Religious Organization = Exclusivism

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
21

Hi A

I agree completely assuming of course that the religion has a conscious origin.

I agree. It is us that does the rejecting. The only thing that cannot be accepted is the imaginary that is taking place of the real because it doesn’t exist. If we don’t come into existence to some degree, then there is really nothing to accept.

I am also not sure what you mean by unified mind. I know of inner unity or"presence" dealing with the quality of the whole of oneself but you may mean something different.

Hi Bessy

The problem IMO isn’t exclusivity but the natural degeneration into secularization of the teaching which results in the normal contradictory manifestations of secular life…

Is a hunting knife a good or bad thing? It is considered “good” if people understand its purpose and use it correctly. It is considered “bad” if used as a means to kill people for pleasure. The knife has no good or bad connotation itself.

Exclusivity is like that. It is necessary and valuable for spirituality when understood rightly. But as a tool for the expression of egotism, it becomes its opposite.

Followers will always fall short and some lose it completely forming their own schools of interpretations or sects. This is why Christianity and the many facets of Christendom can exist simultaneously though Christianity is no longer visible on the surface.

“Right to” and “opportunity for” may not be the same.

The problem really isn’t “fundamentalists” but IMO our tendency to believe anything as long as an "expert"is saying it. Because of this gullibility, we end up acting in ways completely unnatural for ourselves. In this way we are sheep.

Fundamentalists, Nazi’s, liberals, etc. are the same in that they are all sheep. As sheep, life just continues as it is. They seem to differ because of personal preference, but they are all sheep. This is why I admire the “black sheep” It knows it is a sheep but desires to understand so as to become itself even though its individuality will be rejected by the contented flock.

22

Bessy

I have to say something here. It sounds, Bessy, almost like you're saying that humans are [i]entitled[/i] to heaven.  That certainly flies in the face of every religion that teaches that there is a heaven, which mainly claim just the opposite.  We are sinners, and thus, don't deserve heaven.  Luckily, God is good. 
 That said, I agree with most of the original post. I would extend the model beyond religion, though- any set of ideas is defined by exclusivity. Communism is one thing by virtue of the fact that it's not something else.  G.K Chesterton said it best when he pointed out that the only alternative to dogma is prejudice:  A Dogma says "It is like this", where a prejudice says "Whatever it is, it's not [i]that[/i]". Those are really the only options we have.
Now, just because a system of a beliefs must be exclusive, does not mean the adherents must be. For example, I'm sure there are many Communists that are more than willing to consider the benefits of Capitalism, provided they come with a solid argument. Nothing in Communism says that Capitalist arguments cannot be entertained, it simply says that in the final analysis they must all be false. So then, a Catholic can consider arguments for Judaism, and in fact can come to accept Judaism as true on the basis of those arguments. In so doing, though, they cannot sensibly call themselves a [i]Catholic [/i]anymore. That's where exclusivity plays a part. 
 The logic of violence depends entirely on the nature of the belief structure- not in the fact that it is exclusive, as they all must be. Is the belief system about something very [i]important[/i]? Is there must disagreement? If Yes to both, the violence is an option.
23

Well without knowing God, having personal realisation, there is no way that we can know that we are all ONE. All part of the same universe, all part of the same principles. Truth exists within us in the same way that it exists within the world. I’m not talking about your truth and my truth…these are simply pieces of the Truth. There is an absolute Truth that bonds us all. There are people all over the world who grasp this fact and yet I have never met them. What when I travel and I meet someone who grasps this fact - we look into each other’s eyes and there is recognition. There is no need to discuss it as there is a heart to heart communication. Having knowledge that we are all part of God, we are all God individually and collectively, unifies our minds. With a unified mind we are able to move past the issues of our differences and focus on our sameness. We are all different, we have different personalities, different cultures, different hair colour, different realities, and these things are what have seperated us thus far…yet there is a part of us that is all the same, we all carry within us the seeds of truth, we all have the same Christ consciousness or Buddha nature or Bodhi seed or simply we have a True Nature or maybe we can call it our heart - the part of us that never changes - is always and always - it never dies - when we recognise this in each other, we have come a long way to having a unified mind. We have been so focussed on our differences that we have excluded each other and we are afraid that if we shift our perceptions to include others we have to lose something…we have to lose ourselves. I feel that we must lose ourselves (the ‘I’) in order to gain a deeper understanding of this unity.

A

24

A-

A beautiful answer. So well stated, and my thoughts exactly.

25

I’ve never had problems with this saying. For some reason, most people read this as say “believe in me” where as I read it as saying ”think and behave like me"

Lets face it, it literally says “through me” which means it has to be interpreted somehow… but “believing” is to easy… its what most capitalistic, ego-centric christians want to think – i.e. they can have this world AND the next just by “believing” in jesus. I’ve seen Christian TV programs where the preacher (salesman) is literally saying: “jesus wants you to have that car, he wants you to have that nice home, he wants you to be happy” apparently all you have to do is believe he will save you and you get it all?

Well, the devil believes in jesus too. The devil believes in jesus more than any christian ever could so there must be more than “believing”.

I think its interesting to note that the word “believe” seems to be made from two words: “be” and “live”. This is obviously a quirk, but interesting and telling, just the same.

Thinking, behaving and becoming christ conscious is difficult. It means giving up the pleasures of this world, it means sacrifice, it means living a life of service to others – not of self serving, consumerism.

