welsh
Junkmaster
Exactly. It makes the place more interesting, I think.
It's no surprise that Giuseppe Garibaldi, before leading his soldiers to begin the process of Italian unification, worked in a Deli in Staten Island.
The city has people of very color, religious movements of virtually every God, political radicals and arachists, reactionaries and fanatics. Plenty of assholes but some nice folks too. When those fucking bastards flew those planes into the Twin Towers, it might have been a symbolic blow against capitalism, but it was also a shot against social harmony.
Oh well.
Back to religion- you can't really say that religion has helped us become more moral because the institutions have often worked at cross purposes.
Take for instance international law. Today we have a notion of human rights law that owes itself, to some regard, to the ecclesiastical courts but more to the willingness of some teachers from Spanish universities to criticize the government and the conquistadors for their treatment of native americans in the New World. Our notion of human rights can be attributed to historical notions of natural law, which originally was derived from the notion of God.
But at the same time the notions of Just War are also born of Catholic doctrine- the fear of barbarian invasion meant that the Catholics needed a "war" doctrine with which to unify and fight enemies. Yet this also justified crusades against "less civilized" people, opening the door for religious justification for warfare.
The notions of suffering as good for the soul and the notion of "divine right" theory were both used to justify the long-standing practice of repression and authoritarianism, only challenged after the notions of Christian doctrine where challenged by Enlightenment scholars.
For those interested in the violence of the major faiths- check out=
THe Destructive Power of Religion: Violence in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam a four volume set.
It's no surprise that Giuseppe Garibaldi, before leading his soldiers to begin the process of Italian unification, worked in a Deli in Staten Island.
The city has people of very color, religious movements of virtually every God, political radicals and arachists, reactionaries and fanatics. Plenty of assholes but some nice folks too. When those fucking bastards flew those planes into the Twin Towers, it might have been a symbolic blow against capitalism, but it was also a shot against social harmony.
Oh well.
Back to religion- you can't really say that religion has helped us become more moral because the institutions have often worked at cross purposes.
Take for instance international law. Today we have a notion of human rights law that owes itself, to some regard, to the ecclesiastical courts but more to the willingness of some teachers from Spanish universities to criticize the government and the conquistadors for their treatment of native americans in the New World. Our notion of human rights can be attributed to historical notions of natural law, which originally was derived from the notion of God.
But at the same time the notions of Just War are also born of Catholic doctrine- the fear of barbarian invasion meant that the Catholics needed a "war" doctrine with which to unify and fight enemies. Yet this also justified crusades against "less civilized" people, opening the door for religious justification for warfare.
The notions of suffering as good for the soul and the notion of "divine right" theory were both used to justify the long-standing practice of repression and authoritarianism, only challenged after the notions of Christian doctrine where challenged by Enlightenment scholars.
For those interested in the violence of the major faiths- check out=
THe Destructive Power of Religion: Violence in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam a four volume set.