[cite]Posted By: Saga Lout[/cite].....However, I now think that Britain should make it quite clear what our core values are and that they are based on Christianity......
Agree with most of what you say but not this. I am pretty sure I have the same core values as you. But, I would take extreme exception to anyone who claimed that my core values are based on christianity or any other similarly primitive religious belief system.
[cite]Posted By: Friend Or Defoe[/cite]Second generation immigrants take things for granted that the first generation worked hard for. This coupled with racism leads to a chip on their shoulder which leads some to extremism.
What complete utter bollocks.
This
I'm a second generation immigrant. I take precisely f*** all for granted. What leads to extremism is blanket imbecilic statements like that.
[cite]Posted By: Friend Or Defoe[/cite]Second generation immigrants take things for granted that the first generation worked hard for. This coupled with racism leads to a chip on their shoulder which leads some to extremism.
What complete utter bollocks.
I meant it can lead to some people having a chip on their shoulder. Obviously some second generation have a better start in life than many indigenous people and some of them still turn to extremism.
[cite]Posted By: Saga Lout[/cite]I’m not a religious man – as Leroy put it, it’s all about “my God is better than your God”. However, I now think that Britain should make it quite clear what our core values are and that they are based on Christianity. Bending over backwards to accept other cultures and religions with different values to ours is not the way to go – we’ve tried that and it didn’t work. You want to live and work in this country, you have to accept that.
Don't agree. Our core values as a society are not based on Christianity, they are based on Enlightenment thinking e.g. the rule of law, parliamentary democracy and, on the whole, secularism.
The trouble is not with multi-culturalism as such. There is nothing wrong with tolerating other cultures - eating curry, watching a procession on Chinese NY etc. Unfortunately the concept has been interpreted as meaning that cultural practices can't be criticised. That we can't risk giving offence by, e.g., condemning female cirumcision.
The most pernicious example of this is the special protection apparently given to religion. A religious belief has no gretaer intrinsic value than any other belief. If I'm entitled to disagree, perhaps strongly, with a person on tuition fees or electoral reform or public spending cuts why can't I disagree in equally strong terms about their belief that God created the world in 7 days or that Mohammed is his proephet or that he doesn't exist at all. If the person gets offended, well that's a shame, but it should be their problem not mine.
[cite]Posted By: Saga Lout[/cite].....However, I now think that Britain should make it quite clear what our core values are and that they are based on Christianity......
Agree with most of what you say but not this. I am pretty sure I have the same core values as you. But, I would take extreme exception to anyone who claimed that my core values are based on christianity or any other primitive religious belief system.
Seconded. How on Earth would basing our core values on one particular religion go any way towards helping combat extremism in another religion? If anything, we should be doing the opposite - declaring the country as completely NON-religious - NO religious views of ANY description are permitted because they only end up causing trouble. However, because that is completely unworkable, morally wrong, and leads to festering hatred from all religions, that is equally impossible.
[cite]Posted By: Friend Or Defoe[/cite]Second generation immigrants take things for granted that the first generation worked hard for. This coupled with racism leads to a chip on their shoulder which leads some to extremism.
What complete utter bollocks.
I meant it can lead to some people having a chip on their shoulder. Obviously some second generation have a better start in life than many indigenous people and some of them still turn to extremism.
I grew up on a shit council estate, wwnt to a shit school and had a single breadwinner who only worked for about 25% of my childhood (spending the rest of the time on the dole). By your vapid generalisation, I should therefore have an enormous chip on my shoulder about rhe unfairness of it all. Stop making stupid blanket statements and reducing what has been a very well-reasoned, intelligent thread to childishness.
[cite]Posted By: Friend Or Defoe[/cite]Second generation immigrants take things for granted that the first generation worked hard for. This coupled with racism leads to a chip on their shoulder which leads some to extremism.
What complete utter bollocks.
I meant it can lead to some people having a chip on their shoulder. Obviously some second generation have a better start in life than many indigenous people and some of them still turn to extremism.
Because they are fucking low self- esteem, brain washed lunatics....not because they are descended from immigrants.
