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Religion is dying; does it need replacing?

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posted on Jan, 23 2019 @ 02:13 PM
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a reply to: Specimen

Even to the point where, as a young girl going to church, I was forced to cover my hair and when I questioned it (as I have been doing all my life it seems) I was told "because you have to" and when I questioned why the boys/men didn't have to cover their hair the reply was 'because women are vain'. Yes, it did have a very modern Islamic touchy feely feel to it. But the RC religion then and now is being tweeked and the rules changed, so we could say some religions are being rewritten and rules altered, but can we say faith in certain religions is dying or is the practice of certain religions dying?
edit on 01CST02America/Chicago03320231 by InTheLight because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 24 2019 @ 04:51 AM
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As the originator of the topic I’d like to thank all participants. It’s been interesting.

It’s my belief that our species is constantly searching for faith - whether that be religious, natural, scientific or spiritual. Through centuries we have always asked the great philosophical questions, among which are who are we? Where do we come from? What else is in our universe? What happens when we die? The search for these answers is important to us.

Over time we have found answers to so many questions and problems, like surviving better in community groups, farming crops and animals for a stable food supply, building better tools and shelter, and so on, but these are technical solutions to practical problems. The problem of answering philosophical questions are esoteric which a harder alloy or breeding a higher crop yield will not answer.

Tribal and community leaders must have been asked these questions many times in our early history, and it is my belief that we simply made them up. We were not in a position to answer them accurately or truthfully at that stage of our development. We still can’t answer them fully thousands of years later, but we continue to search, as is the nature of our being.

Over time communities interacted with others where creation stories were merged and enhanced and sometimes replaced wh,olesale with stories better than those held. We are an explorative and inquisitive species, populating almost the entire planet, and those stories travelled with us. It doesn’t surprise me to find several commonalities between religious and spiritual faiths around the world.

During my own search for ‘faith’ my logic tells me there is no divinity behind our amazing and incredibly beautiful natural world. I’m comfortable with that and I believe it to be true, although I understand and respect that not everyone will have the same conclusion or experience as me. Each of our searches for faith is personal and we have our own questions to seek answers to. What is important is that we acknowledge our own and other’s doubts and not belittle those who have reached a different and personal truth.



posted on Jan, 24 2019 @ 06:54 AM
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originally posted by: InTheLight
a reply to: Specimen

Even to the point where, as a young girl going to church, I was forced to cover my hair and when I questioned it (as I have been doing all my life it seems) I was told "because you have to" and when I questioned why the boys/men didn't have to cover their hair the reply was 'because women are vain'. Yes, it did have a very modern Islamic touchy feely feel to it. But the RC religion then and now is being tweeked and the rules changed, so we could say some religions are being rewritten and rules altered, but can we say faith in certain religions is dying or is the practice of certain religions dying?


Desperate times call for desperate measure I guess, especially these days in such estranged times to them. The institutions and their covenants may die, but the mythology will probably live on.

You got less people going to church all the while, plenty of people still believe in Jesus.
edit on 24-1-2019 by Specimen because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 26 2019 @ 06:53 AM
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originally posted by: TerraLiga As the originator of the topic I’d like to thank all participants. It’s been interesting. It’s my belief that our species is constantly searching for faith - whether that be religious, natural, scientific or spiritual. Through centuries we have always asked the great philosophical questions, among which are who are we? Where do we come from? What else is in our universe? What happens when we die? The search for these answers is important to us. Over time we have found answers to so many questions and problems, like surviving better in community groups, farming crops and animals for a stable food supply, building better tools and shelter, and so on, but these are technical solutions to practical problems. The problem of answering philosophical questions are esoteric which a harder alloy or breeding a higher crop yield will not answer. Tribal and community leaders must have been asked these questions many times in our early history, and it is my belief that we simply made them up. We were not in a position to answer them accurately or truthfully at that stage of our development. We still can’t answer them fully thousands of years later, but we continue to search, as is the nature of our being. Over time communities interacted with others where creation stories were merged and enhanced and sometimes replaced wh,olesale with stories better than those held. We are an explorative and inquisitive species, populating almost the entire planet, and those stories travelled with us. It doesn’t surprise me to find several commonalities between religious and spiritual faiths around the world. During my own search for ‘faith’ my logic tells me there is no divinity behind our amazing and incredibly beautiful natural world. I’m comfortable with that and I believe it to be true, although I understand and respect that not everyone will have the same conclusion or experience as me. Each of our searches for faith is personal and we have our own questions to seek answers to. What is important is that we acknowledge our own and other’s doubts and not belittle those who have reached a different and personal truth.


