[Vision2020] The Persecution of Quakers: Shame On Our

[Kenneth Marcy]

On Wednesday 26 November 2008 07:52:28 Tom Hansen wrote:

> In my opinion, the age of a religion should not be a requisite to join its
> ranks.

Wouldn't life be simpler if all religions were old enough to be dead? Wouldn't 
life be a lot simpler without the problems they are so talented in causing?

> Otherwise, we would all be atheists.

And still a little logically challenged without a proof of non-existence.

> It is also my understanding (correct me if I am wrong) that Christianity
> would be considered the "new kid on the block" when its age istaken into
> comparison of other world religions.

Muhammad lived in the seventh century A.D., so Islam is younger.

Actually, I suspect that the more practical comment is that even if a $DEITY 
does not exist, humans are genetically and socially endowed in such manners 
that humans will continue to invent what we presently can't prove, and 
otherwise are reluctant to accept, probably does not exist. Humans, in the 
present eon at least, have too much fun fighting each other for dominance and 
control to give up inventing religions and their problems and benefits.

Just to put a book title on the point, I just started reading _Anathem_ by 
Neal Stephenson, a novel about "a young avout living in the Concent of Saunt 
Edhar, a sanctuary for mathematicians, scientists, and philosophers, 
protected from the corrupting influences of the outside "saecular" world by 
ancient stone, honored traditions, and complex rituals. Over the centuries 
cities and governments have risen and fallen beyond the concent's walls. 
Three times during history's darkest epochs violence born of superstition and 
ignorance has invaded and and devastated the cloistered mathic community. Yet 
the avout have always managed to adapt in the wake of catastrophe, becoming 
out of necessity even more austere and less dependent on technology and 
material things." This quoted front fly-leaf text goes on to set up the story 
that follows . . .


Ken