Kal Alvar
Lessons? Of course there are.
Christian fundamentalists are going to further fuel their rage towards Muslims and other minorities because it will (or has) become clear to them that people who are different or don't agree with you are dangerous and need to be dealt with so you can't be a threat.
Which of course is a toxic way of thinking.
jotacar
Yes, and they are vitally important lessons. Extreme devotion to any religious belief is always to be avoided.
The problem is that in its own way Christian fundamentalism is just as blind as Muslim, Jewish, Hindu
or any other sort of fundamentalism.
We humans - regardless of our intelligence levels - are handicapped in our thinking by a phenomenon
called "cognitive dissonance".
Basically, one cannot believe two contrary notions at the same time.
There is a God or there is not a God. (Those who call themselves agnostics are simply too timid
to make up their minds, and have forfeited any respect. They need to man up and make a choice.)
If one recognizes that a Supreme Being exists, then any information that he or she encounters which
suggests that gods are imaginary simply cannot penetrate one's belief system. This means
that all theists are blind and deaf to notions that contradict their fundamental religious convictions.
Most Catholics cannot see or hear any argument that justifies abortion, acceptance of homosexuals,
or the offering of communion to a divorced and re-married person.
Any attempt to change the minds of the Catholic faithful is doomed to fail, since the cognition of the
firm believer renders him or her blind and deaf to ideas that don't fit into his or her catechism.
To be an adherent to *any* religion then, is to cut oneself off from a world of possibilities. Again,
this is NOT a matter of intelligence levels. We are all the victims of cognitive dissonance all of the
time, although a few of us are at least aware of our condition, and we can make an effort to combat
it.
Jimmy C
All of a sudden I like christian fundamentalists.
Anonymous
There are probably plenty of lessons but "fundmentalists" of any colour, politic or religion are incapable of recognising them, or learning from them.
This inherent desire to remain ignornt of reality is one of the basic requirements of being a "fundamentalist". They are what us ordinary, reasonably well-balanced, folk call biggots. There are lot of them scattered around the various sections of Yahoo Answers.
Anonymous
Given the chance they are whacky as the Muslims, someone needs to gather them both up and drop them off somewhere and they can kill each other over who has the right god.