Boring day leads me to rant on organised religion

Ever had one of those days where the idea of sleeping the whole 24 hours away seems appealing, not because of some horrible event, just simply down to boredom? Today has been like that for me.

It's been so warm today, I am bored, yet the thought of doing anything at all bores me even more. It is just one of those days where there is nothing that could possibly lift the curtain of drudgery and boredom which has befallen my simple existance. With that in mind i am uncertain of the reason to even bother blogging, as in itself it is unlikely to make any impact on my current mood or day.

It is odd, since i do have some latent desire to do something, anything, i just have no idea what that something is and everything else is boring me. This is creating a kind of restlessness that i cannot quite explain, propelling my current level of boredom ever higher. The feeling of wanting to do something but being bored by everything is quite a conflicting set of emotions that could quite easily drive one to insanity.

Before i bore anyone who may or may not be reading this blog, i should probably pick a subject of some kind of interest in which to blog about. There is only so long a blog about nothing can stay in the least bit interesting.

I'm going to pick something which i have seen mentioned a few times today, even touched upon in a discussion with my nan and that is organised religion.
So, this is going to be a somewhat long post i guess, mainly pertaining to religion and my views upon it and the reasons i feel those ways about it.

I think it would be highly ignorant or arrogant of me to state what i feel the obvious as a fact rather than a simple opinion right from the get go. That opinion is that in my mind, there simply is no God, that taken into account, i'm sure what is expected to follow is a rant about organised religion and to some extent you could be right.

One of my little brothers is a catholic, he attends a catholic school and has attended all the usual catholic 'events' a catholic boy might be expected to, Hopefully this does not include the usual catholic extra-curricular activities which from time to time grace the front pages of our newspapers. (Please read the latter as a joke...) So anyway, he attends catholic school and by all accounts believes in God and probably the catholic teachings he has so far been taught. He is a mere 8 years old and so i believe very impressionable. He is now of an adequate age that he is able to form his own opinions to some extent. He is old enough to question things he is being told and choose to believe or in some cases not to believe in them. What he has been taught in the past is of course a huge factor in what he chooses to accept today.
The point i am slowly trying to make here is that i truely believe any organisation which sets its teachings in motion from such an early age is not only reprehensible but also damaging. Whether this be an organised religion, the Nazi youth or a cult. Any organisation which not only benefits but perhaps survives on such a practice should by all means be shut down.
Do not get me wrong, i am all for freedom of religion, freedom of belief and the freedom to decide what is right or wrong, what i am completely against is the people who would decide for another what their belief is. An 8 year old child cannot make informed decisions on such complex beliefs which he can probably not comprehend past what seems a simple story in the bible with a simple moral behind it. The continued preeching to said child will leave that child with no way to doubt what he is being told, that is not belief but brainwashing. No matter how subtly it is taught, no matter how subtly it is pushed upon the child or no matter how morally sound the messages are; teaching opinion as fact is wrong.

This is perhaps my major issue with any and all major religions. Pushing a parents belief upon a child is wrong and most organised religion does this with absoloutely no sign of being ashamed. I would go as far to say that other than for the purpose of making children aware of different cultures and religions, religion has no place in any schooling system.

Many beliefs a child will consider as right are passed down by parents, teachers and those close to them, people they look upon with respect. Organised religion is by no means the only perpatrator of this but i believe it to be perhaps the most damaging.

Relgion in general i have no issue with, the teachings whilst in my opinion complete fiction, offer a good set of ground rules and morals to live ones life on. I truely believe that most of the teachings and morals behind most religions are there to improve people. I also believe they are completely out-dated, irrelevent and in some cases can be offensive.

The days where a religion is needed to tell people how they should live their lives is long past, with laws and rules set by governments across the civilised world the reason for their existance in my mind only fulfills a few purposes. To provide a reason for existance, a hope of a better place after death. The continued power over a population of people, the money and prestiege that goes with that. To wage war and spread hatred in a way which will not spark condemnation.

So many views of the major organised religions have changed over time, some very fundamental ideas have became distant from their first conception. How can a religion choose to modernise themselves without seeing that the need for change in the views it has is testement to the fact the book and teachings they preech are quite probably those written in a time where order was needed and the idea of a higher power was one that would bring that order? Thus organised religion was born.

Wow, that turned into a rant right there.

As far as i am concerned, what someone believes in, how they allow it to effect their lives is up to them. I almost wish i were able to have faith in something which seems so far fetched, it would give meaning where there is none. I just honestly believe that to not give a person the right to decide upon his own investigation what he believes in is a terrible thing.

Growing up, i of course was subjected to religion to a certain level, i never had it pushed upon me, i was never told what i was to believe in and i made my own mind up, that the idea of a supreme being creating the wolrd in less than a week was illogical. I feel for all the good that organised religion does the world, which it does in some cases, it does much more harm. So many rights issues are held back by the old fasioned views of religion and whilst in recent times their stances have changed considerably the fact that religion can have any impact on these issues is beyond ridiculous. The fact religion can preech that all men are created equal and in some cases still deny that certain groups should get equal rights based on inherent, unchangable aspects of themselves without feeling like complete hypocrits and hate spreaders is beyond me.

At the end of the day, what a child is taught at a young age can have a huge and terrible impact on how they feel about things later in their life. Allow me to give an example:

If when growing up, i were to be pushed into the catholic system and of course, began to believe in cathlocism, their teachings and ideology and truely decided i wanted to live my life as i would have believed a good person should, when i realised my sexuality i would have became very conflicted. I would have probably turned to another catholic, be it a priest or parent, who would have more likely than not only offer me the fact that homosexuality is a sin, being same sex attracted is one thing, but if i were to ever act upon that and god forbid be happy i would be commiting what could only be seen as an abobinable act of fornication and that i would most likely end up in hell. As a believer, a true believer i would be in a very conflicted state at that point, what would i do? I'd be forced to choose between a happy personal life and my religion, being taught from a young age, it is likely the religion would win through or it at least would lead me to a very fucked up state.
It was already hard enough when we consider that a man and woman being together is considered the norm. I do not expect it to be considered any other way, because that indeed is the normal practice and the one which does make most sense but to add such condemnation to it also... that would leave any child in quite the dilema.

I'm sure some catholics would act in a much better way toward this issue than the example i gave but by doing so they are interpretting the things their religion officially tells them. If they are doing that in my mind they are truely doubting the religion and its belief system. Anyone who makes an exception for any reason on any one thing their religion teaches them is wrong to do so. Simply put, if you doubt the things the religion tells you, no matter how small, you should get out and believe in what you believe in private. I'm guessing that in itself would apply to a large majority of the people within any religion. If you don't actually believe what they teach, if you don't believe everything they say, if you're willing to make exception to the way in which the religion would have you act, how can you call yourself one with that religion? Get the fuck out of the religion, stop being a hypocrit and believe what you have decided yourself, don't feel obliged to fully believe what they teach you, don't feel like you can make willy nilly exceptions to what they teach you and do the right thing.


Oh dear, i ranted a lot, about things i don't care all that much about... still, as i say... religion, great for those who believe, shit for those who are forced to or do not.

Well, i certainly did not mean to rant so much, especially not so generally with no real examples or specific feelings on specific things. Still, i find that organised religion is something which angers me greatly. I find that it holds people back, it brainwashes people, it hurts people and is incredibly outdated.

If i were to believe there was a God of any description, i'll be damned if i would follow the pre-set teaching and dictations on how i should live my life from an organised religion.

At the end of the day, i'll try to live my life in a way that hurts no one else, helps others in some cases and that the people i meet in life can look upon after my death and think 'you know what, he was a fairly nice guy.'