George makes a sound proposition in his post when he discusses the important differences between a mathematician's critical reasoning of acceptance, compared with the blindly naïve acceptance of ultimate reality by religions which revolve around the faith-based existence of some divinity or supreme being.

The question is to whom is ethical, behavioural and moral responsibility owed?
The answer is -to one's own self.

The outcome of thoughts, speech, and actions are strictly the result of one's actions, and are not the responsibility of anyone other than the individual.
It can be argued that individual attitudes will vary widely and bring into question the correctness or wrongness of personal behaviour, but there can be no denying that truth is not variable.

The blind trust and faith of religion counters the factual consideration of the adoption of a particular form of behaviour.
This seems indictive of George's reference to acceptance of beliefs due to doubt and confusion.

Lifestyle should not depend upon religious belief.

yep and surely for mathematical laws and all other laws their is a Lawmaker. Only the irrational claim that order came from chaos.

Rational!? Like you mean once viciously believed and adhered to, beliefs like a flat earth? Or a 6,000 old earth at the centre of the entire universe that revolved around it

Or that all of humanity sprang from just two humans and the incestuous relations between brothers and sisters, the only possible way for humanity to continue if there was any truth to the Adam and Eve (they took to themselves, wives) fable!

Christianity of today has nothing in common from the philosophy that gave it birth!

It became a fear-based cult once Constantine decided to take it over and appoint his own lackeys as the spiritual heads. Some 350 years after the event.

It became a monster when sword welding bishops and popes headed up blood-soaked armies, determined to slaughter the unbelieving barbarians and gave themselves divine authority for this cannot er,r endeavour.

Moreover, the alleged sacrament of the confessional and the almost absolute control it conferred has only existed for around 700 years. And marriage as a church conducted holy sacrament, a little over 300

. But paedophilia has existed and has been rampant in this allegedly holy and devout institution for far longer than either! Even as the rivers of gold flowed into holy coffers!

I cannot but believe in a creator!

But not in any organised religion! Or their organising entities, some of who would seem to be servants of Satan ( a jealous God) and with that, fear!?

When did Jesus require those who followed to be celibate!? When!?
Where is it written or espoused? Maybe like a sacrifice at an altar, it was imposed by Constatine or his lackeys?
Alan B.

The author, being a mathematician, believes religion to be a process of addition, whereas in fact it is a process of subtraction.

Subtract the selfish untruth from your mind, the selfish hurtfulness from your character and the selfish ugliness from your expression, refine those faculties and what you are left with is Truth, Goodness and Beauty, in other words, God.

The first place to start would obviously be a comprehensive Illuminated Understanding of the life and teaching of Saint Jesus of Galilee who of course was never ever in any sense a Christian.

The various essays featured on this reference provide such a comprehensive Understanding.

http://www.beezone.com/AdiDa/EWB/EWB_pp436-459.html#jesusandtheteaching

As do the various essays featured on these two sites:

http://www.beezone.com/da_publications/christian.html

http://www.beezone.com/AdiDa/up/christianityandadida.html

There is a lot of overlap on these sites.

How far away from the truth of Christianity is this clown.

Dan

To George.

The three elements you gave can apply to any religion. Even Zen. If I could add at least one or two aspects that are specific to Christianity it would be on the terms of God and on Jesus. These two elements seperate Christianity from all the other religions. Even Islam which says it acknowledges Jesus as a prophet, does not acknowledge Jesus in the same way that Christianity does. That He died for our sakes, and that He rose again.

As for the aspect of rationality after studying Christianity, or the study of any religion, or even science, I would challenge your stance that before you study, and after you study your beliefs remain more or less the same.

In my observation the more you study something, religious or scientific, the more it challenges you and your previous views. This doesn't revert back to old views ones you get it all sorted out for yourself. It changes your view and gives you something to strive for that is different then before you studied. The only exception would be if your conclusions after studying matched the cultural foundation that gave you your ideals before studying. I don't think such a cultural foundation exists though that is not challenged by the study of Christianity.

The more you know the more you change. So much so that it can be applied by saying what you know and what you are exposed to, affects what changes in you. What you feed your focus on will influence you and change you. You don't remain more the same after further deeper study.

To Alan B.

Your views of Christianity are full of crap. I know that sounds harsh, but the truth is that your views of Christianity do not represent Christian views at all. The views you hold of Christianity are inaccurate of what it means to be a Christian. In Georges's article he made one good point that could be applied to you very well. An atheist describing religion is like a blind man describing color.