God Has A Plan; It is secret and hidden to those who do not want to know it, but open to those who know Him.

Discovering it doesn't come from logic or science, but from your own heart and soul.



posted on Jan, 27 2019 @ 05:19 PM
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I’m afraid my heart only pumps blood and there is no evidence for a soul - an entirely spiritual construct.

Out of curiosity, what is the plan?



posted on Jan, 29 2019 @ 10:43 PM
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originally posted by: charlyv
The common thread in religion is control. Any time you can gather many people into a belief system and then appoint a leader, there is the element of control. History has shown us the good and evil that all religions have been capable of.

People are realizing that they can believe in God and/or any of the prophets, without being classified in a group. Or, of course, they can choose not to believe in anything. I subscribe to the first type. I do not know what God is, but I believe it is something extraordinary.


Agreed to the first point and the second has a strong chance of being what replaces “religion”.

When you believe that there is a “god” but you have no idea what it is, you’ll seek it out if you feel you need to find it. But that quest won’t be to a large building on Sunday so someone can tell you what it is.

Possiby “god” isn’t dead. Organized religion that tells you what god is is dying - particularly when you can agree that a god exists and someone tells you they have it all figured out - but yet you still get the sense they don’t...
edit on 29-1-2019 by EnigmaChaser because: (no reason given)



posted on Feb, 4 2019 @ 08:22 PM
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Religion is being replaced.
By ideology.

For some examples.
You see it with the left taking on realms of censoriousness previously held by the religious right.

You see it in how some ideologies are treated as unquestionable. And if you do the calls of heretic or unbeliever has been replaced with right wing, troll, and/or Nazi. Or you just get blocked.

Hell, you see it in the now secular puritanical thought that somehow one of the participants of a sexual encounter is somehow sullying the other. In the past it was "wicked" women sullying "pure" men in the case of religious thought. Which has now flipped and somehow horrible men somehow sully good women. IE "objectification".

And I could go on.


Dr. Jordan Peterson on ideology.
edit on 4-2-2019 by HarbingerOfShadows because: God is in the TV.



posted on Feb, 5 2019 @ 08:05 PM
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a reply to: Dfairlite

My first response is to say that to me Jesus was speaking about all people. I could be wrong, and many people could be wrong concerning what we think Jesus meant with the words that we are believing to be his.

My second thought is to ask if you understand why Samaritans were hated by Jews? I just recently learned this, and it was interesting.

(Sorry for the late reply, I wasn’t notified of a reply to my comment.)



posted on Feb, 12 2019 @ 10:17 PM
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Just let it die. It's a complete waste. These clowns get tax free establishments and use it to abuse children and spread their bs to others like a mental illness. It will eventually go the way of the dodo and people will start paying more attention to reality instead of pipe dream fantasies.
edit on 2 12 19 by Barcs because: (no reason given)



posted on Feb, 20 2019 @ 02:11 AM
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a reply to: TerraLiga

I don't disagree with the statement that religions of all types are becoming less popular, but I would like to point out that a lot of the way the PEW Research Centre tends to report on these sort of statistics is dependent on the way they count and what they're counting. For example, in your OP (don't know if you copy-pasted from the PEW statements) it is mentioned that "Christ-based religions are declining rapidly", but that statement already counts all "Christ-based religions" as 1 category that is then declining rapidly, that does not mean that all denominations are declining rapidly and there can be significant differences per denomination. It also matters if you're just going to look at the developments over 1 year, or perhaps 10 years or a 100 years. The ABC News Report below from some years ago for example only looks at the developments of 1 year (in the US), and discusses both percentage growths and decline as well as absolute numbers.

When you look at different things you get to see different things...

Anyway:

(False) Religion is a Snare and a Racket

edit on 20-2-2019 by whereislogic because: (no reason given)



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