• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

What makes religion beneficial or harmful to communities?

Dawnofhope

Non-Proselytizing Baha'i
Staff member
Premium Member
It seems to me religion can be of benefit to society when it promotes positive virtues such as love, compassion and justice. People can be motivated to contribute to the betterment of the world and undertake charity. Of course religion isn't necessary for any of this, but for some people it can bring out the best in them.

On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

I don't want to single out any one religion or set of religions as I believe we are talking about elements in all the main world religions. The allegedly harmful ones can promote great good and those that are supposedly peaceful have also been implicated in conflict and violence.
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I see Religion is given so we can find a unity of purpose. That unity should foster a lasting peace and security, so we can one and all participate in an ever advancing civilization based on Virtues.

I think this is the age where the world is now small enough so this will eventually happen.

Regards Tony
 

osgart

Nothing my eye, Something for sure
I do not think religion causes anything. It is a vehicle for however an individual desires to interpret it. It offers hope to those who believe it.

A fundamentalist has their infidels. A moderate religious might be all inclusive.

The idea of mercy, and to love your enemies comes out of religion. That may have done some good.

Requiring belief for everlasting life was a bad move.

Also the moral codes of requirement are outdated.

Talk of God is a productive thing. As a literary story it is full of lessons in living. The type of God we would choose reflects who we are as idealists and people.

Talk of virtues gives religion something to work with. Attributes of being are things we dont talk about enough i suppose.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jim

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
It seems to me religion can be of benefit to society when it promotes positive virtues such as love, compassion and justice. People can be motivated to contribute to the betterment of the world and undertake charity. Of course religion isn't necessary for any of this, but for some people it can bring out the best in them.

On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

I don't want to single out any one religion or set of religions as I believe we are talking about elements in all the main world religions. The allegedly harmful ones can promote great good and those that are supposedly peaceful have also been implicated in conflict and violence.

beneficial: a sense of community, a motivation to do good

bad: inherently divisive, dogmatic adherence to faith-based claims - and beliefs inform actions, so it will inevitably lead to bad decisions sooner or later.


I agree with Hitchins sentiment about this:
Whatever benefit you can come up with, it can also be accomplished by other means then through religious doctrine. There isn't a single good thing a theist can do, that couldn't be done by an atheist.

The bad things however.... most of them are completely exclusive to those religions.
The Hitch issued a challenge once:

Name me an action perceived as good, that can only be done by a theist in context of religious beliefs.
Now name an action perceived as bad, that can only be done by a theist in context of religious beliefs.

The idea being that it's very hard to come up with such an example for the first, yet very very easy to come up with examples of the latter.
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
I see Religion is given so we can find a unity of purpose. That unity should foster a lasting peace and security, so we can one and all participate in an ever advancing civilization based on Virtues.

I think this is the age where the world is now small enough so this will eventually happen.

Regards Tony

In the sense that you are talking about here, I say the world has become bigger then it ever has been.
Instant communication on the internet brings people closer together, yes. In that sense the world is smaller.

However, this also means that people have a lot easier access to a multitude of different ideas. Coupled with freedoms that most of us cherish, the world in the sense of a "free market of ideas" has never been bigger in the entire history of humanity.

So I say that in reality, the exact opposite of what you said is true.
Back in the day, when the world of "ideas" was much smaller (or even non-existant as a single idea was imposed upon people in most societies for most of history), then religions were a way of unification, sure.

Today, the opposite is true. Today, in this small yet ginormous world (of ideas), such religions are no longer unifying. They do the opposite: they divide. And forums such as this one are perfect examples of that.

What unifies people today, or maybe better said: what could unify people today, is shared cherishing of ideas and values like secularism and humanism.

To the point that religions that are not compatible with such values, are no longer welcome. They are obstacles to peace and stability. Where in the past religiosn tended to guide / underpin entire civilisations, today they have to take a backseat. They can tag along for the ride, but they no longer get to dictate the direction.
 

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
It seems to me religion can be of benefit to society when it promotes positive virtues such as love, compassion and justice. People can be motivated to contribute to the betterment of the world and undertake charity. Of course religion isn't necessary for any of this, but for some people it can bring out the best in them.

On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

I don't want to single out any one religion or set of religions as I believe we are talking about elements in all the main world religions. The allegedly harmful ones can promote great good and those that are supposedly peaceful have also been implicated in conflict and violence.

