Weird and Religious
The Dogon people of Mali have complex cosmological stories involving star systems and invisible beings called Nommo, described as amphibious ancestral spirits. Their myths link creation, water, and the structure of the universe in ways that mix observation and symbolic storytelling.
Religious image of the day.
In the name of religion
2019, Christchurch in New Zealand. A white supremacist gunman killed worshippers at two mosques. He used civilisational and anti-Muslim rhetoric with pseudo religious language, presenting violence as defence of a Christian West, drawing on distorted holy war ideas rather than mainstream doctrine.
Fact
In Sikhism, honest work is valued, and Sikhism encourages earning a living through fair effort rather than exploitation.
The first explanation
Religion was the first comprehensive explanation humans ever built, offering answers to everything at once without hesitation or qualification. Weather was caused by mood, illness by offence, and death by intention, while dreams were treated as messages, success as reward, and failure as punishment. Nothing was seen as accidental or meaningless, for the world was interpreted as a network of deliberate causes and moral consequences. This was not sophistication but confidence filling a vacuum, and the strength of religion lay not in accuracy but in certainty delivered at a time when ignorance was overwhelming and alternatives did not exist.
Quote of the day
“Faith means not wanting to know what is true.” Friedrich Nietzsche.
Ask the right question
Why would an all powerful being require ritual worship, praise and submission from humans?
Religious Crooks
Kirtanananda Swami, a leader in the Hare Krishna movement in the United States, oversaw a large commune that generated income through businesses staffed by devotees, later convicted in connection with racketeering and other crimes linked to the community.
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History tells us that wherever fools gathered, there was always a religious crook to take advantage of them. The best way to stop the crooks is not to be a fool.