So I don’t think this saying (or anything Christ said) is exclusive at all. If you want a higher consciousness, then its open to all, you simply have to practice (i.e. think and behave in the ways jesus does). If you don’t, that’s your choice. But no one is excluded unless they exclude themselves. There’s nothing outrageous in that; that’s the “way” one acquires any skill– through sacrifice and dedicated practice.

26

Hello all,

The thread has sort of wandered off the original path. Gee, first time that’s ever happened! :unamused: To summarize so far, it didn’t appear that anyone wanted to challenge the original premise, but everyone was suggesting that exclusiveness was more of a ‘property’ of personal or individual perspective. So let’s go there. I’ll start a new thread shortly.

JT

27

:astonished: Sorrrrrry… I didn’t realize this was an “exclusive” thread

(PS I was about to apologise that this wasn’t what your were asking… but I thought bugger it! What I’m talking about is (always) far more interesting :smiley:)

28

Excellent observation - “Don’t just do what I say, but live as I live, be as I am”
Perhaps someone should pop back a millenia or two and shoot the translators of the gospels…

I think Religion is compelled to engender exclusivity for a numbers of reasons:

I’m not a very theistic person, but if I’m wrong and there is anything resembling the traditional big-guy-in-the-sky knocking about, and he does do great deals on the afterlife vis-a-vis you and me - I think the BGITS must be a fairly magnaimous entity - there is no hell, and everybody gets a ticket to heaven, though perhaps the nastier element of humanity gets the evangelical equivalent of a crappy apartment and a dead-end job. But that’s another thread subject.

No - I think God’s fairly neutral on the subject of sin. Think about it. You’ve got ants in your back garden - yes…? They’re all tiddly, black and busy. Now - some of the those ants must be bad ants (they carry slightly less than their share of the leaf, they sometimes post the wrong trail-marker pheremone, and snicker into their antennea when their friends walk into a wall…) … Bad, bad ants… But I daresay the thought has never even crossed your mind. You could pick up the worst serial ant killer ant in the entirety of ant history between your finger and thumb, and feel absolutely zero connection. Ant sins mean nothing to humans.

So why should human sins mean anything to god…? If God is the light and the way to a non-physical continuance/semblence of life after death, and perhaps the door, the support medium and the generator motor too… Does he stand at the gate with a list and a bow-tie…“Sorry mate, but yer not gettin’ in…” How can the heavenly bouncer make value judgements on beings of a lower order it really can’t feel an empathy with…? Would you be able to sort out the good ants from the bad ants…? Okay - suspending disbelief for a second - perhaps Jesus was God’s attempt to obtain some basis for empathy with us, fine and dandy, time for an update don’t you think…? I mean they didn’t even have i-pods back in year 0AD… Society changes, sin changes. Nothing is static. The Heavenly Bouncer’s dress-code(x) is out of date.

Anyway - sorry, I digress. It’s all very well for God to be magnanimous and allow the most miserable into heaven along with the most pious, but a Religion cannot afford to be so… forgiving. It needs rules, it needs carrots, it needs sticks. [Just a thought, but God should be ALL carrot in my book, and no stick, otherwise, well - God’s no better than us.]

Imagine how long a Religion would last if it preached:

Jocular Chap:“Yeah, well, like there’s this God-bloke, up in the sky, and he, y’know - deeply loves your ass… And when you die… He’ll replace your batteries and take you into, like, this really cool cosmic club, wiv angels and stuff…”

[the great unwashed]: “Tell us O teacher - what must we do…?”

JC “Er… Do…? Well, er - whatever you were doing before I suppose…”

[the great unwashed]: “Tell us O teacher - what must we not do, for fear of God’s wrath…?”

JC: “Wrath…? Er… Look - you guys… You guys ain’t gettin’ me here, God, like doesn’t judge… No Godly Justice - He just is. Just do what you think is okay… Okay…?”

The people would just go okay, I’m a “Just-Is-ian” -then hedge there bets by joining the “raving-kill-every-sucker-who-looks-funny-ians” down the street… People eh’ (as God says) - gotta love 'em.

No - Religions need rules and sticks and carrots, and exclusivity, because a carrot, freely munchable by all, has no worth. And no useful leveredge over the muncher.

29

Hi km2,

No need for apologies. If I had to apologize for everytime I helped take a thread off course… well, I’d have about a thousand ‘I apologize’ posts to make. No problem going to the personal perspective that creates exclusiveness. We may find that religious exclusiveness is the creation of individuals rather than the other way around. Possible?

Hi Tab,

If I didn’t know better, it almost sounds as if you have a theistic streak you’ve been hiding behind that wall of atheism. :sunglasses: Come along for the ride. I’ll get a new thread up in a bit.

JT

30

Hi Tentative - et al,

A few more religious sound-bytes I couldn’t contextualize, or just plain forgot to get down…

  • Rather than God making us in his image, Religion creates a God in ours…

  • Religion is compromized simply by trying to please too many people, think of a cheap suit bought off the peg at a supermarket, it may look okay, but it never really fits anyone. The relationship between a person and God should be an totally exclusive, one off, custom made affair.

  • Organized Religion is mankind’s most cynical response to the spiritual side of human nature, pawning whatever beauty it could of had, for the baubles of pomp and power.

Where was I gonna go with them…? God only knows.

31

One whose heart and soul
Are at one with the great Void
Steps into the mist
And suddenly thinks they
Are stepping right out of this world

  • Saigyo

Sorry tentative. You know I had to do it.

32

[

Amen, amen, amen. Did I say AMEN?

[size=75](why didn’t I think of that, Tab?)[/size]