Should religious issues be pushed on to the general population?

[Holly3278]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

 

[Hastrman]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

Oh, okay. But your objection to wife-burning is also a religious issue, you realize that, right? And polygamy?

I assume you’re opposed to sickly children–and daughters–being left to the wolves. That’s a religious issue too, by your definition.

Or maybe it’s time you admitted the existence of ethics independent of religion, and the legitimacy of debating them in the public square.

 

[royal_archer]

Doing so would negate free will and negate our ability to do good of our own choice. As I explained it to my kids: would God be pleased with you going to church if you were dragged their? In order to please God you have to do it voluntarily. The same goes for charity. Are you doing good if you get robbed by a poor person as opposed to freely helping them?

Can you find a reference in the Bible where we humans were instructed to force others into being charitable?

Instances of humans being asked to render judgement are normally associated with maintaining civil order such as punnishing crimes where there is a victim. Even in adultry there is a victim in the person who was cheated upon. In the case of murder, including pre-natal murder, it is very clear that there is a victim that needs protection. In all other cases I feel it is our duty to make up for the immoral decisions of others, not force them into morality. If God allows us to have free will, I do not feel it is our place to try to over rule him.

 

[Holly3278]

Oh, okay. But your objection to wife-burning is also a religious issue, you realize that, right? And polygamy?

I assume you’re opposed to sickly children–and daughters–being left to the wolves. That’s a religious issue too, by your definition.

Or maybe it’s time you admitted the existence of ethics independent of religion, and the legitimacy of debating them in the public square.

I don’t see how wife burning could possibly be a religious issue. To me, if you burn your wife, you’re guilty of either assault or murder.

As for polygamy, I think it should be legal but that’s just me. I am against polygamy religiously but not everyone is against it as I am.

I already admit the existence of ethics independent of religion. And frankly, I don’t find your post to be very convincing either. Wife burning is obviously violating someone else’s right to live. Of course you would probably say that abortion is also violating someone else’s right to live but then we get in to the debate of when the fetus has rights and when it does not.

 

[puzzleannie]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

quite right
many people object to one adult murdering another adult because of their religious beliefs. why should their point of view be foisted on the entire society? would it not be much better to allow me to murder anyone who stands in my way, simply because of my of personal preference, because I want to inherit his money, or I just don’t like him much, without society making me feel guilty over some outdated commandments from a hairy guy on a mountain?

 

[jkarp]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

Fine, but then the opposite also must be true: secularists cannot be allowed to force their ‘opinions’ upon me and my family. If secular nutjobs want their children to not be exposed to my wacky, misguided belief system, that is their own perogative, however, I must also be allowed to raise my children without the imposition of the misguided garbage taught by many upon them. If it’s good for the goose . . .

 

[Sheeniac]

Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion.

I think science and the field of bioethics would agree that life starts at conception. Unless they’ve determined another start point? Even some atheists believe that (as a former atheist myself) that life starts at conception. Heck - Nat Henthoff of the Village Voice is a famous journalist who is a pro-life atheist.

 

[sawman]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

Dear Holly3278,
Hi! Are you saying that people only define murder religiously? Or that the victims of murder are only defined religiously? As to when a fetus becomes a human being ,I’ve always wondered what else could it possibly be?Two humans get together, they produce a human baby,not a rabbit or mongoose, so how can the issue of when even be viable?
As to should religious opinions be pushed onto people, I was not aware that practising my religion can be considered “pushing” it on someone. In America, at least so far , religious people have certain inalienable rights like freedom of speech, freedom to practise religion, freedom to associate with whom we please,and freedom to petition the government for redress of wrongs,I wouldn’t call any of that pushy.Are these the kind of activities you find to be pushy? Peace!

 

[Kaninchen]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

Well, you can’t exactly expect people to detach themselves entirely from the picture of the world they have in their heads, just because they’re casting their votes - whether that’s because they believe that their value system comes from the dictates of some deity or because value systems are just products of certain behaviors (like ‘altruism’) having had evolutionary advantage in the development of the species and theirs is just a local version of the product.

Political discourse from the Greeks onwards has had a strong element of “our values or theirs” in it and I don’t think that it’s ever going to change! It may be a world of ‘facts’ but everybody looks at those ‘facts’ through the lenses of their different value systems (like people walking around with different colored sunglasses).

We’re stuck with it, for better or worse.

 

[Holly3278]

I think science and the field of bioethics would agree that life starts at conception. Unless they’ve determined another start point? Even some atheists believe that (as a former atheist myself) that life starts at conception. Heck - Nat Henthoff of the Village Voice is a famous journalist who is a pro-life atheist.

Medical science says that pregnancy begins at implantation. I believe this Wikipedia article addresses that issue:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pregnancy

 

[goofyjim]

Abortion transcends the religious argument. It is in our founding documents that everyone has the right to life. I view it as totally unAmerican to permit abortion. All the other stuff, however, I do see as religious in nature.

 

[kristie_m]

My two cents here…

At a six week ultrasound I was able to very clearly see a heartbeat. Can something that is not alive have a heartbeat?

There has often been an arguement that because an embryo or fetus cannot survive on it’s own, it cannot be considered truly alive. A newborn also cannot survive on it’s own. It needs to be fed and nurtured. Is it, therefore, not alive?

The beginning of life is NOT a religeous issue. The sanctity of life, though, is.

