Organized Religion

[JPnyc]

Wow, I can't believe I'm reading the name Georges Gurdjieff on a tech forum (or any forum, for that matter). Besides writing that critique of religion, he was also the source of terrific distillations of the essence of what religion was supposed to accomplish, without all the dogmatic ritual and mumbo jumbo, written by his protegé P.D. Ouspensky.

[Godsrock37]

i couldnt agree more with broken crow. heres my 2 cents for what its worth

he either has the best PR firm ever or the worst, since he calls humans to be his PR firm and we suck (not from a Christian perspective, anyone can see that humans at their core are pretty messed up, created in the image of God yes, but after the whole Garden of Eden deal we'll never be the same here on earth), but i see your point. And id agree. Most organized religions dont spread the idea of free thought and free thinking and its a shame and pretty retarded honestly. There is a lot of corruption that turns the church from a community of people coming to God, accepting others, and seeking truth into a political organization bent on furthering its own ideas and power. id agree that a man saying this is the will of God, or this is what God says, or this is who God is, is a very dangerous man. But true Christianity (not the pat-christian answers that we get all the time as cop-outs, its his will, works all things for the good, etc.) teaches us to struggle with God. Jacob in the old testament ended up having a wrestling match with God (he was stressing out about some life choices) and after getting his hip dislocated God calls him Israel and says he's going to be a great man (the father of a nation). the psalms consistently show a lot of really Godly men questioning God and asking are you really good? are you really who we've been told you are. but in the end they all come to the same conclusion, God is God and is trustworthy, has infinite love, is all powerful, all knowing, is merciful beyond measure and wants a relationship with us. Jesus, right before his death on a cross (which he knew from the beginning was coming) struggled with God, asking him to take away the coming trial. He's now called the savior of the world and is the most exulted. All of these great men struggled with God and are called great and Godly. God wants us to be real with Him and struggle with him. and if you look throughout the Bible, when people struggle with God, thats when he reveals himself, thats when he gives them something to believe