In a world were one person's religion is another person's fantasy, and one person's fantasy is another person's reality, the only sane person is the honest observer.
It's self-evident that without God, there is no way to confidently ascertain the truth of whatever you observe. That's why despotic regimes are always as Godless as despots can possibly make them.
Hmm, then what's your take on the historic theocratic despotism throughout "civilized" world? The folk getting beat'in up really don't give a damn if the oppressors are believers or not. And note that I am NOT advocating atheism, but I am pointing to what to do between two extremes of thought.
Evidently Christ saw that coming: John 16:2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.
Is there honesty when the "observed" is the observer? All people are conditioned by their culture and by education. And for most of us we then observe the outside world through this conditioning . We are slaves to this conditioning with few even being conscious of that fact. And so if honesty is a concern that is only possible if one is deeply and acutely self aware of the burden of all conditioning and how it can dictate or affect what is observed. Regardless of the religion they all seem to share one thing. They give meaning and purpose to people. In an existence that can be horrendous that evenyuslly ends in suffering and death. And so if God did not exists it would be necessary to invent one . Given the circumstances of human existence and human nature religion will always be alive somewhere. And doubtless it played some role in our evolution and survival as a species whether you like that fact or not. When I was young religion seemed stupid to me. Yet my intellect would not buy into atheism. For it became clear that there was no way to know if God existed or not. For I could not get outside of this universe so as to look to personally see if there was a creator there or not. And so that shovef me into being agnostic which is the only intellectually position an honest person can assume. For the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. And the truth is no one knows if a Creator exists or not. But getting people to admit that hard fact just aint gonna happen. Why? Humans are deeply emotional and emotions are more powerful than rationality and reason. Atheists as well as theists are very emotion driven people.
No one can be intellectually honest and exclaim the certainty it is impossible to have unless delusional. That applies to both atheists and theists. Your emotions are dictating your belief while keeping you from seeing the obvious. That you have no way of knowing what the truth is. Way beyond your pay grade. Yet some will never see the obvious on this issue .That is what astounds me and other agnostics. And that is why apparently this atheistic position is fundamentally born of emotions and not reason and clear thinking. A good dose of humbleness. will fix the emotional affection. Haha
God is not bound by the rules of intellectualism, human logic or human observation. God defines what is true and at any point a human contrivance disagrees with God it is by definition wrong.
And yet you have the Spanish Inquisition, systematic destruction/domination of a people who refused to convert in North & South America, Asia, Africa via a gov't military with the clerics right behind them. So unless you're willing to admit that ALL derivatives of the Judeo/Christian faith are illegit to the teachings, you've got to give credence to the OP.
Your first sentence doesn't make sense. Your first paragraph is a moot point, as the OP is pointing to "honesty" in the observance...this means that you have to recognize what you are observing is NOT beholding your own cultural bias. Your second paragraph is yet another moot point, ignoring that the OP points to how such a purpose and meaning can mightily conflict with another religion. Your third paragraph insinuates that I'm against religion. I'm not per se, I'm pointing to the FACT that you have through history people going to war over religion (differences, non-believers, etc.). the honest observer comes to their conclusion as to what actually works and makes sense...it may take a lifetime to reach that conclusion. Being an agnostic myself, I'm surprised that you interpreted the OP as atheistic in nature.
And since the OP is NOT promoting atheism, you response is just you exposing your personal belief system. Man defines God (for the most part in the world) through religion. The honest observer must determine what is true and what isn't in that sense.
Okay, now apply your post to all religions you've come across and then honestly determine how they fit.
Wrong. The only honest observer iscthe one with the accurate view of God. Everyone else is dishonest or mistaken. Humans are extraordinarily bad observers. Regardless of how we see ourselves.
Neither of those things is true, because they are depicting a 3 dimensional object in two dimensions.
Evidently this is supposed to contravene something I said, but I haven't the foggiest idea how. If that can be taken to mean they're all apostate, you haven't come within lightyears of making that case. It's essentially a tautology, so congratulations, I guess.
Are they? Or are they defining its shape by multiple profiles? Each profile is an incomplete truth, a partial definition limited by perspective. The complete truth is made up of these incomplete truths, determined by different perspectives. And thats not even accounting for other potential dimensions interacting with the shape. Can a 4D object be 'truthfully' reported by a being that can only percieve in 3? Is there some leniancy in the expectations of truth in presenting partial perspective when not all the perspectives are available? If I tell you 2+2=4, am I obligated to tell you about 3+1 and 6-2 or make of myself a deciever?
So by your final sentence, there can be no valid religion or the concept of God, given that we're all incapable of obtaining honest observation.
Your quote was " Evidently Christ saw that coming: John 16:2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service." - I merely point out that Christianity throughout the ages has killed/enslaves in the name of God....a direct contradiction to the 2nd Testament cornerstones. The honest observer must weigh all the history against the scriptures, scriptures against history, against logic..to determine the legitimacy of the religion. - I'm not pointing to a renouncing, I'm pointing out that the very actions of the "faithful" and churches are a basically WRONG in regards to the "word(s)" you point to. In other words, they think they got it right. The hones observer sees otherwise. - Dude, I'm all happy that you can show off your grasp of the vocabulary, but you clearly don't get (or don't want to get) what I'm saying here. I hope I cleared it up, because I can't get much baser than this.