For people who are working to help reduce animosities and hostilities across belief divides

[2ndpillar]

I want to review and update my thoughts about this again. I see unprecedented worldwide disasters ahead if the practice of dividing people up into groups and categories defined by beliefs is not widely and thoroughly discredited very soon. No matter what any of us do, it might be too little too late, but we can try. Some ideas about what anyone can do who wants to are:
- Learn to be a better friend to more people.
- Practice friendship and fellowship across the widest belief divides, including liberal/conservative divides within each religion.
- Practice and promote community service online and offline.
- Learn more about the stories and communities of all the religions.
- Read heartwarming stories by and for followers of each religion.
- Stop making up excuses for indulging our worst impulses, and maybe openly denounce that practice sometimes, without pointing a finger in any particular direction.
- Stop thinking of people as being divided into groups and categories defined by beliefs, and maybe openly denounce that practice sometimes, without pointing a finger in any particular direction. For example, stop thinking of people as “theists,” “atheists,” “Abrahamics,” “non-Abrahamics,” “fundies,” “lefties,” even in roleplaying games. Think of the religious labels that people wear only in terms of their association or identification with religious or non-religious communities or societies, and not as if it tells us anything about their beliefs.

If anyone has any other ideas about what anyone can do who wants to, I hope they will post them.

Maybe one should call out evil for being evil, and stupid for being stupid. It will probably take your "worldwide disaster" to cut down on both categories.

 

[Jim]

Maybe one should call out evil for being evil, and stupid for being stupid.

Maybe, sometimes, without pointing in any particular direction, or else pointing in all directions at once. Not too much though. I’m looking for the right balance.

 

[Revoltingest]

I feel like it would be dishonest for me to pass over this without telling you my thoughts about it. In terms of my ways of thinking, I do think that what everyone is searching for is in a personal relationship with God, and that people sometimes do substitute self worship in the place of worshiping Him. Only, for me that has nothing to do with anyone's ideology, or the label they put on it. I've seen examples of what I mean by self worship in people preaching from the Bible that they never read. More specifically, you don't look at all like a deluded narcissist to me. What you look like to me most of all is my favorite example of someone doing the kind of forum community service that I would like to practice and promote..

I've never met anyone who worships oneself....unless it means to be self-centered,
narcissistic, & selfish. But that would apply to both heathen & believer alike. So
I'll stick with no one ever actually worshipping oneself...you know praying to oneself.
Personally, I've never believed in or sought out any gods. I just don't feel the need,
find it reasonable, or see the use in it for me. (Useful to others....sure, I can see that.)

 

[Jim]

So
I'll stick with no one ever actually worshipping oneself...you know praying to oneself.

Well ... sorry to be the one to tell you, but actually, I do that.

 

[Revoltingest]

Feel free to unleash your "righteous wrath". It will only come down upon your own head. You have apparently eaten from the tree of good and evil, and determine what is righteous and evil in your own mind. The result is that you will surely die (Genesis 3:4).

Genesis 3:4 4"You will not certainly die," the serpent said to the woman.

Worry not.
My "righteous wrath" is pretty lame by deity standards.
At its worst, it's just an insulting limerick.

 

[Jim]

I think that the time will come, possibly in a few more generations, when a person will no more dare to say that they wouldn't trust anyone who is not of the same religion or doesn't have the same worldview, than they would dare to say that they wouldn't trust anyone who is not of the same race or nationality. In fact, that might even be true now in most of society outside of Internet forums and some other MMORPGs.

My kid gloves are off on this issue.

 

[Revoltingest]

Well ... sorry to be the one to tell you, but actually, I do that.

Well, everyone here (including me) knew that you are one strange duck.
Woe unto forums with too many neurotypicals.

 

[Jim]

As I’ve said, one thing that I think needs to happen is for people to stop thinking of people as being divided up into belief categories. That needs to be discredited as widely and thoroughly as race categories have been, so that no one would dare to say anything about a group or category of people defined by ideology that they wouldn’t say about a race of people. Another thing that I think needs to happen is for people to get to know the stories and the communities of the religions across the widest divides from theirs, from their point of view.

 

[Jim]

I’m thinking now that part of working to reduce animosities across belief divides needs to be better ways of addressing the wrongs that have been done, and are still being done, in the names of religions and God. It isn’t enough just to say that belief in God is not the problem, so now we can all kiss and make up. We need to directly and openly address the problem of wrongs being done in the names of God and God-fearing religions. If belief in God is not the problem, if belief in God is not the reason for crimes against humanity in the name of God, then what are the reasons, and what are God-fearing people doing about it, besides making up excuses for God?

