Is there really much religious choice?

[Tsar]

@Winston I agree.

Christianity isn't native to Europe. Both Christianity and Islam have their origins with Judaism.

Mithraism was a monotheistic competitor religion of Christianity founded in Rome with pagan origins.

The major three monotheistic religions really destroyed all other religions except the ones in East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

All other religions were forcibly destroyed or shutdown. It was always about control and power because organized religion was one way to get power with threatening the ruling class.

If the pagan religions weren't forcibly destroyed then they wouldn't have died out. Religions don't usually die because they grow obsolete, they die because they're forcibly destroyed.

[Cornfed]

Cornfed,
Well many Druids would disagree. They see Druidism and Paganism as the real religion of Europe. Christianity is a hybrid of things. But its theology is more similar to Zoroastrianism than Judaism. Don't forget that Christianity brought us into the Dark Ages remember? How can that be progress? Also the Christians were the ones who burned the Library of Alexandria down remember? They destroyed many priceless books. Haven't you seen the movie "Agora" about that event and how they killed Hypatia of Alexandria? That set wisdom and knowledge back for centuries.

Christianity is also more artificial whereas Druid is nature worship. Christianity doesn't see nature as sacred. That's a huge deviation from what ancient religions taught, especially during the alleged golden ages where the world was unified in spiritual harmony, aka "the age of Saturn".

I disagree that pantheists never accomplish anything. Great philosophers like Spinoza and Einstein had pantheistic views. If you read what Einstein said about God, it's part pantheistic and part deist. Einstein said he agreed with Spinoza's version of God.

No-one really knows much about the Druids or Gnostics. Any attempt to revive their practices today would be just making stuff up. In terms of the "Sethian" Gnostics, their dualistic notion that the material world is evil is not helpful at all. However, I would regard some of the gnostic texts such as the Gospel of Thomas as being compatible with and adding to mainstream Christianity. In terms of God being within or without you, as in science it doesn't matter where you get your ideas from - it is how you can communicate them to others and what you can do with them. Interminable navel gazing will not get the world out of this mess.

Christianity was arguably the only thing that stopped the permanent extinction of Western Civilization. The Roman Empire was going down anyway and Christianity established the basis for a moral and functional society before the Dark Ages took hold. Monasteries preserved learning, history and the ancient texts. The Church established a central authority on which Medieval society could be based, distributed seeds and agricultural techniques and such like.

Spinoza and Einstein were clearly both hand-rubbing Jews making up completely idiotic nonsense of no benefit to anyone and should be discounted from serious consideration.

[Winston]

For those who are against any and all religion:

Anything that becomes dogma can be a form of religion. If you refer to organized religion, then yes and no. It is not totally true or false. It contains metaphorical truth, but not literal truth. All wise people have said that: Einstein, Tesla, DaVinci, Thomas Edison, Thomas Paine, Ben Franklin, Socrates, etc. None of the great minds or geniuses of history were religious fundamentalists or fundamentalist atheists either. That should tell you that the truth lies beyond both extremes. Both are extremes and warp your mind. Just because religion has flaws doesn't mean you should throw the baby out with the bathwater. It does have metaphorical truth and has helped a lot of people. It is not "all bad" or a negative force as atheists claim. The mistake is when you take it literally, which causes many problems, flaws and contradictions. Even Jesus was not a fundamentalist. He constantly repudiated Old Testament law and interpreted it esoterically, not literally.

That's my take on it after studying religion and spirituality for many years. Many new agers and spiritual seekers have come to the same conclusions after a lifetime of searching. All religions are corrupted though, so to find truth takes digging. It's not handed to you on a silver platter or in a package. To me the religions that are closest to the truth are Gnosticism, Hindusim and Buddhism, but they are corrupted too, so you gotta find the original purer form of them. Even New Age is corrupted and twisted. Also look up "Kemetic spirituality" on YouTube. It resonates a lot with me. See this short intro about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jap_uR9p_qI

The Wolverine actor Hugh Jackman gave this great talk about the nature of God and religion below. It's very insightful, aware and resonating. His observations are what most spiritual truth seekers come to after a lifetime of searching for truth and meaning. As you can see, his views are pantheistic, which I think is the closest to the truth. 



The greatest esoteric philosophers and scholars of comparative religion were in my view:

Manly P. Hall, Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung, Huston Smith, Alan Watts, Helena Blavatsky, Rudolf Steiner

If you are seeking esoteric truth, I recommend reading their books and teachings. They came to the same conclusions that Hugh Jackman and many others, including me, did. Bottom line is that the truth does not lie with religious fundamentalism or fundamentalist atheism, but beyond both extremes. All great minds throughout history realized this, and that should tell you something and speaks volumes.

[Winston]

@Winston I agree.

Christianity isn't native to Europe. Both Christianity and Islam have their origins with Judaism.

Mithraism was a monotheistic competitor religion of Christianity founded in Rome with pagan origins.

The major three monotheistic religions really destroyed all other religions except the ones in East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

All other religions were forcibly destroyed or shutdown. It was always about control and power because organized religion was one way to get power with threatening the ruling class.

If the pagan religions weren't forcibly destroyed then they wouldn't have died out. Religions don't usually die because they grow obsolete, they die because they're forcibly destroyed.

True but don't forget, the theology of Christianity is more similar to Zoroastrianism than Judaism. Zoroastrianism was the first religion to posit the heaven and hell, God vs Satan, dichotomy or duality.

