His job was to rape young girls before their execution

[CoryKS]

Of course, looking at the central role played by religion in justifying the enslavement of non-Christian races in the first place...this isn't quite as impressive as it seems at first.

Slavery needed no such justification. It predates the major religions, and the cultures that went on to develop those religions were steeped in it and considered it normal. For those who consider their texts to be the word of God, it may be a gross oversight not to have denounced what we today see as an evil institution. For those of us who consider religion to be a codification of a culture's mores, it's not that surprising. What is fascinating to me is how a text written thousands of years ago at a time when slavery was commonplace, and which seems to at least implicitly condone it, could be interpreted in such a way that today we feel the revulsion that we do wrt slavery. It's worthwhile to keep in mind that this feeling is not universal - slavery continues to this day in Africa, the Middle East and other parts of the world.

 

[Ken Morgan]

I know you didn't. In fact, you gave a passing nod to some of the good things it has done after you listed the many horrors that, to your mind, it should be blamed for.

And no, you don't need to be religious to do good or bad things. The abolition example wasn't intended to show that religion is necessarily good. The point was that the leaders of the movement drew their inspiration from the doctrine of their religion (unintended consequence, perhaps), and managed to gain traction because they presented their argument in religious terms to those who shared their beliefs. In effect, they used religion as a tool to lead large numbers of people to their desired goal. That ability is a feature rather than a bug, IMO. If some people use it for bad purposes, then those particular instances should be addressed rather than assaulting the concept of religion itself.

Sorry, but I’m reasonably certain that there were more then two leaders of the abolitionist movement. (I’m assuming ur talking about the US movement, and not the UK one?) Funny but it can be argued that it was the superiority of ones religion, and not just $$, that started the whole slave thing to begin with, stretching back thousands of years. We find it distasteful the thought of slavery today, but there are 100’s of thousands of slaves still around, a whole system propagated by many religious people.

The main question that arises is of course where does morality come from? Religious people will say it comes from god, but I would argue that religion gets it’s morality from us. To say that without religion we would be no better than animals is insulting.

 

[arnisador]

Economics drove the European slave trade in Africa, but organized Christianity was what allowed those doing it to overcome their basic human morality and actually engage in this enterprise. The church justified slavery on the grounds that the Africans were inferior and non-believers; many in the U.S. held to the belief that the Africans' enslavement was a necessary step to their religious salvation by comparing it to the Jews' time in Egypt.

The Wikipedia article has info. on it:

Numerous passages in the Bible have historically been used by pro-slavery advocates to support the practice as valid for their societies.

...remained well into the Middle Ages and beyond. Most Christian figures in that early period, such as Augustine of Hippo, supported continuing slavery...

Nearly all Christian leaders before the late 17th century regarded slavery as consistent with Christian theology...

For example, the evangelical Protestant Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts owned the Codrington Plantation, in Barbados, containing several hundred slaves; all slaves in the plantation were branded on their chests, using the traditional red hot iron, with the word Society, to signify their ownership by the Christian organisation.

By the Middle Ages, the most powerful and influential Christian voices were in favour of slavery.

Throughout Europe and the United States, Christians, usually from 'un-institutional' Christian faith movements, not directly connected with traditional state churches, or "non-conformist" believers within established churches, were to be found at the forefront of the abolitionist movements.

in the slave states of the United States, where the justification switched from religion (the slaves are heathens) to race (Africans are the descendants of Ham); indeed, in 1667, Virginia's assembly enacted a bill declaring that baptism did not grant freedom to slaves. The opposition to the U.S. Civil Rights movement in the 20th century was founded in part on the same religious ideas that had been used to justify slavery in the 19th century.

introduction of Catholic Spanish colonies to the Americas resulted in forced conversions and slavery to the indigenous peoples living there. Some priests, such as Father Bartolomé de las Casas worked to protect Americans from slavery, although Casas' works may have helped to inspire the African slave trade.

From elsewhere at WP:

In 1452, Pope Nicholas V issued the papal bull Dum Diversas, granting Afonso V of Portugal the right to reduce any "Saracens, pagans and any other unbelievers" to hereditary slavery. This approval of slavery was reaffirmed and extended in his Romanus Pontifex bull of 1455. These papal bulls came to serve as a justification for the subsequent era of slave trade and European colonialism.

The Southern Baptist Convention formed on the premise that the Bible sanctions slavery and that it was acceptable for Christians to own slaves.

Robert E. Lee: "The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence."

An academic's analysis of that latter: "This [letter] was the prevailing view among most religious people of Lee's class in the border states. They believed that slavery existed because God willed it and they thought it would end when God so ruled. The time and the means were not theirs to decide, conscious though they were of the ill-effects of Negro slavery on both races. Lee shared these convictions of his neighbors"

It's true that there were individual Christians and some smaller Christian groups that opposed slavery, but the organized religion actively participated in promoting and enabling slavery in the U.S.

