I'm reminded of something I read of one of the early (Arab) OPEC oil ministers, about conditions in his country before the discovery of oil: "we were very poor. It was common for families to have 6 or 7 children, in the hope that one might survive".
The statistical evidence that child birth rates drop as a nation becomes more affluent (and infant mortality rates drop) are pretty much inarguable. Several factors have been claimed; infant mortality (<4%) female education, etc. I don't recall any suggestion that religion of any kind has played a part, although it could be argued that a better educated population tends to be less religious.
I have come to think that simple pragmatism plays a big part. When education becomes compulsory, children start to be a cost, rather than an asset.
Except in today's Australia, where a depressing number of young girls appear to be regarding babies as being once again a financial asset.
If it appears that I always look for simple answers to complex questions, it's probably true. I've always been a big fan of Ockham.

Dear David f,
>>There is a mindset in both Christianity and Judaism that we are set on earth to enlighten others in darkness. I regard it as arrogance.<<

There are many people, not only Christians and Jews (also on this OLO) who think they "are set on earth to enlighten others in darkness". It can be called an arrogance only if it is done by force or by denigrating those I think do not want to see things my way (like calling him/her immoral, irresponsible, irrational, indoctrinated, superstitious etc.).

Some people advertise products they want to sell, some give medical advise to those who they think need it, some try to convince you that only their political party has the right programme, and some think that their philosophy of life and seeing reality could benefit others as well. These are all justified and normal ways of communication, provided you do not use force (physical, legal, psychological etc.) to impose your convictions and point of view on others.

"It is understandable that a man may seek but not find; it is understandable that a man may deny; but it is not understandable that a man may find himself under the imposition: you are forbidden to believe" (Karol Wojtyla, later John Paul II, 1978). I think many Jews, and others, will see it the same way, especially if one adds "or not to believe".

Dear George,

I think there are bad ideas in Judaism, Christianity and Marxism and think they are some of the same bad ideas.

I think one bad idea is regarding faith in unprovable propositions as somehow the truth that other people should follow. I think it is arrogance even when not done by force or without denigrating those who think otherwise. It can close one’s mind to new ideas and new experiences. In that it is harmful since one is limited in life.

I agree with John Paul II's saying. It is an imposition to tell someone you are forbidden to believe. However, a belief is not a truth regardless of how strongly you believe it. If a belief is just a belief and not translated into action then a person has a perfect right to believe whatever they want. However, even if they have that right merely holding a belief can be harmful.

A belief in Creationism or Intelligent Design is not conducive for learning about the life sciences.

Beliefs translated into action can be quite harmful.

The belief that some Jews have that God has given them a certain area in the Middle East is a source of conflict. The belief that the Catholic Church has that use of condoms is bad contributes to the spread of AIDS and interferes with population planning programs.

I think the idea of a Chosen People is a very bad idea. It was possibly adopted by an ancient people because they felt threatened by the much more powerful empires around them. This bad idea was not dropped but picked up by racists (superior races), Christians (the new chosen), Marxists (the proletariat) and others. One reason I like Spong’s attitude is that he can take these ideas sanctioned by years of usage and examine them anew.

I also think the ideas of original sin and the Messiah or a Messianic era are bad ideas. I wish Pelagius had won out over Augustine

Dear David f,

Dr Leonie Star writes in the Foreword to Dr Barbara
Thiering's book, "Jesus The Man," :

"The views of innovative thinkers add value to
every society. Only by questioning traditional
beliefs can those beliefs be either reaffirmed
or modified..."

Dr Thering also states:

"...There are times when a religion moves away
from its traditional objectifications, and yet
survives, finding new forms of expression.
As disturbing as it is (to some) when the old
moulds of faith have become too worn and have
to be discarded, the vitality of the human
religious spirit is such that it will always find
new words, new images, new symbols..."

Dear David f,
I am glad we moved away from Lustiger. May I return your compliment by saying that “for some reason it is important to make myself understood to you“.

I would not enter into polemics with runner or his atheist counterparts, whose objections to e.g. tenets of Christianity often sound like objections to (a+b)^2=a^2+2ab+b^2, because “logic” tells us that you can add only numbers, not letters. You are different, even those who do not agree with you can learn from you.

The English language - in distinction to e.g. German or Slavic languages - can distinguish between religious faith (as a state or disposition of mind) and religious beliefs (as what is called “intellectual consent”).

Without attempting to define religion - it somehow encompasses both belief and faith - let me repeat what I had already written, namely that I see it as the “elephant” studied by the “six blind men“: a psychologist, an anthropologist, a sociologist, an evolutionist (of the Dawkins or D. S. Wilson kind), a philosopher, an ethicist, a historian (sorry, that makes seven). They all can agree that there indeed is a phenomenon called religion but are confused about what is its purpose or why it is there at all.

Taking the philosopher‘s point of view (but always aware of the six others) there are in principle only two presuppositions: Either - as Carl Sagan put it - the physical universe is all there is, without cause and without purpose, or that there must be Something (different religions model it differently) not reducible to the physical universe, which has no cause and no purpose.

There is no rational way to decide a priori in favour of the one or the other presupposition. There are only arguments, including rational ones, that can support one’s preconceived preference. One of them might be the Occam‘s razor principle that would favour Sagan. For a believer this preference comes from aspects of religion that belong to the realms of the other six “blind men”. (ctd)

(ctd)
>> faith in unprovable propositions as somehow the truth that other people should follow<<

This lumps together a number of things. As you know, “unprovable propositions” are either stated a priori, called axioms, postulates, presuppositions, etc., and no treatise can do without them, or they are a posteriori statements within a coherent treatise, and Goedel has shown that even mathematics cannot do without them.

Religious beliefs are more of the first kind. They differ from axioms in mathematics in that they are not built on words with no intrinsic meaning attached, but that concepts entering into them - although often of symbolic or “mythological” character - convey a meaning that depends on the believer’s education, emotions, cultural environment etc., a meaning that is not universally accepted.

Nevertheless, to ask a believer to prove the tenets his/her world-view is built on, is like asking a mathematician to prove the axioms he builds his/her theory on. The intellectually unsophisticated believer will take all concepts and statements of his/her belief verbatim, stripped of their symbolic meaning often contradicting science or just common sense. (This is perhaps not unlike those who cannot understand the formal, symbolic meaning of mathematical concepts and speak e.g. of “ideal circles” made of physical matter, perfectly homogeneous, no atoms, etc.)

The concept of truth is complicated, unless you understand it in its trivial meaning, which is too narrow to answer world-view questions. There is formal truth, that logic, mathematics and your computer deal with, there is Truth in the metaphysical or religious meaning of the word that religions make statements about (and that is our bone of contention), and truth as a working scientist, especially mathematical physicist, understands it, truth that his/her theories can hopefully better and better approximate .

We cannot relive our history removing things we do not like today. We can only hope that humanity evolves further, directed less by the “blind watchmaker“ of biological evolution, and more by the “software“ of reason and free will, that I think should be guided, but not dictated to, by higher religions.