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Originally Posted by Griff
Ah, but I do need to be part of a community. . . Religion serves other functions besides spiritual.
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Yeah. Religion makes a counterpoise to the centrifugal forces that tend to pull a society apart -- political divisions, generation gaps, et cetera. Religions make social glue.
Robert A. Heinlein never really saw that part of it and tended to bitch at organized religion as a means of making money through others' superstition, and he never acknowledged religion as a manifestation of the human instinct to be part of something greater than oneself. He coulda been an Episcopalian and still disbelieved in organized religion!
(The only thing wrong with the
via media is all those other drivers yelling, "Hey stupid, quit taking your half out of the middle of the
via!!")
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Originally Posted by rkzenrage
You can be a follower of Christ and not a Christian... the church is not needed.
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You can be a follower of Christ and a Buddhist -- just one more of the Many Roads. I've heard you shouldn't try it on the professional-theologian level though, as the strain between belief systems can drive you rather buggy. But on a non-professional level, now, as a lay person...