jeremy1952

I keep hearing, and would like to beleive, that religion is only an excuse for people who are really fighting about other things. But I don't know of any problem between the people who left for Pakistan and the people who stayed in India besides their religions.

For example, askeutychus wrote, "An ATHIEST is someone who believes he knows all information, recorded and unrecorded there is no fact that he doesn’t know and all without error. He knows all the data recorded and unrecorded, there is no possibility that any data could point to the existence of God."

Of course this is utter bollocks. An atheist knows... or has an opinion... about one, and only one, topic, which is the existence of God. Claiming to know one thing in NO WAY implies knowing any version of "everything". In the twenty first century, is it acceptable to lie like this about other people? To say mean spirited things about someone else, as this so called christian does?

Catholics claim to beleive that their ceremony LITERALLY turns wine and crackers into the body and blood of christ. Then they eat them. All Christians beleive in obeying the law of the land. But eating people is illegal in most countries. So which is it? Do they not really beleive that it's the blood and body of christ, or do they really not beleive in obeying the law?

I'm not very knowledgeable about history and have always brushed the crusades off, "they did it, it was bad, it's over". But current events highlight it's importance and interest. Two extremes are... to some extent, are the crusades still the cause of the current friction between the west and Islam? If so, can understanding what happened then help resolve things now? The other extreme is, did I get it wrong? Were the crusades right and necessary, because 12th centuray Islam really was a threat to civilization, as 21 century Islam apparenlty is?

This is not for school, by the way. I'm just personally interested. Thanks.