When I was in Morocco, I met two identical twin teenagers. They were fellow tourists, and they said that when they went to a shop, the owner had given them a discount, along with a small figurine. We were told this was because of a local belief that twins were good luck. One of the twins mentioned the contrast in the U. S, where other kids would harass them, asking them about their telepathic powers, usually by punching one of them and asking the other if they felt it. I feel that this demonstrates why it is ultimately okay for people to have varying religious beliefs, even if as a Deist I would say that they are irrational: as long as you aren't bothering, harassing, or hurting someone, then nobody has a right to make you give up those beliefs.
I have no right to say that others aren't allowed to believe in Christianity or any other religion. I have the right to question, to criticize their beliefs and they have the right to do the same to me. At any point, I cannot say that they can't be Christian. But I have a right, a DUTY, to stop them from using Christianity as an excuse to hurt people. When they say that I have to be a Christian, or that someone else can't be gay, or that a child must lose his intellectual freedom in order to make way for Christianity, they have moved from exercising their rights and denying others'.
Because using your freedom to deny others' is one of the most hypocritical acts I can imagine, not to mention the inherent wrongness. People justify TOO MANY harmful practices on the basis of religion. Freedom of religion does not give you the right to harm other people. We have the right to worship freely, to believe freely, to live freely, as long as we do not harm other people.
Religious freedom is as often, if not more often, oppressed for the sake of harming people rather than invoked to excuse harming people. But many time, both are done at once. Many would enforce their Christianity on us, justifying things that would suppress our religion by claiming they are just exercising their religion. Religious freedom is a wonderful thing. It allows for many people to live without fear of persecution. It allows for the free exchange of ideas. It allows for the moral and spiritual betterment of our society. People have and still do die in the name of it. So it is inexcusable the way so many treat it: Using it to justify its own repression.
By Dan Retzer (aka Danny Ray)
Have you ever heard the joke—“Why did the ball roll down the hill? ---well because it wanted to get the bottom of it!” Most of us are like the ball, yet getting down the hill and to the bottom of it is difficult. None of us ever really make it. Since I am a new guest blogger, please allow me to introduce myself. As a family doctor who has signed birth certificates and way too many death certificates, I am someone who on a daily basis knows what it means to “fight the good fight.”
Every morning involves not just fighting the battle between hope and doubt in life, but to frequently waffle between the two emotions as the day goes on. My emotional life parallels the physical realm in terms of the second law of thermodynamics concerning entropy: an orderly system tends to go to disorder unless energy is applied. An ordered life of true hope requires the expenditure of energy.
I suspect I will never ultimately get to the philosophical bottom of life alluded to in the previous joke, but I find the journey fulfilling. Please realize anything I write is from the standpoint of a continuum of evolving concepts in an ever-changing worldview which is currently that of a deist. Have I found the ultimate truth? No, but by being allowed to raise balloons of opinion on this blog for others to shoot holes in will allow me to build a better worldview. Perhaps it can be filled with something besides just hot air? With that in mind, take everything I post with a high degree of suspicion.
Recently, several people in the United States military have called for the inclusion of Humanists in the approved groups to endorse chaplains. However, efforts to do this, such as an amendment to a bill that would called for the inclusion on Humanist and other non-theistic were met with outcries, and ultimately defeated. Like in almost every case, the Christian majority attempted to crush religious freedom. I have hope that they will eventually get recognition by the military, but it will only happen when they realize that times are changing, and all must accept it.
Religions like Atheism, Humanism, Deism, and Agnosticism are on the rise. More and more people are leaving revealed religion in search of something truly in line with their reason. The hate Christians pour on us will only serve to provoke more and more to find the problems with revealed religion. I know my dislike of Christian hatred long preceded and helped cause my conversion to Deism, and I know many others who have told their stories online experienced similar events in their life.
