I think your confusion may be a symptom of the societal perspective that religion is supposed to defy reason, rather than be a consequence of it.
Funny events in anti-woke world
- Thread starter Agema
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"Actually I follow this religion now because it's more convenient." Cool.
We're actually giving religious people the benefit of the doubt and assuming they sincerely believe the religion they practice. Thanks for letting us know it's all performative though.
You're not. You're infantilizing the religious as incapable of making rational decisions, so much so that an example of someone making one is disingenuous in your eyes.
Silly me, I thought one followed a religion because its tenants spoke to you in deeply profound ways and you felt that this message and way of life was one you felt could help you live your best life through love and good deeds. Because they spent time reflecting upon themselves and the world around them, really interrogating who they are as a person and why the want to embrace this faith.
Or more pertinent to the example, choosing to raise one's children in a faith simply because its the same one as your neighbours for the sake of fitting in socially strikes me again as fuckin' weird, but also disrespectful.
One also wonders why anyone would want to remain a religious minority when they can just convert to the local norm and avoid persecution, if faith wasn't an issue.
I actually personally know a couple people that did.
Not going into whether i believe that revelation to be the real thing or not, but it certainly was real enough for them to prompt a conversion.
It is rare but certainly does happen.
A very long time ago, at school, the line taken in RE teaching was 'You might as well believe in (Christian) god because if it's real the repercussions of not believing are severe, but if it's not, what have you lost*?', which, to me, seems not a very good way to approach the concept of belief.
*Sunday mornings.
Pascal's Wager:
Pascal's wager - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Though see the "misunderstanding" section right below the linked part.
Yeah, he looks like exactly the sort to come up with that.Pascal's Wager:
Pascal's wager - Wikipedia
Though see the "misunderstanding" section right below the linked part.
I believe that truly being an adherent of [x religion] and believing in [x religion] are the same thing.
If someone is claiming membership/adherence without actually believing it, then they're just nominally a member/adherent, and it's empty/untrue. And if someone believes in the religion without calling themselves an adherent, then they're just playing linguistic games to avoid a descriptive term for whatever reason.
Obviously nobody reaches the conclusions of the Catholic faith independently. But someone learns about them, reads about them and agrees, then at that point they're converted.
If they just join up to experience the tradition of it, but don't believe it's true, then they're not a Catholic. They're a tourist. If they later become convinced, then they're a Catholic-- and that's the point at which the conversion takes place.
Similarly, if someone calls themself an atheist to fit into a particular group and see how they like hanging out with them, despite believing in a deity, they're not an atheist. They're just calling themselves one for other reasons. If they later stop believing in the deity, then they're an atheist.
No. I believe the thing I said I believe not the thing you said I believe. I assume people follow their religion because they sincerely believe it.
You know, I always knew conservative Christians were in it for the clout and legal perks, but it's still jarring to hear it out loud.
The again, Christianity mysteriously got new prohibitions against masks and vaccines recently, soooo
The again, Christianity mysteriously got new prohibitions against masks and vaccines recently, soooo
Actually, I lean somewhat to Tstorm's view. Religion can be believed in for itself, but for many people it's really a form of community where the metaphysics, philosophy and theology aren't very important. The vast increase in atheism/agnositicism in the West partly represents these people increasingly realising that there is no community advantage to be had in religion - or that they can just get community somewhere else. And of course, a lot of that community advantage of religion was the overt social stigma of being non-religious.
However, I also absolutely reserve the right to point out that those people don't really have faith. And that politicians are one of the few professions where there is still social pressure to appear to have faith. Thus, Nikki Haley.
There is significantly more to the experience of religion than knowledge of the doctrine. Converting to a religion you haven't experienced based on finding the doctrines agreeable would be like calling yourself a fan of a band because you read their lyrics. You don't know the actual experience by reading about it.
We could debate the precise point at which "conversion" has happened, but you're not gonna actually know what it is without participating in the ceremony of it, and at the point you've decided to go do that with the possibility of conversion, I think where you draw the specific line is kinda moot.
Don't you know that taking away my ability to force you into roles you never agreed to is a form of violence against me?!