[cite]Posted By: Saga Lout[/cite]I’m not a religious man – as Leroy put it, it’s all about “my God is better than your God”. However, I now think that Britain should make it quite clear what our core values are and that they are based on Christianity. Bending over backwards to accept other cultures and religions with different values to ours is not the way to go – we’ve tried that and it didn’t work. You want to live and work in this country, you have to accept that.
Don't agree. Our core values as a society are not based on Christianity, they are based on Enlightenment thinking e.g. the rule of law, parliamentary democracy and, on the whole, secularism.
The trouble is not with multi-culturalism as such. There is nothing wrong with tolerating other cultures - eating curry, watching a procession on Chinese NY etc. Unfortunately the concept has been interpreted as meaning that cultural practices can't be criticised. That we can't risk giving offence by, e.g., condemning female cirumcision.
The most pernicious example of this is the special protection apparently given to religion. A religious belief has no gretaer intrinsic value than any other belief. If I'm entitled to disagree, perhaps strongly, with a person on tuition fees or electoral reform or public spending cuts why can't I disagree in equally strong terms about their belief that God created the world in 7 days or that Mohammed is his proephet or that he doesn't exist at all. If the person gets offended, well that's a shame, but it should be their problem not mine.
Agree.
"multi-culturalism" (another phrase that get banded about like "PC" so much is it now almost meaningless) had nothing to do with 9/11 or 7/7 just as it had nothing to do with the IRA bombings in Woolwich.
Tolerance has to work both ways. So you tolerate my views and I tolerate yours. That ends when you, or I, want my views to be imposed on me or others even if they are in your family or part of your religion or community.
While people should not be allowed to whip up hatred of other religions that doesn't mean they shouldn't be criticised. And in most cases abhorrent practices linked to religions, including Islam, are criticised in the media. The dispatches programme last week in just one example.
As for FOD's comments maybe you should stop making such sweeping statements about whole groups of people when what you mean is "a handful of 2nd generation immigrants (so not actually immigrants then) out of the many hundreds of 1000's in the UK committed a crime but I'll bracket them all together anyway so I can find a glib solution to a very complex question".
As for Chips on shoulders look no further than the EDL and their ilk.
[cite]Posted By: Friend Or Defoe[/cite]Second generation immigrants take things for granted that the first generation worked hard for. This coupled with racism leads to a chip on their shoulder which leads some to extremism.
What complete utter bollocks.
I meant it can lead to some people having a chip on their shoulder. Obviously some second generation have a better start in life than many indigenous people and some of them still turn to extremism.
I grew up on a shit council estate, wwnt to a shit school and had a single breadwinner who only worked for about 25% of my childhood (spending the rest of the time on the dole). By your vapid generalisation, I should therefore have an enormous chip on my shoulder about rhe unfairness of it all. Stop making stupid blanket statements and reducing what has been a very well-reasoned, intelligent thread to childishness.
Alright, I forgot to put another some in my sentence, these things happen when you're trying to be discrete on the internet. I don't believe ALL second generation immigrants have a chip on their shoulder, most of my mates are second generations.
Wouldn't say extremists they have a low self-esteem either! :-)
I worry that the robust debate required to challenge the fascistic intolerance of certain groups is being hampered by a squeamishness amongst the political classes to confront this nastiness because it is conflated with questions of ethnicity and religion. Calling for the killing of and carrying out of such killings of other ethnic or religious groups, women, homosexuals or anybody else that particular group is against by religion or culture is just wrong, its fascism and its evil.
I am a liberal and it concerns me greatly when our liberal and tolerant society is hijacked by evil people bent on destroying the very tolerance we supply and use that against us.
The answer for me is very clear. Expose evil dogma and evil intent where ever and when ever it occurs and focus on what they say and do and not who they are, or who they claim to represent. Make sure that the laws of the land are applied fairly and that the law is blind to race, creed or colour when it comes to dealing with such evils.
[cite]Posted By: Henry Irving[/cite]
"multi-culturalism" (another phrase that get banded about like "PC" so much is it now almost meaningless) had nothing to do with 9/11 or 7/7 just as it had nothing to do with the IRA bombings in Woolwich.
Just to be clear, in my post, when I mentioned multi-culturalism, I was talking about my own views and it was my own views, the way I feel, that changed after 9/11 and 7/7.
