As a little boy i believed in such things like Santa Clause, Easter Bunny; I had a great childhood during these times and life was perfect. Little things just amaze a young child. Things get heavier as you grow and age. Self interests, business interests, family interests, community interests. All intermingle in great depths through the minds of us all. Throughout history each and every society has developed through the most fascinating survival tactic; Culture! All adapted through a mixture of environment and experience, all taught so the next generation can take the culture greater.
Religion can be thought as the culture of belief. Religion has helped society after society adapt to environment and explain, shape, and teach the people. I feel like I should at the very least bow to the presence of religion for aiding our advancements to where we are now looking at the brink of several life threatening diseases being cured. I do not think we would have our advancements without religion for a few reasons; one being that the natural traits needed for people to even want to find such advancements is the same traits that would explain why people created religion; curiosity, desire to understand, comfort, I'm probably missing some but you get the point. Second is religion I think has curiosity coming in multiple directions; the spark that started development of religion and then in return religion intrigues the mind, causing the people to go even further. I halfway suspect that ancients needed religion to stay sane.
Sometimes we stumble on something so amazing that human imagination would not of been capable to develop. When this happens we experience something uncomfortable, we naturally dislike, and we start working around to restore the comfort that was present before. Every culture has experience this a number of times, things that we now have in elementary schools and is thought to be upsurd otherwise. I often wonder if this conflict feels so much like an attack that the people who defend lose sight of what is not being attacked.
The conflict of Copernicus/Galileo vs Religion was no real conflict but just a new discovery of the universe that surrounds us. Unless you think that whatever religion you are is defined by such things like a verse that suggest the world is flat, then you should have no qualms. We are not capable of creating the rules we can only discover and work within its design. What doesn't sound like God there???
Now there is a respect of adaptation that I don't fully understand but acknowledge its existence. People are comforted in their religion, often to the point where it makes so much sense to them that alternatives just sound ridiculous. I am guilty of this by the first sentence of this paragraph, it sounds ridiculous that people would have a problem with just accepting scientific evidence when it supposedly contradicts the belief structure they are brought up on. Its typically just a detail and never a message. That is except evidence would suggest stoning people in the town square is not effective. In ancient times before Jesus I can understand how such a law was thought to be truth. They understood little of psychological, physical, microscopic, anthropological, populations where smaller, etc, etc. Jesus was the first in the Christian heritage to see the holes in such laws. His awareness to his fellow people was 10 fold of his peers. Thousands of years later collections of writings has been through quite the interesting journey. Though the hands of Kings to cultures of far distances, in nearly every language and found in almost every country, some places its illegal but that's beside the point.
We can't leave out the bad, Christians have advanced their religion through the use of violence. We once again have a growing religious conflict with Muslims. Why???
How is religion going to adapt to this modern world? We know the Earth is billions of years old, we know that life evolves, we know that we are no where near the center of anything but ourselves. I think its easy, we keep the spiritual side and religion will follow. Through out history the very fact that people kept the essence of being connected and just acknowledged that nothing really has changed. Her I'll put something in perspective; In the context of the Adam and Eve being made in 7 days, when Jesus said to love thy neighbor, what does he mean?? OR in the context of billions of years for life to develop, when Jesus said to love thy neighbor, what does he mean??
Whats the point to even have a religion now days?? I think that if you have a spirituality then your religion just is natural, cause its not the religion that matters, its not what you call yourself, its just what you do and how you present. Often people find rituals to create stronger effects of desirable emotions to a situation. Helping with self control and other aspects that one finds important. Religion is more or less just your culture that shapes and conforms your beliefs, its not something specific.
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