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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Let's see where this goes - "Religion is God's punishment for the gullible" - discuss
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
Saw this in a sceptic's sig today and liked it. Struck me as quite a good discussion point, really.
I haven't decided what I think yet, but I do know that I like it.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
So many questions in a one liner!
Does God punish anyone? Well, as to this one I would say 'never', so that's a non-starter for me.
Is religion painful? Hmmmm - it can be, but only because other people are a pain and being alone can also be a pain!
Are people of faith gullible? Some are, but some are highly sceptical.
But I like the quote too - made me smile.
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
Yes, it's a really cute quote. I'm not sure it's any more than that. It's not really a serious discussion point, is it?
I think religions tend to become corrupt and jaded, but I don't see that as God's punishment really. Let's face it, most human institutions become corrupt and jaded.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Atheism is the devil's punishment for the arrogant?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Hawk
Semi-social raptor
# 14289
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
I think religions tend to become corrupt and jaded, but I don't see that as God's punishment really. Let's face it, most human institutions become corrupt and jaded.
And then someone has to reform it.
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“We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don't know." Dietrich Bonhoeffer
See my blog for 'interesting' thoughts
Posts: 1739 | From: Oxford, UK | Registered: Nov 2008
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
It reminds me of an interesting looking cake, which on closer inspection, turns out to be mainly air and spun sugar, and collapses instantly. But there are quite a number of similar sayings, which are quite cute at first, but turn out to be empty, for example, nice garden, no fairies at the bottom, etc.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Laurelin
Shipmate
# 17211
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
It reminds me of an interesting looking cake, which on closer inspection, turns out to be mainly air and spun sugar, and collapses instantly. But there are quite a number of similar sayings, which are quite cute at first, but turn out to be empty, for example, nice garden, no fairies at the bottom, etc.
*nods*
I think it's banal.
It doesn't make much sense:
- If the sceptic in question is sceptical about God’s existence or whatever, why mention God at all and why the emphasis on God punishing other people? ![[Confused]](confused.gif)
- What have the poor old gullible done, to make them deserving of punishment? Why would God want to single them out, in particular?
- Why is religion seen as a punishment, in particular?
However, I've been inspired to make up my own Meaningless Quote: 'The Only Way is Essex is God's punishment for reality TV.' ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
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"I fear that to me Siamese cats belong to the fauna of Mordor." J.R.R. Tolkien
Posts: 545 | From: The Shire | Registered: Jul 2012
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Mark Betts
Ship's Navigation Light
# 17074
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Atheism is the devil's punishment for the arrogant?
But you get arrogant christians as well.
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"We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary."
Posts: 2080 | From: Leicester | Registered: Apr 2012
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
"Religion is God's punishment for the gullible" can be parsed two ways. Well, two at least.
One of them involves a joke at someone else's expense (if you are a sceptic). The other involves putting a sign on your back saying "please kick me - I'm gullible".
Metaphorically.
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Anglo-Cthulhic
Posts: 4857 | From: the corridors of Pah! | Registered: May 2001
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mark Betts:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Atheism is the devil's punishment for the arrogant?
But you get arrogant christians as well.
You get gullible atheists also.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Mark Betts
Ship's Navigation Light
# 17074
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
You get gullible atheists also.
I know... anyway, try this -
Atheism is Darwin's punishment for Naturalists.
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"We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary."
Posts: 2080 | From: Leicester | Registered: Apr 2012
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
Doesn't work. "X is God's punishment for Y" is an existing formula; your version isn't.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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moron
Shipmate
# 206
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
Escher's engravings
You have to read a LOT of posts here to have an opportunity to post this.
Posts: 4236 | From: Bentonville | Registered: May 2001
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The Great Gumby
Ship's Brain Surgeon
# 10989
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:
I think it's banal.
It doesn't make much sense:
- If the sceptic in question is sceptical about God’s existence or whatever, why mention God at all and why the emphasis on God punishing other people?