I think one of the main harms of religion is when a believer reaches a point where they believe, with every fiber of their being and down to the very core of their essence, that they have found "The Truth" and have seen the light. Not all who are religious would fall into this category, but I've encountered many who believe as they do with absolute certainty.

Once a person reaches that point, then they would invariably start to view others (who don't know "The Truth") as lesser beings to some extent. Some might dismiss them as poor, misguided fools, or "lost sheep," but there are others who might see them as agents of evil - heretics, unbelievers, apostates, etc. The former might be non-violent and passive about it, while the latter could be prone to violence and abuse.

The thing is, you can never be too certain about anything. The way I see it, everything is open to question, skepticism, and debate. Nothing should be considered "too sacred" as to not be questioned, and this is also where religion fails.
 
bad: inherently divisive

Division is the natural status of humanity and always will be. The demise of religion wouldn't change this fact.

Summed up best by JM Keynes:

“Bertie [Bertrand Russell] held two ludicrously incompatible beliefs: on the one hand he believed that all the problems of the world stemmed from conducting human affairs in a most irrational way; on the other hand that the solution was simple, since all we had to do was to behave rationally.”

In the sense that you are talking about here, I say the world has become bigger then it ever has been.
Instant communication on the internet brings people closer together, yes. In that sense the world is smaller.

It's very doubtful that our brains cope well with being constantly connected to each other, especially those whose values do not align with ours.

Universalism is a pipe dream, and a harmful one as all utopian beliefs are.

Unity is the wrong goal, (mostly) peaceful coexistence with those we dislike is the best we can hope for. Unfortunately, the pursuit of unity harms the pursuit of peaceful coexistence.


What unifies people today, or maybe better said: what could unify people today, is shared cherishing of ideas and values like secularism and humanism.

We could be united, if only everyone else would just agree with me that my ideology is the best one :D

These are generally Western post-Christian values that developed from a specific (Graeco-Christian) cultural history, and are no more 'universal' than the religion they replaced.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
It seems to me religion can be of benefit to society when it promotes positive virtues such as love, compassion and justice. People can be motivated to contribute to the betterment of the world and undertake charity. Of course religion isn't necessary for any of this, but for some people it can bring out the best in them.

On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

I don't want to single out any one religion or set of religions as I believe we are talking about elements in all the main world religions. The allegedly harmful ones can promote great good and those that are supposedly peaceful have also been implicated in conflict and violence.
I've thought a fair bit about what causes religions to be benign or harmful. It seems to me that the best predictor of whether a religion will be harmful is influence and power.

Sometimes, religions get power just through sheer size, but other times, even a small religion can get extreme power over a small group of people by walling them off from the world.

I think Buddhism is an excellent example of this: in the West, Buddhism generally has a reputation as a peaceful, accommodating religion... sort of a "religion for hippies." However, if we look at Buddhist-majority countries in Southeast Asia, the Buddhism there can be very oppressive.

The difference isn't the doctrine; it's the power and influence.

The same is true about most religions: they'll play nice with others... as long as they're not so powerful that they can do whatever they want.

It's like that saying "good fences make good neighbours:" good secular states make good religions.
 

Quintessence

Consults with Trees
Staff member
Premium Member
Whether or not the ideological construct we're talking about is framed as "religion," it seems to me it basically depends on this:
  • Community Composition. Who are the members of the community we are talking about? Remember, "community" doesn't just mean humans - it refers to an interdependent group of organisms living together in a particular environment.
  • Community Relationships. How do the various organisms within that interdependent community interact with one another as a matter of course? Put another way, how does this community usually function? This is the objective description of the state of things, or "it is what it is."
  • Community Expectations. Humans never seem to accept things as they are. They have desires and preferences. As a consequence, they place expectations on the world regarding how it should be. The world inevitably fails to conform to these expectations, which humans then construe as "beneficial" or "harmful" based on their values.
So the short of it? Something is beneficial or harmful because some human decrees it is so. Nothing more, nothing less.
 

TagliatelliMonster

Veteran Member
Division is the natural status of humanity and always will be. The demise of religion wouldn't change this fact.

Sure. But it would at least eliminate a cause of division that in many cases is extremely dogmatic in nature. And dogmatic division is the worst of its kind as there is no out, no chance of compromise.

In a somewhat stretched analogy, to me that sounds a bit like "so what if you can catch all rapists - there still is going to be other types of crime"

Although that's probably not how you meant it.

It's very doubtful that our brains cope well with being constantly connected to each other, especially those whose values do not align with ours.

