Is religion selfish and self-serving?

Remove all ads!

From modern Anglicans to ancient woshippers of Zeus, they all have one thing in mind... themselves.

Anglicans are Christians and believe you should treat your neighbor as you would want to be treated yourself. This is a rather non-self serving idea. However the reason 'why' you should do this is the self serving part. To recieve eternal life, or to avoid the opposite, eternal damnnation in hell.

Ancient worshippers would sacrifice food, money... people to appease their gods. Not in the hope of making their god happy for the sake of it - "Hi Big Z, just sending a gift to say 'Thank you' for being a nice god. The kids say 'Hi'. You're their hero you know?". Rather the sacrifices were to spare themselves of the god's wrath or to recieve belessings in return.

Some Asian religions involve much meditation to acheive inner peace. Problem is when these monks or worshippers achieve this 'inner peace' they have a habbit of running off and becoming hermits, not wanting to share this newfound revelation with the rest of the world.

Seems to me that religion is all about number one - and I don't mean God. I'm talking about yourself. Do what your chosen diety says to be rewarded or to avoid punishment. Don't do 'nice' things for other people simply because helping people is a good thing to do. Rather help them because in the end you'll be rewarded for it.

Of course you could argue there 'have' to be rewards and punishments. How else could those who have done their god's bidding be separated from those who did the opposite? But thats where intention comes in.

Is a person who killed others unintentionally through negligence worse or better than someone who saved others because he thought these acts would grant him eternal life? One committed a horrible crime according to religious beliefs, they were responsible for the deaths of people. The other saved lives, did a great thing often agreed by all most religious beliefs. However their reasons for doing these things is what matters.

Do the gods destinguish between these intentions? If someone obeyed his god because he loves his god and believes that doing things his god's way will make the world a better place for everyone will he recieve the same treatment to someone who did the exact same actions because he sought the rewards offered?

You could take a realistic point of view and argue that both deserve the same treatment since they both performed the same acts.

Are the rewards offered by gods a way of keeping people in order? A 'last resort' to control those who are on the sideline between sin and salvation from sinning? Should these people be rewarded at all? They certainly shouldn't be punished if they have done no wrong, however their intention should prevent them from recieving the reward.

However if they do not recieve the reward then dosen't that make the god a lier and deciever? Doesn't that mean the god has 'used' these people for his own ends?

Its a strange thing this. By discriminating between those whose intentions were pure and not selfish and those whose intentions were self serving the god makes himself a lier and a deciever, therefore making the god self-serving and betraying others to further his own goals. However to reward them equally makes him uncaring about the selfishness of his followers, making the worship of a diety a selfish thing.

Damned if you do and damned if you don't it seems.

 

WOW! I never looked at it that way...

 

Nice one, though I expect the zealots to come storming in with their pitchforks and BOVDs while screaming: "Teh L0rd 0wn0r5!!11!1 We love him cos he is teh l337!!11! Nothing about punishment, damnation and all that! That only applies to non-believers who are evil and need to burn in hell forever and ever!!111 W00t!!1" any moment now.

Which is stupid, and therefore irrelevant.

That's religion for you. You summed it up very nicely, Abom.

Well done.

 

This thought occurred to me at one point or another and, for some reason, I think I was watching the T.V. show "Friends" when I thought of it. The episode in which Phoebe tries to do one selfless deed...and can't. Eh...anyway...

I believe one of the bigger arguments you are going to see, is that "Since it is in the name of 'God', it makes it selfless, that 'God' is acting through me, and with me, as I do this good deed." I think. I thought of something else before but I promptly forgot it, for some reason.

Going along with what you said, "Do the gods destinguish between these intentions?" Why would a 'god' or 'gods' even care what you did and did not do? If they're/it's truly perfect, it doesn't need you anyway, so it doesn't really matter. But back on subject.

I agree with you completely, Abomination. Religion is all about the self, even religion is about the self, because the 'god/goddess' or 'gods/godesses' only think about themselves as well, by having you do these things "in their name". But I guess that's what happens when a being is created from the mind(s) of a human being.

 

Hmm, interesting perspective. So to put it another way, only atheists can perform truly selfless acts. I knew I was a good person!

There's an off-chance that some members *cough* chev *cough* may have an opinion here.

 

Yeah, I beat chevalier! First to the post!

