Should 'God' be taught is school? (Non religiously)

[seeds]

you appear to be discussing Christianity.

Yes, to a certain extent, that is true.

However, my approach to spirituality is more in line with Hermeticism, wherein it is suggested that all of the world’s religions contain an element (a piece) of the truth.

It’s just that Christianity’s framing of our relationship to the creative source of the universe as being “familial-like” in nature (as in an “offspring-to-parent” type of relationship) makes the most sense to me.

It says that there will be a new heaven and a new earth and the former will not remember the latter. That's the same as 'dead'.

But you will not get anywhere in the quest to find God by arguing with the text of a religion. When a 'real' God is discovered, it will be the only religion instead of the 7000+ we currently have on the planet.

That is absolutely true, Tesla. If the “real” Creator of this universe could be discovered, it would instantly wipe-out all of the divergent ideologies of the world (including atheism/materialism).

However, if in that discovery we also learn that the motives of the “real” Creator of the universe are in line with my thought experiment, then can you not understand why such a discovery would be prohibited?

And just in case you missed the point of the experiment, if what I suggested is true, then all of humanity, without any hesitation, would immediately step across the threshold of death (commit a painless suicide) in order to awaken into their true and eternal form.

In which case, the physiological means (human bodies) through-which new souls are awakened into life would be eliminated (at least from this particular planet).

In fact (speculatively speaking, of course), if the truth of our ultimate destiny was not hidden from humanity, then the abovementioned “exodus” would have occurred long ago, and none of us would be in existence today.

You could discuss those other religions say, Islam, and compare notes on what you feel is crazy about blowing oneself up and getting a bunch of virgins to have sex with, but then, they could discuss what is crazy about a dead guy who got raised from the dead, disappeared, and said they'd come back, and only one witness testifies to all the witness, in a day and age 2000 years ago before anyone knew that thoughts happened in the brain, or if the moon was made of Swiss cheese.

all of them are 'crazy' in the sense they make extraordinary claims about a being science cannot find.

As I have stated many times on this forum (and in line with a Buddhist parable), all of the world’s religions are nothing more than temporary “rafts” that carry us across the waters of earthly life, only to be abandoned upon the shore of death.

(And just as an amusing side note, I suggest that the main reason for the emergence of Islam (a tangent of the Abrahamic line) was to correct the Trinity (three-in-one God) nonsense that arose from the deliberations of the Council of Nicaea a few hundred years earlier.)

Yet science can now interpret some brain waves and determine the thought, even press a key on a keyboard, and another person hundreds of miles away will have there brain stimulated to press a specific key. Science has created the technology to put a rover on mars. science can create gold by slamming two particles together. Science discovered how to take a dense mass and blow up this entire planet, yet science can find ZERO on this "God" or "gods" issue.

I suggest that not only will human science not be allowed to “find God” (for reasons laid-out in my thought experiment),...

...but also, humans and their science - (compared to the creative intelligence of the universe) - are the metaphorical equivalent of amoebas splashing around in a petri dish.

Or more accurately, the metaphorical equivalent of fetuses who are momentarily suspended in the amniotic waters of a cosmic womb.

Indeed, fetuses who are simply not conscious enough to understand what they really are, or what lies on the other side of the “abdominal wall” of the Being to whom the womb belongs.

So, you can argue whether the religions you have chosen to believe and have been taught since children should be left alone, or examine the God issue closer outside of the religious realm and decide if maybe they should go the way of the Greek Gods on mount Olympus.those very Gods that Plato wrote of Socrates saying "We must believe what our fathers taught us of the gods is true". well. Should he have? should we?

By all means, Tesla, mythological nonsense should be abandoned. But we must not allow even greater nonsense to replace it (such as the materialistic “chance” hypothesis).
_______

[Immanuel Can]

Guess I should stop with the off topic comments.

Why? The intent of the thread has already been killed...

If it has, Nick, the reason it's been "killed" is only that secularists are either unwilling or unable to investigate their own suppositions about the subject matter of how God should be "taught in school."

But that's the key issue: not merely "should" God be taught in school, but also "how should" God or religion be taught in school, if it should. The first is almost completely unanswerable if we don't deal with the second -- that is, unless we have no objection to straightforward propagandizing on Atheistic suppositions.

