religion should be banned completely

[The_Professor]

Sir Elton John wants religion banned completely -- because he believes it promotes hatred of gays.

Speaking to the Observer Music Monthly Magazine the singer said religion lacked compassion and turned people into "hateful lemmings".

The PRESS ASSOCIATION reports: In a candid interview for a dedicated Gay issue of the magazine he shared his views on topics as varied as being a pop icon to Tony Blair's stance on the war in Iraq.

He said there was a lack of religious leadership, particularly in world politics, and complained that people do not take to the streets to protest any more.

Sir Elton said: "I think religion has always tried to turn hatred towards gay people. Religion promotes the hatred and spite against gays.

"But there are so many people I know who are gay and love their religion. From my point of view I would ban religion completely.

"Organised religion doesn't seem to work. It turns people into really hateful lemmings and it's not really compassionate."

He added: "The world is near escalating to World War Three and where are the leaders of each religion? Why aren't they having a conclave? Why aren't they coming together?

"I said this after 9/11 and people thought I was nuts. Instead of more violence why isn't there a meeting of religious leaders?

"It's like the peace movement in the Sixties. Musicians got through to people by getting out there and doing peace concerts but we don't seem to do them any more.

"If John Lennon were alive today he'd be leading it with a vengeance," he said.

Sir Elton said people were too busy blogging on the internet to go out onto the streets to stand up for what they believed in.

"They seem to do their protesting online and that's not good enough. You have to get out there and be seen to be vocal, and you've got to do it time and time again.

"There was a big march in London when Britain decided to join the war against Iraq and Tony Blair is on the record as saying 'the people who march today will have blood on their hands'. That's returned to bite him on the ass," he said.

Sir Elton compared his place in British culture with that of the Queen Mother's.

He said: "People come to me and I'm a bit like the Queen Mother. I never get those problems. I don't know what it is with me, people treat me very reverently.

Referring to his "wedding" to long-term partner David Furnish, he said: "It was the same when Dave and I had our civil union - I was expecting the odd flour bomb and there wasn't.

"Dave and I as a couple seem to be the acceptable face of gayness, and that's great."

He pledged to continue to campaign for gay rights saying: "I'm going to fight for them whether I do it silently behind the scenes or so vocally that I get locked up.

"I can't just sit back; it's not in my nature any more. I'm nearly 60-years-old after all. I can't sit back and blindly ignore it and I won't."

Developing...

http://www.drudgereport.com/flash1.htm

[domer]

Elton John, of course, is entitled to his opinions, and many of us may have occasion, lacking other stimuli, to find them thought provoking. But as to the title observation about banning religion: what do we resort to in place of it. In a sense, taken as an overall conglomeration, it's the gold-standard of values. The question is, beyond healthy internal reform, can we let the currency of values religion represents float like a dollar?

[Plane]

"...can we let the currency of values religion represents float like a dollar?"


Well put!


But hard to answer.


I have to say my opinion is Yes , we have to allow Religion to be freely chosen and free to operate , includeing freedom to reject it entirely.


I think that it is a mistake to reject Christ , but unless freely chosen , the choice is not genuine anyway.

[Xavier_Onassis]

It is pretty clear that if one assumes that all of the Bible is the divinely oinspired word of God, then homosexuality is a sin and should be punished.

Modern Christians mostly no longer want to stone or even punish gays, but they still don't want to recognize them as a part of society.

Elton John is mistaken if he believes that it is possible to ban religion. The Communists certainly tried to do this over a long period of time in a wide range of cultures, and although they did reduce the numbers of believers, they mostly created martyrs, and when religion was permitted again, it tended to come back in a less ritualistic, but more emotional and goofy form: babbling in tongues, megachurches, mass pilgrimages, that sort of stuff.

There is nothing that will completely remove religion from any culture, although this has come closest to happening in China, where religion (Tao, Confuscious, Buddhism) is more intellectual and less emotional. The Falong Gon is a very small sect, but is quite persistent, and I doubt that the Party will ever manage to extirpate it.

Some people prefer to allow corruption to exist in their society and do little to remedy this, because they have this belief that in the end, God is gonna punish all the evildoers in eternal hellfire or something like that.

Banning religion is essentially banning ideas, and that is never beneficial in the long run.

[The_Professor]

Very astute analysis, XO.

