True words of wisdom Beet. I agree.
But, THATS NOT WHAT I WAS ASKING.
I was asking…
have any of you ever seriously thought of creating your own religion?
Do you wish to share any particulars about this religion?
For those who haven’t thought about creating a religion but are going to now, what would you make your religion be?
What’s your take?
YES!!
I started thinking about his years and years ago, and it has come through many different phases. first, being young, i rebelled against everything which was any sort of authority. I went to a school where all assemblies were Christian, and so i thougfht it would be cool if we were all pagan and worshipped Thor etc. I think there was a satanist period in there too. This was also due in part to my Art teacher (Mr Larwood, you are the man!) who was into Norse mythology and shiznit like that. But i grew out of all that.
I was then a militant atheist for a long, long time and regarded anyone who held any sort of spiritual belief whatsoever to be superstitious primitives. I had myself envisioned as a crusading prophet who would civilise the savages. But i grew out of that too
Then came Discordianism. How to put this into words…? I cant really. at one time I could have, but that was just me quoting scripture, which is really against what Discordianism is all about. Give me time, and I’ll verbalise
But right now, I’ve gotten to thinking that Christianity, actual Christianity, stripping away the OT and the words of St Paul the Mad, and concentrating on what Christ “said” could actually be a workable system. i dont know what i’d call it to separate it from “Christain” churches who follow St Paul, “Church of Jesus” maybe, but the Jesuits already have that taken.
HVD,
It is a strange coincedence, not too long ago I was driving past a house which caught my attention, more specifically the sign on it that read ‘Masonic Lounge’. After further inquiry into the title I found out that it is a secret (there goes the secret) society of a new political order. They have gone through many names - one of which is the illuminati; which is where discordianism comes from.
Anyway, if you wish to elaborate on your view I would be happy to hear it.
What’s your take?
My current view? Well let’s see, (view is subject to change). basically you take the bible. Tear out the OT. Tear out anything after Luke. You are left with the first three gospels. From here highlight the stuff jesus sadi, “love your neighbour” and all that guff. There you have it. A fully-formed religion ripe for the exploiting.
But before I found it, I’d better check if the BATF will allow it. Otherwise they’ll get all Waco on my ass.
HVD,
interesting, if I get the time I may look into this.
Interesting idea, HVD. The God of the OT is quite different than the God of the NT, and many Christians are only believers because of the NT, and especially the parts you mentioned. The inevitable issues that will come up are that Jesus repeatedly referred to the OT in the NT, and theologians would be quick to point out that he came to “fulfill the law”. Also, without the letters of Paul, it is much more difficult to prove that Jesus came for all of humanity instead of just the Jews. There is nothing in the gospels to discredit Paul. A lot of this may seem ignorant, but these seem to be common issues that would come up with the system.
In my opinion (and as always, it’s just my opinion, ) most of the sexist, homophobic “shitty” parts of Christianity comes from the parts i got rid of. That’s the reason i got rid of them. As for the holes in the theory, well, that’s for the theologians to patch up.
Why make your own religion? I mean WHYYYYY??!
Okay you get your followers, something (i.e. Belife,Fact,Ideology,Person.)that they would be stupid enough to follow, and that it.
Now if you DO get people to follow you, chances are they’re REALLY stupid lonely, emotionally unstable suckers, and what the fun in controling REALLY stupid loneyly,emotionally unstable suckers??
or the worst part is someone kills you and takes over your religion! all that work, gone…sob… err any ways I’ll brian storm with yah…
To Make A Religion
Find something people will belive in, something they will follow.
at most times it something that makes them proud to be in your belife.
proud to be part of your gang and all. Give them something to hide behind so all their wrongs are forgotten, and that they will protect no matter what. This also works in polatics. Usally just a name and a little
belife will do it. for example:
“As Nargraroxz we belive that man was born to be a tree frog and be very very skinny and wise, so as Nargraroxz we stand strong together with our wise leader.”
(stop laughing its not funny, and if your not laughing, then…oh never mind 
)
In short.
A little identification here
A little pride here
A little idea here.
and tah-dah!! you have a really awesome clan of REALLY stupid loneyly,emotionally unstable suckers! congrats!
Religion as in Church, Leader, Belife, and Group, is cwarp. Just like in polatics you got Proud to be ____. You might have fun being the oh powerful Gwakzork! but tell me one kingdom that didn’t fall??
No offence ment to any REALLY stupid loneyly,emotionally unstable suckers!
I’d make a polytheistic religion. Those are cool. They are like super heros with all their super powers and stuff. And they have personality too. Imagining a perfect gods personality is kind of hard. And then I’d have to worry about him being really attractive and him sending me to hell and that wouldn’t be cool. Not that I’m gay or anything but does perfection mean good looking too?