So far as I'm concerned, that's a "live" question.

To follow up on that thought, here are a couple of telling lines, quoted directly from Tesla's last message, Nick:

"But you will not get anywhere in the quest to find God by arguing with the text of a religion."

"...you can argue whether the religions you have chosen to believe and have been taught since children should be left alone, or examine the God issue closer outside of the religious realm and decide if maybe they should go the way of the Greek Gods on mount Olympus."

You can see very clearly here he doesn't actually care for teaching about God or about religion -- what he cares about is DISPROVING and then DISMISSING both God and religion. The allegedly "open" inquiry is to convince students that the way of free thought lies in the direction of getting rid of God. It's not to find out what religions think: and it's definitely not ever to entertain the possibility that one or the other of them speaks truth about God. No, no...that is the one possibility that must never, even for an instant, be entertained.

Much of what passes for secular "religious education" is produced in precisely this spirit: the controlling narrative, the critical perspective from which all this is to be evaluated is the Atheist metanarrative. Within this kind of study, the particular "religions" are blended into one bland category, "religion," or are allowed to squabble, but with Atheism presiding over them as the referee, and the outcome already decided -- none of them will be found to be true.

People who advocate this sort of thing think God and religion are simply bunk. They actually have no interest in "studying" them objectively. And they have no actual desire to let children make up their own minds -- rather, children are to be subtly induced, though the tacit skepticism of the method by which they are to be taught, that no talk of God or religion is to be taken seriously anyway.

It's not "religious education." It's "anti-religious education."

And you wonder why people who do believe in God don't just want to jump on his bandwagon?

[Eodnhoj7]

Why? The intent of the thread has already been killed so there is no reason to stop. Just continue and enjoy the kill.

That is what Atla does, he spams threads in order to kill them.

He can't argue, so he floods the thread with ad hominums.

Aren’t all of these comments (including the one I am now writing) detracting from the intent of the thread?

Besides, I think that some of the questions that the author of the OP (tesla) has presented in his own posts have given us a little leeway to explore tangents.
_______

Is that ^^^^ detracting from the thread?


Atla spams threads all the time when he cannot argue with someone.


As to the OP the word "culture" is intrinsically derived from the word "cult" or "cultivate". Culture cultivates thought processes (cult). These thought processes act as a means to bind people together, thus have a religious function as religion is binding my nature.

To argue whether or not God should be taught in schools is irrelevant as some interpretation of reality, we are all unifying behind, is acting as a religious dogma. God is taught whether people say he is or not.

[Atla]

That is what Atla does, he spams threads in order to kill them.

He can't argue, so he floods the thread with ad hominums.

Aren’t all of these comments (including the one I am now writing) detracting from the intent of the thread?

Besides, I think that some of the questions that the author of the OP (tesla) has presented in his own posts have given us a little leeway to explore tangents.
_______

Is that ^^^^ detracting from the thread?


Atla spams threads all the time when he cannot argue with someone.


As to the OP the word "culture" is intrinsically derived from the word "cult" or "cultivate". Culture cultivates thought processes (cult). These thought processes act as a means to bind people together, thus have a religious function as religion is binding my nature.

To argue whether or not God should be taught in schools is irrelevant as some interpretation of reality, we are all unifying behind, is acting as a religious dogma. God is taught whether people say he is or not.

Nah you're just butthurt about Atla because he tells it as it is. Like: you're actually the biggest spammer on this forum.

[Eodnhoj7]

Aren’t all of these comments (including the one I am now writing) detracting from the intent of the thread?

Besides, I think that some of the questions that the author of the OP (tesla) has presented in his own posts have given us a little leeway to explore tangents.
_______

Is that ^^^^ detracting from the thread?


Atla spams threads all the time when he cannot argue with someone.


As to the OP the word "culture" is intrinsically derived from the word "cult" or "cultivate". Culture cultivates thought processes (cult). These thought processes act as a means to bind people together, thus have a religious function as religion is binding my nature.

