(...) writes:

"I continue to be flabbergasted by the number of people who dedicate
there beliefs to hundreds of religions and gods yet have NO-NADA
objective verifiable evidence to support their beliefs. There is no
evidence that any of these gods communicate with any sane persons of
these religions. No dead fathers, mothers relatives or friends ever
verify there heaven or hell with their living siblings or friends
There is no objective verifiable evidence that any of these gods have,
in any clear manner, established their existence. All religious
beliefs appear to be purely based on the claims of others humans of
questionable sanity, veracity and intelligence. Would anyone invest
their wealth based on these unsubstantiated beliefs? Why do they
invest their very lives so carelessly?"

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********

V:

Thanks for your timely topic.

People do it for a number of reasons.

Some are trained from birth as I was - you take it all for gospel
without question. I was catholic for 50 years before I became an
agnostic freethinker. It took 45 years just to start questioning
things and 5 years to come to a conclusion for me.

Others just need some comfort to 'look towards' and help escape the
present pain of life.

You see, few of us like the idea of permanent death.

Nor does the average person like a life of pain and unhappiness.

So religion fills the gap that atheism cannot help with and in many
cases atheism just makes matters much worse though bitterness and ill
will while ripping out the previous moral and charitable foundation
that religion supplied in the person previous life.

Isn't it much easier to fantasize about something else than stay in
the hear and now? Fanatics about being in heaven with no pain and all
joy?

I try and catch myself when I practice this escapism and work to bring
my thoughts back to the present.

Whenever the fantasy starts I check to see what I am escaping from?

Why do I fixate on something else instead of where I'm at?

If we take care of the present, the future will take care of itself so
the good book tells us.

Practicing mindfulness of the present moment as part of a Buddhist
practice has helped me as well as and working 12 step programs to
repair the damage of the past and balance my life.

When theists look towards the atheist they see nothing but pain and
hatred. So naturally this helps 'keep them in religion' as there is no
other place to go for a semblance of peace.

No, just being an atheist will not solve one's problems by any means.

See:

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.atheism/browse_frm/thread/e77181f1188b4804/8d...?

A lot of atheists I run into make their intellect their God.

They do not know that academic smarts are not the same as peace
smarts.

Until they can transcend their ego they will never find the answer
(peace) they seek.

It is the same for those that think money is all that is standing
between them and happiness.

So it goes for the ego and intellect based person that is devoid of
spiritual values.

Always remember...one thing only goes so far with giving a person a
good life. Seek balance.

Spiritual growth as well as humans are not perfect, but we can all do
better at being humane if we try.

See:

http://jesusneverexisted.org/jne/forum/index.php?topic=4.0

May I suggest that instead of being dogmatic, militant atheists as
many of you are, you become agnostic freethinkers?

Same with the theists crowd. Start questioning the absurd and stop
killing people in the name of God or Allah.

The only true freethinkers are agnostic freethinkers.

Theist or atheist...you are both mind manacled and deluded.

This is the beauty of being a freethinker. We can think for
ourselves.

As such, when we get a toolbox we can decide which tools to use for
the job. Some tools are used a lot, other tools are left alone for the
time being, and still others are trashed when we see they are broken
and useless.

Again, a freethinker is 'free to decide' how they wish to proceed.

Just be careful of falling into the trap of 'mind manacled
freethinker' as many ego based people fall into.

The prejudiced, blind, small minded thinker cannot entertain
freethought as they must block or censor the ideas and concepts before
testing them for truth.

Their ego will not allow it! Such people do not operate on truth, they
operate on ego. There is nothing wrong with having personal opinions,
but when we use these opinions to destroy others, then it does become
very wrong.

The difference between an authority and an authoritarian is this.

An authority speaks from a place of truth and such speaks as an
authority. Whereas an authoritarian rules by fear and not by truth.
For the truth stands on it own and the authoritarian stands on their
EGO.

No, egocentricity is not good for spiritual work and we need to be
open to others ideas and embrace them as nourishment for your growth
and sustenance for life - as no one person is God.

Traditional freethinkers (atheists) do not accept me as one of their
group, since I draw from spiritual paths as well as wordily areas to
garner wisdom to live at peace. Traditional freethinkers do not like
anything that comes from religion.

Kind of a misnomer isn't it...I'm a freethinker...but I must block out
everything that comes from religion and spiritual traditions and
whatever other prejudice I wish to inject into the equation?

Psychologist William James once said, "A great many people believe
they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices."

When we limit prejudice we can open our minds to truth and peace. And
realize the truth of Blake's words that "all deities reside within the
human breast."

If it is religion that an atheists need to adopt, they only have to
look as far as the religion of humanity. But just paying secular
humanism lip service will not do any good.

Our talk of spiritual values must match our actions.

I was at a religious discussion where the group was composed of a wide
spectrum of believers and non believers. One atheist said he ran his
life by the golden rule. Another person piped up that the golden rule
came from the bible, which made the atheist wince.

The atheist seemed to take pride in his self sufficiency and did not
like to run his life by anything that came out of the bible. When it
came up that the concept of golden rule might be from an earlier
source than the bible, the atheist was relieved.

This was a good reminder to me to examine where my guiding light
resides? Is it ego based or truth based?

