Just how messed up is religion?

[J0shuaRay7]

The entire planet is kneeling to men, which you're not supposed to do.
Many are worshipping graven images in the form of crosses, which you're not suppose to do.
Everyone is sacrificing children to fire (in the form of hell), which is really bad according to the Old Testament.

What's worse is that worshipping men results in those men thinking they are God and in turn playing God on children, which is just nasty.

Funnier yet they rank sins and place being gay as being worse than breaking any of the Commandments. How do they consider themselves Abraham? They all seem to be designed in the best interest of men and not God.

None of this planets religions actually feels like Abraham. I was born into the Catholic Church and raised First Christian. But every religion seems to be led by men that think they speak for God rather than direct people towards worshipping God.

The early church and people in the early church perceived Moses and the Jews to have horns. Google Catholic Church, Moses, statue, and horns. Largely because everything that the Church was based on opposed the laws of the God of Abraham. So one could also assume that the early church depicted Abrahams God as the Devil and put horns on him. God in the Old Testament was often associated with fire after all and didn't punish with heaven and hell, but rather plagues.

"As I looked, "thrones were set in place, and the Ancient of Days took his seat. His clothing was as white as snow; the hair of his head was white like wool. His throne was flaming with fire, and its wheels were all ablaze." Daniel 7:9

Furthermore, the Catholic Church and everything it stands for is in complete opposition of Abrahams God and His Commandments.

1. “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me.

Depicting Jesus as God completely contradicts this and promotes the possibility that there could be more than God himself. God can't be One when he's split into two parts. Not to mention, the concept of Jesus promotes the notion that people are supposed to kneel to and worship men when in fact that's exactly what God doesn't want us to do. Men standing as a representation of Jesus blocks people from having a direct relationship with God. Not to mention they are portraying themselves in a likeness to God.

2. “You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

Kneeling to and clutching crosses is in complete contradiction to this commandment. It specifically states that you don't bow down to these images.

3. "You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.
4. “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
5. “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the LORD your God is giving you.
6. “You shall not murder.
7. “You shall not commit adultery.
8. “You shall not steal.
9. “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
10. “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”

Christianity allows people to think they can violate any of these laws and be forgiven. And a lot people in the Catholic Church violate them regularly.

Finally, to discuss the atrocities that result from a planet where people are encouraged to be subservient and kneel to/worship men.

1. By promoting an environment where men are encouraged to see themselves as superior many forms of violence are promoted in man's attempt to sustain control on those around them (murder, domestic abuse, child abuse, rape). Most of these horrendous things would not be occurring if people didn't think they had to control something. Unfortunately, God often gets the blame, when in fact if people were actually keeping His Commandments and encouraging each other to keep them and worshipping God rather than other people and items, none of these things would be happening. Instead, everybody is running over each other and I doubt Jesus died for that.

2. Child molestation is the result of men thinking they are God and playing God. But they wouldn't have this in their minds if people weren't kneeling to men and if men didn't think they spoke for God. Unfortunately, men are too stubborn to accept this and thus child molestation within the various religions on this planet will never stop. Without accepting the cause, they can never find a solution. And instead they will only look for different ways to cover it up. When in fact the solution would be to find a direct relationship between each person and God, to stop worshipping men, and to leave judgment to God alone. But this can never be realized because a large number of people can't accept that they don't speak for God.

[mrex]

"let god go and live your own life", mrex 2015 - doomed pagan.

[Hardheaded1]

The OP is an odd miscellany of disjoint Judeo-Christian factoids.

It uses primarily Jewish dogma to impugn later theology of mostly Holy Roman Catholic belief. You reference "First Christian" as if it were a denomination. Do you mean Disciples of Christ or some independent church?

As for St. Jerome's use of "horned" to describe the visage of Moses after the Law was given him, that term was not understood to be literal by scholars between the fourth and eleventh centuries. It was not until around 1050 A.D. that a literal interpretation had begun to be sometimes seen. So, for an entire millennium, there really isn't any horned Moses to be found.

Familiarity with Judaism and Christianity make minutiae like this bothersome to a fraction of people. If we were as learned in the Upanishads or other sacred texts, other scintilla would doubtless also rise to prominence.

The OP focuses on various literalist interpretations of Hebrew law and Christian teachings. As such, it provides little more than a collection of rants that are endemic to literalists. The underlying standard seems to be the veneration of the cult of Abraham, a common point between Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. But, where is the underlying question concerning the existence of the supernatural at all? Where is the reconciling of pre-Abrahamic beliefs?