I can't speak for other religions besides Christianity, so take my comments with several grains of salt. But the whole point of the Christian story is that God cares for man. A lot. A LOT. So much so that He decided that we grubby humans were worth His own death. God doesn't make us slaves - He adopts us as sons into His family. God and man aren't "using" each other, any more than family members "use" each other.

That's the theology, anyway - true or false. Christianity isn't about losing yourself, Nirvana-like. It's about becoming who you truly are meant to be, in a proper relationship with the creator God.

So in the Mother Theresa example, maybe she was "selfish", dmc, but not quite in the way you describe. It was the nature of Mother Theresa to help lepers. That was her calling. When she helped the sick and dying, she became "more" Theresa-like. If she'd spent the night at a strip club, blowing the church budget on blackjack and whiskey, that would've been, literally, a perversion of her true Theresa-ness. Theresa's moral obligation was to be properly Theresa-ish, in a godly way.

Doing right puts you in accord with both God and yourself as you should be. If that's "selfish", fine.

Incidentally, per the argument that doing good is just a pragmatic bet to get a better position in the afterlife - Christ addressed this very issue in the parable of the vineyard in Matthew 20. There, Christ explains that the saved get the same reward, no matter how hard or long they work. And Ephesians 2:8-9 emphasizes that "it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast."

So regardless of whether or not Christianity is true (that's your cue, Shura), it can't be properly said that Christianity - by its own standards - is "selfish" in a mercenary sense. But it is very much concerned with the self.

 

Eh, I was correct. Go me.

"But the whole point of the Christian story is that God cares for man. A lot. A LOT. So much so that He decided that we grubby humans were worth His own death." - Grey Magistrate

You say 'God' cares for man, correct? If 'God' cared for man, then why did he give his people into the 'Devil's' possession? Revelations Chapter 10 seems to dictate that 'God' gave the world, earth, man, to the devil. That seems to refute that God cares for man, doesn't it?

"It's about becoming who you truly are meant to be, in a proper relationship with the creator God." - Grey Magistrate (again)

Isn't, then, that selfishness is becoming your complete-self? Since you're complete, you're closer to God, which would be in heaven, which would be selfish, because that is the same as doing good deeds because you think that that is how you are going to go heaven.

Ephesians 2:8-9 But also, in the Bible, it says you are saved by works, not just by faith, like it says in James 2:24, as well as a few others which I could give to you, if you wanted them. Both New Testament, which do you decide to believe? It matters, though either way, you're being selfish when you make the decision.

 

No, sobriquet, my apologies, but like abomination, your interpretation of both God and religion is flawed.

God is not a man, God is everything absolutley, God does not have emotions or desires. You cannot apply anything finite when talking about the infinite.

Secondly, religion doesn't work like that. There are in truth no rewards or punishments. Hell is not a place, it is the frame of mind that is transposed onto the mental and emotive planes while passing through from death. Thus if a man is filled with violent thoughts, he is surrounded by violence, et al.

So of course no-one is rewarded for anything. By the time you are dead, you no longer care about those things, you have superceded them, and you are in life, as GM has said, only fulfilling your purpose, doing what is right because that is what is intrinsic about you.

So if one were doing acts of kindness, yet was filled with loathing or greed, then he would find himself in the same position as any other. A place of his own making, no punishment. Unless you think our own minds are a punishment.

Thirdly, the symbology in the bible about giving the earth to the devil is a misinterpretation. Once these boundaries are left our interpretation of good and evil cease to hold meaning. What there is we call good or love or life because that is the nature of existence, and evil is it's absence.

It is refering to the descent into matter. From svabhavat (or spirit-matter) the two are divided into intelligence and will contained in spirit, and matter, the substance which is its vehicle. Named evil by the prophets as it is an illusion that decieves others into thinking it is real.

Of course, the chapter you are speaking of says nothing of the sort, that talks about things entirely different.

I believe it talks of the day 'Be With Us'. The praylaya dissolution, and the Ring Pass Not.

I could give you some quotes to explain it out of my own books, but they would be even harder to comprehend to one who has not studied the symbology. Your most accessible source I believe would be the egyptian myths, especially those concerning Osiris.

Keep in mind revelations is a hodgepodge. Some of it speaks of creation as well.

These are best understood from the himalayan schools, or perhaps the Kabalist. Not because the symbology is clearer, but because it is similar to that of the events in revelations, or some of them at least.

