<Being an agnostic is unnatural, which appeals to me.>
I am not sure I understand what you mean, there, X!!! I have a very healthy rebellious streak, however, so I can certainly appreciate at least one meaning of your comment.
Has anyone read the very most current issue of Time? It has a cover story on the shroud of Turin. Even though it was scientifically proven by radio-carbon dating to be made of linen from the Middle Ages in 1988, based on samples sent to three laboratories which all came back with the same results, I am not really quite sure whether I am convinced that the Shroud was created that late. There are questions as to whether there was a film on the cloth taken for samples which could have corrupted the results. And there is a smaller shroud, the Cloth of Oviedo, with an historical record from the seventh century for Jesus' head, and the stains match the other one. And the nail holes are in the wrists, not the hands, which we now know is more historically accurate, from evidence discussed in the recent PBS series on Jesus.
pathfinder.com
pbs.org
Unfortunately, the online version of the Time story does not include the photographic negative image which is so strikingly like a man's face. That was the most compelling part of the article to me. It is hard to understand how, using medieval technology, anyone could have faked the Shroud. Very mysterious.
Anyway, I have found a very interesting organization that pretty much represents my religious views at present--Atheists for Jesus.
atheists-for-jesus.com
I agree with you and Del about babies, incidentally, X. They are born believers, loving fairy tales and all sorts of fantastic stories, and looking up to their huge parents as very powerful and omniscient (I wish teenagers still believed that part)!
On the other hand, it is parents who teach their children their own religious beliefs, teaching them to pray, sending them to Sunday school, reading them simplified Bible stories. There would not be any little children believing in Jesus, or Mohammed, or the Buddha, unless they learned these tales at their parents' knees.
In fact, one of the most interesting ethical questions to me is whether parents should teach their own belief systems in early childhood, or wait and encourage their children to develop their own later, when they can reason. |