- What have the poor old gullible done, to make them deserving of punishment? Why would God want to single them out, in particular?
- Why is religion seen as a punishment, in particular?
Well, it's amusing enough at first, but while it doesn't stand up to scrutiny as well as it might, I think some of these criticisms are wide of the mark.
Obviously, it plays on the tired old "X is God's punishment for Y" trope. Like the similar "If Eve was created from a rib, why do we still have ribs?" it turns dodgy Christian cliches around, either to make the flaws more obvious (it's always easier to see them when you want to find them), or just for lulz.
I don't think it needs more justification than that, but I think there are interesting possible interpretations. The obvious one is that God doesn't really exist, but is necessary for dramatic purposes in order to make the switcheroo work, but I think that's a bit mundane.
More interesting is the interpretation that there is a God, but He actually wants us to think for ourselves, rather than believing anything we're told based on little or no evidence. He (being omni-everything) knows that anyone who pursues a religion is doing so based on insufficient information, so He punishes them for this gullibility by making them perform daft rituals, attend tedious services in draughty buildings, and so on. Again, just a Bizarro version of a Christian cliche.
The question, especially for anyone who's ever said "X is God's punishment for Y", is how you would disprove it.
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The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. - Richard Feynman
A letter to my son about death
Posts: 5382 | From: Home for shot clergy spouses | Registered: Feb 2006
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Mark Betts
Ship's Navigation Light
# 17074
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Doesn't work. "X is God's punishment for Y" is an existing formula; your version isn't.
Eutychus substituted "God" for "the devil", so why can't I use Darwin?
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"We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary."
Posts: 2080 | From: Leicester | Registered: Apr 2012
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
The heading fits in well with the 'spiritual but not religious' concept, which perhaps applies to most Westerners today.
On the other hand, many confirmed atheists would say that believing in God is gullible in itself, and they wouldn't see any difference between a theist and a 'religionist' in that respect. If religionless theism is preferable to an atheist or to anyone else, that's because it's highly individualistic, has no structures, or authority figures, no cohesiveness, and no shared doctrines. As such it's amorphous, and above all, it poses no threat whatsoever.
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mark Betts:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
Doesn't work. "X is God's punishment for Y" is an existing formula; your version isn't.
Eutychus substituted "God" for "the devil", so why can't I use Darwin?
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
Darwin is not a a supernatural being.
Darwin did not create belief system.
Darwin was a theist when he originated the concept.
Evolution is not anti-theistic.
Darwin wasn't .... Oh bother, there's tons more, of course. But TGG got it right.
[ 13. March 2013, 15:28: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
To be fair, I don't think Mark was banging that particular drum.
This time.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Mark Betts
Ship's Navigation Light
# 17074
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by W Hyatt:
How about: "Religion is God's answer for the fallen."
Or... for the Calvinist... "Irresistible Grace is God's answer for the fallen - well, some of them anyway."
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"We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary."
Posts: 2080 | From: Leicester | Registered: Apr 2012
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kankucho
Shipmate
# 14318
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Posted
Here's another Esheresque take...
Religion is God's punishment for those who think they rightly ought to be punished but aren't sure what for, so construct a god who meets their exacting requirements and who, further, decrees it to be the ultimate offence to deny his existence.
[ 13. March 2013, 16:51: Message edited by: kankucho ]
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"We are a way for the cosmos to know itself" – Dr. Carl Sagan
Kankucho Bird Blues
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
I did wonder whether the quote was a way of looking at a bit of scripture This one from 1 Cor 15.
quote:
17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. 19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.
It's the view from the other side; we're gullible to believe any such thing and so we get what we deserve. Why not "eat, drink and be merry", lay aside all this masochistic self-denial and struggle with our very imperfect faith communities? After all, "tomorrow you die".
To which a good starting point is to assert, following Thomas a Kempis, that "inordinate self love will hurt you more than anything else in the world". And that ain't gullible.
