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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (26519)	12/6/1998 3:22:00 AM
From: Krowbar	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 108807

... but my opinion was then, and is now, that it is better to be a happy conformist believer in the system than to be a lonely, brilliant, but possibly more rational, free thinker. Of course I would never force my children to be conformists, but unlike my parents, I do not belittle group think (except where it involves being cruel to others) And the Boy Scout officials are not being cruel? Your acquiesence is precisely the result that they wanted. That makes it easier for the group to manipulate our descendents. I choose to do whatever it takes to confound them. For instance, when there is a public function where a prayer is said before the meal, I sit down during the prayer and begin to eat. If that sounds rude, I think that it is more rude for someone to impose their prayer on others, and assume that everyone wants to participate. It is supposed to be totally voluntary, so it shouldn't bother anybody, but you wouldn't know it from the ugly stares that I get. Del

To: epicure who wrote (26519)	12/6/1998 6:35:00 AM
From: Dayuhan	Respond to of 108807

X, My son's school is nominally run by the Episcopalians, but since close to half the kids are Taiwanese, Korean, and Japanese (26 nationalities, 170 kids), they peddle it pretty softly. Joey's religion teacher did, though, do Noah's Ark, and asked Joey if he thought the story was true. The response: "Nah. God wouldn't kill all those people." I didn't teach him that, I swear, but I guess I have taught him some things. Fortunately, the religion teacher took it rather well. Not all of them would, I suspect. Steve

To: epicure who wrote (26519)	12/6/1998 12:26:00 PM
From: E	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 108807

I don't go around discouraging people's belief in deities, either. If there is a discussion, I participate in it, as here, of course. When I was in college, it seemed to me tragic that intelligent people could believe nonsensical things simply because it made them feel good to do so, feel so very "special," and affiliated with The Ultimate Top Dog of the Universe, which is what it appeared to me seemed to be happening, and still does. But as life unfurled, I came to envy them their delusions at times. Those times were when painful events that occurred by chance, meaningless events, would have entailed less pain if I had myself harbored the delusion that they really did have a meaning, and that even if I couldn't for the life of me figure out what it was, my Father Deity was taking care of me, and I could rest assured it was all for the best. Still, I feel as though when I die, I will have experienced life fully, and taken it like a grown up Human. My son married a girl who had been raised a strict Catholic, and when they became engaged, she approached me to say that she thought I must be concerned that my grandchildren were going to be raised in the Church-- and she wanted me to know she herself was an atheist, so I shouldn't worry. I told her that I was glad enough to hear it, but that the truth was, any religious upbringing that produced a girl as fine as she and her brother and sisters are, was good enough for my son's children, and I meant it. I think that often religion makes people behave indecently; but not always.