I hope this happens to all Abrahamic religions. Scratch that, I hope it happens to all organized religion. It had its place in the development of human society, but we are past the point of needing angry sky-man to scare us into being nice to each other. It's possible to teach kids to have a moral compass without fear of divine retribution.

[–] undergroundoverground@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I believe it will, as you can see accross the world that eternalism is crushed beneath the weight of high quality education, delivered on mass.

The problem is, capitalists love what Christianity metastasised into.

If anyone want to see the effect modern Christianity has on people, you won't have to look further than the west indies, during the abolition of slavery in the British empire.

Obviously, they wouldn't let aboloshionists anywhere near the slave plantations of the west indies. However, the slavers would allow missionaries. The rational from the missionaries being that once the people kept as slaves became Christian, the slavers would have no option but to let their fellow Christians go.

However, the enslaved converts didn't go to the slavers, demanding their freedom. Bizarrely, vast numbers of them seem to conclude "oh well, as this is only temporary and I'll have the rest of eternity to enjoy, there's no need to rock to boat here. So, I'll settle down and be the best slave I can be, in service to God."

Crazy huh?

When we think of the vast differences in the world religions, you can only imagine how fortunate the rich and powerful must have felt when that specific version of that one specific religion became the biggest on the planet. They must have thanked their lucky stars when they found that out.

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[–] Sauerkraut@discuss.tchncs.de 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I grew up Christian and I still find myself occasionally praying and wishing I still had faith... But it just doesn't seem to add up. If religion was real, why is there zero evidence of anything divine? If Christians are full of God's holy spirit then why are they so hateful and ignorant? Millions of German Christians cheered for the Nazis and now they are doing the same for the Republican fascism.

[–] lath@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Divinity might still exist. Also it's we who might be self-inflating our importance to it.

Bigass universe out there, trillions of known galaxies and less than a universal second since we gained consciousness.

It's like a culture of microbes in between your ass cheeks yelling at what they consider to be the sky because you're not paying attention to them. Make the ass itch though and someone might just scratch it.

[–] CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I was rewatching Community again and got to the Starburns funeral episode. Basically, the study group manages to start a riot and destroy the school, yada yada yada.

Anyway, prior to the riot, each one in the study group is asked to say some words about Starburns, and they end up trash talking the school. We get to the Christian mom of the group Shirley.

When asking her to come up to say her piece, the Dean says something along the lines of "What about you, Shirley? I think we can all use a little bit of Jesus during this time."

Now I've seen this episode....countless times and I highly doubt that Dan Harmon actually meant this to be a critique of religion but it was the first time it really hit me that this must have been how kings and dictators use religion to placate society. How useful it would have been to use an invisible, all knowing, all powerful god.

[–] Forester@yiffit.net 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm sorry that you were raised Catholic.

There shouldn't be a marriage of church and state, with that said, there are sects of Christianity that actually follow Christ's teachings and not the myriad laws and interpretations added over the ages though they are rare.

[+] solsangraal@lemmy.zip 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

[deleted]

[–] Forester@yiffit.net 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (10 children)

Greek Orthodoxy, Ethiopian Orthodoxy as well as the Coptic Christians

Much higher emphasis on taking care of people and being a caring person.

[–] PugJesus@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Not sure that's true. Christianity is pretty inherently evangelical. That's one of the big reasons why it spread so far.

[–] Forester@yiffit.net 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

If you want to have a historical discussion about this I would be more than open to that. I have spent many years studying abrahamic religions. The three sects of Christianity that I have mentioned are all prior to romanization of the church. The Catholic church is the foundation of almost all sects of Christianity, but the Catholic church is itself a splinter group from the original church that was a sect people who still thought of themselves as Jews and were not very open to outsiders. See the whole Jew versus gentile discussion in Acts. But the long of the short is that the Roman Catholic Church did not become a thing until roughly 200AD. And it was only after that point that it became the monster from the meme. Prior to that it was the religion of the poor and downtrodden because it promised a better life after you died. Which was in direct contrast to the Roman religions where you had to pay in to get to heaven.

[–] PugJesus@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (5 children)

Which was in direct contrast to the Roman religions where you had to pay in to get to heaven.

I'm about to go to sleep, but that's not even close to correct.

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[–] Mubelotix@jlai.lu 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

In France almost all churches were built on pagan sites, after civilians were massacred

[–] Sauerkraut@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

In the US we built them where we genocided the native populations. God was apparently asleep or hiding during every genocide his followers participated in.

[–] Mubelotix@jlai.lu 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

What soldiers used to say in France to convince themselves that they did nothing wrong was that if you killed an innocent they would go straight to the paradise and have a good time. Therefore you could kill anyone. They massacred entire towns of tens of thousands and still as of today, the Church commemorates these events as the right thing to do. They even write songs to brag about these great croisades

[–] Sauerkraut@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 1 year ago

Damn, that is heart breaking. Speaking of France, I am a bit jealous that they have the constitutional right to freedom FROM religion. That is kind of amazing, both for the people, the government, and the religions themselves. Religion and politics should never, ever mix. To do so corrupts both the state and the religion. (Just my two cents)

[–] RootBeerGuy@discuss.tchncs.de 17 points 1 year ago

Sounds like something a heretic would say...

[–] LarmyOfLone@lemm.ee 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Religions spread through cultural genocide

[–] PlexSheep 8 points 1 year ago

Not only through that: Children taking on (or being taken on) the beliefs of their parents.

[–] Imperor@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

I got a fever and in the thumbnail on mobile Jesus looked like a gun.

[–] dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Also, don't forget the systemic "borrowing" of local traditions in an effort to ease conversion:

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