So I like the Jim Elliot quote. "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose."
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
Originally posted by Barnabas62
quote:
To which a good starting point is to assert, following Thomas a Kempis, that "inordinate self love will hurt you more than anything else in the world". And that ain't gullible.
ISTM, this is nearly universal.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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HCH
Shipmate
# 14313
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Posted
The original line makes little sense. If the speaker believes in God, then he/she is self-insulting. If the speaker is an agnostic, then what does he/she mean by "God"?
Some claim that a Deep Truth is a statement whose logical negation is a Deep Truth. I don't think this one passes the test.
Posts: 1540 | From: Illinois, USA | Registered: Nov 2008
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
I haven't decided what I think yet, but I do know that I like it.
This seems to me the sort of logic that sceptics accuse those gullible believers of using.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by kankucho:
I'm sure the paradox is deliberate — similar to, 'Thank God I'm an atheist'.
I never understood what that meant.
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
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roybart
Shipmate
# 17357
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Posted
quote:
Religion is God's punishment for the gullible.
I enjoy the irony in this, but would prefer to rewrite it as:
quote:
Certain religionS, particularly those which specialize in hellfire and damnation messages, are someone's punishment for the gullible.
"Religion," sadly, can't be easily separated from the constructs that fallible humans have invented to define, limit, and often distort the fullness of Gods message.
By the way, I'd like to thank Eutychus and Mark Betts so much for their illuminating contributions. Their brief comments reveal much more about themselves than about the topic, but do not appear (yet) to have taken over the thread.
[ 14. March 2013, 12:58: Message edited by: roybart ]
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"The consolations of the imaginary are not imaginary consolations."
-- Roger Scruton
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The Great Gumby
Ship's Brain Surgeon
# 10989
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
quote:
Originally posted by kankucho:
I'm sure the paradox is deliberate — similar to, 'Thank God I'm an atheist'.
I never understood what that meant.
Joke (n): Something said or done to provoke laughter or cause amusement, as a witticism, a short and amusing anecdote, or a prankish act
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The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. - Richard Feynman
A letter to my son about death
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Drifting Star
Drifting against the wind
# 12799
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Posted
Is the point of it not that God and religion are not the same thing?
I read it as saying that those who cling to a religion rather than seeking God for themselves are not going to find much satisfaction in the long term. Obviously it's tongue in cheek, and the idea of God punishing people isn't relevant to the point, just a device to make a point.
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The soul is dyed the color of its thoughts. Heraclitus
Posts: 3126 | From: A thin place. | Registered: Jul 2007
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Of course in an age of information, where every least bit of opinion, idea and tweet is recorded, gullibility would be the dimension for considering religion. The real issue has nothing to do with gullibility, scepticism and knowledge. It has to do with comfort, with explaining the unexplainable, and with hope.
I've never met anyone in times of extreme duress who doesn't have at least some semblance of yearning for something in addition to the cold hard facts. Such a price for sentience. Which makes me consider that 'religion is a punishment for being human'. We are all Homo non sapiens I think
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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Alogon
Cabin boy emeritus
# 5513
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Posted
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Drifting Star:
Is the point of it not that God and religion are not the same thing?
You beat me to it. This could be spoken by a deist of sorts, one who believes that God exists but He slaps those who bother Him too much. (I use the male pronoun unapologetically here, trusting that no one would prefer to think of such a deity as a goddess).
Anyway, there are many religions, some more keen on punishment than others. Why gravitate towards the more sado-masochistic kind? Atheists can well ask believers to state what good going to church (or any other practice of their religion) has ever done for them. Believers had better be ready with an objective reply. (An appreciative chorister can answer easily, while others might be more at a loss).
