The trouble with religion, is that for hundreds of years, people have used it for their own ends.
If you REALLY believe there IS a God, why do you have to go to church? So that you can be controlled?
I'm not against churches, as properly run, they can be a great asset to a community, but too many of them are just places where they take and twist peoples beliefs.
Quote:
thou shalt not
That is NOT the language spoken by the people whose story is told in the bible. It's middle ages English.
If you look in traditional bibles, it says "King James Authorised Version".
It was just that - so many different versions existed, King James decided to regularise the whole issue, and picked this one as the one HE liked best.
Now we have so many new versions, we are back to the same point again! It's not a hard and fast rule book - it's simply a guide as to how you might like to conduct your life.
As to the accuracy of the Authorised Edition, just remember, most newspapers cannot even report events which happened yesterday, without getting bits wrong, or mis-quoting, so how can you expect much translated reports, of events hundreds or thousands of years ago to be historically correct?
It's what you feel in your heart which is most important, not what you are told to believe.
If one of your family jumped, and was refused the opportunity to be buried as you wished, then it is a major reason for saying F**K 'em, but of course, that is not the way it works in real life, the families just get torn apart by religios dogma, which as has been pointed out, has no real foundation.
Remember, the bible has no policy on whether we should use unleaded petrol because it is better for the environment or not, it simply leaves it up to us to treat others (and the earth) with respect, by illustrating past events as fact, and leaving us to make our own decisions on what is right. The rest is opinon formed by men in the pulpit!
So many [
religions] claim God is on their side - He must sometimes wonder who is on His! (Oliver Cromwell)