Tigers!

No where near enough.

AV-98 Ingram

So what does 99% of your post have at all to do with the question in the OP? All she asked was how many Christians know the history of their religion. All you've done is put words into her mouth so you could attack her and not answer the question.

MarkB4

AV-98 Ingram - Did you read everything above? It is a direct response. How is that unclear to you?

AV-98 Ingram

All I saw was you put words into her mouth and then attack her. I'm particularly interested in what Chairman Mao had at all to do with anything...

hinduwoman

She probably decided since everyone knows all about the bad things in Hinduism there are no more shocks waiting.!

And what does the rest of the post have to do with my question?

rakyeltzen

I know as a christian that the church has done bad things. But i also know that everyone has done bad things and it's not because the church has covered it up either just because they have done bad things doesn't mean they have to warn people before they join the church that christian people have done bad things - people know that. Just because they don't know what precisely shouldn't change anything. Maybe it is more religeous groups that do big bad things but statistically, I've heard an atheist is more likely to break the law because it is not against their religeous belifes as well. No one told me that when I joined the forum.

MarkB4

Once again - what I said was a direct response to the OP - I don't know why you are having trouble seeing it. I didn't have to put words in her mouth, unless she wants to redefine the premise of someone "shocked" by learning of the Inquisition and turning to Hinduism (I suspect that it was not the Dalit caste that attracted her). Then the question was asked about whether Christians were even aware of their own history. Well, I have resisted going after the possessive "their" in light of the general meaning of the statement. Most Christians are well aware of atrocities done in the name of Christ - for which we do not blame Christ.

My final note was that an atheist, Mao, sought to eradicate religion in China - it was his stated goal - and he was responsible for the deaths of millions. Do atheists claim that as their own? No - but if you insist on taking the activities that Christians agree are reprehensible and assigning responsibility to the whole of Christianity, we'll have to open that line of inquiry for atheism, as well. Between Mao and Stalin, we could dwarf any reprehensible thing done by men who claimed to be doing it in the name of Christ.

Classical

No comment about converting to hinduism, but as for this question in the OP - Christian know next to nothing about the history of their religion. If there were a test, I would bet 95% would fail miserably.

Few know the actual setting of the times in which Jesus purportedly lived, few know of other pagan religions during those times and their practices, few know when the "gospels" were written and the enormous doubts to their credibility and textual problems - and then further - few know of the first two to four centuries of Christian history and how long it took for this new religion to even appear on the radar screen. After this, few know of the political role of the church, the tortures, murders, etc...

There is no need to go on. Christians, overall, are extremely ignorant of their own religion and if they were to become educated, they would deconvert - just like I did.

Classical

FarmMama

Probably because it isn't true.

Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith in response to comments on an article he published recently entitled An Atheist Manifesto.

Here are a few lines and a link to the article itself:

3. Religion is our only source of morality. Without it, we would be plunged into a secular moral chaos.

This concern is so widespread that I have responded to it at some length. A version of this response will soon be published in the magazine Free Inquiry (Council for Secular Humanism) as “The Myth of Secular Moral Chaos.�?

One cannot criticize religious dogmatism for long without encountering the following claim, advanced as though it were a self-evident fact of nature: there is no secular basis for morality. Raping and killing children can only be really wrong, the thinking goes, if there is a God who says it is. Otherwise, right and wrong would be mere matters of social construction, and any society will be at liberty to decide that raping and killing children is actually a wholesome form of family fun. In the absence of God, John Wayne Gacy would be a better person than Albert Schweitzer, if only more people agreed with him.

It is simply amazing how widespread this fear of secular moral chaos is, given how many misconceptions about morality and human nature are required to set it whirling in a person’s brain. There is undoubtedly much to be said against the spurious linkage between faith and morality, but the following three points should suffice.

If a book like the bible were the only reliable blueprint for human decency that we have, it would be impossible (both practically and logically) to criticize it in moral terms. But it is extraordinarily easy to criticize the morality one finds in bible, as most of it is simply odious and incompatible with a civil society.

If religion were necessary for morality, there should some evidence that atheists are less moral than believers. But evidence for this is in short supply, and there is much evidence to the contrary.

If religion really provided the only conceivable, objective basis for morality, it should be impossible to posit a non-theistic, objective basis for morality. But it is not impossible; it is rather easy.

continued....................

MarkB4

Classical - so there you go - you said it. Christians know nothing and if they did they would deconvert. How is that for arrogance! I feel vindicated in my response!