Dear
Pogo I understand Fear means to Revere and Respect.
well the dictionary doesn't understand it that way.
Fear is never a positive except to the extent it makes you alert to a threat.
Which is useful. But why would you want to invent a threat in the first place?
Because you're setting your target up for a power trip, that's why.
Hi
Pogo
You are still focusing on the external secular level,
with the LITERAL language and terms that people use that aren't perfect.
I think you are missing what is meant by the meaning on the collective level
of laws, principles and concepts of human nature that we DID NOT make up.
It's like the natural workings of the world already exist,
but our "man made" language for these laws are a subset.
And this can include both ABUSES that are "false faith" forced on people;
and CONSISTENT terms and laws the DO describe the physical relations and reactions
going on in nature that we DIDN'T make up..
is it CLEAR between us that the ABUSES that exploit fear-mongering
are SEPARATE from the natural laws of how human conscience and nature work.
I want to make sure you are not running these together, as if religion s are synonymous
with fear-based cult controls, and without making a fair distinction between that
and the TRUE meanings that people seek to express using these systems.
Pogo did we make up the mechanism by which we naturally seek life and avoid
things causing death?
Isn't fear a natural survival instinct and part of that binary system of either:
* yes -- this brings security and stability to prolong health and life
* no -- this is dangerous and to be avoided
Now I UNDERSTAND it is NOT healthy to have
FEAR based guilt-tripping religions for monopolizing authority
You are right to call out ABUSES of religion (or politics) based on fear-mongering,
war-mongering, hate and race baiting,etc. Not fair, not healthy and exploitative instead.
But that is NOT the true meaning and purpose behind religion (or govt laws).
Just because these get corrupted doesn't mean those ABUSES define that's what they are for!
Can we PLEASE make a distinction between
* fear-based religious/cult abuse that ISN'T the goal or purpose of religion
vs.
* natural free choice and knowledge of laws
so that fear and avoidance of ill consequences is part of the
human conscience and learning curve.
If it helps,
Pogo, we know there are stages of human development
where children are first taught to obey their parents for safety and stability.
Only after kids are mature enough to reason on their own, can they be
expected to learn to make decisions, not based on reward or punishment
by parental authority, but by their own independent reason and learning
from experience of themselves and others.
Can we agree that in the PAST, when mass populations of people
start off ILLITERATE and working and depending on the upper management
and govt classes of people, then there WAS the tendency to teach
and enforce laws based on patriarchal authority, similar to the Father being the disciplinarian of the house.
Sure, this pattern is historical and can explain why the Catholic Church
has been structured this way, for social order and stability.
That was in the past.
But now that society has developed further
with more people literate, and with access to global media to communicate,
it is possible for people to operate independently, to form their own
groups and not rely on one centralized authority to govern every thing to be built and provided..
We don't need to stick to the "fear-based" simplistic way of
teaching based on "God's approval or not". That may have worked in the past,
but for the future, all people nations and tribes need to have a system of
training members to keep the group "self-sustaining."
We as humanity are supposed to move toward social and political maturity
where we make responsible decisions by reason and experience, by
educated choice, not by force of law or faith to manipulate the masses to obey blindly!
All the old ways of fear based obedience to authority are the OT way
when society was not developed, people were not literate, and collective
institutions have been used to herd people around under the management of more educated
and experienced leadership.
The NT is about sharing collective responsibility where the people realize equality.
I think this must be where you are driving at,
and the main issue is you do not relate to religious terms for this process
of growing socially to embrace Equal Justice for all people. But that is
what the end stages in the Bible are describing.
You would probably communicate this using secular terms,
and just don't relate to a personified God or Jesus that comes across
as controlling people with icons and worship of authority figures.
So if you don't relate to that approach,
I would suggest framing Jesus and God
as representing True Justice and Universal Truth
that isn't decided or made up by man. We can come
to terms and consensus on what it takes to achieve these
but no, we did not make them up. We struggle with our "man made"
perceptions and words to establish Truth and Justice,
I agree this doesn't work to project it as manmade religion.
What I find works is using religion as a language to speak to audiences
who respond to that explanation.
So
Pogo if this is NOT your native language and you don't feel it relates to you,
it doesn't make sense to use it, that defeats the whole purpose.
It seems better to translate and stick to Secular terms that do ring true with you,
and then work backwards to translate those terms back into the Christian
or Biblical equivalent of that concept or principle.
So if you and I can agree on concepts like Truth and Justice,
once we agree what is the process of establishing these things,
then we could work backwards and show how the Bible uses
religious symbolism to describe that process of how
Truth is established to bring Justice and Peace.
The intent behind the religion is good, but the politics of power grabbing
has corrupted the institutions and masked and lost the message.
[Same with the true spirit of the Constitution vs. the mucked up
bureaucracies we have today that are not what govt was originally designed for,
so of course it is over backlogged and mucked up.]