[Plane]

"Some people prefer to allow corruption to exist in their society and do little to remedy this, because they have this belief that in the end, God is gonna punish all the evildoers in eternal hellfire or something like that."

Something like that?


I would like to know the chapter and verse that says anything like this.


One of the worst administrations of all time was headed by the administrator known as "The Incorruptable" Robespierre.


 http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1794robespierre.html

"Indeed, how could a base and corrupt government have dared to view themselves in the mirror of political rectitude? A king, a proud senate, a Caesar, a Cromwell; of these the first care was to cover their dark designs under the cloak of religion, to covenant with every vice, caress every party, destroy men of probity, oppress and deceive the people in order to attain the end of their perfidious ambition. If we had not had a task of the first magnitude to accomplish; if all our concern had been to raise a party or create a new aristocracy, we might have believed, as certain writers more ignorant than wicked asserted, that the plan of the French revolution was to be found written in the works of Tacitus and of Machiavel; we might have sought the duties of the representatives of the people in the history of Augustus, of Tiberius, or of Vespasian, or even in that of certain French legislators; for tyrants are substantially alike and only differ by trifling shades of perfidy and cruelty.

For our part we now come to make the whole world partake in your political secrets, in order that all friends of their country may rally at the voice of reason and public interest, and that the French nation and her representatives be respected in all countries which may attain a knowledge of their true principles; and that intriguers who always seek to supplant other intriguers may be judged by public opinion upon settled and plain principles.

Every precaution must early be used to place the interests of freedom in the hands of truth, which is eternal, rather than in those of men who change; so that if the government forgets the interests of the people or falls into the hands of men corrupted, according to the natural course of things, the light of acknowledged principles should unmask their treasons, and that every new faction may read its death in the very thought of a crime.

Happy the people that attains this end; for, whatever new machinations are plotted against their liberty, what resources does not public reason present when guaranteeing freedom!

[Xavier_Onassis]

Something like that?


I would like to know the chapter and verse that says anything like this.
=====================================================
I didn't say it was in the Bible, though every prophet in the Book says something about how the wicked are going to pay for their wickedness. Ezequiel is pretty heavy on this tack, and it's most of what the Book of Revelation is about.

I said that many people BELIEVE it, and allow corruption to exist because life is short, buy the rewards of the blessed and the punishment of the iniquitous are eternal. The Roman Catholic Church has been very, very good at this over the years.

[Plane]

Something like that?


I would like to know the chapter and verse that says anything like this.
=====================================================
I didn't say it was in the Bible, though every prophet in the Book says something about how the wicked are going to pay for their wickedness. Ezequiel is pretty heavy on this tack, and it's most of what the Book of Revelation is about.

I said that many people BELIEVE it, and allow corruption to exist because life is short, buy the rewards of the blessed and the punishment of the iniquitous are eternal. The Roman Catholic Church has been very, very good at this over the years.

And would you have no more tolerance for "corruption" ?

We are all human beings here , the Christian teaching is that all of us need forgiveness.

Stamping out corruption absolutely would be like the Sacarecrow of Oz stamping out a fire.

[Xavier_Onassis]

We are all human beings here , the Christian teaching is that all of us need forgiveness.

Stamping out corruption absolutely would be like the Sacarecrow of Oz stamping out a fire.

=================================================
It would? How?

You sure come up with some wacky analogies.

People may NEED forgiveness, but this doesn't mean that corruption should be ignored.

Are you saying that everyone that tries to prevent corruption becomes corrupt?

Do all police who try to eliminate crime become criminaLS?

[kimba1]

pride,envy,gluttony,lust,anger,greed,sloth

out of all of these sins only lust is attacked by religion

all the others are encouraged or frowned upon alittle.

I think sloth is far second

[Plane]

We are all human beings here , the Christian teaching is that all of us need forgiveness.

Stamping out corruption absolutely would be like the Sacarecrow of Oz stamping out a fire.

=================================================
It would? How?

You sure come up with some wacky analogies.

People may NEED forgiveness, but this doesn't mean that corruption should be ignored.



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Corruption cannot be ignored or much tolerated.
Nor can there be a Zero tolerance policy because the result of that is worse than the corruption.
Only the highly politicly motivated are ever availible for political office , this is almost corrupt ti begin with.

Are you saying that everyone that tries to prevent corruption becomes corrupt?

Do all police who try to eliminate crime become criminaLS?