This discussion of the rationality of Christianity might be a good topic to explore the different rationell that Christians hold. As a Christian, I can volunteer what I've seen and what I've come across for perspectives (ways of reasoning, as well as beliefs) from within a Christian scope of reference.

There are several different Christian outlooks. Not many actually come close to your view of christian beliefs and rationell

After reading the comments above I think you should firstly ask yourselves the question Why do I not understand what religion is? Because it's obvious to me that none of you have a clue what religion is, apart from describing the obvious overt characteristics that even a five year old can see.

Most of what you guys say is just mumbo jumbo. It's really just all about you guys trying to make yourselves look educated and knowledgeable. I'm starting to call it the One Dollar Brain Syndrome.

Runner said that "surely for mathematical laws and all other laws their is a Lawmaker".
This is an example of an entrenched belief in the existence of some form of supreme being.
Things evolve, created by their environmental conditions, not by the will of some fictitious "lawmaker".
Laws are conditions of behaviour set and observed by human beings in response to prevailing conduct.

.

Dear George,

.

Welcome back …

If you don’t mind my saying so, George, I have difficulty imagining how a person so deeply religious as yourself, with such profound, unwavering faith in the god hypothesis, could possibly indulge in any form of rational thought independently of your longstanding personal convictions.

It is indispensable, in my view, that certain basic principles be respected during such endeavours :

1. "Affirmati non neganti incumbit probatio" – “the burden of proof is upon him who affirms - not on him who denies." It is the duty of the person who asserts something to produce evidence in order to prove it

2. Also, one cannot be judge and party. He who judges must be independent, with no preconceived ideas on the question to be judged

So, in the absence of good, solid, empirical evidence, the god hypothesis remains just that : a hypothesis.

Our minds are free to roam among the stars, way beyond the universe if we choose – but it’s better to keep our feet planted firmly on the ground.

Here and now is all that"s sure.

.

There is an accurate historical record that supports all I've written here. Those that never ever bother to read are the ones full of crap, cyberbullies posting here.

Jesus was a Jew! And a Rabbi ( teacher) and itinerant worker.

History tells us he fled from Israel aged twelve to avoid persecution and possible assassination to the land we now know as India, and while there was exposed to an early form of Buddhism, which predated Christianity by a thousand years.

Some believe he even became a Buddhist and a member of the Essene sect. Who were extremely knowledgeable in virtually all the then known herbal remedies/medicine.

This association would explain why a returning thirty-year-old Jesus would tech a philosophy that has many commonalities with Buddhism and his art as a healer. And his turn the other cheek pacifist philosophy and sharing!?

. And why when in a heated debate with Nicodemus, he said verily, verily ( truly, truly) I say unto you, to reach unto the kingdom of heaven, ye must be born again. (reincarnation)

And a foundation belief for all Buddhists, Hindus and numerous other eastern philosophies and some early Jewish belief systems like Zoster? If you cannot bother to study history, don't label crap the wisdom of those who have, simply because history challenged and inculcated from birth, false teachings, or as an early writer would have put it, crap!
Alan B.

Dear Alan B,

And those with a one dollar brain are full of crap too.

Most comments here are irrelevant to what the article is about. Its intention was neither to confirm somebody’s Christian beliefs (there is no mention of Jesus, etc.) nor to argue against them. Nevertheless, let me repeat, there is no “evidence for God’s existence” (and His communication with humans) that is convincing for everybody. There are only arguments for and against such conviction, together with circumstantial evidence (personal experience). What is convincing for a believer (whether at the First or at the Second Naiveté level) is unconvincing for somebody who lost his/her faith (or never had it). Indeed, the first two impediments to crossing the “desert of criticism”, mentioned in the article would apply to many commentators: “For some, there is no further stage, for having perished in the desert of criticism, faith has come to an end. For others, the response is to beat a hasty retreat out of the desert (into the First Naiveté)...”

Dear Yuyutsu,

>>The author, being a mathematician, believes religion to be a process of addition, whereas in fact it is a process of subtraction.<<

The similarity of the two approaches, one Oriental, one Western, made me write this article. Neither the author(s) of the Zen saying, nor Paul Ricoeur mention anything that could be interpreted as addition or subtraction. Where I admit, my mathematical background played a role, is in the last paragraph where I compare the insufficiency of personal only faith with the insufficiency of mathematical only models of physical reality. I could have chosen another analogy, but as I said, the article was not about the social function of religion.

