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My last week's research and writing has shocked and disgusted me, but here is the conclusion from new page (a re-write of a 1998 page): "Child Abuse by Christian Priests: Horror, Paedophilia and the Clergy" by Vexen Crabtree (2009): "Child abuse and paedophilia has been a particular problem for Christian institutions. It seems that the Church's teachings on sexuality, and the general restrictions of the strict teachings of Christian churches, lead to a development of sexual dysfunction amongst its priests. Christian Churches, the biggest example being the Catholic Church, have fought to conceal paedophile priests and move them from place to place when allegations arise. They have tried to deal with paedophilia by sending priests on sick leave or to rehabilitation centres ran by other Christians, but, it appears that Christian hierarchies are the last places you should trust when it comes to dealing with sexual abnormality. The scale of the scandals has led to various Churches declaring themselves bankrupt as they attempt to pay some of the court costs and settlement fees demanded of them. No other industry - even those closely associated with children such as boarding schools - has a rate of abuse anywhere near the rate found amongst Christian clergy. Counting is difficult, but, around 3% of all priests appear to be prone to recurring sexual indecency with children." There are many example stories within this page, and I have had to gloss over a seemingly endless stream of horrific cases. I will add more country-by-country profiles when I have the stomach for it, but for now I want to put this topic behind me! Tags: christianity, paedophilia, priests, religion, sexuality
Current Location: Salisbury, UK
Listening To: "Electrohead" by Combichrist
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"Cultural Religion Versus Scholarly Religion" by Vexen Crabtree (2008)
This is a complete re-write and re-launch of the 2005 original. It now has a large concentration on common magical and superstitious practices and their relations to official religion. The introduction and menu follows:
If you explain a basket of beliefs to a large crowd, you can be assured that in your absence they will form conclusions and opinions about their new religion that you didn't want them to form. So, is the 'religion' you have founded best described as the beliefs of the masses, or the beliefs of the 'experts' at the top? When the top priests disagree with the guys on the ground, which set of beliefs and practices is the 'real' religion? Is a religion the grassroots beliefs of people on the ground, or is it the well-considered philosophies and beliefs of the founders and scholars? The problems involving the tussle between popular cultural forms of religion (low-brow religion) and intellectual faith (high-brow), have concerned scholars through history.
- Cultural Religion, Scholarly Religion
- Should the Grassroots or the Experts Define a Religion?
- The Indomitable Market of Magic, Versus Religious Professionals
- Conclusions
The conclusion reads:
Religions are combinations of grassroots practices and cultural norms with high-brow theologizing and intellectualization. The two forms of a religion often battle against each other. It is not right to limit definitions of what the 'true' religion is to either the beliefs of most of the adherents (who might en masse be taken in by fads) nor limit it to what the academics and clerics say, who only represent a small portion of the religion. Therefore the only sensible pragmatic route is to consider religions to be pluralities and umbrella terms. Folk practices are often resilient to top-down declarations of what is or isn't supposed to be part of a religion, and often reforming popular beliefs results only in name-changes and other surface changes, leaving underlying practices more or less as they were.
The grassroots of a religion is nearly always a combination of beliefs and practices from multiple historical sources. Magical thinking, ritualistic habits and popular beliefs all tend to survive within a culture even though its official religion may change. On the other hand, the formal and scholarly religion of clerics and religious professionals is complex, more complete, text based and resilient to change. It is demanding to study and frequently convoluted because the religion's scholars debate the weakspots and difficult spots of the tenets and work out complex theologies to circumvent them. The more difficult the area of study of a religion, the more maze-making its scholars will do in attempts to explain away irrationality. But the more complex and difficult the intellectual aspect of a religion, the more the lowly masses will fail to comprehend or implement it, and the bigger the divide will be between the cultural and scholarly versions of the religion. A religion is always a contradictory mix of both what the leaders say the religion is, plus what the mass of the actual followers believe. Tags: culture, magic, religion
Current Location: Monchengladbach, Germany
Listening To: "Floorkiller" by Project Pitchfork
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Added a section to: "The European Union: Democratic Values, The Euro, Crises and Migration" by Vexen Crabtree (2007) on religion.
46% of European people attach no important to religion, according to a survey of 30,000 people in 27 EU member countries.
11.1. Belief in God
On average throughout the 27 EU countries, only half of its people believe in God. There is much variation from country to country. Only 16% of the populace of Estonia belief in God, but 95% do in Malta. Scandinavian countries are highly atheist. Two main social groups are particularly prone to belief in God; those over 55 years old and those whose education did not proceed beyond the 15-year-old stage. Finally, females are more likely to believe in God than males.
11.2. The Waning of Religion in a Modern Continent
Life without religion has become the norm for most Europeans. About 30% of the population state that they don't believe in God, but still put down an official religion on paper. This is a common trend amongst secularising peoples, as people forget what religion is about. The bigger the religious institution, the quicker it is likely to be shrinking. This has caused structures such as the Anglican Communion to topple as African Bishops, representing African churches that are growing in size and making money, prise the union apart as the weakening West loses its ability to promote its own (slightly) more tolerant version of Christianity.