But even subjective replies might parry a claim that one's religion is a punishment rather than a blessing. I'm reading God's Funeral by A.N. Wilson, about various developments in the nineteenth century (especially in Britain) that made Christian belief more difficult. The situation is poignantly described in Thomas Hardy's poem of the same title, written shortly before World War I: it looks more and more as if is just a human construct, but how are we going to live without Him? Not all readers, however, are convinced that Hardy had society at large in mind, in view of the subtitle which refers to the state of theology. So the poem could be a sort of satire reflecting the same impatience with religious intellectualism as Blaise Pascal expressed when he said that he wanted the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, not the God of the philosophers and savants. At any rate, if Hardy and many of his contemporaries decided that atheism was inevitable, they tended to regard it as a disappointment and burden rather than as a relief.
I can have a lot of respect for that kind of honest atheist, but the happy-go-lucky kind is a hazard. It isn't real atheism unless it is thoroughgoing, which means seeing past and resisting many more popular follies than those generally labeled religious. Popular culture offers all the same fool's gold to children of atheists as those of Christians. If parents get sloppy, their children will not inherit the atheism.
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Patriarchy (n.): A belief in original sin unaccompanied by a belief in God.
Posts: 7808 | From: West Chester PA | Registered: Feb 2004
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The Great Gumby
Ship's Brain Surgeon
# 10989
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Posted
So, Karl - is this how you thought the thread would go?
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The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool. - Richard Feynman
A letter to my son about death
Posts: 5382 | From: Home for shot clergy spouses | Registered: Feb 2006
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Religion is our broken, perverted, fear ridden, psychtoic response to God.
Evensong - you are so right for me. The whole concept of punishment, even in Jesus' own language, is about Him meeting us as us, with and in our horrible constricted language.
We have to DARE to transcend it. I'm in tears as I write that. In fear before God and praying for Him to correct me. I'm in tears a lot nowadays, which shows how frail and damaged I am and have no where else to go but that daring that I feel He endorses.
Am I wrong?
ONLY here and in the emergent and ancient church do I hear voices that go beyond the premiss of damnation.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Gextvedde
Shipmate
# 11084
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Posted
It's a witticism, yes mildly amusing, but nothing more. We could spend days pulling apart the logic structure of it but why bother when William Lane Craig has probably already written a book doing just that
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"We must learn to see that our temperament is a gift of God, a talent with which we must trade until he comes" Thomas Merton
Posts: 293 | From: The Twilight Zone, near the M25 | Registered: Feb 2006
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Great Gumby:
So, Karl - is this how you thought the thread would go?
For once I didn't have a clue.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Originally posted by Barnabas62
quote:
To which a good starting point is to assert, following Thomas a Kempis, that "inordinate self love will hurt you more than anything else in the world". And that ain't gullible.
ISTM, this is nearly universal.
"Nearly" is a nice word. My late dad had this saying that I never quite got.
"Nearly's half way, and half way's nowhere". Was about car journeys IIRC.
Seeing the damage of inordinate self-love is indeed a common religious value. But it's only a start point. Learning how to live out that value without gullibility may take a while longer.
You don't need to start with Thomas a Kempis, or "take up the cross". Start somewhere else if you like. But I always encourage people to start.
Living out the journey can teach us the truth about how deeply selfishness is built into all of us. It is a wrestling match, from first to final bell.
But it is not a gullible journey. Rather, it is a journey during which we find out just how gullible we can be, and have been.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
ISTM that God isn't trying to make us holiness bots, or religious, or even Christian. She wants us to be our whole, best selves.
To the extent that Christianity and/or religion help us with that, great. If not, then we've got them wrong, or they're wrong to begin with, or maybe we just don't need them. (At least, individually. sometimes, the best thing you can do for your faith is to forget about it, for a while.)
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
Clearly it's an advertisement for a book on being "spiritual but not religious."
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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EtymologicalEvangelical
Shipmate
# 15091
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Posted
What does the word 'religion' mean?
Any ideas?
'Cos I ain't got a clue about this (especially considering that even atheists can be 'religious'!)
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You can argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome': but you neither can nor need argue with a man who says, 'Rice is unwholesome, but I'm not saying this is true'. CS Lewis
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