WHy should there be organized religion?

I can't see why organized religion exsists. I go back in forth in 2 week-periods from 2 different beliefs. Sometimes I beilieve in Jah (The Rastafarian God), even though I'm a not a rastafarian, not black, and not a pothead (anymore). It seems to be a God that wants peace and love. The Rastafarians reject Babylon, and there is a referance to the TOwer of Babyl in the old testement. (My mother made me read a bible, recently when she got pissed at me). The Babylonians tried to disperse people across the world, and create different races and launguages and stuff, when truth is "We all are one and one is all". And they LITERALLY tried to build a "Stairway to Heavan". So that is one belief I accept. The other belief I have thats more predominant in my perception of the world and reality, is that of We are all Gods. It's like the "Holy SPirit" thing without the father and the son. That belief could be summed up in a Jethro Tull lyric from the song "My God": "He is the god of nothing if that's all that you can see, you are the God of everything cause he's inside you and me". That's how I feel much of the time. I can't understand why organizecd religion "locks you in a temple and tells you to pray" to quote Billy Joel from "Only The Good Die Young". And I don't get why some organized religion say that taking acid is a "sin", or that "you can't go to bed till your legally wed", and stuff. It all seems a little fascist to me. My final problem with organized religion is that I think it fuels a lot of war. I watched a Tribute To John Lennon movie called "Come TOgether". It had the likes of Dave Mathews and Moby and contemporary muscians performiong Lennon and Beatles's songs. It was really good. Cyndi Lauper of all people sang "Strawberry Fields Forever". LOL But before I heard her sing that Beatles classic, I never knew she was a talented keyboardist, and singer. I'd also like to say that Cyndi Lauper looks REALLY good! Anyway, back to the point, on the video, between songs they had T.V. coverage of previous quotes from John Lennon. After some person sang "Imagine", it showed the interview of John where he said "I said Imagine no heavan.. not no God, though people are entitled to that too. God is in all us. He's not the dirty man up in the sky. We are all one people one world one nation. Together we revere Hari Krishna, Bhudda, Jesus, Muhamed, etc... We're all one. If you want to change the sytem, go and change the system. but don't go around shooting people". I really dug that quote. I think organized religion and the overly-strict adherance to religious principles cause a lot of wars or give people incentive to fight wars. Like in 2001 whoever (Bin Laden I assume) obviosly attacked America in the name of "Alah". So Bush faikls to respond to this, and goes attacking innocent Iraqis in the name of "The Lord", which was really stupid, cause there might not be any God, and if there is, he or she prolly wouldn't want politicians murdering other human beings in his/her name. I wish my parents didn't make me go to church on Easter, but they do. Can anyone help me understand why organized religion exsists?

PEACE

 

it's a way for church officials to control and have power. when you referred to babylon, your missing an important part. Zion was the true land of peace, and when Bob Marley refers to this, it was before the Jamaican's, who were actually black jews living in Africa/Middle East, they were stolen from their roots (Zion) because Babylonians sold them as slaves. Babylon is the root of where all this chaos of religion comes in. The Towers of Babble were actually built by Nimrod because he was the first king, and wanted to show people that there was no God by building this Stairway to Heaven, to show he was in power. Babylon is also where Moses's teaching were corrupted by the Babylonian priests, and also responsible for the modern day Catholic church as well as many numerous things I'd love to go into. Religion is slowly being peeled away and the scam is being illuminated. My advice to you is keep reading, and have respect for all religions by understanding where they come from and how they pertain to modern history through their ancient beginnings. There is a lot to learn, and organized religion is just another way of making you a sheep where the shephard is a wolf. Do yourself a favor, and don't go to church if you don't beleive it. Not to say it is wrong, religion certainly helps people, and they can do wonderful things for a person. But we must understand, all religions come from one thing, and people themselves all come from one. One is all and all is one. We just have too many people who can't accept the fact because of years of brainwashing and misunderstanding.

 

Organised religion exists because it can

It is much a variant of organised government.
Where a small group controls a much larger one and at many points in history
organised government and organised religion were the same thing.
The present government of IRAN for example IS the organised religion
of Iran. It is a theocracy.

So,, why are so few nations theocracies?
Why do so many nations have SPECIFIC rules that seperate
church and state?
Because in this case humanity has learnt from it's mistakes.

Occam

 

there is no should. should is what you do in the little room with the mirrors (and the 'ceramic diety').

there is only bennifit and harm, diversity that is the observable nature of reality, and that this prevents the existence of nothing known or unknown.

people feel compelled to persuade each other for all sorts of reasons, some well intended, some indifferent to most of their real consiquences.

organized beliefs may have grown partialy out of desire we sometimes have for more then we can do alone by ourselves. from this also came hierarchy and soverignty. all to support infrastructure to provide comfort zone which we have come in dominant cultures to take for granted.

people feel emotional needs too. and getting togather to party is one way of dealing with that. and then when we formalize getting to gather to console our mortality. when there you almost have it. then there are priesthoods. not all motivations for that are bad either. joining them is a way of getting by while providing people something they feel they need. just as other forms of diversion and entertainment, only in this case perhapse something deeper.

of course no priesthood can actualy give anyone anything they couldn't give themselves by going for a walk in the woods and sitting on top of a mountain, but getting to gather with each other once in a while isn't a bad thing either.

the only bad thing is people expect things of this, this getting togather and priesthoods and all that, that can only come from what far too many try to use it as a substitute for. and that is a couple of things. one is our connectedness to whatever is greater then ourselves. that and choosing our values and priorities on the basis of the kind of world we would actualy prefer to live in. or that would gratify something deeper in ourselves and the universe arround us to do so.

i won't condem as evil all this getting togather, only what it is used as an excuse for doing and not doing.

