On Religion- In response to XY

I am not sure whether I understand what your religious stand is, and for that matter, whether you yourself are sure of your own religious position. I am also not sure how strong your Christian identity is. To the extent that you have already converted, I see no point in engaging with you further for two reasons. Firstly-your internalized Christian identity is part of yourself, and any attempt on my part to be critical of the Christian faith would be perceived as an attack by an arrogant prick-it is an unavoidable part of human nature to be defensive under perceived attack (I would behave the same manner). Secondly- to the extent that you have become a Christian, the paradigm that you view the world would change, with selective ignoring of evidence that run against your faith- that is why religious debates are always pointless.

But let me just counter the assertions that you make and correct certain inaccuracies. At the same time, just note that my response applies to anyone in general and not you in particular.

1) Renaissance Humanism: It is an oxymoron to be a humanist and a God-believer. The very spirit of Renaissance Humanism is antithetical to the faith required as a Christian. What does the word “renaissance” mean? It means to be “reborn”, and it is a reborn in the spirit of the Greek and Roman antiquity and a reborn in the pagan classics, not the Christian classics. This period is marked by a movement towards a secular worldview, a preoccupation with human experience and knowledge, hence the word “humanism”-a sharp divorce from the supernaturalism and spirituality of medieval times. To say that Renaissance Humanism is a “path to God” is a misrepresentation to say the least. The only “path to God”, if there is one, is the path to beauty, or the pursuit of aesthetics of some renaissance humanists. This, for one is limited to the arts, and as my art history teacher used to say, a Renaissance masterpiece may be commissioned by the Church to instruct the faithful, but there is no guarantee that the faithful is drawn closer to God for he is likely to be distracted by the virtuosity and aesthetic, human, creation of the artiste himself. In terms of values, Renaissance Humanism sees a gradual transition in values and virtues, from the suppression of the ego, unquestioning obedience and submission before God to the Greek values of individual self expression, skeptical curiosity, and heroic pursuit of glory and honor. Indeed, the whole Renaissance came about because scholars fleeing from the Fall of Constantinople brought with them Greek classics lost to the West for centuries and sparked off the movement in Florence! Renaissance Humanism frees the West from medieval Christianity, for you to say that this movement is “fundamental” to the path to God is akin to creationism at its best.
2) Religion and Sanctuary: I have not claimed that you said religion is “absolutely needed” to promote goodness in people, I used the words “much needed.” If you view it as sanctuary, so be it. As Marx puts it, “Religion is the opium for the masses.”
3) Humility, Perfection and Guidance: I am in favor of some Christian values and virtues. They are after all, COPIED from the Greeks (You can read more about the Cardinal Virtues of the Christians that the early Christian theologians copied from Plato.) Of course, it will be great if the Christian God is perfect. But, He is not. For a start, the vengeful, jealous, aggressive God in the Old Testament is somehow transformed to a kind, loving and benevolent one in the New Testament. In Exodus 20: 1

5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me

I cannot quite remember how some Christians spin it. Jealousy is a perfect attribute acceptable in God, but when applied to man, it is a lousy one. The Jewish God is somehow no longer the Christian God. In addition, there are examples of polygamy, incest, and strange tales of torture in the Bible that are conveniently ignored; condemned by modern society, yet held in piety and glossed over in Sunday Church. How you personally reconcile all these is a mystery to me. Also, this it is a classic example of double-thinking that many Christians practice, although to be fair, many non-Christians do so too.

4) Faith and Reason: This is a classic GP question. So I will just skip that.
5) Religion and Terrorism: I never said that ALL top-notch professionals are not religious, or cannot be religious. I merely said that MOST educated, top-notch professional are not religious, or have a lower religious intensity. In addition, I will further claim that the more uneducated you are (for the reason that you pointed out, it is the easy way out in life), the more likely you will be religious. Don’t get me wrong, I am not making a value judgment here. I will like to be more religious, but I can’t practice self-deceit. If anything, being religious has a positive correlation with happiness and longevity.

I am not denying that secular beliefs, in your words (I think mine originally,) cannot be hijacked by politics. The question is whether there is something intrinsic in religion that helps promote the mindless slaughter and violence, much BETTER than any secular beliefs. The tragedy of the human race is that self-righteous men of goodwill, engaged in genocide to achieve utopia. Pol Pot and Mao, in a sense, wanted to create their collectivist Heaven on Earth. Hitler wanted to create an Aryan Heaven freed from the defiled Jews. Of the mass murderers in the 20th century, only Stalin can be said to be driven by a naked ambition and power, without any firm ideological commitment to a creation of Heaven on Earth.

To be precise, monotheistic religion has a pretty bad track record in history. You have the Dark Ages, Inquisition, Jihads etc. Yes, undeniably, politics played an important role. But, the narrow pursuit of selfish gains by politicians cannot be realized without the tacit support, or indeed, the complicity and gleeful participation of the masses. Religion with its blind faith and righteousness of belief fosters the climate for the mob to call for a tempest of blood. I have heard a lot of religious fanatics raving “Let’s kill that chap drinking tea over there, I am good, he is bad; I am light; he is shadow; my God is powerful and right; his Teapot God is weak and wrong; and I am going to prove that right now by going over there, and smash the teapot into his head.”

But, I have not heard of a raving group of Aristotelians killing Epicureans or Cynics killing Stoics. Indeed, I assert that any belief, religious or otherwise, rooted in unquestioning obedience and anchored in blind faith, bring out the latent violence residing in men under the right conditions. On the other hand, any belief deduced or derived from reason, can never succumb to the violence that it so consciously relinquished in the first place. The act of reasoning itself is a triumph over instincts, thus celebrating the wisdom of the human intellect. The blind passion needed to butcher a fellow man requires a constancy and conviction of purpose; one can’t stab properly if he is afraid of a calculation error in his “forces of good” formula.

All right, I have burnt my Friday night. Time to Sleep.