david@ssc-vax.UUCP (David Norris) (12/15/83)
> Laura Creighton: > I have been able to find this trend in every single religion I have looked > at. The religion becomes "established", and gets used as a crutch for > insecurity, rather than a vehicle for spiritual growth. The results > are very frightening. Laura is correct. The results include the Spanish Inquisition, the apostasies of the Catholic church in early Europe, Ireland (although this is probably a mixture of religous/political). But killing someone with a garden hoe does not make the hoe bad. It makes the individual(s) using the hoe bad. You can't, after all, blame the hoe, or the pistol for killing the person. This applies, I think, to religion as well. (Of course, if the objective is to weed the garden, some garden instruments are better than others. But let's not take the analogy too far.) > I have a simple test for Gods. I ask them "what would they like to do if > they could do anything". If your answer comes back as something other > than "make everyone else Gods" or "end world hunger", then I think that > your Godhood is based on insecurity -- and you are still caught biting > your own tail. Since Laura is responding to a fellow commenting on Heinlein, I must assume that "Gods" in this sense refers to such individuals. Question: Can such a test be applied to the Diety (or Dieties, if you prefer) Himself? -- Dave Norris -- ..!uw-beaver!ssc-vax!david