Religion exists

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Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author

Heard this quote the other day. I want to discuss it!) I want to move beyond the obvious of it exists to spread the Word of God. Religion obviously has other beneficial aspects, like influencing people and collection.
 
Keeping in mind that we are speaking in generalizations, there have been religions that have been imposed on people to keep them in control. But there are also religions that people have followed and developed as people tried to discover the answers to questions.

I’d object against against saying that “religions exists to stop the poor from killing the rich” if it has no qualifiers to separate religions used to control people from those that do not exist to impose control.
 
Which religions impose control and which ones dont? Are there religions that are natural, man-made influence, or even both? Which ones are based on the objective world, and which ones focus on the subjective? It seems that the ones with the most control focus on both aspects.
 
That’s a cutesy (albeit quite cynical) little saying one might find in a coffee table book, but that doesn’t make it true. 😉

If you look at history, you see that Christianity sprang up from the poor.

A religion should be evaluated based on whether or not it is true. Not on whether or not people have misuded it or even if it has the potential for misuse.
 
lemondiesel said:
Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author
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I looked it up on Google, and there are only two mentions of the quote anywhere. Both attribute it to Napoleon, but frankly without more instances than that, I tend to doubt it is a real quote at all. (OTOH, perhaps it is usually translated differently, in which case Google wouldn’t find it.) It certainly isn’t in my Oxford Concise Dictionary of Quotations (but lots of things aren’t).

Anyway, as far as the sentiment expressed, obviously I don’t think it’s true. But if it were, would it necessarily be a bad thing? I mean, from a personal standpoint, I would rather be a murder victim than a murderer. I hate to think that I could open my heart to evil to the extent that I could murder someone just for the amount of money he has.

So as I see it, even if it were true, it would be a bigger benefit to the poor than to the rich.

Beyond that, there are so many incorrect unstated assumptions that it’s hard to know where to start.

–Jen
 
revert_jen said:
I looked it up on Google, and there are only two mentions of the quote anywhere. Both attribute it to Napoleon, but frankly without more instances than that, I tend to doubt it is a real quote at all. (OTOH, perhaps it is usually translated differently, in which case Google wouldn’t find it.) It certainly isn’t in my Oxford Concise Dictionary of Quotations (but lots of things aren’t).

Anyway, as far as the sentiment expressed, obviously I don’t think it’s true. But if it were, would it necessarily be a bad thing? I mean, from a personal standpoint, I would rather be a murder victim than a murderer. I hate to think that I could open my heart to evil to the extent that I could murder someone just for the amount of money he has.

So as I see it, even if it were true, it would be a bigger benefit to the poor than to the rich.

Beyond that, there are so many incorrect unstated assumptions that it’s hard to know where to start.

–Jen
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IF that is a legitimate saying, it does not surprise me that Napoleon would say that. In line with his cynical, anti-religious view of the world. Yes, it does sound like something he would say.

As to the rest of your post, I heartily agree with it.
 
Joe_5859 said:
If you look at history, you see that Christianity sprang up from the poor.
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And that just happens to be a coincidence? I imagine its development sort of like early colonial America fighting for independence… eventually people are just sick and tired, and demand something new.
Joe_5859 said:
A religion should be evaluated based on whether or not it is true.
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If this were true, all beliefs and ideologies are here-say, and open to interpretation.
Joe_5859 said:
Not on whether or not people have misuded it or even if it has the potential for misuse.
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America was a good idea, but it was still based on slavery.
revert_jen said:
So as I see it, even if it were true, it would be a bigger benefit to the poor than to the rich.
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Well obviously…thats the purpose of the quote. Eventually the poor and suffering will realize they are exploited in some way, in which case, they choose how to react. Some revolt, some leave, but in the case of religion…some tolerate.
revert_jen said:
Beyond that, there are so many incorrect unstated assumptions that it’s hard to know where to start.
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Such as?
 
lemondiesel said:
Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author

Heard this quote the other day. I want to discuss it!) I want to move beyond the obvious of it exists to spread the Word of God. Religion obviously has other beneficial aspects, like influencing people and collection.
Click to expand...
Funny, I thought fractional banking was the reason that stops the poor from killing the rich.
 
lemondiesel said:
Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author

Heard this quote the other day. I want to discuss it!) I want to move beyond the obvious of it exists to spread the Word of God. Religion obviously has other beneficial aspects, like influencing people and collection.
Click to expand...
Not sure about your quote, but religion will not go away anytime soon. We still have people who think and believe the world is only 6,000 to 10,000 years old.