And I think that view is very much supported and validated by the effects we see that "social" media have on the psych of people that are very active on such platforms.

Unity is the wrong goal, (mostly) peaceful coexistence with those we dislike is the best we can hope for.

I very much agree with that. Imo, it comes down to being "unified" in a system that is literally build from the ground up to deal with multi-culturalism / difference of opinion and to lay down a framework designed specifically for co-existance and co-operation between the various groups.

And I'ld say that in that sense, the groups would be "unified" in a "common goal" of building a society in which everybody can live their life in peacefull co-existance with a "live and let live" mentality.

And I think that secular humanism provides such a framework. Or perhaps better said: I think secular humanism so far, is humanity's best attempt at such a framework.

I think that "unity" is oftenly misunderstood to mean that all have to believe the same things or that there is some fine line that everyone should fall into with little to no differences of opinion.

I think that's wrong. It seems perfectly reasonable to be "united" in the idea of peacefull co-existance.

Unfortunately, the pursuit of unity harms the pursuit of peaceful coexistence.

Well.... If certain groups aren't interested in peacefull co-existance, then those groups have to be dealt with one way or the other. And most likely, those groups won't be available to find peacefull solutions.

We could be united, if only everyone else would just agree with me that my ideology is the best one :D

...for peacefull coexistance.

How else could you peacefully co-exist within a single society, if not through some secular form of government which tries to center its policies around universal values instead of specific values that only matter to the people of a specific sub-group/sub-culture?

To peacefully co-exist with different groups within the same society, you'ld necessarily require the type of society that
1. allows such groups equal rights to even exist
2. gives people the freedom to interact
3. gives people the freedom to switch groups
4. doesn't make one group "more important" then another

It just seems to me that secularism is a very good way to do this. The best that I know off, at least. I'm open to learning about others, if there are any :)

These are generally Western post-Christian values that developed from a specific (Graeco-Christian) cultural history, and are no more 'universal' than the religion they replaced.

I disagree, actually.

Obviously everybody has their historical cultural baggage. At the same time, many things in humanism etc are in direct conflict with judeo-christian values.

Things like freedom in sexual orientation, to name just one, can hardly be called a christian value.


I don't remember where I first heared this, but it's an approach I totally agree with... It's a thought exercise on how to design a society in which you would want to live. There's a catch however: while you are designing that society and while you will be living in it.... you don't know in advance what your ethnicity, cultural background, religion, sexual orientation, intelligence,.... will be.

So, you'll want to design a society in which none of that matters, in the sense of that no matter what group you belong to - you'll have equal shots at happiness, work, wealth, health, love, etc.

It's kind of hard to imagine coming up with anything else then some kind of secular democracy.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Whether or not the ideological construct we're talking about is framed as "religion," it seems to me it basically depends on this:
  • Community Composition. Who are the members of the community we are talking about? Remember, "community" doesn't just mean humans - it refers to an interdependent group of organisms living together in a particular environment.
  • Community Relationships. How do the various organisms within that interdependent community interact with one another as a matter of course? Put another way, how does this community usually function? This is the objective description of the state of things, or "it is what it is."
  • Community Expectations. Humans never seem to accept things as they are. They have desires and preferences. As a consequence, they place expectations on the world regarding how it should be. The world inevitably fails to conform to these expectations, which humans then construe as "beneficial" or "harmful" based on their values.
So the short of it? Something is beneficial or harmful because some human decrees it is so. Nothing more, nothing less.
Are you equating "community" with the religious group?

It seems to me that the negative aspects of religion tend to come to the surface when these things can't be equated... e.g. when there's conflict between religions that are both part of the same community, or when a member wants to leave the religion without leaving the community (i.e. choose their own path without being shunned).
 
It's like that saying "good fences make good neighbours:" good secular states make good religions.

I agree with the first part, but not with the latter.

Yugoslavia, Nigeria, (parts of) Indonesia, etc. have faced ethno-religious conflict while being (mostly) secular.

A secular state alone means little unless the people are committed to the values of secularism. I know you didn't mention it, but democracy can worsen religious differences as a religious divide also becomes a political divide with winners and losers.

Separation of Church and state evolved over 1000 years in the West, dumping top-down secularism on peoples with little history of such things doesn't mean people quickly adopt its core values.

