defender of truth
JoinedPosts by defender of truth
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28
Do You Think Humanity Will Ever Be Completely Free From Religion?
by InjusticeSystem ini realize that many here still have a form of spirituality or faith, and i mean no disrespect to those individuals.
i suppose i am posting this question to those, like myself, who have come to the conclusion that religion in general is a major hindrance to the progress of our species and needs to be put aside so that we can advance to our full potential.
so my question is, do you think this will ever actually happen, and how do you think we can get there?
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Theists, why does God allow suffering..
by The Quiet One in..specifically, the suffering of animals.
you can talk about free will/sin/people choosing to not listen to god etc to explain human suffering being allowed.. but how can you love a god that allows animals, that haven't sinned or chosen to not have anything to do with god, to have their short lives ended in often long, drawn out, painful ways.
i could list stories i've read that would probably make you feel ill, but i'm not looking to shock anyone or start an emotional debate.
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defender of truth
So.. Has anyone watched the video I posted? It's a fascinating discussion, whether you have any belief in a God or not.
Or does anyone want to answer the above postedquestion...?
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Apostasy Trial - Part 3
by defender of truth inwww.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2015/04/26/heres-part-three-of-a-secretly-videotaped-jehovahs-witness-apostasy-trial/
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£150,000,000 Jehovahs Witnesses HQ approved
by defender of truth inthe jehovahs witnesses have gained planning to build a vast uk headquarters complex in chelmsford.the international bible students association, which manages the christian groups literature, gained planning to redevelop a derelict farm near galleywood with a 1.2m sq ft scheme.the 150m complex will provide homes for 1,200 people spread across 16 five-storey blocks, a large printing plant, offices, auditorium, health and fitness centre, water treatment plant and on-site parking for 1,040 vehicles.. the ibsa is now set to begin groundwork at the 82-acre temple farm site and start construction by 2016.. .
www.constructionenquirer.com/2015/04/29/150m-jehovahs-witnesses-hq-approved-for-chelmsford/.
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defender of truth
The Jehovah’s Witnesses have gained planning to build a vast UK headquarters complex in Chelmsford.
The International Bible Students Association, which manages the Christian group’s literature, gained planning to redevelop a derelict farm near Galleywood with a 1.2m sq ft scheme.
The £150m complex will provide homes for 1,200 people spread across 16 five-storey blocks, a large printing plant, offices, auditorium, health and fitness centre, water treatment plant and on-site parking for 1,040 vehicles.The IBSA is now set to begin groundwork at the 82-acre Temple Farm site and start construction by 2016.
www.constructionenquirer.com/2015/04/29/150m-jehovahs-witnesses-hq-approved-for-chelmsford/
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75% of Jehovahs Witnesses oppose same-sex marriage? And 12% are in favour of it??
by defender of truth inwww.allgov.com/news/controversies/which-religions-oppose-same-sex-marriage-white-evangelicals-black-and-hispanic-protestants-mormons-and-muslims-150424?news=856319.
opposition to same-sex marriage is prominent among many religious groups in the united states, according to a new survey.groups with the largest opposition to homosexuals marrying are jehovahs witnesses (75%), mormons (68%), white evangelical protestants (66%), hispanic protestants (58%), black protestants (54%), and muslims (51%), the public religion research institute found in its survey of 40,000 americans.among white evangelical protestants, white baptists are the most opposed (72%).on the acceptance side of the issue, the most supportive are buddhists (84%), jews (77%), americans who select other religion (75%), and white mainline protestants (62%).a breakdown of white mainline protestant denominations shows support is highest among presbyterians (69%) and both episcopalians and congregationalists/united church of christ members (68%).even a majority of white mainline baptists (53%) back same-sex marriages.
among catholics, 61% of whites and 60% of hispanics support gay weddings.. and the survey is here:.
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defender of truth
Village idiot and Steve2:
I'm sorry that you have nothing better to do than criticize my choice of wording. I may have overhyped it a bit by using the term world-famous. I meant in the short term, in the sense of public awareness. I perhaps should have said 'these articles will likely raise public awareness of JW attitudes towards same sex marriage'.
Many people around the world are probably reading these articles, and the first line they see is 'jehovahs witnesses have the highest percentage of people opposed to same sex marriage'. To a casual reader, that may stick in the mind. I did not mean they ARE the most opposing group.
As for the 12% figure (those who approve of samesex marriage) and the question of whether there is an undecided category, why not take 5 seconds to click the link to the survey, which I provided in the OP?
You certainly took enough time out of your day to criticize my comment, so I'm sure you will have time to find the answer you seek..