The followers of the various revealed religions need to learn that the only thing they gain by their hatred and non-recognition of use is even more enemies and deconversions. They are hurting people, who have done nothing wrong but choosing to think independently, for no reason but to injure their own cause through the hateful rhetoric and actions they use to hurt us.You think it would be in the nature of Christianity, a religion that claims to believe in a forgiving deity whose son is the Prince of Peace, to at the VERY least recognize our existence without hurting us or our fundamental freedom of religion. While the hatred comes from a vocal minority, it should be the quite majority's duty to at least TRY to stop the suffering caused by the vocal minority. At least then they would actually be following what their religion claims to advocate, and idea that I agree with: That the very least one can do is accept that others think and believe different;y without causing undue suffering.Sources: http://www.religionnews.com/2013/07/22/humanists-want-a-military-chaplain-to-call-their-own/http://religions.pewforum.org/reports
Simply put, an Atheist is someone who does not believe in a God, and a Deist is someone who believes in a God based on reason. It may seem at first that Deism is more dogmatic, as it requires the use of reason as well as a position on the existence of God. However, the processes and ideas used to come to the two religions reveal that Atheism tends to be more Dogmatic than Deism.
I should go out of the way to explain a few things. There are of course Atheists who base their beliefs in reason. However, communist-enforced Atheism is not necessarily based in reason, but is still Atheism. In addition, Dogmatism is not necessarily a bad thing, it can be very helpful for the many people who cannot or choose not to create their own beliefs. I hold the stance that Dogmatism is bad, as it suppresses those who choose to decide within the context of their religion what to believe.
What leads many people to atheism can be summarized by a quote by Carl Sagan: "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". Atheism requires that for something to be accepted as true, it must have empirical evidence. This is the basis for many people's Atheism. While I would that that stance is a valid one, it closes the door to all sorts of spirituality.
A Deist can choose to believe in a afterlife based on morals, one based on becoming one with the universe, or any other afterlife (including none at all) as long it is reasonable to that person. I hold that eternal Hell and Heaven are both unreasonable, as nobody deserves either, but some Deists would disagree. And that's okay! The means by which we arrive at Deism allow for such a thing to occur.
The means by which an Atheist comes to his beliefs would not allow such things. They would necessitate a complete absence of ANY spirituality, because it would not posses the requisite extraordinary proof. It promotes a philosophy similar (but not necessarily identical to) materialism. The concept of needing cold hard evidence for any beliefs, which is what causes many to become Atheists, inherently rules out too many things. The reason behind Atheism makes it far more dogmatic than the actual definition of Atheism!
(Also, I plan on having a Sunday-Tuesday-Thursday posting schedule from now on, but I can't guarantee anything.)
With the recent legislation in Texas, a rather large and ugly abortion debate has sprung up. While I won't get into my thoughts about abortion, I'm going to talk about a specific comment that anti-abortion advocates, mainly of the revealed religion variety, make. They complain that abortion does not ask for the consent of the child, and thus it must be immoral.
But I would ask, do you, the Christian, ask the consent of the child before baptizing it? Do you ask for the child's consent before attempting to sell their entire lifetime's intellectual freedom. Do you ask before you spend years indoctrinating them? I was certainly never given that option, to exercise my right to choose my religion, and was instead FORCED to be a Christian. As yo can tell, I am no longer a Christian, but that is not because I was asked.
You'll always hear of so-called "radicals" attempting to indoctrinate children. As long as it is an acceptable target, we are allowed to recognize that indoctrination is a gross violation of ALL people's intellectual liberty. Most parents fail to see the hypocrisy of hating radicals who indoctrinate while at the same time indoctrinating their own children. Most people see know problems with it, because that is always how it has been. The sky is blue, dirt is brown, and parents indoctrinate their children.
The status quo is unacceptable. We should begin moving away from indoctrination, into an age where all people's fundamental right to choose what religion they follow is not only respected, but guaranteed. This extends to Christians, Muslims, Atheists, and Deists alike.
In June, an article was posted on the Unified Deism website about the inevitable rise of Deism. It talked about the merits of Deism, and how it was better than Atheism and Theism. You can hear many people, especially in major Deistic communities such as Positive Deism and the World Union of Deism, talk about how Deism will inevitably triumph. While I (obviously) agree with them that Deism is the superior religion, its merits alone cannot carry Deism to victory. It will take a massive effort to increase public awareness of Deism before we can even begin to rival even Agnosticism.
