When I die and go to hell so be it

[madokie]

I know pain, I know rejection, having been a poor underprivileged kid I learned a lot. Religion as we know it today is the ROOT of all evil.
peace

[BlueEyedSon]

1. Not ALL, but a lot. And plenty of ignorance too!

[Dr.Phool]

2. But, evil is the root of all money.

[gordianot]

3. Heaven and hell is in the eye of the beholder.

Like Mark Twain observed one mans heaven can be another mans hell.

[madokie]

5. Through it all, I learned Love and today my heart is broken

I have a run amuck pResident and a populace who seems to not care. :cry:

[TallahasseeGrannie]

9. Be more careful of that heart, Madokie!

Don't let it break over world issues. Save it for those you love. The world will always be out there and it will never be what it should be or what we want it to be.

[gordianot]

14. I think the populace does care, just not hungry enough.

[aka-chmeee]

12. The Mysterious Stranger

Most devastating thing that ever happened to my young faith! I have not felt any need for religion since I read it almost 40 years ago.

[gordianot]

18. Rod Sterling illustrated it best in an old Twilight Zone.

Where a petty crook was killed by the Police. He wakes up in a beautiful penthouse surrounded by women and money. As a lifelong loser he finds he cannot lose and gets everything he desires. Very soon he finds this is his own eternal personal hell and what he desires most are answers which he does not get.

A world of slaves, conformity, privilege, unending war, and purposeful ignorance is a living hell. Those who wish for this type of existence have not yet figured it out.

[BushOut06]

4. Seems to be an awful lot of anti-religious sentiment around here

And quite frankly, I find it just as disturbing and frightening as those who use religion to further their own goals. People want to lump all religion into the same boat, and anyone who is religious right along with them. I'm not particularly religious myself, but I do believe in tolerance. Religion has been used for thousands of years as a tool - it's not the religion itself that causes wars and suffering, it's the people who use that religion to further their own agendas.

[madokie]

6. I'm not anti-religious just pointing out, 'but the bible says'

[Deja Q]

7. I hear ya.

I wonder why they're drawing things out as long as they are.

If they were compassionate, they'd kill us all this instant and have it done.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

11. Holy Moly!

What a horrible thing to say.

I'm sorry you are feeling so hopeless.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

8. Evil

is a tree with many, many roots. Roots on roots attached to roots leading off roots. And a lot of them deal with beliefs.

But religion has also done good things along with the bad. Yin and Yang, I guess.

For example, without the monks of Europe we would have lost the ability to read and write way back in the Middle Ages.

[Warpy]

10. Mark Twain said it best

"Heaven for the climate, Hell for the conversation"

[msongs]

13. only religious people can go to hell since they invented it in their

minds.

hell is a concept priests use to terrorize people to get compliance, conformity, and of course,
lots of money.


Msongs
www.msongs.com/political-shirts.htm

[madokie]

16. As a young kid in the church my dad founded

I spent many years terrified of HELL
today I am confortable in knowing, neither heaven nor hell exist outside of the realm's of one's own beliefs. As the other inhabitants of this earth, I will only cease to exist.

[Hubert Flottz]

20. The church I went to when I was growing up, was built by a man...

who was convicted and served time in a maximum security prison, for embezzling the very money, that he then used to build the church. The church had already been built by the time the man was caught. After the man got out of prison and came back to services there, the church made him a Deacon. I guess the devil is in the details, but I never understood after I was old enough to find these things out and to know what they meant. I can be just as good a person by staying at home on Sunday, as I can by going to a church such as that and being a hypocrite.

I don't think I need to roll in the floor, wear finer clothes than you can afford to wear on Sundays, or have a bigger, newer Buick than you have, to be a good person.

I'm telling you the honest truth. What I saw with my own eyes at church, stopped me from going.

[madokie]

21. I'm sure I am better for it, just not sure how, maybe in the love of life

I raised my stepson's to respect all, small and large, That you are not better than any living thing. That in the scheme of things we are all equal. I embrace death as I have embraced life.

[Hubert Flottz]

15. God is a concept, by which we measure our pain. I'll say it again,

God is a concept, by which we measure our pain.

I don't believe in KINGS!

EDIT: to post link...

http://www.bagism.com/lyrics/plastic-ono-band-lyrics.html

[Elidor]

17. Religion is a disease

Anthropomorphization run amok. Any individual, group or culture that claims to know the mind and the will of god is full of shit.

[shrike]

19. be nice if it were so

But it vanished today, greed wouldn't vanish along with it.

Nor would ethnic tensions, nor the seemingly innate human need to look down on someone, ANYONE . . .

Unfortunately, things are never that simple.

[blue in ohio]

22. If there is a god.

Then he is either powerless or cruel.
Then he is either testing us or fucking with us.
Then he is either blind or apethetic.

I would have to assume the worst.