Weird and Religious
Early Christianity had groups who believed extreme self denial brought them closer to holiness. Some hermits lived on top of pillars for years, exposed to the weather, preaching to people below. These “pillar saints” thought physical suffering purified the soul.
Religious image of the day.
In the name of religion
1857, northern India. During the Indian Rebellion, massacres and reprisals occurred on both sides. Religious fears over conversion and defilement played a role. Participants justified violence as defending Islam or Hindu tradition and protecting sacred customs from perceived foreign religious threat.
Fact
In Christianity, repentance is important, and Christianity teaches turning away from sin and changing one’s direction in life as part of returning to God.
Why religion survives
Religions like to present belief as a thoughtful commitment, a position reached through reflection, study, and understanding, yet in practice most believers know remarkably little about what they claim to believe. Their faith is inherited, not examined. It is absorbed through family, community, and repetition, not through reading or analysis. Religion survives not because its followers understand it, but because they do not.
Quote of the day
“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” Voltaire.
Ask the right question
If divine commands define morality, could cruelty become good simply because it is commanded?
Religious Crooks
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad’s case is highly contested and usually treated as a theological dispute rather than fraud, so instead a clearer example is Wayne Bent, leader of the Lord Our Righteousness Church, who claimed prophetic authority while controlling followers’ lives and finances, later convicted on charges related to abuse of minors.
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Religion is supposed to bring morality but it also seem to bring a lot of crooks who take advantage of people.