To argue whether or not God should be taught in schools is irrelevant as some interpretation of reality, we are all unifying behind, is acting as a religious dogma. God is taught whether people say he is or not.

Nah you're just butthurt about Atla because he tells it as it is. Like: you're actually the biggest spammer on this forum.

Honestly...so what if I am, so what if I am not. There is nothing you can do about it ...

sad atla... frown face for you

[Nick_A]

Guess I should stop with the off topic comments.

Why? The intent of the thread has already been killed...

If it has, Nick, the reason it's been "killed" is only that secularists are either unwilling or unable to investigate their own suppositions about the subject matter of how God should be "taught in school."

But that's the key issue: not merely "should" God be taught in school, but also "how should" God or religion be taught in school, if it should. The first is almost completely unanswerable if we don't deal with the second -- that is, unless we have no objection to straightforward propagandizing on Atheistic suppositions.

So far as I'm concerned, that's a "live" question.

Tesla used the term “non religiously.” This is an important qualifier and excludes religion, Responding to this question in a way which respects its intent requites first how the word God is being used.

Secularism only appreciates two possibilities: no God or a personal God and how to teach the concept a person favors.

However there is a third concept of God Plotinus defined as the ONE and Plato defined as the GOOD. Where no God and the personal God refer to Man on earth, the ONE refers to universal truths Man is within which transcend man on earth and governs the universe. Can the ONE be taught non religiously? Yes but the dominance of secularism and the struggle for power between its representatives assures it is only for a distant future if at all.

There is no sense in arguing how God should be taught until deciding what God is. That won’t happen. Society is not ready for it so consequently it must be limited to more advanced private forms of education.

"Who were the fools who spread the story that brute force cannot kill ideas? Nothing is easier. And once they are dead they are no more than corpses." Simone Weil

The attraction to the great ideas including the reality of the ONE or the GOOD have become corpses for society as a whole enchanted with its remote while its nose remains stuck in the ground. It may be best to just continue the argument between blind believers and blind deniers. Anything else may disturb the peace and become too disruptive. Why rock the boat. If you do you may be forced to drink the hemlock.

[Tesla]

you appear to be discussing Christianity.

Yes, to a certain extent, that is true.

However, my approach to spirituality is more in line with Hermeticism, wherein it is suggested that all of the world’s religions contain an element (a piece) of the truth.

It’s just that Christianity’s framing of our relationship to the creative source of the universe as being “familial-like” in nature (as in an “offspring-to-parent” type of relationship) makes the most sense to me.

It says that there will be a new heaven and a new earth and the former will not remember the latter. That's the same as 'dead'.

But you will not get anywhere in the quest to find God by arguing with the text of a religion. When a 'real' God is discovered, it will be the only religion instead of the 7000+ we currently have on the planet.

That is absolutely true, Tesla. If the “real” Creator of this universe could be discovered, it would instantly wipe-out all of the divergent ideologies of the world (including atheism/materialism).

However, if in that discovery we also learn that the motives of the “real” Creator of the universe are in line with my thought experiment, then can you not understand why such a discovery would be prohibited?

And just in case you missed the point of the experiment, if what I suggested is true, then all of humanity, without any hesitation, would immediately step across the threshold of death (commit a painless suicide) in order to awaken into their true and eternal form.

In which case, the physiological means (human bodies) through-which new souls are awakened into life would be eliminated (at least from this particular planet).

In fact (speculatively speaking, of course), if the truth of our ultimate destiny was not hidden from humanity, then the abovementioned “exodus” would have occurred long ago, and none of us would be in existence today.

You could discuss those other religions say, Islam, and compare notes on what you feel is crazy about blowing oneself up and getting a bunch of virgins to have sex with, but then, they could discuss what is crazy about a dead guy who got raised from the dead, disappeared, and said they'd come back, and only one witness testifies to all the witness, in a day and age 2000 years ago before anyone knew that thoughts happened in the brain, or if the moon was made of Swiss cheese.

all of them are 'crazy' in the sense they make extraordinary claims about a being science cannot find.

As I have stated many times on this forum (and in line with a Buddhist parable), all of the world’s religions are nothing more than temporary “rafts” that carry us across the waters of earthly life, only to be abandoned upon the shore of death.