It will take time.What will happen after it is exposed?
 
lemondiesel said:
Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author

Heard this quote the other day. I want to discuss it!) I want to move beyond the obvious of it exists to spread the Word of God. Religion obviously has other beneficial aspects, like influencing people and collection.
Click to expand...
The Catholic Church was created to teach the truth. We didn’t start using the word religion until later to describe it. As far as I know, Jesus never uses the word religion once. The Catholic Church is not necessarily a religion. It is simply a church. Religion is our relationship to God. Religion comes from a word which means to rebind. Religion restores our relationship to God. In order to restore your relationship to God you need to know the truth. Other religions can teach some of the truth, but only the Catholic Church can teach the full truth about God, because it was the only Church created by God.
 
lemondiesel said:
Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author

Heard this quote the other day. I want to discuss it!) I want to move beyond the obvious of it exists to spread the Word of God. Religion obviously has other beneficial aspects, like influencing people and collection.
Click to expand...
Well, maybe it’s ironic but many of Jesus word’s actually indicate that God favors the poor-and people and groups have used this to justify anti-wealth positions, liberation theology and various communist and revolutionary idealists come to mind.
 
joshrp said:
Religion is our relationship to God. Religion comes from a word which means to rebind. Religion restores our relationship to God. In order to restore your relationship to God you need to know the truth. Other religions can teach some of the truth, but only the Catholic Church can teach the full truth about God, because it was the only Church created by God.
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I take it you are unaware of the differences between spirituality and religion. Religion, a form of institution, is like a government with an executive branch that has power of the supernatural. And no, it was the only religion created by Jesus, a man who has many similiar doctrine and ideologies as (for example) Buddha, who lived hundreds of years prior.
 
lemondiesel said:
revert_jen;8276029:
So as I see it, even if it were true, it would be a bigger benefit to the poor than to the rich.
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Well obviously…thats the purpose of the quote. Eventually the poor and suffering will realize they are exploited in some way, in which case, they choose how to react. Some revolt, some leave, but in the case of religion…some tolerate.
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My point, which was not the point of the quote, is that if religion keeps the poor from murdering the rich, religion is more of a benefit to the poor than to the rich. The feeling from the original quote is that religion is an oppressive cultural artefact that benefits the rich by preventing them from being murdered. What I am trying to get across is that I don’t believe it’s anything of the sort, but if it were, it would be a cultural artefact that benefitted the poor by preventing them from being murderers.

–Jen
 
what i took from the quote wasn’t actual killing, but more towards revolution or along those lines. History has showed us there will always be different levels of hierarchy in society, and one usually has more leverage over the other in a political sense (meaning having more authority for how things are run etc). So as I read over the quote, this idea was stuck in my thoughts.

Because we are not self sufficient, we live in societies. Society brings along dilemmas. What better way to influence those dilemmas then by saying you will pay for your actions in the next life…

…for eternity.
 
lemondiesel said:
what i took from the quote wasn’t actual killing, but more towards revolution or along those lines. History has showed us there will always be different levels of hierarchy in society, and one usually has more leverage over the other in a political sense (meaning having more authority for how things are run etc). So as I read over the quote, this idea was stuck in my thoughts.

Because we are not self sufficient, we live in societies. Society brings along dilemmas. What better way to influence those dilemmas then by saying you will pay for your actions in the next life…

…for eternity.
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In the next life and also in this life! Moral corruption is self-destructive…
 
lemondiesel said:
Religion exists to stop the poor from killing the rich. - dont remember author

Heard this quote the other day. I want to discuss it!) I want to move beyond the obvious of it exists to spread the Word of God. Religion obviously has other beneficial aspects, like influencing people and collection.
Click to expand...
I agree that religion has positive purposes other than God communicating to humankind, but I don’t think it follows as some atheists (not pointing any fingers) claim that this means religion evolved for any Darwinian purpose. It would not be surprising to me that God reveals himself in a way which brings good or justice to the world (in the long term, possibly) beyond his revelation, and besides that, of course, this argument fails to deal with the abundance of historical and philosophical evidence and arguments which suggest not only that God exists but that he has (and does) revealed himself through history.

Bottom line is, YES religion has purposes beyond being God’s method of communication, NO that doesn’t give any evidence for atheism unless they already refuted all the arguments for God, at which point the Darwinian origin of religion (if true) wouldn’t really be helpful.
 
lemondiesel said:
depends on the person
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Moral corruption is always self-destructive because a person **without integrity **disintegrates like a rotten apple! If we live without principles we become the slave of our desires like a drug addict…
 
lemondiesel said:
And no, it was the only religion created by Jesus, a man who has many similiar doctrine and ideologies as (for example) Buddha, who lived hundreds of years prior.
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If you take that to it’s logical end, then what you find is that pretty much all religions can be boiled down to one religion because they all have “similar doctrine and ideologies”.

(Allow me to address the “similar doctrine and ideology” part of your statement, albeit at length. Buddha and Jesus Christ had completely different ideologies. The fundamental teaching of Buddhism is that the world that we see and feel is an illusion. That means that all the suffering, pain, and happiness that one feels in this world means absolutely nothing, because it doesn’t exist and is simply an illusion and that to reach fulfillment (nirvana), one must come to this realization. One of the fundamental teachings of Jesus Christ is that what happened on this earth (our choices, our sufferings, our happiness) mattered greatly to our immortal souls (“But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal” - Matthew 6:20 (NASB)). Furthermore, the highest ideal (next to the Ressurection) in Catholicism is that of Jesus Christ on the cross. This is perhaps the greatest acceptance of suffering ever (A God that suffers along with us; who knew?!). Given these facts, there is no way that Buddhism and Catholicism share anything alike)

Jesus Christ came to this Earth not to (primarily, at least) start a religion (just a happy consequence). He came to save the immortal souls of each and every human being from the wrath of eternal damnation (His Church continues that mission to this day). It’s as simple as that.
 
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