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75% of Jehovahs Witnesses oppose same-sex marriage? And 12% are in favour of it??
by defender of truth inwww.allgov.com/news/controversies/which-religions-oppose-same-sex-marriage-white-evangelicals-black-and-hispanic-protestants-mormons-and-muslims-150424?news=856319.
opposition to same-sex marriage is prominent among many religious groups in the united states, according to a new survey.groups with the largest opposition to homosexuals marrying are jehovahs witnesses (75%), mormons (68%), white evangelical protestants (66%), hispanic protestants (58%), black protestants (54%), and muslims (51%), the public religion research institute found in its survey of 40,000 americans.among white evangelical protestants, white baptists are the most opposed (72%).on the acceptance side of the issue, the most supportive are buddhists (84%), jews (77%), americans who select other religion (75%), and white mainline protestants (62%).a breakdown of white mainline protestant denominations shows support is highest among presbyterians (69%) and both episcopalians and congregationalists/united church of christ members (68%).even a majority of white mainline baptists (53%) back same-sex marriages.
among catholics, 61% of whites and 60% of hispanics support gay weddings.. and the survey is here:.
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defender of truth
When it comes to opposition, the top opposing religions are 75% of Jehovah’s Witnesses..
With this and many other articles covering this survey, JW's are becoming world-famous as the most opposing group of religious people towards same sex marriage.
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Apostasy Trial - Part 3
by defender of truth inwww.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2015/04/26/heres-part-three-of-a-secretly-videotaped-jehovahs-witness-apostasy-trial/
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Apostasy Trial - Part 2 - Accusation Against Elder Needs 3 Witnesses
by berrygerry indespite being in for decades, i have never heard this before.. can any elders confirm this, and the reasoning?.
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Why the Future of Religion Is Bleak
by defender of truth inreligious institutions have survived by controlling what their adherents know, argues tufts prof. daniel c. dennett, but today that is next to impossible.
illustration: brian stauffer for the wall street journal.
by daniel c. dennett.
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defender of truth
www.wsj.com/articles/why-the-future-of-religion-is-bleak-1430104785
Religious institutions have survived by controlling what their adherents know, argues Tufts Prof. Daniel C. Dennett, but today that is next to impossible
ILLUSTRATION: BRIAN STAUFFER FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNALByApril 26, 2015 11:19 p.m. ETDANIEL C. DENNETTReligion has been waning in influence for several centuries, especially in Europe and North America. There have been a few brief and local revivals, but in recent years the pace of decline has accelerated.
THE RESILIENCE OF RELIGION
Today one of the largest categories of religious affiliation in the world—with more than a billion people—is no religion at all, the “Nones.” One out of six Americans is already a None; by 2050, the figure will be one out of four, according to a new Pew Research Center study. Churches are being closed by the hundreds, deconsecrated and rehabilitated as housing, offices, restaurants and the like, or just abandoned.
If this trend continues, religion largely will evaporate, at least in the West. Pockets of intense religious activity may continue, made up of people who will be more sharply differentiated from most of society in attitudes and customs, a likely source of growing tension and conflict.
Could anything turn this decline around? Yes, unfortunately. A global plague, a world war fought over water or oil, the collapse of the Internet (and thereby almost all electronic communication) or some as-yet unimagined catastrophe could throw the remaining population into misery and fear, the soil in which religion flourishes best.
Behind the decline
With hardly any significant exceptions, religion recedes whenever human security and well-being rises, a fact that has recently been shown in numerous studies, but was suspected by John Calvin in the 16th century. He noted that the more prosperous and comfortable his Genevans became, the less dependent they were on church. Presumably, those who deplore the decline of religion in the world today would not welcome the sort of devastation and despair that could give religion its second wind.
There is no other plausible scenario that could halt the slide, for a fairly obvious reason: the recent rapid growth of mutual knowledge, thanks to the global spread of electronic and digital communication.
Any institution—just like a person or an organism—depends on a modicum of privacy in which to conduct its business and control its activities without too much interference and too many prying eyes. Religious institutions, since their founding millennia ago, have managed to keep secrets and to control what their flocks knew about the world, about other religions and about the inner workings of their own religion with relative ease. Today it is next to impossible.
What is particularly corrosive to religion isn’t just the newly available information that can be unearthed by the curious, but the ambient knowledge that is shared by the general populace.
ENLARGEFunny business
Laughter is particularly subversive. A Mormon watching the episode of “South Park” that lampoons the Church of Latter-day Saints doesn’t just see some outsiders poking fun at her religion. She learns that vast numbers of people find her religion comical, preposterous, ludicrous, as confirmed by the writers’ decision to belittle it and the networks’ decision to broadcast it. This may heighten her loyalty, but it also may shake her confidence, and as soon as she even entertains the hypothesis that belief in God might be a life-enhancing illusion, not a rock-solid truth, she is on the slippery slope.