If there is one thing that almost every Deist laments, it is the fact that no one has heard of it. The most people know of it is that Atheists like calling the Founding Fathers Deists. Other than a hand full of intellectuals, not too many non-Deists know what Deism is. Unlike Atheism, it is not even a household word. Nobody is going to convert to Deism that doesn't know about it. If we truly want Deism to succeed, people will need to know about it.
Deism has almost always been a religion of intellectuals. Many of noted the necessity of a dictionary when browsing the Positive Deism forums. One of the things that makes Christianity popular is that you don't need to think hard, or be an intellectual. All you need to do is sit in a pew, sing some hymns, repeat some of what your pastor says, and bow you head in silence a few times, and you're saved from eternal damnation. Deism requires that you think hard, question your beliefs, and, most difficult of all, think independently.
If these two things cannot happen, Deism can never become popular. We cannot solely debate the merits of our religion with theologians and intellectuals. We must make Deism accessible to the average person. If it requires hours of research and deep thinking, most people will say "Screw, let's stick to Christianity." Of course, they would need to have heard of Deism before they get to that point. The so-called "Inevitable Rise of Deism" cannot be brought about by doing what Deists have always been doing.
What made The Age of Reason so popular? It made Deism accessible to the people of the time. Of course, now modern readers can barely understand it due to our language changing. We must make similar efforts to move Deism away from the overly-educated and to the common person. Not only must it be accessible to them, it also must not be stereotyped as an 'intellectual elitist' religion, like Atheism sometimes is. We must do our best show the beauty and wonder of Deism in new ways, because clearly what we are doing now is not working.
Back when I was a Christian, I wasn't particularly involved. I went to Church once a month, and always came for Christmas Eve and Easter. I'd had my doubts, but religion just didn't matter to me. I lived my life without really caring about religion too much, except when it was science-related or political. I always supported evolution, which really lead to my fall from religion. Life was simple, I didn't have to care about religion that much.
Of course, now I spend a good deal of my free time thinking about religion. It is simple no longer. I have to prove God, justify morality, figure out the afterlife, and all those things, because without a holy book to guide me, I have to come up with most of my beliefs. Religion is certainly much more difficult when you are a Deist. People don't like having to work hard, when they can just sit and let a preacher tell them what they believe.
It can be hard to get out of the complacency of not caring about religion, but I would certainly encourage anybody who has doubts about their religion to start searching for what they believe. For me and most others, it can be truly rewarding when you get to the point where you truly know, without a doubt, what you believe. It can be a hard journey, filled with anguish derived from turning your back on what you once claimed to have believed. But the end result, be it Deism or any other religion, will allow you discover who you are.
So I say to all people who enjoy the comfort of their chair to the struggle of soul-searching: Free yourself from complacency. In the end, it will be worth it. You as a person and society as a consequence will be better off, happier, and ultimately improved.
No, I am not declaring myself to be the evil person who comes out at the end of time to rule the world. That is known as the Beast, not the Antichrist. The (or, should I say, an) Antichrist is any "spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God (1 John 4:3 KJV)." I certainly fit that description, as do most of you, my readers, because statistically you are a Deist. I wouldn't recommend running around declaring yourself an Antichrist though, because most Christians don't even KNOW what the real meaning of the term is. This in particular highlights a particularly troubling aspect of religion in today's world: too few people actually know what their religion actually is.
Browse enough atheist forums, and you are bound to see this phrase (or some variation of it): Atheists know more about the Bible than Christians do. The sad part is that it is probably true: People call themselves Christians, when none of them have even come close to reading even half of it. The Bible, the very foundation of their belief, is regarded as highly as On The Origins of Species on the lists of "Books Christians Read."
Of course, the reason nobody has read the Bible other than the people who have left Christianity is simple: The more you read, the more you question it. That is why it is only encouraged for the priests, the devout to read it. If you don't even know what is in it, except for the few slogans the Church shouts at you, you can't begin to question it. The amount of people who will leave because they have never read the Bible is slim compared to the amount that will because they read it. I guess we should applaud the Church for it's great strategy. Maybe then they'll stop shouting.