“When asked what values they "cherish above all", respondents overwhelmingly chose "peace" (52%), "respect for human life" came second (43%). Democracy got 24%. Way down at the bottom – 11th out of 11 – was "religion" with a meagre 7%.” [National Secular Society]
My collection of statistics on the UK highlight the loss of power and influence of religious ideas in Britain. Less than half of the British people believe in God, and two thirds have no connection to religion. "Between 1979 and 2005, half of all Christians stopped going to church on a Sunday".
11.5. European Law and Values on Religion
Of the Union's 27 states, according to Wikipedia, only five have an official state religion. Cyprus (Cypriot Orthodox Church), Denmark (Danish National Church), Greece (Church of Greece), Malta (Roman Catholic Church) and England (Church of England). Some states have close relationships with various religious bodies that are not enshrined in law.
European Law institutionalizes equality and religious freedom. This means that religions are not free to discriminate against each other; anti-discrimination laws mean that employers are sometimes forced to accommodate a persons' religious beliefs as long as it is practical to do so (this is especially the case in some countries such as the UK), and in others many private and local agreements allow some religious people special privileges at work. But the overall attitude is that, due to the multiple religions that make up the European Union, Law cannot impose religious rules. The ethos that brings most tolerance and equality, therefore, is strict secularism. This goes to its extreme in countries like France, where, according to the EU Monitoring Center, "religion is very rarely taken into consideration within companies' diversity initiatives and the majority of the population would seem to adhere to the idea that religion belongs to the private sphere of life".
When it comes to religion, the following values and customs are pertinent to keep in mind, in Europe:
- Religion is a private affair, and a personal choice.
- There is no compulsion in religion under law.
- People have a freedom to change their beliefs (to convert) whenever they want.
- Western culture is critical and skeptical, and religious ideas are frequently questioned and challenged.
- Freedom of speech overrides religious sensibilities about blasphemy.
- People attempt to accommodate religious practices were practical. This is enshrined in European law.
There are secularising trends towards some of the following areas of tolerance, in a multi-faith Europe:
- State buildings and events should not support any particular religion.
- Public events, especially more important ones, should avoid emphasis on any particular religion.
- Religious education in schools should be optional.
- Religious theories should not be taught in schools as fact, not even by faith schools.
These values ensure that official culture does not indirectly discriminate against anyone by enforcing one brand of faith over another, and ensures people are free to pursue their own religions at will, but, not at the expense of other people's freedoms. Tags: europe, god, religion, secularisation
Current Location: Monchengladbach, Germany
Listening To: "The Funeral of Hearts" by HIM
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As Jewish Christianity began to develop its own character, Jesus was no longer considered to be just a man. He had a special relationship with god, and was perhaps conceived of by God before anything was created. But he was not an eternal man nor a god. My page on Arianism continues: “Arianism describes the pre-trinitarian doctrine of a holy, but not a godly, Jesus. It is not always adoptionism and not always monotheistic, either. It was defined by a negative principal (that logically Jesus can't be God and still suffer on the cross). If Jesus was God (i.e., perfect), Arians realized, what chance would any Human have of imitating him? Although Arian-sounding theologies existed from the second century onwards, it only became a wide point of contention after the third century. In the third century Origen of Alexandria, the greatest theologian of his time, had declared that the Father was Greater than the Son. This principal was later named after its principal proponent and most articulate defender, Arius (256-336 CE). It was opposed by Athanasius, who became a Nicene Christian from 325 CE. In the Roman Empire, Arian Christianity was supplanted by intolerant Nicene Christianity by the 5th century, but remained the most popular form of Christianity amongst the tribes surrounding the empire, until the 8th century. [...] The eventual victory of the Cappadocian Nicene faith from 380 CE meant that as the Empire collapsed, the Christianity that was left behind was the dark, violent, centralized type that did not tolerate dissent. By the late fourth century, a recognizable Roman Catholic Church had emerged. The doctrine of the Trinity had been created, and the vengeful violence of Nicene Christianity was in full, open, bloody view. Anti-semitism was given its official sanction. The edited Nicene Creed was the only form of belief that was to be tolerated. Inquisitors began reviewing religious beliefs, condemning victims to imprisonment, torture and public execution for failing to believe the right things. This state of affairs persisted and plunged Christian societies into a 1000-year long dark ages. If the Arians had survived the onslaught and been the religion that the Empire left behind, we would have been left with a Christianity that would have left a glowing legacy of Jesus. Instead, the Nicene's violence and intolerance won out, and the 'ages of faith' that resulted darkened humanity from the fifth until the fifteenth century. ”"Arian Christianity" by Vexen Crabtree (2008) Tags: christianity, god, history, jesus, religion
Current Location: Afghanistan
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I am finishing off an essay on "Arian Christianity (the Father is Greater than the Son)". Arian Christianity was purer and less tainted with paganism that its successor (and made more sense!). But alas, although it was a close call, it was not the Christianity that the Roman Empire was to give the world! My page laments its demise under the ruthless hammer of Nicene/Cappadocian Christianity. - Everyday Thinking Errors, about how our cognitive functions mistakenly create patterns from ambiguous data, and about social psychology results in inaccurate beliefs about patterns in the world.
