I have seen people make claims that religion has spurred hatred and wars and all kinds of evil things. Just what impact has religion made in your opinion? If it is bad, tell how, and how things would be better without religion. If it is good, tell what advantages it gives, and how things would be worse without it. Keep in mind, this is NOT a closed debate whether you think it is or not. Please look at my opinion below.
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Accept responsibility for our own creations.
*As I posted on a thread on "Prove God is real"*
The first universities created in the Middle Ages were started by monks. These universities grew quickly and soon there were hundreds of universities across Europe, paving the way for the Renaissance (which many atheists hail as the beginning of the age of knowledge). Technically, if religion didn't exist, those universities run by monks wouldn't exist and the subsequent growth in knowledge and culture wouldn't have happened and Europe would truly be in a dark age. The civilizations that inhabit Europe wouldn't have gotten their start and America wouldn't have gotten its start.
Not just to make an argument for Christianity, Buddhist and Shaolin temples were centers of knowledge in Asia. To say that religion only hurts is taking a partial view. Yes, the towers collapsed because of an attack from radicals and the crusades weren't pretty, but Rwanda didn't need a push from religion to fulfill its genocide. Soviet Russia didn't need religion as an excuse to manufacture nuclear bombs and put on a Cold War, and Hitler didn't need religion to commit his atrocities.
Actually, some of the greatest men in history have been based in religion. St. Thomas Aquinas pushed for advancement of the sciences. Galileo, who certainly believed in God, made the heliocentric model famous. Even Albert Einstein, who didn't follow a certain religion said he believed there probably was a God, just that that God probably didn't take a great interest in us humans.
Even IF, and I say IF, religion is just a creation of man, we have to look at what it is. A creation of man, just like war, hate, and lying. I believe there is a God. And I believe that He is dismayed by our attempts to point the finger for war, hate, and lying - our creations - at something else. I think everyone would do much better to accept the blame and say "I'm trying to do something about it, whether by changing myself or the world around me." At least that is what REAL devotion is trying to do, rather than play a philosophical blame game akin to our system of politics.
Voted for by UnluckySeiko.
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It has it's pros and cons.
Pros:
Religion aided social communication and cooperation by providing something that was common and important to all members. It established basic laws and a code of conduct to both minimise societal conflicts and endorse submission to authority, allowing for government bodies (originally the churches) to easily control the population.
Cons:
Claiming a supernatural element to these laws along with a divine reward/punishment system backfired. Whilst the notion of god(s) was effective in scaring people into submission, it led to wide spread delusion and a lot of unnecessary fighting over who's imaginary friend was better. Due to man's growing knowledge base, the culture was changing but constantly hindered by commitment to old notions of infallible gods, slowing progress. In most situations, religion falied to adapt and was demoted to mythology and forgotten by the people. Surviving religions continue to hinder progress by attempting to carry ancient law into a modern world, and the observance of any fundamental religionist will show that the two don't mix.
Voted for by NoeL-.
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NoeL-
November 30, 2009
The dark ages only happened because religion kept science away from the public, and killed "heretics" that were practicing science outside the church. You're right, without religion there wouldn't be universities run by monks. There would have been universities run by academics - just like today. The Christian monopoly of science in the middle ages was a bad thing, not a good thing.
Weydon
December 1, 2009
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Another 500 years later the Spanish Inquisition began and they would punish brilliant minds for forward thinking.
Yes, religious institutions are capable of good and bad. Who would've figured? It's almost as if they are like every human institution ever concocted.
January 8
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rwanda - do your homework!
you need to research rewanda a little bit.even som enuns have been convicted of complicity in the genocide. here is what wiki says:
The Roman Catholic Church itself has been considered to have played a significant role in fomenting racial divisions between Hutu and Tutsi.[16] The Roman Catholic Church affirms that genocide took place but argues that those who took part in it did so without the permission of the Church.[16]
Though religious factors were not prominent (the event was ethnically motivated) the Human Rights Watch reported that a number of religious authorities, particularly Roman Catholic, in Rwanda failed to condemn the genocide.[17] Some in its religious hierarchy have been brought to trial by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and convicted.[16] Bishop Misago was accused of corruption and complicity in the genocide but was cleared of all charges in 2000.[18] The majority of Rwandans, and of Tutsis in particular, are Catholic
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