It's come in for some flak, but I stand by my view that our laws and values of this country have historically been influenced by Christian beliefs. I have declared that I am not religous myself.
[cite]Posted By: bingaddick[/cite]I worry that the robust debate required to challenge the fascistic intolerance of certain groups is being hampered by a squeamishness amongst the political classes to confront this nastiness because it is conflated with questions of ethnicity and religion. Calling for the killing of and carrying out of such killings of other ethnic or religious groups, women, homosexuals or anybody else that particular group is against by religion or culture is just wrong, its fascism and its evil.
I am a liberal and it concerns me greatly when our liberal and tolerant society is hijacked by evil people bent on destroying the very tolerance we supply and use that against us.
The answer for me is very clear. Expose evil dogma and evil intent where ever and when ever it occurs and focus on what they say and do and not who they are, or who they claim to represent. Make sure that the laws of the land are applied fairly and that the law is blind to race, creed or colour when it comes to dealing with such evils.
I'm glad you still feel like this Bing - I became a lot less tolerant, as I have said - I am not proud of that, but it is the way I feel.
I think that a plethora of religions share the same core values.
If you read the koran, the bible and the torah you'd find remarkable similarities and find that they are not mutually exclusive in their messages. It's just the nutters that interpret and manipulate what's in them and pervert the messages to suit their own agendas/ ideologies which cause the problems.
I think 99% of people in the world accross all walks of lifes, religious or not, embrace the similar general values and are decent and want the same things for them and their families. It's just the other 1% , religious or not, who give the human race a bad name and them's the ones who get the headlines and cause divisiveness in society.
[cite]Posted By: nth london addick[/cite]I thought that lots of our laws were based around Christian values, I could be well wrong but I am sure that I had read that somewhere
They are.
The 10 Commandments are accepted in Christianity and also, as Rodney says, Islam and Judaism and have traditionally been the moral underpinning if you like for the development of law in this Christian country.
However things are changing and religious freedom, especially the religious freedom of Christians, is being subsumed by other human rights.
In the interests of thread continuity I make no comment as to the rights and wrongs of this development but a recent example is the Christian bed and breakfast owners who refused to allow homosexuals to share a double bed and were compelled to pay damages.
[cite aria-level=0 aria-posinset=0 aria-setsize=0]Posted By: Saga Lout[/cite].....However, I now think that Britain should make it quite clear what our core values are and that they are based on Christianity......
Agree with most of what you say but not this. I am pretty sure I have the same core values as you. But, I would take extreme exception to anyone who claimed that my core values are based on christianity or any other primitive religious belief system.
Seconded. How on Earth would basing our core values on one particular religion go any way towards helping combat extremism in another religion? If anything, we should be doing the opposite - declaring the country as completely NON-religious - NO religious views of ANY description are permitted because they only end up causing trouble. However, because that is completely unworkable, morally wrong, and leads to festering hatred from all religions, that is equally impossible.
Leroy do you think that our core values are based on christianity (rightly or wrongly as i have no view on it) but potentially they shouldnt be or where do you think our core values are taken from
I dislike the term "christian values" it implies that Christians have the monopoly on right thinking. I am certainly not a Christian or a member of any other faith but I would defend my values against anyones.
I may have it wrong but I read it that Red and Leroy are talking about their personal beliefs and what should be in the here and now rather than the history of why we are where we are which is what I think Saga is saying.
Saga is also saying, I think, that we should defend our Christian tradition whereas the other two disagree.
I'm sure they will correct me if I've misunderstood them and apologies if i have!
Well Len its not a suprise that the 10 commandments are accepted by Judaism as they are Jewish laws. They were given to Moses (a Jew) by his God as laws for the Jews. Christianity is an off shoot of judaism and is a foriegn religion introduced to this country by immigrants.
Go and look them up and see how many we follow? Adultary? Not a crime in our laws. Keeping the Sabbath (saturday btw). No we're at footie. Not coverting our neighbours wife? Would ya? Having no false idols?
Murder and lying. Yes they are in the laws but they are in most countries.
How did a thread about riots in the Middle East suddenly stray into the origins of Western society? Bahrain update
Anyway...
