
03-16-2006, 02:10 PM
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Registered User
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Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: England
Posts: 68
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jseal
mabelode,
I’m unfamiliar with cultures which are free of religious practices. I don’t mean to suggest that there are none, only that I don’t know of any. Even if not entirely devoid of religious practices, which cultures would serve as useful models?
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There are none I know of either.
As BruceandNan stated, everyone believes what they were taught by their elders while growing up. This means that it is extremely difficult to get away from religion completely, because we are taught religion as truth. As the Jesuits said, "Give us a boy, and we shall return you a man, a citizen of his country and a child of God”.
Some of us ask more questions as we grow up, and of those, there are some who care enough to think about what we have been taught and draw our own conclusions (at both ends of the argument). Unfortunately, probably a large majority do not give it enough thought and (passively) adopt the famous agnostic approach (and I paraphrase) "it is best to believe as, if there is a god, you get into paradise, and if not, nothing is lost".
With that attitude it is difficult to break the cycle.
Would an atheist society work? I don't know, but society is not perfect now, and it would remove a number of problems....
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