- Gnosticism - a page on ancient gnosticism religion... probably not for this year though.
- International Citizens?? Something to do with globalisation, global citizens' pressure groups, the internet, potential world government, anti-nationalism, and stuff.
- Zombies: Necromancy; a page about the necromancers found in zombie films. Need time to re-watch some films.
- World Government (nearly finished).
- Obesity - on permanent hold ATM. About the medical and personal costs of obesity and its prevalence. Have lost sight of why I was doing this page.
- Seculariation Rates (religion). A collection of stats examining the progress of secularisation in the West, and its challenges and reverses.
- Neophobia - the fear of the new!
Tags: jesus, monotheism, religion, vexen, websites
Current Mood:  hopeful
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New page: "Birth Control and Contraception: Wisdom Versus Superstition" by Vexen Crabtree (2007) Tags: aids, birth control, contraception, disease, dogma, health, hiv, overpopulation, pope, population, procreation, rcc, religion, sexuality, stds
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"The Divine Number 12: 12 Gods, 12 Disciples, 12 Tribes and the Zodiac" by Vexen Crabtree (2007)):
The conclusion reads (briefly; many interesting tid-bits are iterated through first!):
When you see the number twelve, watch out. If the number is employed in a practical sense to divide time, measurements, or angles, then the chances are it makes awesome mathematical sense to utilize such a factorable number as the number twelve. But if you see it used in a superstitious, religious, magical, paranormal, holy or weird way, be warned that it is based on ancient sun-worship, star warship, and ridiculous astrology. As a species we have been using it to divide the solar realm into twelve divisions, assuming that each one is ruled by a personification, a god, a divine being, a teacher, a prophet or a son of the sun. Now we understand what stars, planets and stellar objects are, it makes no sense to retain the mystical, nonsensical connotations of the 'holy', 'perfect', 'divine' or 'special' number 12. Such superstitions have made their way into major religions; there are 12 tribes of Israel as founded by the 12 sons of Jacob, the 12 disciples of Mithras and Christ, the 12 Gods of Olympus and according to Shi'a Muslims, 12 successors to Muhammad. The number 12 is useful because we use a base 10 numbering system (using 10 digits: 0123456789). It makes no sense to say that Gods would use a base 10 numbering system: Therefore gods would not divide the skies, their sons, their chosen ones or the message into twelve parts just because we have ten fingers! So applaud the usefulness of number 12... but watch out for those who are deluded by the pagan, irrational, magical and nonsensical claims made about it! It is, after all, only a number. Tags: 12, astrology, disciples, god, gods, israel, jacob, mathematics, olympus, religion, superstition, tribes
Current Location: Mönchengladbach, Germany
Listening To: Wumpscut's "Totmacher" by Haujobb
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"Categorizing Satanism: Moojan Momen's 8 Pathways to Religious Experience" by Vexen Crabtree (2007). The categories are not designed so that each religion fits one category; most religions cater for multiple types of religious experience. The more successful religions accept more types of religious experience. How does Satanism fit with each mindset?
- Ritualism
- Legalism
- Evangelism
- Social Reformation
- Asceticism
- Monasticism
- Gnosticism
- Mysticism
The conclusion reads:
Satanism provides some acceptable elements for those looking for: ritualism (2/5), social reformation reactions (2/5), some philosophical forms of asceticism (2/5) but most of all for those who enjoy the intellectual and counter-cultural side of gnostic forms of religion (4/5). It will be acceptable to only the few mystics (1/5) who can ignore the heavily skeptical and rational theology of Satanism. It provides nothing for those who would seek out, or attempt to justify, legalistic, evangelical or monastic religious experiences as Satanism is highly individual, socially decentralised and world-embracing. Tags: anton lavey, asceticism, comparative religion, evangelism, gnosticism, legalism, momen, monasticism, moojan momen, mysticism, religion, religions, ritualism, satanism
Current Location: Monchengladbach, Germany
Current Mood:  annoyed
Listening To: "Nothing At All" by Lights of Euphoria
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"Satanism is a World-Affirming Religion, not a World-Renouncing One" by Vexen Crabtree (2007) Drawing on the useful distinctions Roy Wallis of religions into the mainstream world-accomodating, world-rejecting (think isolation, christian monasteries, nihilism, buddhism) and world-affirming (materialistic religions, some philosophies, daoism), I measure each type against Satanism. I do not just point out that Satanism is a materialistic, world-loving religion, but also examine what points of similarity and difference it has with world-accommodating and world-rejecting ones (surprisingly, there are some areas of agreement). Roy Wallis' categorisations are based on the reaction of a religion to the environment of the world. I am soon going to a similar category-comparison to J. Gordon Melton and Robert Moore, who grouped new religions into eight 'families', largely based on their internal beliefs. And finally, a third comparison will be with the categories that Mooman Moojan, William James and Max Weber all came up with. Tags: comparative religion, nihilism, reality, religion, satanism, world
Current Mood:  busy
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