[cite]Posted By: LenGlover[/cite][quoteThe 10 Commandments are accepted in Christianity and also, as Rodney says, Islam and Judaism
Surely this line alone shows that morality isn't unique to any one religion or belief system. Christianity certainly doesn't have a monopoly on morality or development. Indeed, in the first half of the last millennium (ie c.1000-1500), the most enlightened cultures were those of North Africa and the Middle East. Ultimately, the change that arose in Europe (that has resulted in what we would call 'Western culture') derived from the gradual rejection of (in our case Christian) theocracy in favour of tolerance of different beliefs and questioning of higher powers.
I think describing our culture as something that is or should be somehow 'inherently Christian' is an insult to the vast majority of people who are not Christian, insulting to the great thinkers who shaped our history and deliberately hostile to non-Christian citizens.
There's very little unique or special about Christianity, and for every flaw in Islam (or whatever religion you choose), a similar flaw can be found in Christianity. As mentioned already, a Christian congregation protests at the funerals of soldiers in America.
[cite]Posted By: LenGlover[/cite]I may have it wrong but I read it that Red and Leroy are talking about their personal beliefs and what should be in the here and now rather than the history of why we are where we are which is what I think Saga is saying.
Saga is also saying, I think, that we should defend our Christian tradition whereas the other two disagree.
I'm sure they will correct me if I've misunderstood them and apologies if i have!
You're right, I was talking about the history of why we are where we are - I didn't think anyone could disagree with that.
Yes and I do feel we should defend our Christian tradition. Despite being non-religious myself, I don't like the idea that in 20, 50 or 100 years time the predominant religion in Britain could be something other than Christianity. Something of what makes this country what it is would be lost if that happened.
[cite]Posted By: IA[/cite]There's very little unique or special about Christianity, and for every flaw in Islam (or whatever religion you choose), a similar flaw can be found in Christianity.
I agree with this, but our laws were fashioned (historically) based on the Christian faith, not Islam.
[cite]Posted By: LenGlover[/cite]I may have it wrong but I read it that Red and Leroy are talking about their personal beliefs and what should be in the here and now rather than the history of why we are where we are which is what I think Saga is saying.
Saga is also saying, I think, that we should defend our Christian tradition whereas the other two disagree.
I'm sure they will correct me if I've misunderstood them and apologies if i have!
My view is that our core values and laws, ones we share with Europe, the US and the whole of the civilised world, are based, not on Christianity, but more on the ideas that were developed during the Age of Reason which was a reaction against ignorance and primitive religious beliefs.
You are right in inferring that I am not concerned about defending our Christian traditions or ideas. But that does not mean I am not absolutely passionate about defending the rights of people in this country to hold and follow those Christian ideas and traditions.
To refresh my memory I have just googled the 10 commandments.
1. You shall have no other gods before me.
2. You shall not make for yourself any carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
3. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your manservant, nor your maidservant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
5. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.
6. You shall not murder.
7. You shall not commit adultery.
8. You shall not steal.
9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”
Apart from 6, 8 and 9 I don’t think any could be said to be enshrined in the laws of any modern civilised society. And I think every modern civilised society has a law which enforces an idea which is exactly the opposite to the first one!
[cite]Posted By: IA[/cite]There's very little unique or special about Christianity, and for every flaw in Islam (or whatever religion you choose), a similar flaw can be found in Christianity.
I agree with this, but our laws were fashioned (historically) based on the Christian faith, not Islam.
Go on then. How? Examples please.
The 10 Commandments argument has been shown to be bogus by Henry and Red_in_SE8
And if you can't see a qualitative difference in the base morality of Islam and Christianity (the religions, not the religious people), and aren't a follower of either, then why do you think it's important for the state to protect one over the other? Surely they can both coexist peacefully within (but not dominant in) a modern, Western, liberal state.
My point was about the influence of Christianity on the history of the development of law and ,even whilst asserting that ......"The 10 Commandments argument has been shown to be bogus by Henry and Red_in_SE8"....., both of them acknowledge the influence of 30% of those Commandments. I would also respectfully suggest that much of Family Law is based on divorce and repercussions thereof and a major reason for divorce is adultery which takes it to 40%.
