david haas

and why do some have it and some don't? It doesn't seem to make any
difference what the religion is either. You must address that in your
explanation.


------
D. Haas

"Consistency requires you be as ignorant today as you were a year ago."
Bernard Berenson

charles & mambo

Huh? Who the hell you talking to?

--
Got to be a Chocolate Jesus, better than a cup of gold
See, only a Chocolate Jesus can satisfy my soul
When the weather gets rough and its whiskey in the shade
Best to wrap your Savior up in cellophane
He flows like the Big Muddy, but that's okay
Pour him over ice-cream for a nice parfait...
Got to be a Chocolate Jesus, make me feel so good inside
Got to be a Chocolate Jesus, keep me satisfied

raven1

A misspellllign of "religioeus faith", I gueess... BTW,
<ponkl>

christopher a. lee

<klonp>

conditionedsoul2

First of all, what is meant by "religious faith"? Many religions
require not much faith at all (Jainism, Buddhism, Taoism,
Confucianism, many forms of "Hinduism"). Other, monotheistic ones,
stress faith but this can be taken two ways. One is that they have
faith in something which they can't and/or don't know, namely God
and/or His concern with them. The other kind of "faith" is the kind of
strong conviction that is the result of direct personal experience.

With that in mind, we can say that those who have the first kind of
faith I mentioned do so because they feel that they have a greater
chance of obtaining Truth if they're willing to take the risk of being
wrong. Being skeptical about everything may be a more secure way, but
it's definitely slower. Imagine if you lived life that way; never
taking risks. Beliefs/faith/ideas are nothing more than motivations
for action and different modes of living. Anyone who claims *absolute*
knowledge of anything in the phenomenal world is dreaming (quite
literally, according to some religions). As for the second kind of
faith, there is obviously no question of why those who have this kind
of faith simply do so. It is simply a tautology.

Btw, so-called "blind faith" is an ad hoc concept concocted by
atheists. However, there are many who believe things just because
they've simply never thought of how their beliefs could NOT be true.
Believing what you're told is a much too convenient way of reducing
the mental load.

In conclusion, "religious faith" or lack thereof is based on our
individual psychological make-up, which is in turn determined by our
experiences/activities. Every action has a reaction and those
reactions elicit experiences, which in turn influence further actions.
Everyone's psyche is determined by this cycle of action and reaction.
Because everyone's activities/experiences/pysche are different, there
is really no such thing as an objective *point* of view. Unless, that
self can step outside of the self, that is. This is, of course, impossible.

brian henderson

On 19 Jul 2003 10:43:23 -0700, conditionedsoul2@yahoo.com (jiva)


That's simply not true. I've been told by *MANY* theists that even if
it was proven absolutely that God wasn't real, they would still
believe because their entire lives are based around that 'fact'.
Without God, even if God doesn't exist, they'd have nothing to live
for.

Pathetic but true.

conditionedsoul2

F****ve me if I'm immediately skeptical. First of all, if a so-called
"theist" says that, can he even be really called such? Does he
actually have ANY faith, let alone blind faith? People who have real
faith in God give their lives to Him. Who gives their lives to
something which they accept as proven NOT to be true? Who truly
believes in ANYTHING without good reason? Growing up atheist, this was
one of the things I found most hypocritical of theists. They say they
believe in God and even love God, but they don't really show it at all
in neither their behavior nor their mentality.

In Christianity, there have been attempts at radicalizing the
understanding of God in order to "save" the religion. In fact, some
even call for an "atheistic Catholicism" in which God is rejected and
the Christian focuses entirely on Jesus and His life as a source of
inspiration. Similarly, we've been asked to "take a leap of faith" in
God (Kierkegaard) and reunite with "the ground of all being"
(Tillich). Then there's the pantheist's way around the problem of
believing in something which you have no experience of and accepting
that there is much proof against it; just change the definition.
Consider also fideist thinkers who claim that belief in God does not
have to be justified in any way. None of these radical approaches to
understanding God actually represent any real faith in God at all,
what to speak of blind faith.

When all is said and done, "blind faith" becomes not even an oxymoron,
but an expression that is *totally* self-contradictory and therefore
impossible. If your faith is "blind", then it follows that it is not
really "faith". I have faith that my father is not planning to bomb a
government building. What proof do I really have that this is true?
All I can go on is lack of evidence and positive evidence of the
opposite conclusion. If it were true that he does, in fact, have such
a plan, I would certainly be shocked and distraught because what I
thought I was sure of turned out to actually be false.