I agree with your last sentence. It does not contradict anything I wrote about the rational background of a scientist’s view of his/her Christian faith.

To Not_Now.Soon,

You do not seem to contradict what I wrote. I agree with everything you said with one clarification.

>>I would challenge your stance that before you study, and after you study your beliefs remain more or less the same.<<

This stance would apply to the original Zen saying. In my “Christian” rephrasing I said “they regain their validity at a higher, more sophisticated level” and explicitly emphasised this later in the text, where I tried to explain what this could mean using the analogy of two $100 notes . For instance, you still say “the sun is rising” as did your forefathers, although now you know that it is in fact the Earth not the Sun that does the “rising”.

I also added that some beliefs (e.g. the Resurrection) should be taken at their face value, i.e. their meaning preserved as it was at the uncritical stage of First Naiveté. Unless I missed something, this addition is missing in Paul Ricoeur’s description of the passage from First to Second Naiveté.

Dear Banjo Paterson,

Nobody is taking away your “god hypothesis” that needs “evidence”. Except that it is not about God of Christian faith as understood, and experienced, by educated 21st century Christians.

Yep, that's religion !

To George.

Your right that my views don't contradict much on what you've said about the three dimensions of Christian Faith. As for the aspect of accepting something in naivety and then after challenging it accepting it more strongly and more deeply, I think that is true a lot of the times, but not all of the time. There are several aspects that with study changes a person from accepting the things in their cultural background to instead challenge them on those things. The more a person studies, I think the greater the chances that this'll happen for them on one topic or another within Christianity.

Over all though, sorry if I sounded harsh. It's a good article and a good topic. I think talking about Christian rational is a good subject. Because from what I've seen there are several foundations to build off of in Christian reasoning. Some of them can be broken down more with study, or at least refined more, while others are built up more with more to study that confirms them.

To Alan B.

To clarify. Here's some of your positions on Christianity.

•mocked the ability of Christians to reason.
•thinking that Christians are flat earthers, and that they think the age of the earth is a young age. (Some Christians believe it is younger, others don't. None that I know of believe it is flat).
•that Christianity is a fear based cult, and christians are violent sword welding maniacs. (Concerning the fear based it's a very narrow view of Christianity, and either an exaggeration or just wrong; concerning the violence, just laughable. If that's what you think sums up Christianity then calling it crap is justified.)
•that Christians are pedophiles. (Seriously dude? That alone warrants crap if you think pedophilia is accepted in Christianity).

These things all warrant the response that they are crap and not representative of Christianity. Regarding historical reliablity of these things, are they representative of Christianity or cherry picked things you've focused on when it comes to Christianity? For more history on Christianity what about that most hospitals in the west were started by Christians. Is the good will of Christians missing in hostory, or was it cherry picked out of history?

Moving on to Jesus though, I'd like to see some of the historical sources you have to say Jesus went to India at 12. Looked them up on google for anything; all I got are conspiracy theories and rumors. Is there anything you've found that should place Jesus or his family as a traveler? Either rich enough, or merchants as an occupation? Best I can tell the only reliable record of Jesus is in the four gospels. From those we get that Jesus was a carpenter, and that the town of Nazareth knew Jesus from growing up with him and his family.

I'd like to see the sources of history you've found for Jesus. For your first comment, I stand by what I said. Don't take it personally though. You're probably just misinformed and assume the exaggerated view of Christianity is an accurate representation of it. Sorry but it's not.

To Mr. opinion.

It's not news to anyone that you're more snarky than anything that adds revelance to a topic. You've done this on other topics that you claim you have a degree studying the topic. If you want to be taken seriously then you'll have to contribute more then trying to come up with a new clever insult. After all, if those you insult have more to say and are better at debate and conversation then you, then that makes you worse then them (no matter who they are or what the topic is). The insult is more damning on you then it is on anyone else.

To Not_Now.Soon,

>>There are several aspects that with study changes a person from accepting the things in their cultural background to instead challenge them on those things.<<

Again, I agree. More or less this is what I wanted to say with the analogue of two $100 notes: At closer look, one of them becomes just a symbol (metaphor etc) of a real value, the other retains its actual value (or veracity) but with a deeper insight.