If you want some examplse I shall give them. Keep in mind you shall find them verbose and confusing.

But back on topic, those hermits you speak of remove themselves from public view for very good reason. The first is that if one was meant to hear from them, they would. The second is it forces one to proceed through hardship to reach their goal, thus they may learn more from the adversity and trials getting there then they ever could from the prophet himself. You are your own best teacher. Thirdly, it is often true that words of truth are misconstrued by those who wish to deliberately discredit it, and this may do others harm, yet by no fault of those who spoke them. Also, if one is not ready to hear such things, often more harm than good is done, and this is to be avoided, for if it is necessary for one to hear it, they will.

So no, it is not simply becasue the only way they may fulfill their own purpose is by achieving solitude, their own purpose being one of self-perfection indeed, but in the aim of best abling one's-self to serve humanity, and all life, but also for the good of those who are not yet ready to follow that path as well. Do nothing, and things shall right themselves, that is heaven's way.

Selflessness in fact is one of the biggest parts of most religions. People do not do things simply to go to heaven, that is not their desire. This interpretation of heaven I feel, is also misled. Heaven refers to something else.

Allow me to illustrate.

The fact is, this is speaking more of the suffering of others rather than avoiding it yourself. None of us truly suffer at all if we choose not to.

[ January 15, 2004, 09:16: Message edited by: Manus ]

 

I'm with Abdomination and Shura on this one.

 

I'm under the impression, religion works with chocolate and whip. Do so, you get chocolate. Do so, you get whip. Not a unique system, nor a system without merits. The problem is, for what chocolate, for what whip. Bah, good that only true faith saves, my faith is true, I'll get chocolate, whatever I do.

 

That depends on how you define self-serveing. I breath, and eat, and drink so I can stay alive. Am I just a self-serving jerk who should stop breathing? Christianity says you should serve God. God is life (among other things). Trying to make your life better is not a sin, so long as you don't break God's commandmants in attempting to do so. Thou shall not Steal/Lie/Murder/etc...

Point two:

I don't consider making wise decisions to be self-serving either.
expample:
"I don't set my body on fire because it will burn and cause me much suffering"
Self-serving or wise?
"I don't reject God's mercy because without it I will burn in eternal suffering"
Self-serving or wise?

I think that you think the purpose of Christianity is self destruction. "The self is evil and must be destroyed." You are in error if you think this. It is true that there is evil lust in all of us do to sin, but only that evil part must be destroyed, not the whole person. Hence redemption, not annihilation.

 

Just so everyone knows, I am agnostic (not athiest, there is a difference).

Okay... reply time. Sheesh its late and I'm going to regret this in the morn-... regret this later today when I wake up.

@GM
I don't think you can ever state what the motives for Mother Theresa's actions were. You're not her. She heard her calling apparently. It still can not dismiss the fact that she knew - she KNEW - the rewards that were being offered for serving God's will. She knew them better than most.
Whats more, if faith and not actions dictate who is rewarded then it still doesn't refute my argument. The concept of faith, to believe in something without evidence, is something I can 'never' do. In order to have faith someone must have a damn good reason to have this faith. The reward factor still exists. One could have faith in their chosen diety because doing so will grant them a better afterlife.
Even then, the idea of faith is very selfish of gods. The gods are asking people to turn their backs on fact, to trust completely in something that can't be proven and you'll only know when you die. That sounds VERY demanding to me. If you're wrong in who you hold faith towards, you'll find out... in a very nasty way.

@Manus
I have no idea what you're on about, and for you to say that my interpretations of God and religion is flawed then you got another thing coming. You've just explained your own religion and your own beliefs there. Now, I'm not going to argue that your religion is wrong, but your logic is easily torn to shreads. If God has no emotions or desires then why did He 'create' the universe? If He has no desires then He couldn't have intentionally done it. If He didn't intentionally do it then it was an accident. If it was an accident then He obviously isn't 'everything' or all powerful. Don't think that by calling God 'He' I make him a man. It's simply a term given to God, you might also notice how I use the term 'He' and not 'he'. If death results in this hypothetical 'cocoon' created by your own thoughts then all this talk of heaven and hell is wrong? Or are you presenting another version of the Bible?
But thats beside the point. I'm talking about INTENTION here. Why would people do good deeds? Why do people strive to 'appease' their god? As far as I can see its for selfish ends. The moment you follow a god, human nature dictates you did this because you realised it would be advantageous to yourself.