It's a similar mindset reported in the original post, dealing with another Abrahamic religion. The organized religion of Islam is used to justify the rape and murder of children by redefining the rape as a marital act and the murder as a justified execution...and substituting the religion's twisted ethics for the basic human morality of the people there.

Religion is what's needed, and used, to convince good people to do bad things:

Good people can do good and bad people can do evil. But for good people to do evil -- that takes religion. -Steven Weinberg

 

[David43515]

Since this thread has taken such a wide turn away from the way it started, and has become a place for people to voice thier displeasure with religion, I`d like to share with you an illistration I read recently.

Picture a farmer driving a large open-bed truck filled with sugar beets en route to the sugar refinery. As the farmer drives along a bumpy dirty road, some of the sugar beets bounce from the truck and are strewn along the roadside. When he realizes he has lost some of the beets, he instructs his helpers, "There is just as much sugar in those which have slipped off. Let`s go back and get them."

I would argue that it is religion (whether Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, etc.) that helps us to see all men as brothers, as equals, as friends that need our support and love. That it is through religion that men can most fully understand the value of thier fellow men, and because they understand, truly begin to care about those around them. That is a teaching that is almost universal among people of faith.Those who look down on others and seek to selfishly use them can`t be said to have any real understanding of thier religion. Sadly, they may try to wrap themselves in the cloak of religion to try and justify thier selfishness, predudice, and cruelty, but they are a minority. A man can be kind and loving to those he meets without knowing anything of religion. But no man can really believe in religion without being kind and loving to those he meets.

"Behold I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; That ye may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God." Mosiah 2:17 (Book of Mormon)

 

[David43515]

I grew up in a Christian family in a city with a good sized Muslim and Hindu community, so I was lucky to know a few people from lots of faiths. I`ve known very devout Muslims who were ashamed of the radicals who killedinnocents in the name of thier religion. I`ve known Christians who shudder at the bombing of abortion clinics and the murder of the doctors who work in them. And I`ve seen a Jewish concentration camp survivor who had every reason to hate show forgivness to the people who took so much from him.

Most religous people are no different than the people all around you every day. They have thier faults and thier weaknesses, but they`re just people with common sense who try thier best to do what`s right. They aren`t filled with hate or selfiness any more than the rest of the population. When you begin criticizing all of them with bold strokes, you`re saying the same thing about your friends and family members, the people you work with and see in the grocery store or in the pub down the street. Are they all evil bastards out to manipulate the rest of society for thier own profit and pleasure? Of course not. So lets stop the faith bashing.

 

[Ken Morgan]

I grew up in a Christian family in a city with a good sized Muslim and Hindu community, so I was lucky to know a few people from lots of faiths. I`ve known very devout Muslims who were ashamed of the radicals who killedinnocents in the name of thier religion. I`ve known Christians who shudder at the bombing of abortion clinics and the murder of the doctors who work in them. And I`ve seen a Jewish concentration camp survivor who had every reason to hate show forgivness to the people who took so much from him.

Most religous people are no different than the people all around you every day. They have thier faults and thier weaknesses, but they`re just people with common sense who try thier best to do what`s right. They aren`t filled with hate or selfiness any more than the rest of the population. When you begin criticizing all of them with bold strokes, you`re saying the same thing about your friends and family members, the people you work with and see in the grocery store or in the pub down the street. Are they all evil bastards out to manipulate the rest of society for thier own profit and pleasure? Of course not. So lets stop the faith bashing.

Why? Because it hurts your feelings? I see countries bashed, political parties bashed and various MA bashed on this forum. Why does religion get a bi?

No one is bashing religion per say, but we are expression our dissatisfaction with all archaic (and modern for that matter), belief systems. This dissatisfaction has been generated by centuries of abuse on mankind, and many of us have had enough sitting on our hands accepting the magical man in the sky, simply because our parents, grandparents, that nice pastor fellow all say it is true. Who all say if you don’t believe there is something inherently wrong with you and you are going to hell.

Look, if you want to follow religion, be my guest, have fun, hope it helps you through life, but do not force it on me, the public, or proclaim that religion is this untarnished vehicle for good.

When the catholic church apologizes for diddling little boys, when the muslims apologize for killing people, when the hindus apologize for the caste system, when the jehovah’s apologize for letting little children die because they refuse blood transfusions, then, and only then, does religion have the right to come here are claim moral superiority!

 

[arnisador]

I would argue that it is religion (whether Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, etc.) that helps us to see all men as brothers, as equals, as friends that need our support and love.

Well...on an organized level it has just the opposite effect, doesn't it? Jews vs. Muslims in the Mid-East, Muslims vs. Christian America...religion foments wars and adds fuel to the fire.

I would say that modern genetics is much better for what you describe above. It proves that the differences are minor.

They aren`t filled with hate or selfiness any more than the rest of the population.

The basic Christian belief is that all of those who are not Christians will be tortured for eternity in burning lakes of fire. That's hateful. Some Christians reject that. That's an improvement. But Christianity, like most religions, is at its heart based on exclusivity and the persecution of those who think and believe differently. I find that pretty hateful, as a belief system.