I saw this statement today. Is there any truth in it?

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What part of it is truth? Since when do atheists have to be non-religious or even anti-religious, necessarily?

So if I am an atheist (which I'm not), and I believe that we should be compassionate towards others (which I do believe in), then this shall be termed "religion"? So, if I help my neighbor with her shrubs, which I did about an hour ago, that's "religion"?

Please note that I did not kneel and pray to the shrub-god .

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"The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."-- Einstein

There are some who become very religious in their stance against religion.
But one extreme will lead to another.

Communism was a religion in the sense that it replaced the Christian God with Karl Marx, Lenin, and later Stalin. In China they didn't have any particular god so they manufactured one in Mao. This makes me question the claim that Communists were atheists. I say that Communism is a religion. It has a creed or dogma, the Communist Manifesto, and a bible, Das Kapital. They had god-like adoration of 40 metre tall portraits of Lenin and Stalin in Red Square for rallies with tanks and troops marching past. They put Lenin's body in a shrine in Red Square. I have seen people queue for 2 Km just to briefly pass by Lenin's pickled body. If that is not a God ceremony, I'll sell you a bridge in Alaska.

Humanism is a religion in the sense that the formal Humanist Associations in Britain and America have a creed of principles resembling religious creeds. The difference is that Humanism does not construct a personal god and urges people to take personal responsibility for fixing problems instead of praying to an imaginary man in the sky.

To say that Humanism has a God is a stretch. I consider myself a Humanist but I don't know of any god that I or other Humanists worship. We may venerate great men, but only as men. We admire but not worship heroes of the struggle for religious freedom like Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, Charles Darwin, Thomas Huxley, Neil Kinnock, Christopher Hitchens, and Richard Dawkins.

We humanists may admire but not worship great scientists. Scientists are our heroes because they seek the best evidence based explanations instead of mythology and superstition. We admire Galileo, Bruno, Hypatia, Eratosthenes, Aristarchos of Samos, Pytheus, Copernicus, Richard Feynman, Einstein, Weinberg, Brian Green, Carl Sagan, Louis/Mary/Richard Leakey, Don Johanson, and the many thousands of top researchers in all fields of science who also happen to be Non-Theists.

We humanists also admire great political leaders (Theists or non-Theists) like Washington, Lord Acton, Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, François Mitterand, Gerhard Schroeder, Neil Kinnock, and Boris Yeltsen.

If someone is a Humanist and has a god, then he/she is a religious humanist. Remember the first Humanists were religious believers. Humanism and Theism are not mutually exclusive. Secular Humanists tend to be Non-Theists, Agnostics, or Atheists. Almost all scientists are Atheists in the true sense of the word meaning "lacking" A- "theism" god belief. It is not denial of the existence of god. That is why I prefer to be called a Non-Theistic Agnostic.

Amergin

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Militant Agnostic: I don't know, and neither do you. There is no evidence of God so belief is optional.

I prefer to be neutral on religion. I don't really care if people have gods or not. I do not care if people have religion or not. Religion is just a creed of belief. On one hand you could call everyone religious if it is just a code of conduct and belief. However, religion has come to mean belief in unnatural, paranormal, or supernatural things and that the belief is tied to a creed of required ideas.

I am not religious in my opposition to perverted or even harmful religions (fundamentalisms or psychotic religions.) I oppose those dangerous religions for the same reason I oppose the use of cocaine, tobacco, and alcohol. I agree with Dawkins about the meme theory of religion and that there are harmful memes that actually damage brain circuits in the analogy of a brain virus. This is not simply my belief, it is a solid scientific theory backed by evidence. Negative memes (mind viruses) cause mental illness. I am not attacking all religions, most of which are morally neutral or good. I mainly oppose Christian and Islamic perversions of religion called Fundamentalism, Evangelism, or Talibanism.

Amergin

Amergin

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Militant Agnostic: I don't know, and neither do you. There is no evidence of God so belief is optional.

They may become vehement screaming atheists, as I like to call my husband, but I wouldn't call it a religion.

And wouldn't inventing a new religion would be like inventing a new wheel. They all have the same basic principles. Worship this entity and no other.

But then again, my husband is far from being an atheist evangelist. In that, he doesn't try to convert others, he doesn't even really talk about the fact that he is one in everyday conversation. Only when you come to our front door with the "No Proselytism" sign on it preaching about whatever god like idol you worship that he does get irate.

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- Wisdom comes when you stop looking for it. -
"If God were alive today, he'd be an atheist" - Kurt Vonnegut

Please visit my foster dog blog: The Colbert Report.

I've known people who I think made things their "religion" ...

My wife and I were once in a square dance society .. there were so many movements and sequences to be learned. If you missed a dance someone would call you up and ask what happened... then you'd make to a dance and they'd say where were you? It got to be well uuhhh like a religion for them. After a while we became "apostate" square dances and gave it up!

Another example.. Years ago after graduate school I was looking for a position and happened to be at the psychiatric section of this hospital inquiring for work..

The doctor had a prominent black couch with a large portarte of "El Sigmundo" hanging on the wall above this couch..anyway

he says to me: What do you think of Sig Freud?

I replied: Ohh well I really think he made some great contributions.

He did more than that! replied the doc and he almost scowled at me... kinda like a religion for me..

Oh some other examples come to mind ..

There were some prominent "Christian Humanists" in the past like Thomas More who coined the term "utopia"..

See:

Utopia by Thomas More

But I don't see any great separation between true religion and humanism..

Above all else an examination say of the life of Jesus will show I think that he was indeed a man and valued humanity..

When ethics and philosophy are separated from religion I think there will be trouble.. this may one reason fanaticism has become so prominent today.

A new religious principle is that prejudice and fanaticism whether sectarian, denominational, patriotic or political are destructive to the foundation of human solidarity; therefore man should release himself from such bonds in order that the oneness of the world of humanity may become manifest.

(Abdu'l-Baha, Baha'i World Faith, p. 247)

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"it benefits us to be thoughtful, not of the glory of our minds, but rather, above all else, of the glory of God."
- Johannes Kepler

I think there's an echo around here.

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"The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."-- Einstein

Being an atheists means you don't believe in God. It doesn't mean you don't believe in anything.

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"I fully comprehended the power of the human mind at the exact moment I came to the realization that I'm totally insane and have no idea what I'm talking about."