Creating new, more enlightened religions

In response to a Guardian article, "The reconquest of Christmas", by David Cox on the increasing importance of Christmas

Link to article and thread at The Guardian.

Christianity and its festivals (especially Christmas and Easter) are of immense historical and cultural importance to European (Western) civilisation, but very few of us can honesty call ourselves Christians any more, i.e. people who believe in Jesus Christ as their saviour.

If anything, we are just cultural Christians (continuing a habit that we've forgotten, or rejected, the meaning and purpose of).

Most of us have ceased to believe in the religion (i.e. religions) which once bound us together (L. religare!). This represents a huge social and cultural crisis, made all the more evident in the presence, in multi-cultural society, of others who ARE still bound together by a religion, they actually still take seriously and believe in.

The thing is, human beings NEED religion - of some kind - to bind their communities and society together. We have only been staggering on without it because there are no "real" communities any more (or very few), having been made redundant, along with the extended family, by a money economy and the welfare state, and because society is provisionally held together by the myth of national identity, maintained mainly by the media, but behind which there is little more than the primitive power structures of the nation state.

However, we now have the freedom, the knowledge AND the technology to create new, rational, far more enlightened and fit-for-purpose religions; and not just one or two, but as many as we need to cater for our diverse needs and tastes. It's just a matter of some suitable software becoming available to facilitate some serious self-organization, and then getting the ball rolling.

We can look forward, hopefully, to interesting, truly revolutionary, times ahead!

My homepage: http://www.spaceship-earth.org

To: Comment at the Guardian Re: Creating new, more enlightened religions Date: Saturday 30 December 06

In response to a Guardian article, "The reconquest of Christmas", by David Cox on the increasing importance of Christmas Link to article and thread at The Guardian. Christianity and its festivals (especially Christmas and Easter) are of immense historical and cultural importance to European (Western) civilisation, but very few of us can honesty call ourselves Christians any more, i.e. people who believe in Jesus Christ as their saviour. If anything, we are just cultural Christians (continuing a habit that we've forgotten, or rejected, the meaning and purpose of). Most of us have ceased to believe in the religion (i.e. religions) which once bound us together (L. religare!). This represents a huge social and cultural crisis, made all the more evident in the presence, in multi-cultural society, of others who ARE still bound together by a religion, they actually still take seriously and believe in. The thing is, human beings NEED religion - of some kind - to bind their communities and society together. We have only been staggering on without it because there are no "real" communities any more (or very few), having been made redundant, along with the extended family, by a money economy and the welfare state, and because society is provisionally held together by the myth of national identity, maintained mainly by the media, but behind which there is little more than the primitive power structures of the nation state. However, we now have the freedom, the knowledge AND the technology to create new, rational, far more enlightened and fit-for-purpose religions; and not just one or two, but as many as we need to cater for our diverse needs and tastes. It's just a matter of some suitable software becoming available to facilitate some serious self-organization, and then getting the ball rolling. We can look forward, hopefully, to interesting, truly revolutionary, times ahead! My homepage: http://www.spaceship-earth.org