To believe or not to believe...
The question of whether to believe or not to believe is at hand and I'm wondering if those who are balking at leaving their beliefs for the sake of their better judgment have considered - really considered - the importance of rethinking. The times are so desperate around the globe that deciding on the side of NOT leaving belief is no longer an option.
Sam Harris is perhaps the one man who has said it best and said it most often, that clinging to religious belief, in light of today's technological advances, and specifically in light of our nuclear and chemical capabilities, has become far to dangerous for anyone to consider continuing. The reason is simple... religion adds a remarkable degree of division between cultures, so much so that it has the potential to drive people to committing insanely horrible acts, neighbor upon neighbor.
Fanaticism is the word we speak in describing such acts, but it is the moderate religionist, though not himself a fanatic, who props up the framework of religion from which the fanatics come.
911 is the classic example to consider, an oddity by its magnitude in destructiveness, yes; yet consider also, all the lessor celebrated acts of fanatics that happen almost daily have all happened for exactly the same reason - belief. The more such acts are ignored (and, for the most part, we do ignore them) the more they will escalate toward the unthinkable... the detonation of a nuclear weapon or the release of mass quantities of deadly chemicals onto an innocent society. It is on the shoulders of moderate religionists to back away from their beliefs as a means to stop terrorism. Subtract the broad acceptability of belief from propping up the steel within the terrorist's mind, whether it's to shoot an abortionist doctor, to hang a census worker or to suicide bomb a city bus, and we may see a better tomorrow. Fail to back away from religiosity and terrorism will continue to plague us to our early deaths.
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Sam Harris is perhaps the one man who has said it best and said it most often, that clinging to religious belief, in light of today's technological advances, and specifically in light of our nuclear and chemical capabilities, has become far to dangerous for anyone to consider continuing. The reason is simple... religion adds a remarkable degree of division between cultures, so much so that it has the potential to drive people to committing insanely horrible acts, neighbor upon neighbor.
Fanaticism is the word we speak in describing such acts, but it is the moderate religionist, though not himself a fanatic, who props up the framework of religion from which the fanatics come.
911 is the classic example to consider, an oddity by its magnitude in destructiveness, yes; yet consider also, all the lessor celebrated acts of fanatics that happen almost daily have all happened for exactly the same reason - belief. The more such acts are ignored (and, for the most part, we do ignore them) the more they will escalate toward the unthinkable... the detonation of a nuclear weapon or the release of mass quantities of deadly chemicals onto an innocent society. It is on the shoulders of moderate religionists to back away from their beliefs as a means to stop terrorism. Subtract the broad acceptability of belief from propping up the steel within the terrorist's mind, whether it's to shoot an abortionist doctor, to hang a census worker or to suicide bomb a city bus, and we may see a better tomorrow. Fail to back away from religiosity and terrorism will continue to plague us to our early deaths.
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