In my lifetime shops were closed on Sundays and I made the point that things were changing. Sunday trading being something that has already changed. 50%. Blasphemy is still technically a crime although, these days, it appears anything goes when it comes to denigrating Christians although one is not allowed to comment on certain other religions. Like I said things are changing and have changed. I reiterate my point is the influence of Christianity on the history of development of the law. 60%.
6 out of 10 will do as an illustration of my point.
[cite]Posted By: IA[/cite]How did a thread about riots in the Middle East suddenly stray into the origins of Western society?Bahrain update
Anyway...
[cite]Posted By: LenGlover[/cite][quoteThe 10 Commandments are accepted in Christianity and also, as Rodney says, Islam and Judaism
Surely this line alone shows that morality isn't unique to any one religion or belief system. Christianity certainly doesn't have a monopoly on morality or development. Indeed, in the first half of the last millennium (ie c.1000-1500), the most enlightened cultures were those of North Africa and the Middle East. Ultimately, the change that arose in Europe (that has resulted in what we would call 'Western culture') derived from the gradual rejection of (in our case Christian) theocracy in favour of tolerance of different beliefs and questioning of higher powers.
I think describing our culture as something that is or should be somehow 'inherently Christian' is an insult to the vast majority of people who are not Christian, insulting to the great thinkers who shaped our history and deliberately hostile to non-Christian citizens.
There's very little unique or special about Christianity, and for every flaw in Islam (or whatever religion you choose), a similar flaw can be found in Christianity. As mentioned already, a Christian congregation protests at the funerals of soldiers in America.
And I say all this as a Christian.
....."Surely this line alone shows that morality isn't unique to any one religion or belief system.".....
Where have I said it is? However it is a fact that Britain has been predominantly Christian for hundreds of years and it is only in the last 50 years or so that this has really been called into question, both by the influx into the country of substantial numbers of people practising other religions and an increasing number of atheists and agnostics amongst our own people.
[cite]Posted By: IA[/cite]And I say all this as a Christian.
But cheers for pigeonholing me as anti-Christianity
OK
1) We knew killing people was wrong before God told the Jews
2) We knew stealing was wrong before God told the Jews
3) Adultery is not illegal
4) Laws that don't exist any more or haven't been enforced in a long time don't count.
5) You have ignored the entire content of Red_in_SE8's post as well as mine
[cite]Posted By: IA[/cite]Go on then. How? Examples please.
The 10 Commandments argument has been shown to be bogus by Henry and Red_in_SE8
And if you can't see a qualitative difference in the base morality of Islam and Christianity (the religions, not the religious people), and aren't a follower of either, then why do you think it's important for the state to protect one over the other? Surely they can both coexist peacefully within (but not dominant in) a modern, Western, liberal state.
You got me!
I don't think I said that there was a difference in the base morality between Islam and Christianity, just that the people who fashioned our laws were not Islamic, but Christian but, as I say, you got me - they were not Christian.
Wouldn't it be nice if the religions could coexist peacefully, I'm just not sure if they can.
Why I think the state should protect one over the other is that I like to walk round 300 year-old churches to be honest.
Comments
Agree with most of what you say but not this. I am pretty sure I have the same core values as you. But, I would take extreme exception to anyone who claimed that my core values are based on christianity or any other similarly primitive religious belief system.
I'm a second generation immigrant. I take precisely f*** all for granted. What leads to extremism is blanket imbecilic statements like that.
Don't agree. Our core values as a society are not based on Christianity, they are based on Enlightenment thinking e.g. the rule of law, parliamentary democracy and, on the whole, secularism.
The trouble is not with multi-culturalism as such. There is nothing wrong with tolerating other cultures - eating curry, watching a procession on Chinese NY etc. Unfortunately the concept has been interpreted as meaning that cultural practices can't be criticised. That we can't risk giving offence by, e.g., condemning female cirumcision.
The most pernicious example of this is the special protection apparently given to religion. A religious belief has no gretaer intrinsic value than any other belief. If I'm entitled to disagree, perhaps strongly, with a person on tuition fees or electoral reform or public spending cuts why can't I disagree in equally strong terms about their belief that God created the world in 7 days or that Mohammed is his proephet or that he doesn't exist at all. If the person gets offended, well that's a shame, but it should be their problem not mine.