Unless of course he was a she… That would be an even worse problem.
Frozenviolet stated:
I would like to follow your logic and understand the semantics of your post, but statements like “that they would be stupid enough to follow” presupposes that beliefs, facts, ideology, and people associated with religions are stupid. Your post might as well have stopped there. The rest of your post just goes into vivid detail of this ‘stupidity’.
Frozenviolet, I must tell you that I have studied religion for many years. Through highschool, college, and university (not as a major). None of the religions I have studied have been able to sway me to their side or to persuade me of a messiah, or of a God defined by these religions. But I still know that many if not all the religions are based upon VERY important and serious matters of life EVEN TODAY! There is nothing STUPID about a student writing a essay about something that the student is wrong about, it was a try. But that example suffices to say that religions wouldn’t be stupid even if everything they stated and stood for was utterly wrong. But everything they claim, say, and stand for is not utterly wrong.
You are very quick to judge and label about something you obviously do not know very much about. Expressing your opinion about something is one thing, but saying that religions and anyone who believes in religions is stupid, is rude.
Frozenviolet stated:
See this above paragraph? The assumption and implied statement is that religion is about controlling really stupid, lonely, and emotionally unstable suckers. Not very nice to say, you must try to imagine that people who ARE religious may read this - there is a plethora of ways to explain your opinion without being inconsiderate. First of all, some of the greatest people in the world were religious - including Einstein!
Leaders have people follow them. Are people who follow others necessarily stupid, lonely, emotionally unstable suckers!?! Maybe it will help you to look into your past to see all the situations you were in where you did things to ‘fit in’ or other situations where… you made someone do something you wanted them to do, followed someone because they inspired you, went after something you ‘thought’ was right, etc. I hope this brings you to understand that generalizations can be dangerous when made haphazardly.
What’s your take?
cba, lol
your post reminds me of the South Park episode with the “Super happy best friends”, a superhero team with Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Krishna, Moses, Lao-Tse and Sea-Man; they all band together to fight David Blaine
Jesus: “We have all banded together to fight evil. Well, all of us excpt Buddha, who doesn’t really belive in evil.”
Magius, I think the point that Frozen Violet was trying to make, is that if you just create a religion out of thin air - without (necessarily) defering to reality or “what-is” - then you are relying on the ignorance of other people to follow you.
If I said that “Nargraroxz the tree-frog” was the unquestioned leader of the universe - and did so for no other reason than because I can or because I was entirely delusional - than it would have to be indicitive of the ignorant over-credulity and gullibility of the followers to actually follow me. It shows a complete lack of rational thought.
I don’t think the point was ever made that the followers of all religions suffer from this affliction, just some of these more crackpot religions (though how you differentiate is a point to ponder) that reek of the “let’s-make-it-up-as-we-go-along” line of thought.
The Heaven’s Gate cult would be a good indication of that - the people, in essence, died because of their inability to employ critical thought. That is ignorance, and ignorance is just a small step from stupidity when all is said and done.
Are we all on the same wave length here?
JP stated:
It might very well be what she meant JP, I’m always happy to hear an optimistic side. Couldn’t frozenviolet have just said that? Instead of labelling, demeaning, and making a joke of the general term ‘religion’?
JP do you not think Frozenviolets post is quite forceful, presumptive, and out right demeaning? It doesn’t matter what the point of the post is, if you deliver it with such disdain. My previous post was about the delivery and how it obstructed my understanding of the higher point of what was being said.
Jp stated:
Exactly, that wouldn’t work because it is irrational. Some of the craziest ideas on the planet were actually quite rational. Hence, why even smart people make mistakes - logic and rationality only take us so far in reality, but even they lead us to walk into walls sometimes. It doesn’t take much logic or rational to take the things we ourselves do and throw them into an extreme and say that GOD is omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent. There isn’t some great complex and altering theory going on here, for of a quick answer to a question that required some effort of the mind and the body. If it didn’t then we would not have gotten past the stage of believing that lightning is God being angry at us.
Jp stated:
Nothing was said about any ‘crackpot religions’ in frozenviolets post, you see that’s just the problem; there was no specification. But here are some point from Frozenviolets post that logically lead to ALL religions being talked about…
Frozenviolet:
and…
JP stated:
What? I’m not saying that what they thought was right, but how much do you know about the critical thinking used by this cult to come up with the assertions that they came up with. A plethora of great people died for errors in critical thinking, we are making with the best thing we got. This cult you speak of, if I’m not mistaken, was the cult that committed suicide because they believed a comet or meteor was going to hit the earth on a specific day - they wanted to kill themselves before the comet/meteor did. They killed themselves and the comet/meteor never hit.
