Theophobia

[barracuda]

Yes, but Muslims and Jews didn't bring the Bush clan to power in this country, the Christian right did.

ALL of those groups brought my political leader into power.
-- And wait wait wait... you are saying that AIPAC et al didn't love Bush? get outta here.

Go research the Jewish voting demographics versus Christian fundie demographics and get back to me.

EDIT: I'm talking about the US. I don't even know what Canada is.

[American Dream]

Here we get into the part where faith can conflict with critical thinking, as faith does often lead well-intentioned people into congress with problematic people and ideas, don't you think?

Sure. So does money. So does sex.

You are missing and/or avoiding the point- faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

The desire for money and sex can undermine critical thinking but this is not the same as faith in things unseen...

[beeline]

.

Just to be clear, I didn't say I was a Buddhist, just that I respect the philosophy. And furthermore, I respect the philosophy of Christ, whose main message was 'do unto other as you would have done to you.' Words to live by.

However, where most people that I've come across go wrong is blind, unquestioning faith in their particular sect's leaders, whether it's the Pope or James Dobson or the Dalai Lama or David Koresh. Somewhere they cross over the line from having faith to being a cult member. And that goes for any religion, really, when you get down to it. "Blind faith will get you killed."

[Canadian_watcher]

Here we get into the part where faith can conflict with critical thinking, as faith does often lead well-intentioned people into congress with problematic people and ideas, don't you think?

Sure. So does money. So does sex.

You are missing and/or avoiding the point- faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

The desire for money and sex can undermine critical thinking but this is not the same as faith in things unseen...

you keep changing what you want to hear from me.

Are you breathing?
Are you sure I'm out here, typing this?
What makes you like one food more than another?
Does your mother love you?
Is there actually an oval office?

[American Dream]

Here we get into the part where faith can conflict with critical thinking, as faith does often lead well-intentioned people into congress with problematic people and ideas, don't you think?

Sure. So does money. So does sex.

You are missing and/or avoiding the point- faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

The desire for money and sex can undermine critical thinking but this is not the same as faith in things unseen...

you keep changing what you want to hear from me.

Are you breathing?
Are you sure I'm out here, typing this?
What makes you like one food more than another?
Does your mother love you?
Is there actually an oval office?

You still seem to be avoiding the point- that faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

[Canadian_watcher]

You still seem to be avoiding the point- that faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

I get that you think that.
I personally believe that that is wrong.

[norton ash]

http://rabble.ca/columnists/2010/05/culture-wars-commoners-versus-end-timers

Culture wars: The commoners versus the end-timers
By Murray Dobbin | May 17, 2010

If you have ever heard the Christian end-timers (who welcome Armageddon and The Rapture that follows for them) defend Israel and hope for an all-out conflagration in the Middle East you could almost be forgiven if you dismissed them as marginal whack-jobs good only for a kind of black humour entertainment.

I said almost forgiven. Because as Marci McDonald points out in her new book, The Armageddon Factor: The Rise of Christian Nationalism in Canada, if you don't take these people seriously you may be quietly contributing to the demise of democracy and all the social democratic programs it has created in the past 50 years. (See her 2006 article on the subject here.)

Stephen Harper takes them very seriously, to the point where he has encouraged and facilitated the rapid buildup of a powerful Christian right political machine on Parliament Hill and beyond that is getting its way more and more with the Conservative government. The way McDonald explains it, Harper suffered a serious erosion of support from the neo-liberal crowd when in 2008 he buckled to NDP and Liberal pressure to spend billions to stave off a serious recession -- and brought the country its worst deficit situation in decades.

To replace that part of his core vote Harper had to reinforce and activate the other half: the Christian right. Attacks on science; excluding abortion from his maternal health program overseas; an escalation of his assault on women's equality; more attacks on human rights institutions; the continuing get-tough-on-crime agenda (including a new law eliminating the concept of a "pardon"); a bare-knuckled assault on the godless CBC; the most fierce pro-Israeli policy of any western country and his general contempt for the institutions of democracy, all play to this extremist Christian constituency. And so do Harper's massive tax cuts because they effectively starve government.

