Sunday School

[fullermingjr]

@TheEncogitationer

“Well, I don’t believe in learning other languages. I believe God gave men different tongues and divided them at The Tower of Babel and that’s how it’s meant to be.”

How very sad!  The woman’s faith system that said that statement… that thinks humanity should be divided this way has completely missed (a) the point of Babel and (b) the nature of man as presented in the text, regardless of one’s belief or non-belief.  Even taking these stories as teaching some kind of moral lessons such as The Myth of Sisyphus or The Myth of Icarus the son of Daedalus, this woman missed the point! Of course, I don’t equate Greek Myths with my faith – I see Christianity as viable (and I know many here do not). My point is this: Even if you took the Babel story as a myth, the point of the myth was missed by this woman. How much more so, for someone like me, who does not take it as a myth. – but that is a completely different topic. Even so, one could tolerate her beliefs and maybe an opportunity may arise where a real dialog could happen.

Of course, you can’t mandate what customers say, as long as they are not threating people physically. If I was told to my face that I was a fool for believing in God, I hope I would have enough maturity to nod and smile. Even Jakelafort responded to me in his response where he included the phrase, “…of course religion is make believe…” but hey, I’m not mad – I’m a believer in an Atheist forum 😉

Even so, customers should not be giving out their tracks unless they strike up a friendly conversation with another customer or even an employee and it’s a personal interaction. I’ve been invited to secular, anti-religious events and activities, especially when I worked at the University of Maryland College Park. When stuff is put on your car, it is frustrating. I just throw it away. I consider it an advertisement like anything else. How many flyers want me to buy this gadget or subscribe to that service – it’s constant and irritating, but I just throw it away.

With all that said, I don’t think it is possible, in a pluralistic society to avoid some of this, including marketing, philosophizing, proselytizing, and the like. However, it can be better managed and I just want things to be reasonably equal. The article showed a problem: the head of an agency not sending out a cultural message (e.g. Happy Easter) but a religious message (Jesus Rose from the Dead). Somewhere is a healthy, policy-driven, realistic approach that can allow the non-theist and the theist to work together.

It is sad to me that there are many people of faith that buy into religious systems that are overtly illogical. I know – some on this forum think ALL religious systems are overly illogical.  However, critiquing weak or inconsistent expressions of faith isn’t the same as conceding that all faith is irrational.

Regardless, thanks for your thoughts!

• This reply was modified 1 hour, 22 minutes ago by fullermingjr.

[Strega]

@fullermingjr No religion is rational by the very definition of the word rational – derived from logic and reason etc.

A religion is by definition a faith based construct, for which belief  is required, not reason.

A Venn diagram of Religion and Rationality would barely touch at their potential meeting point.
I suppose Religion could be arational – that might fit.

Anyway, do carry on 🙂

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