Religion

I'm With Stupid said:
Did you read the actual study? It's certainly relatively well-produced and in-depth research, but I doubt the authors would claim that it's "proof" of anything. If you look into it, while it's a relatively widespread (but largely white, American, middle class) study, it's entirely based on self-reporting. So it's not a surprise that someone who claims to go to church every week on a survey will also self report lower numbers of sexual partners, lower use of illegal drugs, lower consumption of alcohol, and higher levels of things like volunteering. One of the survey questions on forgiveness is as follows: "Because of my spiritual or religious beliefs, I have forgiven those who hurt me." How is that not clearly a loaded question? Someone who isn't religious who has forgiven those who have wronged them still couldn't answer yes to that question. When self-reporting, even when anonymous, people will answer what they think they should answer. There have been surveys that show that more people "go to church every week" in America than there are churches to fit them all in.

Some of the medical problems are likely to be more reliable because there's not the same religious stigma about things like cancer or obesity, but self-reporting things like "feeling depressed" isn't exactly reliable, and even diagnosis of depression could be more of an indicator of how likely someone is to seek medical help than actual levels of depression. People in a particularly close-knit church community might be more likely to go to a pastor than a doctor if they're feeling depressed, for example. Some of the questions are well-written to try and remove any religious bias, but some aren't especially successful at doing so.

Some of the indicators on the study are literally lifted straight from religious beliefs. So for example, there's absolutely no reason that "number of sexual partners" should be framed as a negative thing, and yet there it in the list of health problems along with depression, prescription drug addiction and cancer. What you're saying there is that people who self-report religious beliefs will also self-report following those religious beliefs. You might as well put "not covering your head" as a problem that needs to be surveyed and then ask a bunch of Muslim women how often they do it. Basically if you ask a person how often they attend religious services and pray, and then on the same sheet of paper ask them how often they smoke marijuana and how many people they've fucked, you're not necessarily going to get a truthful answer every time.

Which isn't to dismiss the study, just show that it's a single study of a single demographic in a single country, and therefore isn't proof of anything.
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You Gave the post more respect than it deserved imho.
 
crublue1 said:
The headline says

Raising Kids With Religion Or Spirituality May Protect Their Mental Health.​


The key word here is "may"

Hardly proof is it?
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Kids raised with religion or Spirituality are more likely to have a well defined family support network which operates away from the religious aspects of their upbringing, so this (3 year old) research is pretty meaningless.
 
denislawsbackheel said:
You Gave the post more respect than it deserved imho.
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It's always good to read stuff though, especially if it challenges your existing views and isn't written by an idiot. What's quite telling is that they don't make any distinction between prayer and meditation, suggesting that the religious nature of the practice isn't particularly relevant.
 
Trevor Morley's Tache said:
Kids raised with religion or Spirituality are more likely to have a well defined family support network which operates away from the religious aspects of their upbringing, so this (3 year old) research is pretty meaningless.
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WE've employed 4 Jehovahs witnesses and their morals and standards are very high indeed, their kids are well behaved and they have respect for their elders. It's almost an honour to work with them. Good laugh as well although there are limits........
 
Kids leave school with no practical knowledge, they can't wire a plug or put up a shelf. They can barely make toast. They don't get educated about pensions, investments or the tax system, or how government operates, or how global economy works.
But we choose to ram religion down their throats as if it's normal to believe in something that clearly doesn't exist, or at best is extremely questionable.
Something is wrong here.
 
crublue1 said:
Kids leave school with no practical knowledge, they can't wire a plug or put up a shelf. They can barely make toast. They don't get educated about pensions, investments or the tax system, or how government operates, or how global economy works.
But we choose to ram religion down their throats as if it's normal to believe in something that clearly doesn't exist, or at best is extremely questionable.
Something is wrong here.
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Been like that since time began! A few thousand years of living under lies. It's the Romans fault. Cnuts. What have they ever done for us?
The Romans made non-belief in Christianity punishable by death. No wonder it stuck.
 
crublue1 said:
Kids leave school with no practical knowledge, they can't wire a plug or put up a shelf. They can barely make toast. They don't get educated about pensions, investments or the tax system, or how government operates, or how global economy works.
But we choose to ram religion down their throats as if it's normal to believe in something that clearly doesn't exist, or at best is extremely questionable.
Something is wrong here.
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There are probably better explanations of how religion is covered in schools but I suspect it isn’t really rammed down their throats. The link below also suggests there is an acknowledgment that other belief systems exist ie atheism

Surely being taught an overview of all religions is a step towards tolerance?
 
vmsuhail said:
What about the amount of mental solace that religion gives children and adults ?
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You don’t need to lie to provide comfort and solace for children and adults, we can do that as a species without the made up fairytales of religions.

Learning to provide comfort and solace without having to make up a load of old gibberish would be a better life skill as it would make people improve their understanding of empathy and social therapy and learn how to tackle problems through human understanding making people feel better through realism and humanism.

And for the one needing comfort and solace, once we as a species understand that there’s nothing out there, we will learn to be more resilient as we understand the realism that it’s us and only us who can change things; it’s not a god or the religion that changes things, it’s our own mindset.
 
journolud said:
There are probably better explanations of how religion is covered in schools but I suspect it isn’t really rammed down their throats. The link below also suggests there is an acknowledgment that other belief systems exist ie atheism

Surely being taught an overview of all religions is a step towards tolerance?
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Or we could accept it for the farce it is and teach our children more important things instead.
Love, respect and tolerance for your fellow humans doesn't need to be linked to religion, in fact it's counterproductive to do so.
 
crublue1 said:
Or we could accept it for the farce it is and teach our children more important things instead.
Love, respect and tolerance for your fellow humans doesn't need to be linked to religion, in fact it's counterproductive to do so.
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We’re a multicultural society with people of many faiths. What could be more important than teaching our children tolerance of those faiths while encouraging an open mind about them.

I don’t know how it works in a faith school or particularly how it works in general but I remember vaguely from my boys school days that Religious Education was very different to how it was at the Brother run Catholic school I went to and had an emphasis on tolerance, citizenship, compassion, being a decent human being.

I don’t follow a religion myself so have no agenda to push but do think some of the more stridently held and expressed atheist views are the opposite of the above
 
“God is the creator, nothing can come from nothing”… yeah? well, if nothing can come from nothing, who created god?

“Everything is god’s will”… yeah? well, if everything is god’s will then what are you praying for? You’re praying for things that, if they are not part of his plan, they won’t happen so what’s the point?
 
journolud said:
We’re a multicultural society with people of many faiths. What could be more important than teaching our children tolerance of those faiths while encouraging an open mind about them.

I don’t know how it works in a faith school or particularly how it works in general but I remember vaguely from my boys school days that Religious Education was very different to how it was at the Brother run Catholic school I went to and had an emphasis on tolerance, citizenship, compassion, being a decent human being.

I don’t follow a religion myself so have no agenda to push but do think some of the more stridently held and expressed atheist views are the opposite of the above
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Fair play mate.
 
crublue1 said:
Or we could accept it for the farce it is and teach our children more important things instead.
Love, respect and tolerance for your fellow humans doesn't need to be linked to religion, in fact it's counterproductive to do so.
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A quote from a scholar and a gentleman.

“Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.”

Bless you Christopher Hitchens
 
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