The late computer scientist John McCarthy, a founder of artificial intelligence, once said, “When I see a slippery slope, my instinct is to build a terrace.” That’s what theologians have been doing for hundreds of years, shoring up whatever they think they can salvage from the rain of information eroding their ancient peaks of doctrine. In some denominations the clergy are obliged to swear to uphold the “inerrant truth” of every sentence in the Bible, but this is becoming more of an embarrassment than a shield against doubt.
Hardly anybody today believes in—or would want to believe in—the wrathful, Old Testament Jehovah, for instance. A God who commands our love is a nasty piece of work by today’s perspectives, and has been replaced, over the centuries, by ever-less-anthropomorphic (but more “loving,” more “forgiving”) addressees of our prayers. (Isn’t it curious how the obsolete term “God-fearing” is still used in some quarters as a commendation?) God has no ears, but may “listen” to our prayers, and “works in mysterious ways,” which is a face-saving way of acknowledging that He doesn’t answer them at all.
Do you remember the impressive and rigorous Benson Study? It was conducted by a Harvard Medical School team that labored for years. It was finally published in 2006, and it concluded that intercessionary prayer for the recovery of heart-surgery patients not only didn’t work; in some conditions it showed a small but measurable increase in post-surgical complications.
ENLARGE
Media bias
This was dutifully reported by the media, and promptly forgotten by most. But if the study had found any positive result, you can be sure it would have been on the cover of all the newsmagazines and featured in television specials. This pro-religion bias in the media is crumbling, however, and once it dissolves, the exposure of all the antique falsehoods of religious doctrine will oblige the theologians to build yet another terrace, lower down the slope. They are running out of rocks.
Religious leaders of all faiths are struggling to find ways of keeping their institutions going, and one of the themes emerging from the surveys they conduct is that creed should be de-emphasized and loyalty and community should be fostered.
PHOTO: GETTY IMAGESIf we are lucky—if human health and security continue to rise and spread around the globe—churches might evolve into humanist communities and social clubs, dedicated to good works, with distinctive ceremonies and disappearing doctrine, except for a scattering of reclusive sects marked by something like institutional paranoia.
If we are unlucky and calamity strikes, our anxiety and misery will provide plenty of fuel for revivals and inventions of religions we have happily learned to live without.
Prof. Dennett is co-director of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University and co-author, with Linda LaScola, of “Caught in the Pulpit: Leaving Belief Behind.” He can be reached at [email protected].
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The Children Act review – Ian McEwan’s compelling study of rational versus religious belief
by defender of truth inlucy scholes.
sunday 26 april 2015 10.00 bst.
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defender of truth
Sunday 26 April 2015 10.00 BST
The Children Act, McEwan’s 13th novel, presents us with some of the usual trappings that have come to characterise his recent work: the well-educated and well-off protagonist whose equilibrium is suddenly upset by a powerful external force; and a single moment of apparently innocuous, but ultimately momentous, misunderstanding.
By day 59-year-old Fiona Maye, a high court judge, presides over family division cases; by night she sips Sancerre on the chaise longue in her Gray’s Inn flat, dines with colleagues at Middle Temple, or attends concerts at Kings Place “(Schubert, Scriabin)”. Her 35-year marriage with her academic husband is imploding, but this is background noise; the main event is the emergency case she’s just agreed to take on. A 17-year-old Jehovah’s Witness named Adam – an impossibly beautiful, slightly unbelievable, near ethereal presence who writes poetry and plays the violin – is refusing the blood transfusion that could save his life, and Fiona has to decide whether rational or religious thought wins the day.
McEwan’s own atheism rings loud and clear from the very beginning, and from the cases detailed in the first chapter alone it’s obvious that Fiona’s job is to be the voice of reason in the face of religious short-sightedness – a strict Moroccan Muslim father who wants to remove his daughter from the care of her English mother; another, from an Orthodox Jewish community, who wants to limit the education and life experiences his ex-wife wants for their daughters; and a Catholic couple whose faith is compelling them to watch their conjoined twins die, even though the medical establishment advocates the saving of one at the expense of his much weaker brother.
Interestingly, these mini-tales are by far the most compelling elements of the novel. When we’re brought back to Adam and Fiona, it seems less like McEwan’s in charge of the actions and decisions made by his characters and more like he’s observing their every move, recording their interactions with each other and descriptions of their environments with the formal, unemotional tones of an anthropologist. In many ways it’s a parable of the obvious – “It was not her business or mission to save him, but to decide what was reasonable and lawful” – but there’s something about the studied solemnity of McEwan’s tone that held me captivated.
The Children Act is published by Vintage (£7.99). Click here to order it for £5.99