Christianity was created because the Roman Empire needed a way to unify everyone without having to maintain a standing army which was too expensive. So Constantine was tasked with using religion to unify the empire without using military force. This saved a lot of money and trouble. The empire had been decaying too and needed a new unifying force. Religion was the answer for the time.

I heard Jesus was an amalgam of several characters, not one person. So he may have been a historical person, but his legend is that of several characters mixed into one. Jesus was not trying to create a new religion I heard, he was trying to reform Judaism. Same with Buddha. He was trying to reform Hinduism, not create a new religion. Their followers created the new religion.

The reason Pagan religions had to be wiped out, is because it taught you to seek God within and in nature, not in the Bible or Church. Right? Plus Paganism is polytheistic, and the Roman Empire needed a monotheistic religion to unify the empire. A polytheistic one wouldn't do that. They already had polytheism and it did not unify the empire politically.

Today there is some revival in Paganism. A young girl on YouTube named Scarlett Ravenswood has many good videos on Paganism. So it resonates with some people and was never obsolete. Because people choose the religion that resonates with them, so it's subjective and can never be obsolete.

Also we don't know how many Pagans there are today, because many Pagans and Druids are solitary practitioners, and hence unknown and undocumented. Even many Wiccans are solitary. Also, many Wiccan and Pagan groups do not advertise themselves or have a public website. Some are informal and private and known only to its members. So the true number of Pagans, Wiccans, and Druids is hard to determine.

Here is one public Druid organization though: www.druidry.org . They have an online course and many local meetup groups all over the western world.

[Winston]

Cornfed,
Well many Druids would disagree. They see Druidism and Paganism as the real religion of Europe. Christianity is a hybrid of things. But its theology is more similar to Zoroastrianism than Judaism. Don't forget that Christianity brought us into the Dark Ages remember? How can that be progress? Also the Christians were the ones who burned the Library of Alexandria down remember? They destroyed many priceless books. Haven't you seen the movie "Agora" about that event and how they killed Hypatia of Alexandria? That set wisdom and knowledge back for centuries.

Christianity is also more artificial whereas Druid is nature worship. Christianity doesn't see nature as sacred. That's a huge deviation from what ancient religions taught, especially during the alleged golden ages where the world was unified in spiritual harmony, aka "the age of Saturn".

I disagree that pantheists never accomplish anything. Great philosophers like Spinoza and Einstein had pantheistic views. If you read what Einstein said about God, it's part pantheistic and part deist. Einstein said he agreed with Spinoza's version of God.

No-one really knows much about the Druids or Gnostics. Any attempt to revive their practices today would be just making stuff up. In terms of the "Sethian" Gnostics, their dualistic notion that the material world is evil is not helpful at all. However, I would regard some of the gnostic texts such as the Gospel of Thomas as being compatible with and adding to mainstream Christianity. In terms of God being within or without you, as in science it doesn't matter where you get your ideas from - it is how you can communicate them to others and what you can do with them. Interminable navel gazing will not get the world out of this mess.

Christianity was arguably the only thing that stopped the permanent extinction of Western Civilization. The Roman Empire was going down anyway and Christianity established the basis for a moral and functional society before the Dark Ages took hold. Monasteries preserved learning, history and the ancient texts. The Church established a central authority on which Medieval society could be based, distributed seeds and agricultural techniques and such like.

Spinoza and Einstein were clearly both hand-rubbing Jews making up completely idiotic nonsense of no benefit to anyone and should be discounted from serious consideration.

Are you sure about that? Or is that propaganda? Western ethics was formed by Socrates and Plato remember? So even without Christianity, western culture could have been sustained by the ethics of Plato and Aristotle, right? The reason Christianity was created was to unify the Roman Empire because it was decaying and paying a standing army was too expensive. Right? So it was a political religion, not a spiritual one. Though of course, it contains elements of spirituality and truth in it, it has to otherwise it would not attract anyone. You gotta put out some truth to attract followers, even if your intent is to mislead them.

However, one of the chief aims of the Bavarian Illuminati in 1776 was to eliminate Christianity. So it must have been a threat to powerful elites. Or Christian ethics at least. The great British historian Nesta Webster noted this in her book on secret societies. She said the eradication of Christian morals has been the chief aim of socialist movements in the 18th and 19th century. So Christianity was a big threat to somebody.

[Winston]

Wow. George Harrison of the Beatles shares his spiritual insights below. He was definitely very spiritual and wise. Just like the Hugh Jackman video above. Uncommon for a celebrity rock star.



Here is a 10 min video where Hugh Jackman talks about life and spirituality and what God is. Also very deep and profound.

[Winston]

Wow check out these deep spiritual insights by the Beatle George Harrison. Several clips are below from his interviews. He definitely was very aware and evolved and spiritual.



Keep in mind that many celebrities such as rock stars and movie stars are similar to us in that they are misfits and cannot live a normal life or hold a 9 to 5 job either. It seems that if you are a true misfit and can't stand being a slave or robot, you either become a loser and misfit who's ostracized like we are, or loved and famous like rock stars and movie stars are. So you are either loved or hated if you are different from others, not neutral. lol. This might explain why celebrities tend to be into mystical teachings. For example Madonna is into Kabbalah and the Beatles were into Hinduism. Etc. Because they are misfits too and seeking deeper meaning, like we are.