I was piddling around the web today and I found a really interesting documentary on YouTube looking into the issues of Religion and Atheism. It lasts about an hour if you watch both parts, which I recommend you do. It's very interesting. Don't assume that it's going to take one side or the other. Hope you enjoy.
Here's part one...
And here's part two.
God, I love the BBC.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Found something interesting.
Posted by FHB at 6:30 PM
4 comments:
Well, after listening to both parts I remain unchanged in my personal belief. I cannot put man into the same category with plants and other animals. We think, reason, love, and even hate for some special purpose other than to just exists.
John Lennon's "Imagine" doesn't hold water "no religion too", something has to fill a void and any void can be filled with good and evil. Basically, stupid humans will always hate, mistrust, be jealeous, and even kill over, or because of some dogma.
I think that people need a sense of spiritual direction, even if it's given to them by faith in science. It often seems to me that secularism and atheism are less a lack of religious faith, but rather a different faith in a different deity. The zeal with which people like Richard Dawkins often condemn religion reminds me of a 16th or 17th century Jesuit monk defending his version of the true faith.
There's obviously no proof of ether sides belief, so it's faith that actually keeps it all going. The LAST thing I would want to do is condemn someone's faith or belief, or put all my faith in man, or some narcissistic belief that excludes a spiritual possibility. That's not to say that I believe in God, but I'm sure we can never know, one way or the other, till we die and find out. I've got an open mind.
I love the part in the video when Liddle gets them to admit that they don't know what happened BEFORE the Big Bang, and that Darwin really doesn't explain how a new species is established, but does explain how they evolve once they've been established. So, Mr. or Mrs. scientist, if you don't know, and can't ever really know, it's all back to faith, isn't it? Faith in what, if not a higher something? Faith, maybe, in the idea that we may not know now, but will know eventually. Everything will one day be knowable? Have faith then in man's ability to figure it all out? Of course, just because we don't know a thing doesn't make the answer something like "And then God lifted up his hand and....".
A wise old dead philosopher once laid it out for me. Speaking about the conflict in Europe that rose out of the Protestant Reformation in the 17th century, he said that no one can really know one way or the other. There's no way to know which religion is the true one. Faith is what matters, so the government should mind its own business, and people should leave one another alone. Wise sentiments. Too bad humans don't really seem to have the capacity to leave one another alone.
No religion is the correct one - no way to know. It's truth God's Grace that all mankind will be forgiven. It makes no difference which way he chooses to show his faith in this life. All will be revealed and all will be surprised, and so sorry they made the differences in this life.
Brilliant program - thanks!
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