In answer to the OP: it’s not curses, it’s demons. Dumbass.
In answer to the above, we’ve obviously determined that God both exists and does not exist, until we open the box and observe him. He’s either withered into nothingness from the sustained attack of logicians, or not. The only way to know is to open the box.
Trouble is figuring out what constitutes the box. Until we all universally agree what the box is, and what constitutes opening it, we’re sort of ultimately stuck with uncertainty on the subject, if we’re playing by quantum rules.
That said, in practical application, I think we’ve got it about right in the U.S. Everybody’s meshugas on the subject is their own business, unless and until it bumps into someone else’s meshugas.
I have asked you over and over again to provide a cite to back up your claim that “the major religions spread by force”. Thus far, you haven’t provided any cite. Instead you’ve just repeated yourself over and over again. Repeating a claim over and over again doesn’t make it true. If your claims were actually true, you wouldn’t find it so difficult to provide a link to an outside source of widely acknowledged reliability, otherwise known as a citation, or often just a “cite” for short.
To convert means to change. A person who changes his or her religious identification from Baptist (not Baptism) to Assemblies of God (not Assembly) has changed his or her religious identification, and therefore by definition has converted, even though both Baptists and Assemblies of God are both Christian denominations. Your unproven theory is that a person’s religious identity is determined by the way their parents brought them up. A person brought up by Baptist parents with a Baptist identity, who then converts to Assemblies of God, flies in the face of this theory. However, even if we ignore cases of conversion from one denomination of Christianity to another, there are still tens of millions of people in the United States alone who have changed religions in their lifetime, according to a poll that you yourself linked to.
First of all, please provide a cite to back up your claim that “a huge number of those were raised in Christian homes after their parent or grandparents converted”.
Second, please provide a cite that “the overwhelming majoirty of [Christians] were raised in Christian households”. If it’s actually true, you shouldn’t have so much trouble providing a cite.
Once again, you pick a single definition out of five while ignoring the others. Nice try.
If you want me to believe that these are facts, provide some evidence, backed up by cites, in support of them.
For God’s sake, how many examples do you need? Do you need a remedial history lesson? Have you never heard of Charlemagne, Cortez, Pizarro, Abu Bakr, etc., etc., etc? Do you need a cite for me to prove Washington was the commander of the Continental Army?
Fine.
Charlemagne conversion by force:
The relevant entry:
“By forcibly Christianizing the Saxons and banning on penalty of death their native Germanic paganism, he integrated them into his realm and thus paved the way for the later Ottonian dynasty.”
This essentially Christianized Europe.
From wikipedia on Cortez (he’s the guy who subjugated by force the Aztecs. The Aztecs were the dominant civilization of what is now primarily Mexico.)
“Then he proceeded to Tabasco, where he met with resistance and won a battle against the natives. He received twenty young indigenous women from the vanquished natives and he converted them all to Christianity.”
Here is a short description of his bloody campaign to crush paganism and spread his religion.
That takes care of Central America.
Fracisco Pizarro brutally crushed the Incas (they were the dominant civilization in the Andes and northern South America. This was Spain’s initial foray into the continent and their influence spread from there. Don’t believe me? There’s a reason they all speak Spanish down there.)
One source:
Relevant entry:
“Christian fanaticism was ruthless with the Incas. The Christians had despised the Inca values and applied brute force to demolish everything that was non-Christian. We ache today when seeing the remains of the Inca cities which had once thrived.”
From wikipedia:
“Though Pizarro is well known in Peru for being the leader behind the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire, a growing number of Peruvians regard him negatively. By taking advantage of the natives, Pizarro ruled Peru for almost a decade and initiated the decline of Inca culture. The Incas’ polytheistic religion was replaced by Christianity and both Quechua and Aymara — the main Inca languages — were reduced to a marginal role in society for centuries, while Spanish became the official language of Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia and Chile. The cities of the Inca Empire were transformed into Spanish, Catholic cities. Pizarro is also vilified for having ordered Atahualpa’s death despite his paid ransom of filling a room with gold and two with silver which was later split among all his closest Spanish associates after a fifth share had been set aside for the king.”
I refuse to further explain how the Crusades affected the spread of Christianity. As for Islam, I’ve already given you names and places and am bored researching facts which to anyone with a cursory knowledge of world history is plainly obvious. If, at this point, you refuse to grasp the vital role military force has played in the spread of religion, I can’t help you.
You can bob, weave, and twist all you want. “Converting” from Christian to Christian is not converting from one religion to another. A person moving from Brooklyn to Queens is still a New Yorker. In the statistics quoted, the number of those practicing the religion in which they were raised is around 90%. But, that includes the people who stopped practing altogether. So, the actual number of those who converted to another religion is even smaller. Don’t ask me to cite what amounts to 3rd grade math. Over 90% is an overwhelming majority by any standard.
If you can’t even grasp that “religion is the ritual observance of faith”, you’ve excused yourself from any debate on the subject.
Bottom line: You desperately need to believe that religion was spread through love and goodwill and that all those who practice would’ve chosen their faith without parental influence. Perhaps being faced with reality is shaking your own faith. Maybe you just enjoy being contrarian to the point of absurdity. Either way, your continued demand for cites which A: have been extensively provided and B: are largely unnecessary for someone with a rudimentary understanding of world history and English, continues to demonstrate serious denial.
I’ve already wasted enough time going round and round with you.
Here’s what you’re missing: Scientific thinking disallows someone to believe something that has no basis in fact. Critical thinking doesn’t just teach us to look for evidence before accepting something as true, it teaches us to dismiss anything that relies purely on superstition or random speculation. Once somebody grows to understand the concept or rational thought, they should realize they had no reason to be convinced of curses in the first place. As far as scientific method is concerned, not believing something is true (or even possible based on current knowledge) is nearly the same as believing it is not… until evidence to the contrary arises.
It’s also no more proven nor verifiable than the existence of Zeus, Cthulu or the Spaghetti Monster. Non-critical thinkers seem to believe that if something can’t be disproven it should remain in the realm of discussion. What they’re missing is the fact that a literally infinite number of un-falsifiable scenarios is possible, which makes their study or consideration such a colossal waste of time they are a disservice to legitimate scientific thought. Given this infinite number of possibilities, the probablilty of any specific one of them being true approaches zero.
Uh, what? Charlemagne Christianized Europe? The Wikipedia entry that you cited only mentioned that be brought Christianity to the Saxon Kingdom that constituted only a portion of modern-day Germany. How did you arrive at the conclusion that this “Christianized Europe”? Do you even know what Europe is? If so, then why would you make such a ridiculous claim?
world :rolleyes: of smileys. 