 

[Jim]

Now I’m wondering how much attention to pay to evil, unhealthy activities in an Internet forum where I’m posting. It might be better to just ignore them and stay away from them, but I have a gut feeling (men don’t go by irrational, unreliable sissy feelings like women’s intuition, we use manly “gut” feelings) that those activities need to be openly denounced somehow, sometimes. My spiritual teachers overlooked people’s faults individually, but they openly denounced their evil behavior in general terms. I’m not sure though if that was something they were modeling for us to do or not, and if they were, I’m not sure that I understand it well enough and that I’m in the right place and position to try doing it myself.

No, in talking about evil and unhealthy activities, I’m not talking about jokes wisdom about zippers and - never mind.

 

[Jim]

The reason I'm talking about evil and unhealthy activities in this thread is because the activities I have in mind are activities that help perpetuate animosities and hostilities across belief divides.

 

[Jim]

I said above that I think part of what we need to do is directly and openly address the problem of wrongs being done in the names of God and God-fearing religions. If belief in God is not the problem, if belief in God is not the reason for crimes against humanity in the name of God, then what are the reasons, and what are God-fearing people doing about it, besides making up excuses for God?

My answer to that is there might be many reasons for the wrong things that people do in the name of God, and the reason that they say they're doing it in the name of God is because that's the best excuse they can think of. Part of what followers of God-teachers are doing about that is denouncing those wrong things, denouncing the practice of using God as an excuse for them, and practicing and promoting better attitudes and behavior in their own religious communities.

 

[Jim]

Now I think it isn't even true to say that belief in God is not the problem. I think that some ways of believing in God are part of the problem. In fact, part of it might be what I've been discussing in another thread, wearing the label of a religion without being immersed in its story and community life.

 

[Jim]

Part of what I think needs to happen, to help reduce animosities and hostilities across belief divides, is for people who are following divine messengers to do whatever we can, not only to help stop wrongs being done in the name of religion, but also in promoting our messages to avoid encouraging the kinds of belief that facilitate that, and maybe even to denounce those kinds of belief. One example of what I see as a wrong kind of belief is believing whatever a faction's propaganda says about what its scriptures say, without any fact checking. Also, promoting a religion as a system of beliefs and practices. We need to promote our religions by telling their stories and inviting people into a community life inspired by those stories.

 

[Jim]

Now I’m thinking that I might be making things too complicated, and I want to approach this differently. I’ve been thinking of reducing animosities across imaginary belief divides as an urgent need, to avoid unprecedented worldwide disasters. Now rather than thinking in terms of reducing animosities, I want think of it in terms of increasing fellowship and cooperation across the widest divides, and being part of a movement in that direction. That could be by looking across the widest belief divides for examples of religious or non-religious communities and their members involved in some of the same kinds of community service or economic and social development that I’m involved in, and learning more about what they’re doing.

 

[Workman]

Now I’m thinking that I might be making things too complicated, and I want to approach this differently. I’ve been thinking of reducing animosities across imaginary belief divides as an urgent need, to avoid unprecedented worldwide disasters. Now rather than thinking in terms of reducing animosities, I want think of it in terms of increasing fellowship and cooperation across the widest divides, and being part of a movement in that direction. That could be by looking across the widest belief divides for examples of religious or non-religious communities and their members involved in some of the same kinds of community service or economic and social development that I’m involved in, and learning more about what they’re doing.

I like you Jim, and nothing else will make me think any different of you!..why because your intentions of doing is what covers your judgmental thoughts..what is your history in your Love life? If you don’t mind me asking...

 

[Jim]

I think we need to be clear about this in our own minds: Promoting alienation across any lines dividing people into categories, including categories defined by ideology, is an inexcusable, evil practice, and no less so as a form of social interaction or entertainment.

 

[Jim]

... what is your history in your Love life? If you don’t mind me asking...

Sorry that I forgot about your question. I’ll answer it here: Nobody here understands me!

 

[Jim]

Now for the first time ever, I see some possible sense in thinking of belief in God as part of the problem, and denouncing it and fighting against it. I think that some popular ways of believing in God are part of the problem, and do need to be denounced. Now I can see denunciation of belief in God as a community service, if it’s done in that spirit, as a service to humanity, and if it’s done honestly and responsibly. If it’s done that way, I see it as part of what is needed to reduce animosities and hostilities across religious divides.

 

[Jim]

One of the ways of believing in God that I might want to denounce is believing in a God whose existence can be proven.