Because they are fucking low self- esteem, brain washed lunatics....not because they are descended from immigrants.
Agree.
"multi-culturalism" (another phrase that get banded about like "PC" so much is it now almost meaningless) had nothing to do with 9/11 or 7/7 just as it had nothing to do with the IRA bombings in Woolwich.
Tolerance has to work both ways. So you tolerate my views and I tolerate yours. That ends when you, or I, want my views to be imposed on me or others even if they are in your family or part of your religion or community.
While people should not be allowed to whip up hatred of other religions that doesn't mean they shouldn't be criticised. And in most cases abhorrent practices linked to religions, including Islam, are criticised in the media. The dispatches programme last week in just one example.
As for FOD's comments maybe you should stop making such sweeping statements about whole groups of people when what you mean is "a handful of 2nd generation immigrants (so not actually immigrants then) out of the many hundreds of 1000's in the UK committed a crime but I'll bracket them all together anyway so I can find a glib solution to a very complex question".
As for Chips on shoulders look no further than the EDL and their ilk.
Wouldn't say extremists they have a low self-esteem either! :-)
I am a liberal and it concerns me greatly when our liberal and tolerant society is hijacked by evil people bent on destroying the very tolerance we supply and use that against us.
The answer for me is very clear. Expose evil dogma and evil intent where ever and when ever it occurs and focus on what they say and do and not who they are, or who they claim to represent. Make sure that the laws of the land are applied fairly and that the law is blind to race, creed or colour when it comes to dealing with such evils.
Just to be clear, in my post, when I mentioned multi-culturalism, I was talking about my own views and it was my own views, the way I feel, that changed after 9/11 and 7/7.
It's come in for some flak, but I stand by my view that our laws and values of this country have historically been influenced by Christian beliefs. I have declared that I am not religous myself.
I'm glad you still feel like this Bing - I became a lot less tolerant, as I have said - I am not proud of that, but it is the way I feel.
If you read the koran, the bible and the torah you'd find remarkable similarities and find that they are not mutually exclusive in their messages. It's just the nutters that interpret and manipulate what's in them and pervert the messages to suit their own agendas/ ideologies which cause the problems.
I think 99% of people in the world accross all walks of lifes, religious or not, embrace the similar general values and are decent and want the same things for them and their families. It's just the other 1% , religious or not, who give the human race a bad name and them's the ones who get the headlines and cause divisiveness in society.
They are.
The 10 Commandments are accepted in Christianity and also, as Rodney says, Islam and Judaism and have traditionally been the moral underpinning if you like for the development of law in this Christian country.
However things are changing and religious freedom, especially the religious freedom of Christians, is being subsumed by other human rights.
In the interests of thread continuity I make no comment as to the rights and wrongs of this development but a recent example is the Christian bed and breakfast owners who refused to allow homosexuals to share a double bed and were compelled to pay damages.
and i too will steer well clear of that question to aid the thread to continue.
But if the majority of our laws are then that sort of backs up Saga's point.
and contradicts Leroys, but throughout this whole thread Leroy seems to be spot on with his knowledge.
Leroy do you think that our core values are based on christianity (rightly or wrongly as i have no view on it) but potentially they shouldnt be or where do you think our core values are taken from
Saga is also saying, I think, that we should defend our Christian tradition whereas the other two disagree.
I'm sure they will correct me if I've misunderstood them and apologies if i have!
Go and look them up and see how many we follow? Adultary? Not a crime in our laws. Keeping the Sabbath (saturday btw). No we're at footie. Not coverting our neighbours wife? Would ya? Having no false idols?
Murder and lying. Yes they are in the laws but they are in most countries.
Anyway...
Surely this line alone shows that morality isn't unique to any one religion or belief system. Christianity certainly doesn't have a monopoly on morality or development. Indeed, in the first half of the last millennium (ie c.1000-1500), the most enlightened cultures were those of North Africa and the Middle East. Ultimately, the change that arose in Europe (that has resulted in what we would call 'Western culture') derived from the gradual rejection of (in our case Christian) theocracy in favour of tolerance of different beliefs and questioning of higher powers.
