Bad Religion

After battling, yet again, to hear over the talking in the lecture on Thursday, we finally got to learn something of religion - both bad and good.


I'm not a religious person by any stretch of the imagination, but I do think that people have the right to believe in what they choose to believe in. Where I draw the line is when they start encroaching on others in an effort to 'convert' them. It smacks to me of pyramid selling - the more recruits you can get, the nearer to God you become.

I believe that (as with most things in life) people have choices about what they believe in as far as a God is concerned. If those choices are taken away from them, as was purported with cults like the moonies or the Waco movement, then it becomes bad. Mass suicides or massacres, in my mind, are not part of any great plan for enlightenment or the greater good. As for so-called kidnapping and brainwashing of new recruits to these cults - is that the media's knee jerk reaction for sensationalism? I was in my early teens when the moonies were big news in the media, and looking back it seems that the whole purpose of coverage was to inject fear into the public about these supposedly bad people. I don't know what goes on behind the closed doors of these organisations, but I would like to think that members are free to leave at any time they choose - I could be wrong of course.

Jehovah's Witnesses were talked about quite a bit during the lecture. One thing I have mixed feelings on is their refusal to have blood transfusions or transplants - they do have a point, they're safe from receiving contaminated blood, which isn't such a bad thing in these days of HIV etc. Although I don't agree with a lot of their operating methods, on a lighter note, there is one thing I definately agree with them on - and that is not celebrating Christmas. That is one part of religion that has gone sort of bad because it's way over the top with commercialism and lost almost all its meaning in the younger generations. No, I don't celebrate Christmas; I am an oasis of calm while the world goes mad around me!

Religious cults in twentieth century America