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I am religious and believe in free will

71 (27.7%)

I am religious and do not believe in free will

10 (3.9%)

I am not religious and believe in free will

114 (44.5%)

I am not religious and do not believe in free will

61 (23.8%)

Total Members Voted: 251

[RAM]

I think that, if humanity were designed with compatibility with worship in mind, that they would be able to innately discern the correct method of worship in some way. To be certain that, should they choose to worship, they are actually succeeding. Otherwise it seems a bit like building a car with no means to discern the location of the road nor presence of obstacles. Genuine efforts at doing "the right thing" are met with near- effectively certain failure and a tortuous sense of doubt. Wisdom dictates that, given that the odds of success effectively don't change whether of not the effort is successful, that there is zero value in making the effort.

If humanity is not designed to be compatible with worship, it seems rather cruel, and, well, stupid, to expect them to succeed at a task which doesn't match their design specifications.

Now, the exact specifics of such innate discernment of the correct method of worship could be difficult to come up with, assuming that the being doing the designing is limited, especially if the design is supposed to be able to choose not to worship, but it should be possible. A simple mental block to cause them to be incapable of noticing that everyone that sought something to worship found exactly the same thing regardless of their methods ought to suffice... But given the massive range of different methods of worship, many vehemently incompatible, such as whether human life is sacred and must be maintained, sacred and must be offered up in blood rituals, or not sacred at all and it is far more important to die gloriously than to prolong life... Polytheism and monotheism can be two different ways of looking at the same situation, but then some religions ruin that by making direct digs at the alternate concept. Some religions have chosen people and the rest of the world doesn't matter, some have rules against sitting idly by while people need to be converted... it just isn't plausible to believe that humanity falls into the range of beings that can reasonably be expected to successfully worship any one scenario of theology. And if such were the case, it at least rules out the possibility that a sane, or even coherent being designed humanity and intended for them to worship an exclusive religion. religions that are permissive of members espousing the correctness of other religions would still be potentially somewhat viable though...

[Egan_BW]

Of course. Christians say that you already know who you should be worshipping and if you say otherwise you're lying. -_-

[scriver]

Fools, you have no perception! The stakes we are gambling are frighteningly high.

We must crush him completely, so like John before him this Poseidon must die
For the sake of the nation, Poseidon must die

[Urist McScoopbeard]

PPPOOOSSSEEEIIIDDDOOONNN!!!

[TD1]

When some Emperor declares war on you, but you actually don't mind him so send him a sea-food buffet as a peace offering.

[RAM]

Of course. Christians say that you already know who you should be worshipping and if you say otherwise you're lying. -_-

But the what of the people who are on the right path, and have god's assistance to be on the right path, but leave it? And what of the parable of the workers who join at different times of the day? The worker who works all morning but gets too much sun and decides that they really aren't going to survive a life of field-work so heads inside to recover, while someone else works for the evening... They both do the same work but only one gets paid. It is a pretty terrible contract that specifies that you don't get any compensation at all unless you completely finish all of your own contributions. Honestly, I kind of suspect that the best argument against religion is "Just assume for a moment that God is a dodgy used-car salesman.". Like, what if Buddha didn't have a great transcendent epiphany, but just got drunk and stumbled blindly into a wad of transcendence energy and has since being trying to sell the world on their nobility when they are more of a drunken lout who is completely full of it... Would Buddhist teachings actually look any different? You never want to go into business with Darth Vader. Sure, he has the money, and pays generously and on time, but he is beyond reproach. If Darth Vader just swoops in and says "I changed the deal, deal with it." then you have no recourse, you can't even review him as a bad client...

[Rolan7]

So, "separation of church and state", particularly the Johnson Amendment, has been under attack for most of the year.  I'm not sure how I even feel about that.  Churches already endorse candidates if they want to, though it seems most are decent enough to preach the issues instead.  Enforcement is a complete joke.  Are we better off saying it's illegal but allowing it, or being honest and treating churches as the political entities they are?  The constitution demands the first, Trump's pushing for the latter. 

The painful irony is that they're trying to push this through via *tax plan*, but nobody's considering taxing these political churches. 
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/11/10/tax-bills-repeal-johnson-amendment-could-cost-taxpayers-more-than-1-billion/852554001/
^ This is pointing out that political donors would be able to donate to churches (or even "churches"), avoiding tax.  I've always seen churches as somewhat political, but that depends a lot on the individual church.  This change *would* be abused, by churches-in-name-only if nowhere else.

Taxing churches would solve this, and it's something I've always kinda wanted, but I get that that would technically violate separation of church and state.  This change DESTROYS separation of church and state by allowing churches, if they choose, to be tax-exempt lobbying mechanisms.

