How to respond to the claim that religion makes you a slave

[TimothyH]

Religion made me a slave.

and whoever would be first among you must be your slave; (Matthew 20:27)

**and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness **(Romans 6:18)

**For he who was called in the Lord as a slave is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a slave of Christ. **(1 Corinthians 7:22)

I’m not ashamed to be called a slave.

-Tim-

 

[Bonnie]

I’m not ashamed to be called a slave.

Nor am I - in that context. But those who would say we are slaves as a criticism also imply - or say outright - that we do so unthinkingly, that we check our brains at the door of the Church. And that is simply not right.

 

[peter26]

Do you not know that if you yield yourselves to any one as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.

Romans 6:16-18 (RSV)

 

[MaryHelp777]

Romans 6:16-18 (RSV)

Wow love.that quote. Praise God

There’s a reason God’s Word is so powerful an answer to all our questions:

the Bible says: “The Word of God is a double edged sword, able to pierce bones and marrow, and reveal the hearts of men.”
“My Word does not return to Me without having accomplished what I set out that Word to do.”
“My words are Spirit and they are life.”

 

[Upgrade25]

Nor am I - in that context. But those who would say we are slaves as a criticism also imply - or say outright - that we do so unthinkingly, that we check our brains at the door of the Church. And that is simply not right.

Saint Augustine spoke of the possibility of evolution and quantum mechanics hundreds of years before Darwin and Einstein.

The following is an excerpt from Frank Sheed’s Theology for Beginners, page 72/241 on my Kindle app:
“Around the end of the fourth century, over fourteen hundred years before Darwin, St. Augustine wrote De Genesi ad litteram, establishing that Genesis was not meant to be taken literally. His own view was that in the beginning God created the “seeds,” the elements which would ultimately develop, evolve, into our universe. (He has a couple of theories about the six days, neither of them literal.)”

We check our brains at the door?

 

[CompSciGuy]

I think the statement needs to be elaborated. A slave in the sense that one is placed under the moral restrictions of the religion they follow? If that is the case, then I would make two points. First of all, assuming you are not living under a Sharia law country, your decision to follow a religion is pretty much voluntary, which rules out the possibility of slavery. Second, having moral principles is not the same as being a slave. Everyone has moral principles. I am sure a secularist would also believe that murder is a very bad thing and that noone should do it. Does that make the secularist a slave to his moral principles? What if he has a neighbor that he really doesn’t like and knows that he can bump him off without getting in trouble with the law? At any rate, I would say that in many ways people who strive to live by religious moral codes are actually freer in the end, because they are self-disciplined and have control over their passions. This would be my “secular” answer, though scriptures talk about being a slave to sin and then being set free… but maybe this is just coincidence.

If they mean that religion makes you a slave because it restricts you intellectually, then that is a false statement that is oft-repeated and kind of ironic in a way, because the people who repeat it often consider themselves “freethinkers” but in reality they are sheep who repeat the same dumb lies that are fed to them by other atheists. As others have said above, Catholics have a long history of pursuing science and the understanding of the natural world and our religion has not impeded this venture thus far, in fact, it has made the journey all the better. While it is convenient to lump Catholics into the same category with anti-science young-earth fundamentalist Christians (a sect which has only arisen in the last couple hundred years) it is not a fair or accurate thing to do.

Speaking of which, I can’t remember how many times I have heard in a pro-life/pro-choice debate that “the pro-life movement is ignorant and based on a poor understanding of science.” When pressed, the pro-choice people are unable to provide examples of what we are ignorant of, scientific or otherwise. I begin to think that this is just a canned insult that people throw at their opponents without any discretion whatsoever.