I think describing our culture as something that is or should be somehow 'inherently Christian' is an insult to the vast majority of people who are not Christian, insulting to the great thinkers who shaped our history and deliberately hostile to non-Christian citizens.
There's very little unique or special about Christianity, and for every flaw in Islam (or whatever religion you choose), a similar flaw can be found in Christianity. As mentioned already, a Christian congregation protests at the funerals of soldiers in America.
And I say all this as a Christian.
You're right, I was talking about the history of why we are where we are - I didn't think anyone could disagree with that.
Yes and I do feel we should defend our Christian tradition. Despite being non-religious myself, I don't like the idea that in 20, 50 or 100 years time the predominant religion in Britain could be something other than Christianity. Something of what makes this country what it is would be lost if that happened.
I agree with this, but our laws were fashioned (historically) based on the Christian faith, not Islam.
My view is that our core values and laws, ones we share with Europe, the US and the whole of the civilised world, are based, not on Christianity, but more on the ideas that were developed during the Age of Reason which was a reaction against ignorance and primitive religious beliefs.
You are right in inferring that I am not concerned about defending our Christian traditions or ideas. But that does not mean I am not absolutely passionate about defending the rights of people in this country to hold and follow those Christian ideas and traditions.
To refresh my memory I have just googled the 10 commandments.
1. You shall have no other gods before me.
2. You shall not make for yourself any carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
3. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your manservant, nor your maidservant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
5. Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.
6. You shall not murder.
7. You shall not commit adultery.
8. You shall not steal.
9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”
Apart from 6, 8 and 9 I don’t think any could be said to be enshrined in the laws of any modern civilised society. And I think every modern civilised society has a law which enforces an idea which is exactly the opposite to the first one!
Go on then. How? Examples please.
The 10 Commandments argument has been shown to be bogus by Henry and Red_in_SE8
And if you can't see a qualitative difference in the base morality of Islam and Christianity (the religions, not the religious people), and aren't a follower of either, then why do you think it's important for the state to protect one over the other? Surely they can both coexist peacefully within (but not dominant in) a modern, Western, liberal state.
In my lifetime shops were closed on Sundays and I made the point that things were changing. Sunday trading being something that has already changed. 50%. Blasphemy is still technically a crime although, these days, it appears anything goes when it comes to denigrating Christians although one is not allowed to comment on certain other religions. Like I said things are changing and have changed. I reiterate my point is the influence of Christianity on the history of development of the law. 60%.
6 out of 10 will do as an illustration of my point.
....."Surely this line alone shows that morality isn't unique to any one religion or belief system.".....
Where have I said it is? However it is a fact that Britain has been predominantly Christian for hundreds of years and it is only in the last 50 years or so that this has really been called into question, both by the influx into the country of substantial numbers of people practising other religions and an increasing number of atheists and agnostics amongst our own people.
I am not going to entertain that enormous pile of steaming dogpoo.
I'm not sure what I've said wrong other than commit the heinous crime of talking about the traditional religion of my country.
However in the interests of maintaining the thread I'm out of here.
It is a sad fact that only certain viewpoints are allowed to remain without being sunk on here.
But cheers for pigeonholing me as anti-Christianity
OK
1) We knew killing people was wrong before God told the Jews
2) We knew stealing was wrong before God told the Jews
3) Adultery is not illegal
4) Laws that don't exist any more or haven't been enforced in a long time don't count.
5) You have ignored the entire content of Red_in_SE8's post as well as mine
Enormous pile of stinking dogpoo.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Anyway, in far more important news
The BBC have a country-by-country guide on the protests
You got me!
I don't think I said that there was a difference in the base morality between Islam and Christianity, just that the people who fashioned our laws were not Islamic, but Christian but, as I say, you got me - they were not Christian.
Wouldn't it be nice if the religions could coexist peacefully, I'm just not sure if they can.
Why I think the state should protect one over the other is that I like to walk round 300 year-old churches to be honest.
I know this thread is now a few days old but I found the above link to be very interesting and gives a different perspective