=^^=
.../\...

 

Spirituality (belief in gods, the supernatural, life after death, etc..) came about to fill the needs of people. However, organized religion was pretty much born as a form of government, it comes from theocracies. This is particularly the case in middle-eastern cultures, and eventually leaked it's way into european area cultures (who got sick of it after a while, spawning reformations across europe), which we can see from the past and even still in the present. The middle east has pretty much always been theocratic, so it makes sense that all today's mainstream organized religions were born there. Christianity, Judaism, Islam...

This idea that the church should not rule the state is a fairly new idea - One brought about by people rebelling against waring, violent, oppressive theocracies.

It is my personal opinion that organized religion should be avioded. I think it is harmful to society. Most people just want to live peaceful, normal lives regardless of their religious belief, and they deserve to do so. When large groups of people are being told that other's are "sinners" or "heathens" or "infidels" or bad in any way just because they don't believe like you do it is creating an intolerant and bigoted attitude that resonates throughout society for generations. It divides us because we are different. It pressures us to conform. It certainly doesn't do much to help us to deal with a large and diverse global community.

 

curiosity: what did the above quoted statement mean?

 

"should" is an espression of what we feel or observe or feel that we observe, or more likely have been enculturated to feel, to be desirable.

it is invisible to the diversity that is the nature of reality.
it therefore has little if anything to do with the reasons for the existence of anything.

the "little room with the mirrors" is an ironic reference to "ceraimic dieties" and slightly stretched similarities in the sounds of words.
i got this from someone who reputed it to be a quote, or a paraphrase of a quote, of krishnamurti. (whome, to be perfectly honest, i have not deeply studied)

=^^=
.../\...

 

ORGANIZED RELIGION ????/!!!!!

I went to a small country church that was one step short of pulling snakes out of a box when I was a kid...hell, I was twenty before I knew there were religions with organization

Kind of had to be there to appreciate what I mean.

 

They figured out how to profit off both of them.

Thats why.

This is where I mark the beginnings of Modern Babylon.

The Catholic Church was the first step.

The Protestant Reformation was the second step.

The total separation of Church and State was the third step.

It allowed Capitalism to become the religion. Money to the be god.

Everyone could still go to their little church huts and prey on sunday though!
Totally rad!

Now its just money vs God.

At least money has physical power!

Money is the only deity worth worshipping, and chasing after. You actually see a result in the here and know if you find this power.

Humanity has not learnt from its mistakes. Humanity has rebuilt Babylon, and the Tower of Babel is being built up again.

Babylonians did not disperse the people. The God of the Old Testament supposedly did. The Babylonians worshipped the son of man, and the demi god King Nimrod. Nimrod built the Tower of Babel according to myth. Which was the first World Empire. This is what the ancient kings all saught after. The most notable being Alexander. Conquering the known world was a big thing back then. As it would be now. They wanted to live up to this legend of Nimrod.

He was a tyrant king. He bribed people from the tribal lands to come and join his city and he would offer them protection and give them an area to farm, or a job to do to contribute to repay him for their safety. This worked. He built the tower of babel as a stairway to heaven yes. To show that god was not there, and the only god worthy of worship was he himself. He was the first Pontifex Maximus, a Latin term resurrected and renamed by Julius Caesar. It was a supreme leader of religion and politics.

This is why Jehovah, who is the Rasta Jah. Destroyed the tower of Babel physically and metaphorically.

People are dangerous when their united as one, with our present mindsets. Maybe thousands of years before our genes evolved or were untainted by invaders humanity could be considered one, but not now.

Differences give us differences in point of view.

Difference did not exist under a one world empire. Religion is only the bastardchild of these events. It was the ultimate of organized religion. With the Emporer and his priests, adorned in the most elite of shit being worshipped as gods. Domiting the entire populace, where anyone thinking on their own would be killed.

Morality was not an issue. Obeying tradition and orders were the only issues.

Thats why the tower was destroyed supposedly by God.

The Rastas claim that they lived in a one world society that did not need to build a cancerous domain. Where dominion is all that means anything. What and how much you own is the only definition of power inside Nimrod's city.

Is this not true about modern Capitalist societies? America leading the way.

When people come togethor in dominion it destroys.

Just like any other parasitic organism. It takes a choice to be symbiotic with your host. Or you could simple take its essence and destroy it to further yourself untill you realized you fucked up, and are basically screwed now.

No organized religion can be symbiotic. When it concerns converting people and building temples.

How can there be one love when were programmed to dominate?

The only answer is deprogramming. This is the aim of most of the worthwhile beleif systems.

Babylon programs. Plain and simple. Its installed in every person in America, to chase the green. Or to at least acknowledge its power. Even though money is a concept of paper that converts to an idea. Or a bullshit soft metal, in the old days.

Zion can never exist in a civilized world. We would all have to give up all this we take for granted to experience it. Babylon gets centered on white people, because we were always the ones pushing technology and advancement. Now that African Americans have been Babylonized they achieved great things. They claimed to have been living symbiotic with nature, which they were doing, in a tribal setting. Babylon was all about domination. Thats all there is to it. Thast why Organized religion should NOT exist. It is just displaying dominion over non-follwers, and even to its own followers.

True that.