If I were to proclaim that I was a Muslim, you should laugh. I have never even picked up a Koran, much less read one. Nobody should believe something they don't know enough about. You shouldn't believe any scientific theory without at least KNOWING what it was about. In the same way, you should not be able to call yourself a Christian without AT LEAST reading the Gospels. I would say the entire Bible, but then they would start whining that they would have to learn ALL of what they believed to be God's word to Humanity. I can say that if I believed God wrote a book, I would cherish it, because of its inherent value, which would be more than all the things I own, because it is God's direct communication to man, and who on Earth wouldn't cherish it, if the truly believed?
There is something that many people don't like to admit, Atheists, Deists, and other non-Christians alike. There are in fact, good sides to revealed religion. Many, the World Union of Deists in particular, like to go on and on about the evil they promote. While I'm not going to say they don't promote some bad things (the fact that I have never mentioned my religion in person for fear of the consequences is testament to that), they do promote good things.
One of the Five Pillars of Islam is Zakat, which is donations to the poor and/or other charitable acts. While many people in America choose to focus on the evil parts of Islam, it is obvious on further inspection that it is not as completely evil as many claim. When I visited Morocco a while ago, I asked if we should worry about pickpockets, as they were a concern in the parts of Spain we visited on that trip. We were told that even though Morocco is considerably poorer on average than Spain, we did not have to worry about pickpockets because the culture is inclined to give to the poor, and thus there was little need for pick pocketing. Islam managed to impact an entire society for the better.
There are so many charities, hospitals, and other good things set up in the name of revealed religion. They stand testament to revealed religion's ability to motivate people to do good. We, at the very least, should acknowledge this, as it is a very plain and clear fact. However, all these good things can and will exist outside of revealed religion.
Just as we shouldn't kid ourselves into thinking that revealed religion is entirely evil, we shouldn't be convinced that religion is entirely good. If we didn't have revealed religion, good people will still do good things and bad people will still do bad things. The thing is, if we removed revealed religion and put natural religion in its place, we remove from the bad people a means of doing evil, while the good people still have a way to do good. We can have all the good parts of revealed religion (the charity, the good morals, the happiness) without all the bad parts (the bad morals, the means of oppression, the ability to get away with molesting children).
So, whenever you are in a discussion, and Christians point out all the good things Christianity has done, don't ignore them. Acknowledge the truth, that there ARE good elements of Christianity, but we don't NEED all the bad things to have the good. We just need the right people.
Some may object to my use of the word "believe" in the title. Yes, Deists believe. Just as atheists and Christians do. While some use less faith and blind belief than others, all religions are beliefs because we all believe and have faith in our system, whether or not it is back up by reason. Anyways, I'm getting off topic.
Some people have asked me, "Well, what would be the benefits of being a Deist? If I'm not going to heaven, what's in it for me?" I don't like this line of reasoning. I have never though of religion as being about personal gain. I feel that religion should be about the spiritual and mental fulfillment of people within the bounds of reason. For me and many others, Deism is what makes sense to us. That's really why we believe.
Of course, I guess Deism does have more benefits, mostly resulting from the mental fulfillment part. Deism offers a sense of peace and happiness to those who choose to be a Deist. This is not because it is an inherent property of Deism, but because it is an inherent quality of Deists to BE Deists, and by knowing and understanding what they believe without all the baggage of their former religions they can gain all these happy feelings. Ultimately, most people enjoy living their lives without contradictions with the belief system the call themselves and what they actually believe.
Religion used to be a source of pain for me. I held many of my Deistic beliefs that I do now, but I was forced to make that into something that looked like Christianity. I kept shoehorning my beliefs into Christianity, and forcing my self, convincing my self, that I believed in parts of Christianity that I didn't really believe in. But when the time came that I looked up Deism for the first time, I began to realize what I truly believed in. After my conversion process, I knew what I truly believed in, and I didn't force myself to believe in anything. This is why I am a Deist: because it is ultimately what is right to me, and the acceptance of that gives me peace.
I know that I cannot speak for others, but from what I have seen similar things occur to others. By accepting Deism and by realizing that is what they believe, they can gain happiness. We don't need eternal rewards to be a Deist. Just a sense of reason that leads us to conclude that we believe in a God.
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