply it just doesn't belong to us alone and it must be preserved for all of us and help to guarantee its
future.
Spirituality, I think, means not to spread hate, malicious gossip , etc . Spirituality means knowing how to take care of the animal kingdom in general , house pets, not to cause them suffering, maltreat them, dump them because we no longer are interested in them or because they are not 'HIP' anymore.....
Spirituality means to treat children with respect,...the same way we adults expect to be treated , and not to inflict physical or mental maltreatment like we see now in many countries around the planet, by exploiting them just out of sheer greed, not caring at all about their wellbeing !.......
Spirituality indeed is all about GOODNESS, however small that deed might be .... because in the end ,indeed, we will know that we have done the right thing , which means also, however selfish that may sound, enjoying to be a better human being and that GOODNESS I call then energy ....... POSITIVE ENERGY ........... and that energy can be spread all around to create more positive energy ..... somehow I think ... " SPIRITUALITY IS ABOUT ENERGY '..... but the right energy ..........
Spirituality does not certainly mean, in my opinion, to make a good deed a let the whole wide world know how good and ' great ' and special we are .... because of what we have done ..... and HUMILITY is indeed the key to spirituality .... that is how I personally see ... it !
Karl , I don't know if you have beign paying attention to the poetry that is being written for the project ... but us I see it...there is a kind of spirituality in the process .... It is all about beauty ..... Yes spirituality in a sense is all about beauty ....a very special and a rare kind of beauty ..... In the poetic sense ........
In reply to Galileo's Universe:
Nice clear answer. Well done. :)
So, how do I get a copy of your book? Anybody that writes this way on, a regular basis, on multiple topics, with such ease - must have a book!
In reply to mmbbaa:
LOL! ... thanks for the thought . IT is that I'm always fascinated by humans :):) ...and perhaps because our arrogance seems to have grown out of incredible proportions in the last century as to truly have come to believe that we somehow are GOD himself, that is why I'm more puzzled about our behaviour in general, of course that's not new, but now we seem to have stretched ourselves to the outermost limit... Take for instance how we as an individual or a commercial enterprise are able to claim to have the right to 'OWN' genes in our body !! ... to use and do with those genes anyway we want to as it pleases us for financial gain ! ... I couldn't think of anything more bizarre and illogical than such a foolish totally ill conceived notion and yet hardly many people seem to be bothered by the fact that a group of scientist have claimed and anointed themselves with the supreme right to claim ownership of the HUMAN GENES simply because they happened to 'discover' them !!!... If for one thing , I think that the word 'DISCOVERED ' is being wrongly applied and falsely manipulated...I would say that they had the sheer luck to have bumped into them ! ... you ' discover ' a friend in a friend you had and didn't know that person was indeed a friend with great qualities.... a GENE , that is another story , a gene is an essential part and a inseparable component of our total make up in the entity called the HUMAN RACE.. it is there for eternity ..... They just BUMPED into them...but never to be own by individuals as in SCIENTISTS or COMMERCIAL ENTERPRISE ... as to treat them as their personal property with the right to dispose of as they financially wish !
Anyway that is what motivates me to write ... after all humans have always been very inspiring and there is always something interesting to' DISCOVER' about their character , motivations and believes ...that is the good part...... that I like ...:):):
In reply to Galileo's Universe:
I second that ... the arrogance of humans multiplying, squaring or cubing in the 20th C... Scares the heck out of me. Is it time that we are humbled? It isn't pretty when God decides that we need to be humbled. Anything but that please!