As for "Good fences make good neighbours", the following paper makes some good points imo. Unfortunately, the dominant global paradigm is to do the exact opposite:

We consider the conditions of peace and violence among ethnic groups, testing a theory designed to predict the locations of violence and interventions that can promote peace. Characterizing the model’s success in predicting peace requires examples where peace prevails despite diversity. Switzerland is recognized as a country of peace, stability and prosperity. This is surprising because of its linguistic and religious diversity that in other parts of the world lead to conflict and violence. Here we analyze how peaceful stability is maintained. Our analysis shows that peace does not depend on integrated coexistence, but rather on well defined topographical and political boundaries separating groups. Mountains and lakes are an important part of the boundaries between sharply defined linguistic areas. Political canton and circle (sub-canton) boundaries often separate religious groups. Where such boundaries do not appear to be sufficient, we find that specific aspects of the population distribution either guarantee sufficient separation or sufficient mixing to inhibit intergroup violence according to the quantitative theory of conflict. In exactly one region, a porous mountain range does not adequately separate linguistic groups and violent conflict has led to the recent creation of the canton of Jura. Our analysis supports the hypothesis that violence between groups can be inhibited by physical and political boundaries. A similar analysis of the area of the former Yugoslavia shows that during widespread ethnic violence existing political boundaries did not coincide with the boundaries of distinct groups, but peace prevailed in specific areas where they did coincide. The success of peace in Switzerland may serve as a model to resolve conflict in other ethnically diverse countries and regions of the world.

Good Fences: The Importance of Setting Boundaries for Peaceful Coexistence — New England Complex Systems Institute
 

Ponder This

Well-Known Member
It seems to me religion can be of benefit to society when it promotes positive virtues such as love, compassion and justice. People can be motivated to contribute to the betterment of the world and undertake charity. Of course religion isn't necessary for any of this, but for some people it can bring out the best in them.

On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

I don't want to single out any one religion or set of religions as I believe we are talking about elements in all the main world religions. The allegedly harmful ones can promote great good and those that are supposedly peaceful have also been implicated in conflict and violence.

Perhaps the very thing that causes most religions to benefit a community are the same thing that causes it to be harmful to a community, in which case, it makes more sense to talk about how religion is used than a particular quality that religion has.

For example, we might say that religion encourages devotion, but that devotion can be towards beneficial or harmful ends. The quality of encouraging devotion is not itself harmful or beneficial in the absence of a consideration of the object of devotion.
 

joe1776

Well-Known Member
Religion is just a waste of time.

Here's a brief argument to support my claim:

P1 Religions should be judged on their impact on human morality.

P2 Christianity has been a very popular religion.

C1 Therefore, we can use Christianity's moral effectiveness to judge religion on the whole.

P3 The world, at one time condoned slavery but today every nation in the world has abolished the legal practice.

P4 With more than 100 mentions of slavery in their Bible, none guide Christians to condemn the practice.

C2 Since most Christians ultimately condemned slavery, they must have done so despite their Bible's moral guidance and not because of it.

P5 Women and homosexuals are gaining equal rights in Christian-dominated nations of the world. The Bible doesn't support these advances either.

C3 Therefore, since the Christian Bible hasn't supported moral advances but it hasn't stopped them either, we can say that: If we agree that religions should be judged on their impact on human morality, Christianity, the world's most popular religion, and an example of religions generally, has been a waste of time.

If you think another religion has been effective in promoting moral advances, please offer your argument.
 
Last edited:
Sure. But it would at least eliminate a cause of division that in many cases is extremely dogmatic in nature. And dogmatic division is the worst of its kind as there is no out, no chance of compromise.

In a somewhat stretched analogy, to me that sounds a bit like "so what if you can catch all rapists - there still is going to be other types of crime"

Although that's probably not how you meant it.

Religion is a source of division, but also one of unity.

If you abandon a religion it doesn't mean you have one less source of division though. Loss of religion creates a vacuum which is filled by another marker of ideological identity.

When our highest marker of identity is political, this can leave little room for unity.

As noted by evolutionary psychologist John Tooby: Paradoxically, a political party united by supernatural beliefs can revise its beliefs about economics or climate without revisers being bad coalition members. But people whose coalitional membership is constituted by their shared adherence to “rational,” scientific propositions have a problem when—as is generally the case—new information arises which requires belief revision. To question or disagree with coalitional precepts, even for rational reasons, makes one a bad and immoral coalition member—at risk of losing job offers, one's friends, and one's cherished group identity. This freezes belief revision.