The catch-all title of "how messed up is religion" is almost so vague as to be pointless. Fashion is messed up. Education is messed up. The ecosystem is messed up. English grammar is messed up. Internet security is messed up. Food production and agriculture are messed up. Animal rights activism is messed up.

The OP is not a critique of religion, but of the Christian religion as seen through the conservative and probably Evangelical interpretation of Christianity. Religion must address beliefs and practices from every sort of culture the world over. It appears to be some call-to-purity diatribe with a few pet peeves about arrogance and child abuse thrown in.

What exactly is the point? A beginning composition teacher would require the essay to go back to the outline and show organization and intent, lest it be dismissed as a rambling rant.

[Bowyn Aerrow]

People do not worship The Cross. This isn't the Golden Calf. The Golden Calf was worships and seen as god itself. The Cross is seen as a symbol of Christ, His Suffering for our sins. Sure people get down on their knees before the cross in Church because the symbol of Christ is pretty much hung over the Altar of most Churches to remind us of Christ and his Suffering, but they are not praying to the Cross, they are praying to God and Christ.

Your problem with the Catholic Church is YOUR problem. No seriously, 1.1 billion other people on earth apparently find the Catholic Church to fulfill their spiritual needs. That is obver half of the total Christian population on earth which makes up 31.5% of the whole population of Earth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rel...opulations lays it out.

The church was formed some 1600 years ago and grew to become a world wide institution which holds sway in every corner of the world and holds the most Christians.

They are doing something right in order to be number one.

Your basic myth-understandings of Doctrine and what people are doing, such as the myth that people are worshiping the cross leads to stupid arguments that have no basis in reality thus makes you look like the moron.

The Church is flawed - true, but the church has changed its ways and doctrine and readjusted countless times over the centuries. At one time the Catholic Church was totally against the idea of a sun-centric solar system, condemning astronomers to death. Today the Vatican owns its own Telescope(s) and many a priest carry degrees in many fields of science.

Proof that the church changes, it may take a long time for it to change, but eventually it does.

The current Pope is laying the ground work to move the church from total anti-gay rhetoric to ease the transition to a gay tolerance/accepting and even giving marriage institution. Its a slow process, but then when you are a billion strong organization with 16 centuries of every behind you trying to change the course of that and head in another direction means overcoming a great deal of inertia.

[Lexington]

What exactly is the point? A beginning composition teacher would require the essay to go back to the outline and show organization and intent, lest it be dismissed as a rambling rant.

Or, even worse, shared on Facebook ad finitum with the word "This" attached.

Lex

[MikeW]

...The catch-all title of "how messed up is religion" is almost so vague as to be pointless. Fashion is messed up. Education is messed up. The ecosystem is messed up. English grammar is messed up. Internet security is messed up. Food production and agriculture are messed up. Animal rights activism is messed up. ...

Humanity is messed up. < That's a period. :eek:

Still, here we are (so far at least), doing whatever we're doing.

[Virge]

I read your post. It's obvious that you're pretty religious and have some string religious ideas based in religion.

But the solution for religion's problems is not more religion, another religion, or more religious gibberish about religion.

The solution for religion's problems is to cut out all the stupid bullshit in it and insert some common sense and reason. Stop discussing Moses, Abraham, Old Testament, ten commandments, and all the rest of it and talk about REAL THINGS.

My capacity to reason and use my brain to figure things out beats the fuck out of any stupid folklore and superstitions written by people in the bronze age.

[LJay]

OP, with all due respect, it is time that you grew a pair and did some serious studying instead of quoting crap. Until then, please don't write back.

[Bowyn Aerrow]

Are you a hateful Jew or hateful Muslim?

My Bet is that he was bible abused as a kid, raised in a home where the 'Word of God' was law and he was constantly told crap that isn't altogether true. That coupled with his sexuality and the intolerance than many churches still have for LGBT all comes together to cause him angst over Organized Religion.

He is a victim of so called 'christians' (those who use the name to justify their brand of hatred) and most likely has lost sight of God.

The sin isn't his, its the others who did this to him.

[Hardheaded1]

I'm not of the opinion that the OP is a victim or that there is any sin involved.

We all try to figure it all out. We all have varying influences that shape us. We all are accountable as adults for our actions.

It's just too easy to claim victimhood when we have every day and new opportunities to evolve. Ultimately, it's a choice.