Religious tolerance

[Anonymous]

I'd like to know how people define "religious tolerance". There have been a few threads recently that questioned doctrine, followers, etc.

Does it mean no one can question:

Doctrine?
Political activities of a specific church?
Followers of a religion?

I think most (hopefully all) of us can agree that it's wrong to make blanket statements and derogatory assumptions of someone based solely on their religious beliefs. Isn't it unreasonable that everyone be expected to be reverent about aspects of particular religions that they find offensive?

I'd really like to have this discussion without it turning into a flame war. The cries of bigotry and persecution in every thread regarding religion truly have me wondering about these things.

(special note to ranting atheist poster: I'd appreciate it if you didn't start insulting everyone on this thread. I'd like to have a conversation and your posts seem to have a way of dragging an entire conversation down to name-calling and mud-slinging. We know how you feel and there's no reason to keep repeating yourself in an offensive manner)

[Anonymous]

Not sure if this answers your question, but to me, as a Catholic (watch the non-Catholic poster who carefully polices for the Vatican to come out here), my faith is important but I will only answer to God for myself. My faith is very personal and private thing and I feel I should be more worried about saving my own soul and not so concerned with anyone else's. Although people can try and claim to, I think no one knows the mind of God but God alone. I don't believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible. I guess I'm trying to say that my faith is my own business and your faith or other beliefs are your own business.

[Anonymous]

My question is about interactions more than any belief system. The specifics of religion are certainly a personal matter, but what is tolerance in the situation of discussing religion at large and/or on an individual basis?

[Anonymous]

I've watched some of the previous threads on religion with dismay.

One problem facing believers is that it's almost impossible to get on here to discuss your own beliefs, let alone defend them. This is because belief and doctrine, and our own personal interpretations of it, are so complicated. I'm protestant, and I've done a lot of reading about the early church, various alternative interpretations of Jesus' teachings, et cetera. I certainly don't subscribe to everything my particular protestant church teaches, and I'm also comfortable with a lot of ambiguity. For that matter, from various things he's said in sermons and in conversation, our (gay) minister is pretty also pretty open to challenging doctrine.

But the nature of DCUM and most internet fora is to break things into black vs. white. This is also a favorite meme of atheists, I might add. Harris and others like to argue that, "if you're not a literalist, you're not a Christian" which tends to put believers into a box, which is very convenient for internet keyboard warriors.

Faced with the impossibility of defending my complex beliefs, which include some ambiguities, against simplistic hate-posts from people like the ranting atheist, my preference is not to bother. There doesn't seem to be any point to taking on the ranting atheist.

[Anonymous]

In my view, tolerance means I'm not going to discriminate against you. If you come live in my neighborhood, so what? If your kids and my kids are friends, great. If you want to work in the same company as me? Super. I have zero problem with anyone practicing whatever religion they want to practice as long as .... and here's the distinction ... you don't cram it down my throat. You don't create laws that are directly related to your religious beliefs that I am now forced to abide by. And it's different if a law comes about that I simply don't agree with. For example, I think it's absurd that people have to wait until they're 21 to drink but can serve in the military at 18. I don't agree with that, but that didn't come about because someone's "faith" dictated that it be so. When someone's religion crosses into my personal life, I don't think it's intolerance of the religion for me to be pissed off about that.

[Anonymous]

I think the special pleading by religious folks gets a bit much at times. Religious belief has been set aside in a protected area in a way that no other beliefs are. Say I make an outrageous claim--say that the Earth is hollow, and filled with an unlimited supply of oil--and you respond that there's no support for that, and that it leads to some really stupid public policy.

I don't scream and yell that you're being intolerant--I expect to be called out, and to make my case. Religion is really the only aspect of public life where folks demand a special dispensation.

Here's my definition of tolerance: if you want to talk about fairies and magic that's fine. As soon as you start trying to impact public policy on the basis of these magical beliefs, you deserve as much derision as possible (e.g. everything from anti-gay marriage to climate change denialism, to teaching schoolchildren Creationism).

A lot of modern Christians want to define God nearly out of existence (i.e. God is Love, or somesuch) and they won't get any argument from me; but most voting American Christianists believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible.

[Anonymous]

BTW, what ever happened to Christians between the early first century and today. A major component of Christianity is that you're *expected* to take a lot of flak from non-believers, and that you're supposed to evangelize in the face of such skepticism. Christ, this is pretty much the core component of the religion--and the only negative one in modern Christianity--and you guys want to defer on even that.