Stephen Harper, Stockwell Day, Preston Manning, The Christian and Missionary Alliance.

The Fellowship, The Family, The C Street Group.

It's not a 'phobia' to hate and fear people out to do you harm. Or to dislike the selfish, racist, irrational suckers with a bullshit persecution complex who keep fascists in power.

[barracuda]

I do though believe that there *is* some guiding force of the universe and that our ability to see past the ends of our noses and react as often as possible out of courage and love rather than fear.. That's pretty much much spirituality in a nutshell.

Again, C_W, I ask you, is this your faith? I'm just wondering so that I may adjust my phobias accordingly. Also: that seems pretty vague.

[Stephen Morgan]

Here we get into the part where faith can conflict with critical thinking, as faith does often lead well-intentioned people into congress with problematic people and ideas, don't you think?

Sure. So does money. So does sex.

You are missing and/or avoiding the point- faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

The desire for money and sex can undermine critical thinking but this is not the same as faith in things unseen...

You think they get into government by believing in invisible sky people? Might help if the invisible sky people believe in them, I suppose, but otherwise no. They get in there by being ruthlessly pragmatic and entirely self-absorbed. Faith, and even belief, don't come into it as anything more than a pretence.

Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.

[norton ash]

Again, C_W, I ask you, is this your faith? I'm just wondering so that I may adjust my phobias accordingly. Also: that seems pretty vague.

C-W's a theist, deist, pantheist adherent of the Church of What's Happenin' Now.

Or as the blind man closest to the ground in the big shadow said 'An elephant is soft and mushy.'

[Stephen Morgan]

Are you breathing?

I try.

Are you sure I'm out here, typing this?

No. You could be a sinister self-aware computer plotting our demise, in which case typing would be a inefficient mode of interaction with your computer.

What makes you like one food more than another?

Frying it.

Does your mother love you?

It is impossible to know the emotions of another, or of oneself.

Is there actually an oval office?

The world contains offices of all shapes, thanks to the narcissistic impulses of modernist architects.

[American Dream]

You still seem to be avoiding the point- that faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures.

I get that you think that.
I personally believe that that is wrong.

You don't think "that faith in things unseen in and of itself can be corrosive to critical thinking and again and again has led people into congress with the worst sort of haters and authority figures"?

If so, this is part of the problem...

[DrEvil]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:LynnH ... igence.svg

Let the flaming commence!

[Searcher08]

Ok, but what about the part where faith supports Racism or Fascism?

in my opinion that is abhorrent to any real faith. I know it happens.. does it ever. But as sunny said, above, there are people of faith that would never ever support racism or fascism. Most of them, probably. As I see it it's the nutty ones that get all the press and dominate political movements because they are the ones motivated by control and power over.

Here we get into the part where faith can conflict with critical thinking, as faith does often lead well-intentioned people into congress with problematic people and ideas, don't you think?

You dont get the irony that you approach 'critical thinking' with the same degree of faith that you so consider in others the first step down The Road to Perdition.

Your language is full of patronising weasel words such as "well-intentioned people" "problematic people and ideas" "dont you think?" .

For someone who is so concerned about fascism, you are not exactly a pluralist when it comes to thinking.

Reductionist so called 'critical' thinking - you sound like the missionary bringing the news to the unenlightened, except you NEVER examine the foundations of your 'critical thinking' faith.

How about doing that? Are you up for it? Or do we move along, because we can question anything except THAT?

[Canadian_watcher]

Again, C_W, I ask you, is this your faith? I'm just wondering so that I may adjust my phobias accordingly. Also: that seems pretty vague.

C-W's a theist, deist, pantheist adherent of the Church of What's Happenin' Now.

Or as the blind man closest to the ground in the big shadow said 'An elephant is soft and mushy.'

Anyone needing evidence that there's a predilection towards openly bashing the faithful, here's some (more) for you.