@Aces
Self-serving does not equate to breathing and eating. These actions are required in order to survive. Worshipping God is NOT required to survive. It's an extra. It's an option. The reason for following a god is the debate here. Certainly you can live a life devoid of sin and NOT be religious in any way. However religious people follow a life without sin often because a higher power commands them to do so and they know that failing to do so will result in a type of punishment, whereas obeying the orders of this higher power will equate to rewards.
Now about setting yourself on fire. Inaction is different to action. I don't set myself on fire because I don't have to. I COULD set myself on fire if I wanted to. I don't want to. Therefore I don't set myself on fire. To set yourself on fire would be a self-serving action. Not setting yourself on fire would not be a self-serving action because you are not taking action.
Now for your next part of point two can you avoid using double negatives? If you believe in God you will understand that you don't have to accept or deny God's mercy. Since when does someone have to accept or deny it? Both require an action of some kind. If I deny God's mercy then I'm obviously a fool. If I accept God's mercy then I've done so for afterlife insurance (i.e. my own benefit). If I do niether or if I did not know of God's mercy (besides, what mercy are we talking about? Am I constantly at his mercy? This god can kill me at any time he wants? I should be greatful he hasn't? Well you're certinaly a nice god aren't you? Forcing us to grovel at your feet for some unknown reason. You know you're more powerful than us, why demand that we accept your mercy or burn for not?) why should I be punished for it? If I grow up in a country with no knowledge of Christianity or too little of it to have any notice taken, why should I be punished if when it comes time for me to die, Christianaity was the 'correct' religion? Why should be life of being misinformed be justification for eternal suffering? Some nice god we're talking about here.
I do not think the purpose of Christianity is self destruction. I simply think that following Christianity is flawed.
If you are a Christian for non-self-serving reasons such as thinking that God's way is the best way to live because others will benefit then you should be rewarded as God has promised.
However if you follow Christianity because you've been told that doing so will result in a very nice reward then you should still be rewarded as promised. However if this is true then Christianity is self-serving since you followed it for personal gain. However if this is not true and you will not be rewarded then God has lied to you and has used you by using fear to change your way of life.

 

Well, as you obviously don't want to know the reasons people do these things, as you have dismissed all that any of us have said out of hand, why did you even ask such a question?

OK, I'll give you the benfit of the doubt and assume you actually do want to know something.

You know Mother Theresa's mind no better than GM. How can you say she was motivated by selfish goals and no others. I have actually read some of her work and it did not seem selfish by any means. If anything, GM is more qualified to speak of this than you because he has a psyche more similar to her own.

Faith is not belief without evidence. It is trust. Often one has very good reasons for that trust. As do I, there is plenty of evidence if you will accept it.

Also, as GM has pointed out, no-one goes to 'hell' simply because they do not have a belief in the christian God.

For the record, I have no religion, except maybe all of them.

'He' did not just create the universe. God is the universe. Those who directed our personal creation came later. They are us. We are them. There is no difference. As to how this started. How could one of us possibly know? We did not even exist as distict or concious entities at that time, all we can go by is what we are told.

As for those others, you may call them gods I assume, but that is not how I would term it. In any case, emotion and desire are material things, not spiritual. Divine Will and Intelligence has a different outlook. To grasp this is what many spend their entire lives trying to achieve, you will forgive me I hope if I cannot explain it to you. Nevertheless, the path for realisation of it is open to you if you so wish to seek it.

What you are doing, as I said, is trying to comprehend the infinite. As something finite, this can not be done. This was hard for me to accept at first as well. There are limits to any form of human knowledge. Metaphysics, by definition, can go a step further than science, but we must still stop at a certain point.

I am not sure what you mean by talk of heaven and hell. I would not be surprised if many were under an incorrect assumption about what the Masters or religious texts like the bible have said. In any case, they all say the same thing in different ways, unless they have been tampered with in recent times. I do not think any have to such a great extent that the meaning is no longer visible.

I know a lot of what I said was confusing, but belive me, the books I could quote from to explain it would be even more so.

As to intention, the majority of my post was about exactly this, did you not read it? I shall repeat myself...

Ok, people do things because it is the right thing to do. They know this through impulses of the spirit. Wisdom. Compassion. Any of these things.

