What Is the Concrete Value of Religion?

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dauer

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Sparked by something Tao said in another thread I want to pose this question. What's the concrete value of religion? What does religion give back to the world? What is the pragmatic value of religion in the world, not just on you as an individual, but on the larger world? Does the positive impact outweigh the negative impact? Are there other institutions that have a greater or comparable gain and are more efficient?

What is wasted/lost by religion? What is neglected? How does religion divert energy that could be applied elsewhere and what would be a more pragmatic way to channel that energy?

What would the effect on the world be if there were no religion at all?

Secondly please consider the same questions, replacing the word religion with the word spirituality. Please explain in each case how you would define the term being discussed be it religion or spirituality for the sake of clarity.

My questions presuppose both a positive and a negative impact however, if you see the positive or negative as absent please ignore that part of the question or respond directly with your objection.

I realize I've asked a lot. If it is more agreeable, just address a piece of what I've asked but please try to maintain an awareness of this thread's gestalt in your answer.
 
dauer said:
What is wasted/lost by religion? What is neglected? How does religion divert energy that could be applied elsewhere and what would be a more pragmatic way to channel that energy?
Click to expand...

I feel that most waste their time reading between lines.... What is lost to a degree by religion is world unity..... But that isn't AT ALL the religions fault, it is the followers.... I follow christ, I am to love my enemy...... I know this but you are a muslim and I will go to war agaisn't you for that.....

Muhammad(saws) Told me that I am to love mankind before I can even begin to love Allah my god..... Yet I shan't help that man, that man is not my brother, that man is Jewish....

It really freaking baffles me... It really does... Cause, are any of us really playing by our "rules"??? We're not... We're divded by borders and nations and our own leaders and our own laws and rules not our religions laws... We will wage war on others... But all, ALL of our religions promote and teach LOVE..... where is it? Where are we going wrong? If we all seriously lived how our religion/gods told us to there would be peace(Or a lot lot lot more than there is now.), even though there are so many different religions....
 
Isn't it interesting to juxtapose "concrete" and "value" together? That which can be seen and built upon, whose qualities cross all boundaries and philosophies paired with an idea relative to individual groups complete with well defended borders.

It has been said that religion is a social "glue" holding groups of people together in a common ground of being, but whether or not this is positive or negative is up for grabs. Consider the exclusivity, the ethnocentrism, the theocentrism. To consider good and bad as independent of one another can only be a mental exercise such as considering the actuality of a simple lead acid battery: is the negative side better or worse than the positive side?
 
dauer said:
Sparked by something Tao said in another thread I want to pose this question. What's the concrete value of religion? What does religion give back to the world?
Click to expand...

Hope

Thomas
 
The different religions have served as different psychological systems for the mental and spiritual health of the people long before the secular versions, known as psychologies, have been around.
 
Alex,

I agree with you that the core of religion is often love and the difference has more to do with the specific way that's expressed, but what of those forms of religion in which "walking the walk" that is, following the rules of a particular sect, from an outsider's perspective, minimizes the role of love? In those situations would you say that those sects are due to the people of the religions while those sects that express love in a more agreeable and observable way are due to G!d? Are you drawing a dichotomy between doing the right thing -- G!dly -- and doing the wrong thing -- human?


Paladin,

I'm not entirely following. Are you saying that the good and the bad in religion come together and we need to consider it as a whole? If so, how do you consider the whole?


Thomas,

I like your answer very much. It's short and sweet and gets to the heart of the matter, as it were. If there were no religion in the world what do you think would happen to humanity's ability to hope? How would you respond to someone who says that it is because of religion that hope for a better time is so necessary, not because of its ideas but because of its effects?


Seattle,

Are you suggesting that secular psychological systems displace the need for religion?
 
Alex P said:
But all, ALL of our religions promote and teach LOVE..... where is it? Where are we going wrong? If we all seriously lived how our religion/gods told us to there would be peace(Or a lot lot lot more than there is now.), even though there are so many different religions....
Click to expand...

I'm with ya, Alex.

I think the difference is that religion is a group-centered activity and so can lead to the polar opposites of the same basic group emotions and behaviors. We get solidarity, creating both feelings of belonging and feelings of exclusivity. Religion gives us an identity, but once we have an identity, we tend to define everyone that is "not us" as inferior, lost, a threat, etc.