 

[MH84]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

I just want to say that anyone (not Holly specifically) who suggests what Holly is saying here, doesnt believe that the Catholic Church’s teachings are true, and believes that morality is subjective.

Holly, Im not saying that Im an example of a faithful Catholic, but Im just commenting based on what youve written in the OP. Frankly, either the Catholic Church is right or it is wrong. If the Church is the true church teaching the truth received from God, then its religious beliefs SHOULD be influenceing societal laws. My :twocents:.

 

[Holly3278]

I just want to say that anyone (not Holly specifically) who suggests what Holly is saying here, doesnt believe that the Catholic Church’s teachings are true, and believes that morality is subjective.

Holly, Im not saying that Im an example of a faithful Catholic, but Im just commenting based on what youve written in the OP. Frankly, either the Catholic Church is right or it is wrong. If the Church is the true church teaching the truth received from God, then its religious beliefs SHOULD be influenceing societal laws. My :twocents:.

You might not realize this but I am no longer Catholic. I am now Episcopalian. I do believe the Catholic Church is right on many things but the Catholic Church is also wrong on a number of things. That is my opinion.

 

[MH84]

You might not realize this but I am no longer Catholic. I am now Episcopalian. I do believe the Catholic Church is right on many things but the Catholic Church is also wrong on a number of things. That is my opinion.

Oh, I didnt realise, I probably shoulda checked first. Anyway, just substitute “Catholic church” for “Episcopalian church”.

 

[Newbie2]

I don’t see how wife burning could possibly be a religious issue. To me, if you burn your wife, you’re guilty of either assault or murder.

As for polygamy, I think it should be legal but that’s just me. I am against polygamy religiously but not everyone is against it as I am.

I already admit the existence of ethics independent of religion. And frankly, I don’t find your post to be very convincing either. Wife burning is obviously violating someone else’s right to live. Of course you would probably say that abortion is also violating someone else’s right to live but then we get in to the debate of when the fetus has rights and when it does not.

The Ten Commandments were written long before our society (USA) existed, and many of our laws are based on Judeo-Christian morality.

It doesn’t really matter how one would “off” his wife, let’s just say it’s murder…and the moral prohibition of murder is religious in origin. So we should do away with laws prohibiting murder because they’re “religious-based”?

Where, then, does morality stem from if not from some sort of religious roots?

You automatically assume that the fetus does not have legal rights, and that is not universally the case. Thankfully, more and more states are recognizing that an unborn child has rights independant of the mother. There have been recent sucessful cases, haven’t there, where a pregnant woman’s killer was convicted of double-murder? I don’t have a source, unfortunately.

Not to mention that moral rights don’t necessarily equal legal rights.

Medical science says that pregnancy begins at implantation. I believe this Wikipedia article addresses that issue:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pregnancy

Well, there ya go. Wikipedia, that authoritative source of all wisdom. Sorry, but it’s simply not possible to lump “medical science” into one universal opinon…and it’s just that, a collection of opinions.

Besides, what’s not generally at issue is not when Pregnancy is defined, but when life begins, and the RCC believes it to be at conception.

 

[Sheeniac]

Medical science says that pregnancy begins at implantation. I believe this Wikipedia article addresses that issue:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pregnancy

There are more far sources that give actual opinions than wikipedia. It’s not necessarily a bad source, but it’s not the best place to base a philosophy.

In addition, it doesn’t deal with bioethicists. Aren’t you saying that ethics, which can be secular, should trump religion?

BTW - I didn’t say ‘pregnancy’, I said life.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

Is it just me or has anybody else noted that incredible amount of ‘false dichotomies’ that are used as arguments by those who (wittingly or unwittingly) have fallen victim to the ‘moral relativism’ crowd?

 

[kristie_m]

You automatically assume that the fetus does not have legal rights, and that is not universally the case. Thankfully, more and more states are recognizing that an unborn child has rights independant of the mother. There have been recent sucessful cases, haven’t there, where a pregnant woman’s killer was convicted of double-murder? I don’t have a source, unfortunately.

You may be thinking of the Peterson case in California. Scott Peterson was convicted of killing both his wife and unborn child. That particular case had an interesting twist, though, as the child, with the cord still attached, was found separate from the mother. There was some discussion as to exactly when the child was killed.

However, it did spawn a bill “Lacy and Connor’s law” (and I’m sorry, I don’t know whether or not it actually passed) which was supposed to acknowlege a fetus as being a person. But it would seem that a fetus is only really a person if the mother wants to carry it to term. Otherwise, why would abortion still be legal in CA?

 

[jman507]

Hi everyone. Should religious issues such as abortion be pushed on to the general population? We all know that abortion is largely a religious issue because many people believe it is murder but this is based upon their religious beliefs. Their religious beliefs teach them that from the moment of conception, it is a human being or a person with legal rights. But that is a religious opinion and not a factual opinion. Should religious opinions really be pushed on to other people? I’m sorry but I don’t think they should be.

It would seem to me that if any moral standing was partly in any way derived from some type of religious movement, you’d have to more or less throw out nearly all ideas of morality. It would seem to me abortion is awfully far removed from an outright religious position. You may have “thou shalt not kill,” but that seems rather well accepted by society at large.

The rest of the abortion argument is derived from ideas about what the soul is and what constitutes a person. It would seem to me that would be partly derived from the Church traditions, but has also undergone a vast philosophical considerations. It would seem to me it is a fair non-religious position to be on the table, along with other positions.

If one was to dictate how one should approach worship, now that would be an encroachment by religion.