When the guiding light of this atheist was not grounded in the bible
he was happy. But when it came from an area that he did not like, he
was upset.

How can the same material be used to build a palace by one man, yet
only build a hovel for another? By one spiritual practitioner seeing
truth and applying it to live a life at peace. And the other person
only seeing prejudice and problems and doing nothing.

Every religion was made by man and as such every religion is imperfect
as it is run by man. Despite these imperfections, each religion also
has many "perfection's" within it as well.

We can still be open to peace generating tools from any of the
religions and spiritual traditions that are available to us if we are
serious about being at peace. This requires us to run our life by
truth and not by prejudice.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said: "Therefore, whatever you want
men to do to you, do also to them" (Matthew 7:12). Nowadays this verse
is commonly referred to as "The Golden Rule," and is more commonly
quoted as: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

Here are some of the earliest sources for this concept of reciprocity

~1970-1640 BCE "Do for one who may do for you, / That you may cause
him thus to do." - The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant 109-110, Ancient
Egypt, tr. R.B. Parkinson.

* ~700 BCE "That nature only is good when it shall not do unto another
whatever is not good for its own self." - Dadistan-i-Dinik 94:5,
Zoroastrianism.

* ? BCE "Whatever is disagreeable to yourself do not do unto others."
- Shayast-na-Shayast 13:29, Zoroastrianism.

* ~550 BCE "You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your
countrymen. Love your fellow as yourself: I am the LORD." - Tanakh,
new JPS translation, Leviticus 19:18, Judaism.

* ~500 BCE "Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find
hurtful." - Udana-Varga 5:18, Buddhism.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethic_of_reciprocity

Now, whether you believe in God or believe in Jesus or are an atheist
or Buddhist does this wisdom not apply to you? This truth is universal
in nature as it is based not on being of a certain religion, other
than that of the religion of humanity.

In this case, you can adopt a peace generating tool and apply it to
your life irrespective of your religious beliefs or lack thereof.

I had to chuckle one time when an atheist argued that the golden rule
is not perfect, so he said he does not follow it. When I questioned
him about what he does follow as well as the state of perfection that
applied to his life, all he could do was reply with profanities and
attacks on me.

Those that can't argue truth...argue personalities.

If we are waiting for perfection when it comes to spiritual studies we
will always be disappointed. Before applying perfection to anything
outside of us, we should examine the perfection within us.

The nature of humans is that of imperfection, so we must always look
towards direction and forget perfection.

I heard a story one time in a Yoga lecture that illustrates this
point. "Range is of the ego - Form is of the soul." The only thing we
need to be concerned with is how is our form when it comes to our
spiritual practice and our life.

Regarding the golden rule? It is more perfect than imperfect, so it is
a most useful tool to live a life at peace by.

And when we combine it with other tools such as universality, natural
law, contrast the greater good with the greater right, etc the
synergistic effect is close to perfection as humans can get with this
subject.

But it takes some thinking and one will not see it without an open
mind. Wisdom for living a life at peace is all around us for the
taking. But many of us get blinded with labels and personal
prejudices.

Whenever we take it upon ourselves to beat down, we are headed in a
direction of destroying peace. We destroy our own peace as well as
others peace. As such, I practice from many religious and spiritual
traditions without problems or prejudices and readily look for such
gifts irrespective of what label they come under - on the contrary I
am most grateful wherever I find them.

If I am not able to use a concept, I leave it alone, but do not spend
my time or energies to beat others down.

Do we like to be beaten down?

I saw some paintings in a Japanese museum that showed a cousin of the
Buddha being of great power and to show his strength he went up to a
baby elephant and pushed it down to the ground. A second painting
showed the Buddha helping this baby elephant back up to his feet and
the Buddha lifted the elephant high up over his head and said, "It is
much better to uplift - than to tear down."

Whether this is a true story or not I do not know. But we can all
benefit from uplifting rather than destroying.

I see this predisposition to destruction many times in responses I
receive from my posts. The critiques offer much in the line of 'no
goods' but they seldom do they offer any substantive tools to finding
peace. Maybe I do not have it '100%% right' but I have it 'right
enough' to be able to be at peace if I apply these principles. If I
waited for perfection, I would never act. I use the tools at hand.

Aristotle ~ "It is the mark of an educated mind to rest satisfied with
the degree of precision which the nature of the subject admits and not
to seek exactness where only an approximation is possible."

This being able to 'rest satisfied' is something the perfectionists
lack and why they will never be at peace until they stop collecting
concepts and start using the concepts of peace generations.

The atheist I mentioned above demonstrated this with his blanket
dismissal of the golden rule since it is not 100%% perfect. He could
offer no substitutes for the golden rule, all he could do was succumb
to personal attacks on me. We can examine our writing to see what
useful tools for finding peace we offer to others it also says a lot
about our own practice of generating inner peace.

When you practice peace promotion with others you will reap inner
peace promotion. When you practice destroying others peace, you will
reap self destruction of inner peace. This is the truth when the
prejudice of ego is stripped away.

Whether atheists, theists or Buddhists, I submit that you all drop the
pretense and lies that you have been grasping onto for entire life and
rebuild your life through a foundation of truth and testing and
regenerate yourselves into a truth based agnostic freethinker.

Take care,

V (Male)

Agnostic Freethinker
Practical Philosopher
AA#2