(And just as an amusing side note, I suggest that the main reason for the emergence of Islam (a tangent of the Abrahamic line) was to correct the Trinity (three-in-one God) nonsense that arose from the deliberations of the Counsel of Nicaea a few hundred years earlier.)

Yet science can now interpret some brain waves and determine the thought, even press a key on a keyboard, and another person hundreds of miles away will have there brain stimulated to press a specific key. Science has created the technology to put a rover on mars. science can create gold by slamming two particles together. Science discovered how to take a dense mass and blow up this entire planet, yet science can find ZERO on this "God" or "gods" issue.

I suggest that not only will human science not be allowed to “find God” (for reasons laid-out in my thought experiment),...

...but also, humans and their science - (compared to the creative intelligence of the universe) - are the metaphorical equivalent of amoebas splashing around in a petri dish.

Or more accurately, the metaphorical equivalent of fetuses who are momentarily suspended in the amniotic waters of a cosmic womb.

Indeed, fetuses who are simply not conscious enough to understand what they really are, or what lies on the other side of the “abdominal wall” of the Being to whom the womb belongs.

So, you can argue whether the religions you have chosen to believe and have been taught since children should be left alone, or examine the God issue closer outside of the religious realm and decide if maybe they should go the way of the Greek Gods on mount Olympus.those very Gods that Plato wrote of Socrates saying "We must believe what our fathers taught us of the gods is true". well. Should he have? should we?

By all means, Tesla, mythological nonsense should be abandoned. But we must not allow even greater nonsense to replace it (such as the materialistic “chance” hypothesis).
_______

you are choosing an ideology that in your thought experiment there is an assumption of some real knowledge about it, when there isn't any 'real' knowledge. you say that's by design. but its just as easily there is no design. the truth is no one knows. that's the point of the class. assuming you will never 'find' such an entity that exists is the same as saying mankind will never fly to the moon. today's species is young, and growing in communication and knowledge and technology exploding at a scary rate. soon different methods of modifying DNA could create the next 'homo' series of evolution, and what will more advanced brains and potential Artificial intelligence (true intelligent singularity type) think of our silly monkey like (comparatively) reasoning here when they exist and not us?

You make the mistake that all do when discussing the idea of God. You assume to know something about it. and that is the tragedy. and the point of such a class.

[Immanuel Can]

Tesla used the term “non religiously.” This is an important qualifier and excludes religion, Responding to this question in a way which respects its intent requites first how the word God is being used.

The term is, in the context, absurd.

It asks us to believe in a "non-religious" study of God. But there is no such thing. What one can study "non-religiously" is not God at all, but only various human concepts of God. And the presumption has to be, then, that "God" is merely a psychological imagining of the human mind, not a real entity. So you're not studying God at all...you're studying what is taken to be false concepts.

Since many "religions" believe in God, and because all believe in the truth of their propositions, in order to study them "non-religiously," one has to act as if these religions are all simply deluded and refer to nothing real anyway. In other words, one has to hand over the high ground to Atheism, even before any inquiry starts.

So Tesla is gelding the inquiry at the beginning, and then bidding the educational system to be productive in exploring the issue of God. Good luck with that.

Secularism only appreciates two possibilities: no God or a personal God and how to teach the concept a person favors.

Secularism is actually a procedural word, meaning "without reference to the sacred," or "outside the realm of the sacred." Since "the sacred" is the primary realm of "religions," what is one then studying? Nothing but weird sociology...the compiled delusions of various people.

However there is a third concept of God Plotinus defined as the ONE and Plato defined as the GOOD. Where no God and the personal God refer to Man on earth, the ONE refers to universal truths Man is within which transcend man on earth and governs the universe. Can the ONE be taught non religiously?

Oh. So you don't want "non-religious" study: you want your own religious view to shape the inquiry? How are you going to convince people like Tesla that that's a good idea?

There is no sense in arguing how God should be taught until deciding what God is.

Well, we could study various conceptions of God, and I think we should; but we will have no way of arbitrating among them, sorting out the weaker from the better views, if we don't allow truth-criteria to be involved. In other words, we would need to ask which conceptions were more rational, consistent, productive, true-to-life, and so on. And this, a "secular" or "non-religious" approach does not allow.