The fact is, if you live this sort of life your mental patterns change. You may have started for selfish purposes, but soon you will not be able to cognise such a thought, it is no longer in you. You may not feel this way yet, but that does not mean that no-one does.

OK. You say it is not self-serving becasue it is required to survive? How could anything else be more self-serving? In any case, to accept that such a thing may be self-serving, but not 'selfish' is what we have done. The same is here. Simply because there is a benefit to the person acting in such a manner does not mean it is motivated by selfishness.

Also, to the beleif of many of these people, this further existence is the one that matters. Life on Earth is transitory and temporal. It is also not the only form of life that there is. You eat to live. Others abide by their morals to do the same. Becaus this life is to them as a dream is to you. Not because they want a reward; as Iago has stated, the result is eventually the same for everyone. They do it because it would make as much sense to them to live 'sinfuly' as you have termed it, as it would to you to hold your breath or refuse to eat. But this is not the only reason. To eat benefits only you. To live with compassion, with morality, with worship ir reverence for anything, be it a God or simply the world around you, benefits everyone. More often than not, this is also their intent.

It has practical reasons as well, but no more so than it is practical to eat. Which is also an action you choose to do by the way, just like setting yourself on fire you could choose not to. Remeber that for you to live, something dies. Nothing dies when a man repents for his mistakes.

You are also, as I said before, misinformed about God. The mercy spoke of by Aces most likely reffered to the fact that you are forgiven for your previous sins, that the fact that you have learnt from your mistakes and are proceeding forwards in a manner attuned to the nature of life, love, the universe, or in other words God, is what is important, and is what is intended. That we learn, and perfect ourselves.

You are saved only from yourself.

Yet again, as I stated before, nowhere does it say in any religion that those who live morally but yet do not worship the God as described by that religion, as they are all the same anyway, would be somehow treated badly.

What is said is that if you know of the philosophical code outlined by these religions, and choose against the advice of those who would help you, and live reprehensibly in full knowledge that you are doing the wrong thing, that is, that you yourself feel you are living immorally yet for some reason do not care or try not to, then you shall injure yourself, that your progress shall be hampered by your own actions. No-one condemns you to anything, everything is a product of your own mind and your own will. You create the life, and afterlife, that you have chosen for yourself. You will do so again.

I understand if you do not agree with the way a religion may be represented by it's priests, but religion has nothing to do with this. You are also seeming to consistently single out christianity here. I have responded according to your questions, but if you meant christianity and not all religins why did you not say so at the begginning?

Just remember that every action you take that does not injure yourself, like not setting yourself on fire because to do so would be inane,is a self-serving action. Life is self-serving, because we are the ones who are living. This does not mean it is immoral or selfish. So those who spend their lives in the service of others, working for all of life around them, are doing the wrong thing because that makes them a better person for it? Don't be silly. An action that hurts yourself, as you have highlighted, is just as self-serving because you have chosen to do so.

But there is a difference between doing something simpy becasue it is self-serving and doing a thing which is self-serving simply because it is you that is doing it. If your actions benefit others, and are done because you feel it is the right thing to do, how is that wrong? One cannot live a moral life only for his own benefit; The two are not compatible. If one decides it is also the most practical thing to do, then they are right, and at least it is a step along the way. I would rather one lived morally for his own benefit then immorally for it.

Selfish assumes you are doing something for you and you alone, to the exclusion, or more likely detriment, of another. This is simply not the case here.

[ January 15, 2004, 15:22: Message edited by: Manus ]

 

I think religion IS selfish, for a few different reasons:

1) Most RELIGIONS today are big business. Like any other big business, they're motivated more by the bottom line than anything else. Hence, self-serving.

2) If you want to deal with organized SPIRITUALITY - where a group of people with similar ideas about God come together to worship -I still think this is a selfish thing. IMO, human belief in God came about because primitive man needed a way to explain natural phenomena that he couldn't understand. What started out as mythology and shamanism eventually turned into modern religions as the Donald Trumps of the age saw their opportunities to grab power. Nowadays, since we no longer need Thor to explain thunder, we're left with different systems of beliefs that people adhere to out of personal comfort. If it isn't the ultimate in selfishness to hand-pick a religion based on what suits your personal beliefs, I don't know what is.