The idea we can solve such problems rationally presupposes that we are rational in the first place (which we are not).

And I think that view is very much supported and validated by the effects we see that "social" media have on the psych of people that are very active on such platforms.

It doesn't bode well for the idea that greater interconnectedness makes for greater toleration though.

I very much agree with that. Imo, it comes down to being "unified" in a system that is literally build from the ground up to deal with multi-culturalism / difference of opinion and to lay down a framework designed specifically for co-existance and co-operation between the various groups.

And I'ld say that in that sense, the groups would be "unified" in a "common goal" of building a society in which everybody can live their life in peacefull co-existance with a "live and let live" mentality.

And I think that secular humanism provides such a framework. Or perhaps better said: I think secular humanism so far, is humanity's best attempt at such a framework.

I think that "unity" is oftenly misunderstood to mean that all have to believe the same things or that there is some fine line that everyone should fall into with little to no differences of opinion.

I think that's wrong. It seems perfectly reasonable to be "united" in the idea of peacefull co-existance.

You wouldn't agree that peaceful coexistence in a Muslim theocracy is a good idea though.

Unity tends to revolve around everyone else becoming 'more like me' whatever position you start from.


How else could you peacefully co-exist within a single society, if not through some secular form of government which tries to center its policies around universal values instead of specific values that only matter to the people of a specific sub-group/sub-culture?

To peacefully co-exist with different groups within the same society, you'ld necessarily require the type of society that
1. allows such groups equal rights to even exist
2. gives people the freedom to interact
3. gives people the freedom to switch groups
4. doesn't make one group "more important" then another

It just seems to me that secularism is a very good way to do this. The best that I know off, at least. I'm open to learning about others, if there are any :)

The best solution is the exact opposite fo what we are doing: localism.

Humanism retained the optimistic, universalist, progressive teleology of Christianity, combining a Pelagian belief that humans can overcome their flawed nature, a Gnostic belief in 'salvation' through knowledge and a Socratic belief in the power of reason.

If we rid ourselves of this conceit and went back to the pre-monotheistic tragic view of human nature we look to mitigate human imperfections rather than believing we can fix them.

If you look at America as an example of a divided polity, the problem is not that people have different beliefs, it is that people with different beliefs rule over them (or could rule over them).

A liberal New Yorker doesn't like a conservative from Alabama making decisions that affect them, and vice versa. Instead of trying to find a compromise, just change the system so that the difference in values doesn't matter.

Create a Swiss-style federalised system of self-governing localities and you remove much of the cause for discord.

If people want a community run along secular humanist principles they can have one, while others can have their conservative Christianity. If you don't like what is happening where you live, move somewhere else.

Leave only a handful of things at the federal level: defence, international relations, etc.

It's not perfect, but is better than trying to create a one-size-fits-all solution.
 

The Hammer

[REDACTED]
Premium Member
On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

I think this has more to do with man's twisted interpretation of the Gods and their desires, confusing them with his/her own baser needs.
 

Quintessence

Consults with Trees
Staff member
Premium Member
Are you equating "community" with the religious group?

Not at all. There are many sorts of constructs we call "communities." Being ecocentric, I tend to think of "community" as biologists think of it, which was spelled out in the previous post.


It seems to me that the negative aspects of religion tend to come to the surface when these things can't be equated... e.g. when there's conflict between religions that are both part of the same community, or when a member wants to leave the religion without leaving the community (i.e. choose their own path without being shunned).

Communities are always dynamic and changing, full of what we label as conflict as well as what we label as synergy or cooperation. There is no getting rid of that or avoiding that. Labeling some element within the dynamic world we live in as negative (or positive) is a product of human expectations and values. So there are "negative/positive aspects of religion" only insofar as some human holds to some particular set of expectations that make it so. This means when asking something like "what makes religion positive/negative" it's important to articulate what your own values are first. That tells the listener why you see something as a positive/negative... or something about your expectations of the world.

I suppose this is probably getting more abstract than the OP intended or was looking for, though. :shrug:
 

Quintessence

Consults with Trees
Staff member
Premium Member
If you don't like what is happening where you live, move somewhere else.

If only it were that easy, right? These days? So many obstacles to this. Something would need to be done about that to move your vision along.
 

1213

Well-Known Member
...
On the other hand religion can harmful. It can promote division, intolerance, fanaticism and hatred. It can even contribute to wars.

Perhaps, I think it would be important to understand, is it the people who promote something, or is it the religion that promotes.
 
Top