JP,
I happened to take Astronomy in my first year of University; are you aware of the myriad comets/meteors/other space debri that fly by the earth on an hourly basis? Some of it poses a real threat if it hit the earth and there are many close calls. The government doesn’t warn people because there is no point - so you never find out about the close-calls you live through on a monthly basis. Once in a while if there is a really bit comet/meteor that goes by the earth there is a newspaper article in the news, or sometimes just in Astronomy magazines. What I’m getting at is, if these religious gurus were astronomers as well and did their calculations on a comet/meteor approaching the earth and the figures told them they are doomed by this day and this time; add in some big coincedences that make them believe the comet/meteor has something in common with their religious belief, and you have all the critical thinking you need to draw some really far reaching conclusions, which really the people can’t be blamed for.
JP,
what do you honestly think of Frozenviolets last line in the previous post?
And tell me in your honest opinion if NOTHING in Frozenviolets post strikes you as inconsiderate, not having had enough critical thinking put into it, far reaching conclusion, and an obvious attempt to judge and label religion itself and all those associated with it.
What’s your take?
I’m not arguing that the post wasn’t unnecessarily obtuse, but at the same time I don’t believe that there was any genuine malice there. Perhaps I am overly optimistic - “gullible” even - but I generally like to assume that there is value and truth in many things that are said, once you look beyond the the way it is phrased. I will agree that FrozenViolets post - or at least some parts of it - could have been construed as attacks upon any individual practicing or adhering to a religion, but I doubt, going beyond the terminology, that that is what was intended.
The topic, remember, is about “creating” a religion, not about practicing one that’s existed for many centuries or millenia even. I do not deny that if we accept the words at face value that they seem - as I said - obtuse and potentially offensive, but if we replace the word “all” with “some” (which is what I belive the post was really aiming at) then I would be hard-pressed to disagree with her at times. People do seem to invent beliefs out of thin air - or adopt and arbitrarily alter pre-existing ones - purely to suit their own prejudices and peculiar outlook.
Once again, if I have interpreted this the wrong way (the post was aimed at all followers of all religions) then I will happily rescind all this, but if we transcend the terminology and instead look at the underlying intents and rhetoric of the post then I don’t think that this is the case.
Yes but by extending them - without justification - to these extremes then we can say that we are acting in complete contradiction to the principles of logic or rational thought in the first place. I don’t extend what I “know” into something greater, because I am aware that there is absolutely no basis for it. It’s one thing to say “I believe in God” but it’s quite another to say that Jesus is returning in a spaceship (as the Heavens Gate cult suggested - if I am not mistaken). The first statement may be based entirely in logic and rational thought, the other - in all likelihood - is not. What possible evidence could they have supporting their stance? It’s no small step from the former position to the latter, make no mistake about that. It’s a step into which critical thought is discarded in favour of a slightly perverse fantasy, and marks the boundary between a logical belief and an unhealthy, irrational belief.
I’m simply deconstructing them. They may well have had a great deal of justification for their beliefs - I’m not denying that - the question is whether these justifications hold up to rational scrutiny.
The credulous mind needs little in the way of justifications. In fact, by the time the justifications are apparent, the belief is already there. The justifications come later.
You are free to disagree with me - perhaps now it is I who is being too general - but I don’t think that these sort of religions would exist in a world properly trained in critical thought.
I think you are giving these people too much credit.
I any of these people were capable of doing the observations and equations necessary to predict with such exactness the date at which the Earth would be struck by a comet then - once more - I will be happy to rescind, but I can be fairly certain that these beliefs are not grounded in anything so solid as astrophysics or astronomy. For instance, you and I are aware that there is a great deal of matter flinging past our planet - our pot-marked surface is evidence enough that, from time to time, a particularly great piece of matter collides with it - but would that make you assign a date (arbitrarily until proven otherwise) at which this was to occur? And would you then commit suicide in anticipation of this event? No, you wouldn’t, because quite clearly you are rational enough to distinguish fact and fancy. There is no scientific basis in what these people think, they’ve simply been brainwashed by their own propoganda and their own eventual power.
Once again, if you are extended the fact that there are asteroids whizzing past our planet at tremendous speeds, to the point at which you assume - with absolute certainty - that one of these asteroids in going to impact at a specific date, and commit suicide in anticipation, then I fail to see how the faculty of critical thought has been employed to prevent such an tremendous leap in their conclusions.
I can see, perhaps, how they arrived at believing what they did, though - at the same time - I can also see where their propensity towards rational thought (or lack thereof) failed them.