Note that I'm not saying that there's anything WRONG with this type of selfishness. My own religious "practice" was shaped in this very way. As long as there are holes in the human soul there will be religions around to fill them.

 

"I believe that God is unknowable and therefore unservable, and therefore the greatest service man can render is to his community, whose needs are self-evident."

--Kurt Vonnegut

I get the sense that most of the people responding to this thread have read entirely too much Nietzsche and not enough C.S. Lewis.

I don't see too many atheists working in soup kitchens. If the result of religious selfishness is helping your fellow men, then I say we need a lot more selfishness in the world. If every man and woman on the planet aspired to Mother Theresa's level of selfishness, we wouldn't need to wait for death to get to Heaven. It'd be right here on earth.

(Disclaimer: I am an agnostic. Although I hold in contempt the self-righteous gasbags who hold homosexuality as an abomination because of Leviticus 18:22, as well as the Harry-Potter-is-the-Devil crowd because of Deuteronomy something or other (propounded by people who have either not read or decided to ignore most of the rest of the Bible), I find that the liveliest and most open-minded interlocutors on the question of faith are the true faithful. To suggest that religion is selfishness and nothing else is to throw the baby out with the bathwater.)

 

The question is, then, how many of you know people that do good deeds, like working in a soup kitchen just to help people? That they don't think there will be any self-satisfaction by the end of it, or anything of that sort? Everyone I know that does things like that do it because they feel good about what they did. They did it to feel good. Then shouldn't sex, for example, be in the same boat? Both make you feel good, both help people each other out though in different ways. Sorry if that was a bit crude.


@Manus - Sorry, I feel like I'm picking on you a litte bit..."your interpretation of both God and religion is flawed." All interpretation is flawed though, so your interpretation is flawed as well. If you go by religion's definition, then it is this. Which religion I'm interpretating maybe flawed because I don't know everything about all religions. I know about Christianity though. My dad was in the monastary up until his ordaining, and I've gone to Catholic schools all of my life and have discussed Christianity with many, many different types of people. Unless every single person is incorrect, then mine is, at least, not far off. Sorry if that come off very harshly, didn't mean for it to, but that's the best I felt I could word it as of now. ""God is not a man, God is everything absolutley, God does not have emotions or desires. You cannot apply anything finite when talking about the infinite." So God is evil then too? He has to be evil if he is everything. That totally contradicts all Christian beliefs, and most other single-god religions. Another thing, when Jesus died, God got angry and sad. Are those not emotions? Also, in various passages in both the Old and New Testaments, God gets angry, or sad, or vengeful.

"Faith is not belief without evidence. It is trust. Often one has very good reasons for that trust. As do I, there is plenty of evidence if you will accept it." But, in the Gospels, it says that part of faith, in God, is believing without seeing, without evidence. I think this was when someone didn't believe Jesus has risen from the grave and had to see him and his wounds. This evidence you speak of, do you have any irrefragable evidence that God, and only God, could have created it? Or any other deity you believe in and only that deity could've created it? I think not. It'd be like the one thread about the schizophrenic who said he found irrefragable evidence of God's existance. "What you are doing, as I said, is trying to comprehend the infinite." How do we know that it is infinite though? It could just be a finite that is too large for us to comprehend. Like you say, humans can only comprehend to a certain point. We don't know what's beyond or how much, so we just call that 'infinite'.

@Aces - ""I don't set my body on fire because it will burn and cause me much suffering"
Self-serving or wise?"
It could be neither, for the suicidal, that would be a selfless act so people wouldn't have to clean them up after they were charred into ash by the fire. At least in their mind.

@Gonzago - "I don't see too many atheists working in soup kitchens. If the result of religious selfishness is helping your fellow men, then I say we need a lot more selfishness in the world. If every man and woman on the planet aspired to Mother Theresa's level of selfishness, we wouldn't need to wait for death to get to Heaven. It'd be right here on earth." How can you be so sure that very few of them are atheists? For Confirmation, as an example, you have to do service hours, that is, of course, if you have parents that are Christian and make you do those Sacraments. Also, monatary donations are made by atheists in greater sums than the monatary donations by any other religion to charities. Different means to the same ends.