[Anonymous]

(BTW, I'm not sure if I'm "ranting atheist" here. I certainly don't feel like I'm ranting. Actually, I'm drinking a cup of coffee and kind of chuckling at you guys' hyper-sensitivity.)

[Anonymous]

OP here. At some point, doesn't it make sense not to use intentionally offensive terms like "fairies", "magic" and "imaginary friend"? Isn't it intolerant to use these examples when you're trying to have a civilized conversation about religion? I'm not proselytizing and neither is anyone else. I think it is also intolerant to marginalize non-believers.

I'm getting annoyed with my fellow atheists on this board.

[Anonymous]

OP again. It sounds like you may be the poster I made a special note to. Please, just stop. I'd like to have an adult conversation here and you're trying to throw a wrench in it. I refer to you as "ranting" because of your inability to have a conversation instead of blathering on about what you think of religion. To discuss an issue, you need to listen, too.

[Anonymous]

What would you call it? Sorry, not all of us were raised from birth in a "faith tradition". I think a lot of non-God-believers use terms like that because to use the God-believers preferred terms is a form of question-begging. Should we call it "your diety"? Or, the "supposed creator of the universe"? Heck, I know religious folks who think it's "intentionally offensive" if you don't capitalize "God". Sorry, at some point, you'll need to grow a thicker skin.

Again, how is "religious tolerance" any different from just assuming all basic premises of religion.

[Anonymous]

I'm not going to argue with you, I'd appreciate it if you'd not trash a thread I started to discuss this. Try waiting for responses if you're at all concerned with how anyone outside of you defines "tolerance".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: Here's my definition of tolerance: if you want to talk about fairies and magic that's fine. As soon as you start trying to impact public policy on the basis of these magical beliefs, you deserve as much derision as possible (e.g. everything from anti-gay marriage to climate change denialism, to teaching schoolchildren Creationism).

Thanks, OP, for pointing out that this language shows a lack of respect and even seems intentionally insulting.

When I see words like this, I assume the poster doesn't want to have a discussion. Instead she has a childish need to insult me.

I know that subsequent posts from the ranting atheist will contain gross over-generalizations, like "catholic = pedophile." (I saw that one a few days ago on DCUM. Seriously, all catholics? Even all priests?) Followed by gross over-simplifications about what the ranting atheist claims I am *supposed* to believe, as in her post above which says we are all anti-gay, climate change-denying creationists. (FWIW, many of us find Big Bang and evolution compatable with belief, and many of us are also pro gay marriage.)

Thanks for trying to engage on this, I appreciate it. But I'm sorry to say that as long as the ranting atheist is on this board, this protestant won't be tempted into any serious discussion of religion. I know there's no chance any attempt to explain my beliefs will be met with more than the two seconds it takes to type up some new insults.

[Anonymous]

15:03 again. Should say just for the record, I'm a big fan of Al Gore on the subject of climate change. Before the ranter nails me on that....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My question is about interactions more than any belief system. The specifics of religion are certainly a personal matter, but what is tolerance in the situation of discussing religion at large and/or on an individual basis?

Hmm....

In the office, we are told to follow a couple of principles when challenging/confronting somebody.
1. Offer specific points instead of general, broad-brush characterizations.
2. At least try to seem genuinely interested, instead of like you are just out to trash their religion.
3. Offer some nice news with the bad, especially when you will be delivering mostly bad.
4. Listen. This rarely happens on DCUM (hello, ranting atheist).

So instead of the recent thread asking something like, "How could anybody be a Mormon?" the thread could read something like "How do Mormon's feel about X aspect of the religion?" And then OP's initial post could say something like, "All the Mormons I know are very nice people, but I don't understand XYZ." This looks like you are genuinely curious, and you see some good points to Mormons you know (the "good points" don't even have to be about doctrine), and this isn't yet another thread designed to slam them.

I appreciate your effort to ask these questions. If I'm reading you correctly, you're willing to accept that some people have faith, while you don't. And you understand that references to the flying spaghetti monster aren't going to encourage the free exchange of ideas, with said free exchange being (instead of insulting) your real goal.

In theory I'm with you. But in practice, I'm not sure this works out well over the internet. It's more of a conversation you have over a cup of coffee with your new acquaintance, the Mormon. Especially when there is one really disruptive poster (the ranting atheist, or if anybody said the atheists are all going to hell). Recently there was a thread where somebody identified herself as a "biblical historian" (not me) and offered up some ways that historians evaluate the books of the new testament. I found it fascinating. But some posters (the ranting atheist?) just mocked her, instead of asking specific questions about anything they had trouble with. I can't see how this is going to change on DCUM. Chat groups, IMHO, are a bad vehicle for this kind of discussion.