Yes, it was harsh and I don’t agree with what she said. However, once again, I am prepared to put a positive spin on it and assume that the statement only applies to these religions that are created in complete defiance of the laws of common sense, not necessarily all religions. It was careless, perhaps, to ennunciate her position in the overly-general terms that she did, but at the same time, I’m quite certain she didn’t mean any offence to people who follow religion, yet are still capable of employing common sense from time to time.
Of course, she’s the only one - when all is said and done - who knows what she meant, so I’m going to wait until she clears it up for us before I deconstruct her post any further. 
JP,
your last statement sounds good.
But I do have a few words… 
JP stated:
Just to clarify, I think it has malice because of Frozenviolets last sentence…
Jp stated:
I agree. My whole problem is with the generality of Frozen’s post.
Jp stated:
I agree.
I await Frozenviolet’s response.
What’s your take?
Magius, well my post was more more or less joking about those who create ideaologies (i.e. Religions) for the sake of having power. I’ve bin involved in the whole mess of leaders, and “it’s my ministry” for a long time, so my post was more or less ment to joke about the concept of even making a religion (religion in the sense of a leader, a church and followers oh, and a reason to be in that church) and the whole power game I’ve seen in many churches (actully all I’ve run into so far, but then again depends what you mean by “church”)
My post was filled with overexaggerations which where ment to be funny, but guess we don’t share the same sense of humor. Usally “lets create a religion” posts (the ones I’ve run into) are usally joking around about the concept about even making one.
Well all in all I didn’t mean any harm, stomach ulcers,drain bamage (I mean brain damaged) to anyone who is or isn’t religious. I never intend to “flame” unless someone flames me first that is 
Peace Dude… Oh, and pardon ze delay. 
Frozenviolet stated:
NO problem, this thread I made was meant to be serious and I thought you were being serious, or I should say one of those demeaning jokey but I know what I am talking about ways; so I wanted to clarify that the discrepency wasn’t nice. But you meant it as a joke, and anyone who reads this thread will read your most recent post and know you were joking. Cool. I hope I didn’t come on to hard, but I think you can see where I was coming from.
Frozenviolet stated:
I am interested in your involvement with the mess of leaders and ‘it’s my ministry’, can you tell me more? In the latter part of this quote are you not talking about Churches and religions that already exist? So was your post about religions that exist now? Little confused.
Frozenviolet stated:
Cool, like I said this thread was meant for peoples honest opinion, if you thought it was meant to joke around - then that’s cool, it’s not your fault.
Frozenviolet stated:
Diddo.
What’s your take?
What does diddo mean? 
My father comes from a very religious family (christian; though he isn’t a fundamentalist himself, nor very religious.) He used to be a missionary so from very young on I was involved in many religious and theological discussions (not all about Christianity). Any ways what I mean with “My ministry” is that I’ve always noticed how most Christians longed to have a church, and followers, and how the people in the church seemed so proud of their leader, and how leaders would fight with each other to keep their ministry (church, followers) All in all it seemed just one big senseless power game, and it ended up that it all had nothing to do with their belief at all.
In my latter part of the post, yes I was talking about those that already exist.
Any ways I’ll talk serious of the matter now 
I never really thought about creating my own religion.
Depends on what you mean with “religion”. Is it a church and ministry? or is it a way of living? what? If it’s a way of living, then I guess I’ve bin creating one since I started making choices and forming opinions. Would it be a religion if I shared my way of life with others and we would agree and live the same then?
by the way, I like your quote about loving life and life will love you back.
‘Diddo’ is a word from another language I think, but it’s used in agreement clauses. Ie. I too believe that; or I agree, or I think so too - In the movie Ghost with Patrick Swayze ‘diddo’ is used to signify ‘I love you too’. The way I meant it was ‘I think so too’.
I would just like to say how interesting and amusing it is, to still find individuals persistent in the search for a more meaningful existence, within reality, by adhering to the same old methods of religious worship that have caused so much pain and suffering all around the world.
Religions instil isolation, predjudice and fear in individuals and within communities. Isn’t it about time that man realised that the important common-sense, be good to the person sitting next to you, help each other, don’t be greedy, we only live this life once so lets make it a pleasant one philosophy has got to be the best way to go?
If there is a God (i like to keep an open mind), and it is true that we are all gods Children, then i’m not to sure if i want to meet him.
God has given his chidren free choice.
But do you watch while a child plays with a knife?
Do we sit by and watch one country attempt to destroy another?
And yet this is exactly what ‘God’ does.
Search your minds for the truth. Learn to love and respect yourselves, others and life before you give all your love to a being that may or may not exist. If he does exist then you will be excepted into heaven for being such a gorgeous person and if he does not then you haven’t wasted your time, love and soul on beliefs that have no bearing in the modern world except to those who crave power and money through the exploitation of individuals insecurities about life.
Stay well, live and love…Piface.[/u]