 

OK, OK, back to the actual issue. Abomination writes:

Exactly! The Bible never asks people to believe without evidence. It's not a Miracle on 34th Street kind of faith - "I believe, I believe, it's silly, but I believe!" The whole Bible is just one "darn good reason" after another to believe. There are arguments that appeal to human nature, history, logic, society, the natural world, and even emotion (hey, Christ was a pret' emotional guy). Reading through books like Jeremiah and Ezekiel, there's a sense of divine incredulity that people would be so incredulous - given all the evidence, God wonders aloud (through the prophets), why in the world is everyone running after the idols-du-jour?

You touch on this, a soubriquet:

That's John 20:24-31, where Christ and Thomas have a li'l chat. Maybe a better definition of Christian faith is from Hebrews 11:1 - "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." Some think of faith like believing in Santa Claus, but it's more like believing in Christmas. Will we have another December 25th this year? Well, we can't "prove" it 'til it actually rolls around the calendar. (Maybe the world will end on Christmas Eve - who knows?) But we have darn good reasons for believing that, though yet unseen, December 25th is going to come right before the 24th and right after the 26th. And because we believe in that, we buy gifts and make Christmas travel plans. We can't "see" the Christmas to come, but we know darn well it WILL come, and we act accordingly. (That's the faith referred to in James 2.)

Is that selfishness? Or, like Aces wrote, just common sense? Well...maybe we should define selfishness...and distinguish it from both unselfishness and madness.

 

@GM - "Will we have another December 25th this year?" Of course we will have it, but whether or not we'll be around to live it is a whole other matter. Agreed, Hebrews 11:1 describes Christian faith very well. But is faith what makes God exist or does God exist outside of faith? Without faith, would he perish?

"self·ish ( P ) Pronunciation Key (slfsh)
adj.
1) Concerned chiefly or only with oneself: “Selfish men were... trying to make capital for themselves out of the sacred cause of human rights” (Maria Weston Chapman).
2) Arising from, characterized by, or showing selfishness: a selfish whim."
Will that do as a definition of selfishness that we can agree upon? It seems reasonable enough, I would think, and we can go from there. And madness means, in no uncertain terms, insanity or insane-like behavior.

Acting to future events is not selfish, because, well, it hasn't happened yet. Our desires and actions may change from what we planned on doing. For some reason I think that can come from what you said about whether or not there will be another December 25th since it hasn't happened yet, we don't know if it will exist. You can't be selfish if something has not yet existed. Correct?

If anything, religion TODAY is selfish, at the least, or at least the institution in which it comes from; the Church, Mosque, et al. Rallymama said it best, I believe "1) Most RELIGIONS today are big business. Like any other big business, they're motivated more by the bottom line than anything else. Hence, self-serving." Whether or not the followers of the religion are selfish, that seems to be a whole different matter, and would vary from person-to-person, so I don't think a single answer here, or anywhere, really, could supply us with an adequate answer.

 

Actually more imminent profit comes from establishing there's no God, no judgement, no punishment, no damnation. Number one. Do what you will. Answer to no one. That's where pure profit seekers go.

Less pure profit seekers think tithes and prayers make it all. They're going to be largely surprised, as the Bible says. Prayers are important, tithing is good and honourable, but it's not the heart of it. It actually is sacrifice up to the point of neglecting and forgetting oneself in the service of others. It can't really be faked if one's only in it for hopes of getting a better place in the afterlife.

In most, if not all, Christian doctrines, there's no salvation through works. No matter how you try, you still need grace. Grace is connected with love. As Saint Paul says in 1 Cor, 6:

which suggests that if you taka business-like approach, that's what you'll get back. Penny for penny doesn't sound too alluring given that without grace no one would survive a judgement under Law. 7 is:

Makes it even clearer: God knows the hearts of men and, as he loves a cheerful giver, he doesn't sound likely to make business with you. After all, what can you really give Him? What do you have you wouldn't have got from Him? That's the Christian approach.

An interesting read for our dear skeptics:

Seems that we don't know everything, we won't know everything until it's too late for us, that doing good and right doesn't buy anything and in fact we only know it's love what it's all about. Love that doesn't seek its own. I doubt it can be enacted by someone who only wishes to avoid flames - for so he sees hell, and probably sees God as a sadistic maniac who's best obeyed or fled from, the latter being impossible therefore the former being the only remaining hope. I doubt it can be enacted by someone's who's trying to do business with God. After all, how are they going to do business with a real godly god who died for them mortals just because he loved them? Heh...