I don't think religion operates any worse than other large social institutions. Unfortunately, it does not seem to operate any better, either.

Spirituality is the personal journey after the Divine, personal growth, etc. I haven't noticed as many negative issues with it.

Perhaps the problem isn't that people have religion, but that people fail to back religion with spirituality. In that case, as Alex points out, religion becomes just one more social group and an excuse to serve self and group over a higher goodness, which is Love.

If we focused more on spirituality, within our respective religions or on our own in no single faith system, my guess is we'd get a lot closer to Love.
 
p_o_o,

If we focused more on spirituality, within our respective religions or on our own in no single faith system, my guess is we'd get a lot closer to Love.
Click to expand...

I think so too. It seems almost like a reality check with one's own sense of right and wrong as well as with the logical consistency of one's religious expressions is sometimes necessary. I don't mean that it's necessary to challenge myths that are of personal value, but dogmatic views about other people or one's own community that contradict the foundations of one's faith.

-- Dauer
 
dauer said:
Seattle,

Are you suggesting that secular psychological systems displace the need for religion?
Click to expand...
Nope. Religion is much more than just psychological/spiritual health. However, this thread is about the 'concrete' value of religion, so that is cutting out many of the benefits of religion right there.
 
seattle,

what are the benefits of religion that aren't concrete and by what metric do you measure them?
 
dauer said:
Paladin,

I'm not entirely following. Are you saying that the good and the bad in religion come together and we need to consider it as a whole? If so, how do you consider the whole?
[/quote


Well, it is the only "concrete" way of of viewing it. If you break it down into parts it becomes abstract.

I consider the whole of religion in just this way, after all it is a living, breathing thing, it evolves, it is added to and taken away from.
To some it offers hope but by that same token continues the suffering, the mental baggage that another religion sees as the prison of self.
Of course there is social value, there is caring for the sick and elderly, there is striving after justice and peace, and there is the tyranny of dogma.
It would be intellectually and ethically disingenuous to consider religion as bad or good but that it simply is part of the human drama.
One by one humans will end this drama but as a group it will continue.
Click to expand...
 
dauer said:
seattle,

what are the benefits of religion that aren't concrete and by what metric do you measure them?
Click to expand...
They would have to be subjectively measured by each individual. I suppose you might be able to do a survey to measure them, but the measurement would then be a complete (or incomplete) as the survey. (You really can't have a survey that could possibly cover all the viewpoints of all the people regarding the subjective benefits of religion.)
 
Religion v. Spirituality.

More and more I'm viewing Religion as a technological advance like the gun or automobile.

ie the outcome depends on the user.

all can be used for good or for 'evil'.
 
seattlegal said:
The different religions have served as different psychological systems for the mental and spiritual health of the people long before the secular versions, known as psychologies, have been around.
Click to expand...

That makes so much sense!! So lets all go back to living in caves and prescribing antimony for every ailment!! We can worship our spirit ancestors while we hallucinate to death ;)
 
Religion facilitates the formation of politically significant ethnic blocs. It is a mechanism which allows cohesive societies to emerge and evolve toward civility prior to nationalistic structures.

Chris
 
path_of_one said:
I'm with ya, Alex.

I think the difference is that religion is a group-centered activity and so can lead to the polar opposites of the same basic group emotions and behaviors. We get solidarity, creating both feelings of belonging and feelings of exclusivity. Religion gives us an identity, but once we have an identity, we tend to define everyone that is "not us" as inferior, lost, a threat, etc.

I don't think religion operates any worse than other large social institutions. Unfortunately, it does not seem to operate any better, either.

Spirituality is the personal journey after the Divine, personal growth, etc. I haven't noticed as many negative issues with it.

Perhaps the problem isn't that people have religion, but that people fail to back religion with spirituality. In that case, as Alex points out, religion becomes just one more social group and an excuse to serve self and group over a higher goodness, which is Love.

If we focused more on spirituality, within our respective religions or on our own in no single faith system, my guess is we'd get a lot closer to Love.
Click to expand...

I knew someone would go and fill in the gaps, you did it beautifully :)
 
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