And I've seen "churches" formed by Libertarians etc simply to prove political points - so I'm not accusing Christians of anything here.  This is (more) about lobbyists than preachers.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The legal confusion that will result from political and religious orgs fusing is an extreme clusterfuck, but I'm actually less concerned about secularism violations. That'll happen, but honestly? I think the churches will break before they can fly. The point that the religious right likes to make about separation of church and state being for the church is to a degree true, and applies here.

They'll lose this influence battle. God is Dead, after all. Politics is way more actually important to people, and so the churches will be the ones that move, the ones that are sworn off by their internal dissenters whenever an election passes (just look at what happened when Trump was elected!), and the ones that lose all relevance to their communities.

I don't want to see the Johnson Amendment repealed, but if it does...bring it on. I'm ready for American churches to get their last hurrah and then accelerate straight into the ground.

[Urist McScoopbeard]

That shit scares me. Devout religious people scare me, and while this blanket statement doesn't apply to everyone, they're essentially psychopaths who care more about pleasing God than doing right by actual human beings. Every interaction I have had with a deeply religious person has held true to that, even people who I thought were my friends have attempted to convert me in the creepiest possible ways--and when they couldn't, stopped talking to me.

Separation of Church and State is very, very necessary.

[TD1]

Truly devout people are kinda crazy. One woman started trying to convert me, and claimed demons were in the Church because a demon-hunter had passed through. There's a fine line between religious fervour and insanity, IMO.

TBF, though, one of my best friends is devout. They're also rather laid back about it, and whilst they've tried to do conversion-like stuff before, they take no for an answer. I think he tries it because Church tells him he morally has to, which is kinda sad. Anyway, many devouts are crazed, not all

[Rolan7]

"Crazy" is a loaded term.  Seeking conversions, in most religions/faiths, isn't unreasonable.  It's *necessary*, if you care for others.  And that's why some faiths prevail over others.  Simple genetics.

Meanwhile, my worship of the (non)-gods of the gaps, believing in the forests I grew up in...  That's not going to take off.  It simply is what is.

I could say that the power is everywhere, that it's where we choose to put meaning.  And then make a meaningful claim that that power affects us return.

That it claims us as we created it, and one shouldn't turn their back on the Lands they grew up in.  Not fully.

[smjjames]

Eh? Genetics determines what faiths prevail over others? That's like, the bullshittiest explaination for religious choice or an explaination of what religions prevail over what and where that I've ever heard of.

If you want to go with "religions have their own spiritual genetic code and the battle of faiths is just an extension of evolution", go ahead and run with it.

edit: Theres also the possibility you're drunk atm and thus not making complete sense.

[Rolan7]

If you want to go with "religions have their own spiritual genetic code and the battle of faiths is just an extension of evolution", go ahead and run with it.

This is what I meant.  The survival of faiths is almost or entirely the result of selection, in the biological sense.  The faiths which survive are good at conversion and resistant to deconversion.  Monotheisms, which offer a single vague answer to the MANY questions of the universe.  Which absorb the many small gods into lesser ones, into one.
*spit*

edit: Theres also the possibility you're drunk atm and thus not making complete sense.

There is also this.

[Egan_BW]

Just because its genetically successful doesn't mean I won't call the obsessive drive to convert people not Fucked Up. Just like there are various creatures and behaviors that are successful in the natural world which I think are pretty Fucked Up!

[smjjames]

If you want to go with "religions have their own spiritual genetic code and the battle of faiths is just an extension of evolution", go ahead and run with it.

This is what I meant.  The survival of faiths is almost or entirely the result of selection, in the biological sense.  The faiths which survive are good at conversion and resistant to deconversion.  Monotheisms, which offer a single vague answer to the MANY questions of the universe.  Which absorb the many small gods into lesser ones, into one.
*spit*

edit: Theres also the possibility you're drunk atm and thus not making complete sense.

There is also this.

Doesn't explain how Hinduism survived despite co-existing with at least one monotheistic religion (not sure if Buddhism counts as a religion or as a philosophy for the sake of discussion) for centuries and I don't think Hinduism is big on active conversion. Though it does have a monotheistic aspect to it.

The proccess of Christianity replacing the Roman/Greek pantheon isn't entirely clear (to me at least), however, some of the adoption was political, especially after Emperor Constantine declared Christianity to be the official religion. Also, Christianity displacing, destroying, and sometimes even assimilating parts of, other religions didn't come about via "which one is better adapted", it was effectively the spiritual version of the zerg since much of the conversion was done at the point of a sword.

Even then, Christianity still picked up a lot of pagan stuff, the signs are everwhere if you know what to look for.

Just because its genetically successful doesn't mean I won't call the obsessive drive to convert people not Fucked Up. Just like there are various creatures and behaviors that are successful in the natural world which I think are pretty Fucked Up!

The obsessive drive to convert people was a critical survival trait early on, obviously.