[henry quirk]

his Mimi schools him in Christ

I instruct him on Crom

the 8th grade indoctrinates him in Marx

[Impenitent]

god should be taught in school if you are going to teach god anywhere... god needs to sit in the little desk in front... omniscient? what?

-Imp

[Immanuel Can]

the 8th grade indoctrinates him in Marx

Ain't that the truth!

[Nick_A]

I C

It asks us to believe in a "non-religious" study of God. But there is no such thing. What one can study "non-religiously" is not God at all, but only various human concepts of God. And the presumption has to be, then, that "God" is merely a psychological imagining of the human mind, not a real entity. So you're not studying God at all...you're studying what is taken to be false concepts.

By definition we cannot study the ineffable. We can only study its effects through dunamis and the results of universal laws proving that the ineffable is a necessity to produce creation. The experience of dunamis is the result of opening to awe and wonder of that which is greater than ourselves while the universal laws become more understandable as science advances. Both can be supported by education but cannot be as long as those like you demand exoteric religious beliefs. Yes, science can eventually verify the necessity of a conscious source for creation

I believe that one identical thought is to be found—expressed very precisely and with only slight differences of modality—in. . .Pythagoras, Plato, and the Greek Stoics. . .in the Upanishads, and the Bhagavad Gita; in the Chinese Taoist writings and. . .Buddhism. . .in the dogmas of the Christian faith and in the writings of the greatest Christian mystics. . .I believe that this thought is the truth, and that it today requires a modern and Western form of expression. That is to say, it should be expressed through the only approximately good thing we can call our own, namely science. This is all the less difficult because it is itself the origin of science. Simone Weil….Simone Pétrement, Simone Weil: A Life, Random House, 1976, p. 488

[Nick_A]

his Mimi schools him in Christ

I instruct him on Crom

the 8th grade indoctrinates him in Marx

Can you imagine how terrible it must be for a kid to awaken one day and realize he is surrounded by senseless lunacy. What to do? He tries drugs but after a while they just make matters worse. He needs what the Ways offer but society does what it can to deprive him of this human need. What a mess.

[henry quirk]

"Can you imagine how terrible it must be for a kid to awaken one day and realize he is surrounded by senseless lunacy."

Not mine. He's well-grounded. He recognizes the nutjobbery for the most part, and where he has questions, we -- he and me -- talk about it. No doubt, I'll make him into a horrorshow but at least he won't be a soma-addicted snowflake pussy-thing.

#

"He tries drugs but after a while they just make matters worse."

We have several on-going conversations runnin': drugs bein' one of 'em. He knows, and is reminded regularly, of my thinkin' on the subject.

#

"He needs what the Ways offer but society does what it can to deprive him of this human need. What a mess."

What are 'the Ways'?

[Nick_A]

Henry

What are the Ways

A Way is an inner path leading in the direction of the source of our being. I think there is only one Way but several paths which at some point merge at the Way. We are living in chaotic times leading to the loss of inner direction.

Are you familiar with the story of Noah's Ark? The inner meaning is a description of consciousness. The flood is a description of inner chaos we live in while the ark is a description of consciousness which floats above the flood. Lacking consciousness Man perisihes in the flood of chaos.

AA for example I believe is such a path. a person enters it in a state of possession. They are powerless in front of alcohol. Yet by following certain techniques they can be freed from the obsession. The techniques provide a kind of Ark which prevents a person from sinking into obsession.

As you look out into the world it is obvious that there are a great many lost souls caught up in some sort of obsession and at worst killing each other. Secularism struggles to make sure efforts to bring people into a state of balance in which human consciousness dominates the chaos of artificially created desires remain in a small minority.

I agree with you that a man has to defend himself and his family. But what I read of going on in Chicago isn't defensive killing; it is offensive reactions of lost souls which secularism is powerless in front of.

Secularism has lost the meaning and purpose of human education so by definition cannot educate about Man's connection to God. I don't intend to sink into the chaos of the floods and I hope you can keep your feet and your powder dry as well.