First, I believe the part of the Bible you're thinking of is the Old Testament, which largely becomes useless in Christian thinking after the arrival of the New Testament. I'm also not convinced that ALL religions calls for the harm of others. So your point, IMHO, is ignorant, prejudiced, and slightly offensive. It's a little like blaming the violence on TV for the increase in violence among children. The argument doesn't take. Or, as Joss Whedon once wrote, "That's crazy troll logic." Furthermore, I'd argue that religion, like art, philosophy, sports and science, tends to respond to current human thought. Thus, in religion's case, it can become more or less violent according to the beliefs of the times. Alex Post Script: Christ David, you really despise religion in all of its forms. I have one question: Where you beaten up as a child by a group consisting of Christians, Buddhists, and Greco-Roman Pagans? 'Cause this really is a whole lot of hate over something that's easy to ignore. ----Original Message Follows---- From: David Dyer-Bennet <dd-b at dd-b.net> "Alex Nixon" <unitcancellation at hotmail.com> writes: > I can't believe that I'm getting involved in this discussion, > especially given how little I've read of it. Still, here it goes. > > David, your belief that Religion is to blame for hurting people and > causing the destruction of great civilizations is fallacious. It > wasn't religion, spirituality, or the belief in the supernatural that > did that- it was people. Religion is merely an institution, a way of > looking at the world, a vehicle for one's actions. It is not an > independant, thinking entity. Right, and an institution that teaches beliefs and rules of action should get no blame for bad effects of their teachings. Sorry, not buying it. -- David Dyer-Bennet, dd-b at dd-b.net / http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/ John Dyer-Bennet 1915-2002 Memorial Site http://john.dyer-bennet.net Dragaera mailing lists, see http://dragaera.info _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail