What Good Has Religion Ever Done For Us?

[Leo Volont]

The crusades have been disparaged by history revisionists and of course it did have it's excesses. However, the crusades are what brought Europe out of a thousand years of stagnation that we now call the dark ages. It was the crusaders that established new trade routes. What they found in the Temple ruins in Jerusalem revolutionized architecture and established a new economic system. This was the catalyst for the renascence and the Christian reformation. If it were not for the Crusades we would all be living the same way they now live in the Middle East. Only worse because there would not be a United States or a western civilization to hold it in check and advance it as well.

You are forgetting the most important thing. The Crusades successfully defended Europe from the Wave of Barbarism that having swept out of Mongolia devastated the whole entire rest of the Civilized World. Only the Catholic Church was able to organize and implement a viable Defense.

 

[Brutus1964]

Leo Volont

Thank you for your input. You are correct.

The Crusades are not over. Many in Islam (certainly not all) are still Hell bent on taking over and imposing Shariah Law over the entire world. To them they we are still in a holy war against us. This is why Osama Bin Laden calls us Crusaders because he is continuing the war. The stakes now are the same as they were in the 12th century. Like the Catholic Church before it, our best means of defense now is the United States.

 

[Tiassa]

Perhaps you can draw up a plan by which a Civilization could thrive without ever seriously protecting itself.

You know, that's just offensive. I'll just go with Marilyn Manson:

Burn the witches, burn the witches, don't take time to sew your stiches
Burn the witches, burn the witches
Good is the thing that you favor, evil is your sour flavor
You cannot sedate all the things you hate
Burn your bridges, burn your bridges, don't take time to sew your stiches
Burn your bridges, burn your bridges
Good is the thing that you favor, evil is your sour flavor
I don't need your hate, I decide my fate
You cannot sedate all the things you rape

"Dogman"​

That you would pretend that all of it was a civilization "seriously" protecting itself is just a tad ridiculous, sir.

Here, read through a civilization's attempt to seriously protect itself: Trial and Interrogation of Anne Hutchinson (1637).

I won't get into the Salem Trials or the Inquisitions. In those cases, people needed to be protected from civilization.

Although there's an interesting question: Whence resides Torquemada's soul?

 

[Leo Volont]

Here, read through a civilization's attempt to seriously protect itself: Trial and Interrogation of Anne Hutchinson (1637).

I won't get into the Salem Trials or the Inquisitions. In those cases, people needed to be protected from civilization.

Although there's an interesting question: Whence resides Torquemada's soul?

The Salem Witchburnings were not Religious. The Salem Courts were secular protestant courts. What do you expect then when True Religion is rejected, and the Barbarians pull away from the Catholic Church, that these Anarchists won't get themselves into trouble.

Indeed, you should examine Catholic Rule over Europe where the Church Courts repeatedly intervened to suppress the superstituous persecution of 'witches' and such. These were the Inquisitions, which Protestant Propaganda insists were doing the exact opposite of what in actuality they were doing.

With the Protestant breakaway from the Church, there was no longer any agency which could control the ignorant mobs. Certainly you cannot cite the behavior of ignorant and superstitious mobs to indite Religion, when such outrages only resulted when Religious Authority had quite been overthrown.

 

[cole grey]

LEO,
Links, quotes?
I want to hear about the protection of witches.

 

[Cris]

Leo,

Secular protestant is an oxymoron. Protestantism is a religious position. And there is no effective difference between religious beliefs and superstitions - both are irrational beliefs of an imaginary supernatural.

 

[Cris]

Brutas,

Besides bringing us language, writing, reading, education, art, music, moral values, justice, civilization, democracy, freedom, and order what good has religion ever done for us?

It is not clear that religious belief caused any of these things. But it seems likely that without religion we would be far more scientifically advanced and might now be free of the many diseases that ravage the world.

Also without the fantasy beliefs in an afterlife wars would probably not exist since life would be considered far more precious.

 

[Leo Volont]

LEO,
Links, quotes?
I want to hear about the protection of witches.

The best apologist for Catholic Civilization is Hilaire Belloc, who I believe was a French Catholic who was raised in England. Informative, but he also has a very good english style. He has written so much, and I have read so much that I can't really cite a title.

But it is true that the Church Courts were in fact courts from which all the modern traditions of jurisprudence originate. In most well established Catholic Parishes, witchcraft was not a problem, but in the hinterlands where superstitious excesses were reported, Church officials would be sent to re-establish order, and their priority was to stop the lynchings and the burnings. More people were cited for spreading false accusations than for engaging in diabolical or satanic practices.

European History only becomes rife with Witchburnings after the Catholic Monolith was broken and local Jurisdictions took over control, or rather, allowed all real law and order to evaporate. Here we can interpret the Historical Picture to show us a Catholic Age of Civilized Enlightenment followed by a Protestant Dark Age. Yet, Catholicism had created a large Educated class which did not disappear when the bloodthirsty Protestant Barons took over. Within a Century Catholic Moral Values and Traditions would begin to re-emerge -- it was the Momentum and Inertia of Catholic Civilization, but Protestant leaders would insist it was of their own creation. We still have Protestant Schools teaching children that The Dark Ages was followed immediately by the Protestant Reformation. It fails to explain that all of the Great European Cities were built by Catholics, including hundreds of Major Cathedrals, whose archetectural splendor has never been matched, and whose scale has only been exceeded since the invention of steel and re-inforced concrete.

 

[Brutus1964]

Leo Volont

I am a Mormon. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is sometimes considered to be Protestant, but technically it isn't. The Church is not an offshoot of any particular faith. We consider the Church to be restored from the original Church that Christ himself established while he was still on the earth after his resurrection. We believe that after the apostles were killed off the original church went into apostasy and was again reestablished on Earth by God and Jesus Christ through Joseph Smith the prophet. We believe that other churches do contain the truth and certainly bring their followers closer to God, but our Church has the fullness of the gospel.

 

[cole grey]

Also without the fantasy beliefs in an afterlife wars would probably not exist since life would be considered far more precious.

I hate to be so critical of humanity, it's bumming me out, but the idea that wars would not exist is a "fantasy" unless one state rules the planet.
Look at the chinese invasion of tibet. A secular nation invades a country with a "re-incarnated buddha" as it's political leader. Or maybe they just killed their own people to take back "their" territory. It depends on who you believe.
But let's skip the sad stories.
Look at Japan -
KAMAKURA PERIOD(185-1333) Military government established in Kamakura by Minamoto no Yoritomo. Emperor, as figurehead, remains in Kyoto with the court aristocracy.
1192: Imperial court confers on Yoritomo the title of seii taishogun ("barbarian-subduing generalissimo"). Bushi become new ruling class.
MEIJI PERIOD (1868 -1912) The emperor is restored; Japan makes transition to nation-state.
Dispossessed bushi become soldiers, policemen, and teachers with fall of feudal system and political reform. New national policy is to make Japan a rich and powerful country, to prevent invasion by Western powers. Emphasis is on building a strong military and strengthening industries. Japan becomes world power through victories in Sino-Japanese (1895) and Russo-Japanese (1904-05) wars. Korea annexed (1910-45).

Why do we need military governments? To conquer and defend.

Look at all the wars between the fuedal "barbarians" in Europe. And why do you think they call fuedal periods everywhere "fued"al?
Look at all the tribal warring that has occured in shamanistic cultures, where the only God they had were the trees and animals, to keep away the evil spirits.
People kill each other for economic purposes, and racial hatred too.

Let's stop fantasizing that murder is sanctioned by humanity only through religion.

 

[one_raven]

I completely agree with cole grey.
Wars have always happened and likely always will happen.

People simply use religion as ONE excuse because it is an easy one to manipulate. Just ask an ancient Roman.