Libre

Guilt is a natural human emotion evolved to help helpless defenseless animals with overly large brains act in a cooperative manner to achieve species propagation. Guilt is also a tool exploited by religion as a means of power and control. It's as simple as that.

Steve

THE OBAMA ENERGY PLAN

Advertising

Christopher

Great input, roobarb; I have a few responses.

I believe that the consequence of not doing the “right” thing is guilt, separate from religions. Religions can help us become more in tune spiritually and recognize more easily the behaviors that cause guilt. They can also "create" guilt that should not be there.

Quote:

In my humble opinion one reason religions were created was a political one-to control the masses from killing one another. Religion was the code used to enforce and entrench basic social taboos such as incest and murder. Without it societies would disentegrate.

Yes, this has been one reason people use religion - to gain power over others, although such behavior is not specific to just religions.

Quote:

From my perspective all organized religions use the preaching of what is morally right and wrong to control the masses. Guilt is in my opinion othing more then a device to manipulate peoples' emotions to coerce them into behaving in ways that might not otherwise come naturally.

It is supposed to work such that organized religions preach to show others how to control themselves, without manipulation. I agree there are some who use religions in the way you describe, through manipulation. The way I see it is that people in general have tendencies to manipulate others both within and without religions.

Quote:

For me guilt is unhealthy. In my humble opinion a person who feels guilty feels such a thing because he or she has not resolved a conflict and until they resolve it, guilt pings away like an annoying mosquitoe buzzing in one's ear to serve as a reminde that we need to resolve the thing we are avoiding resolving.

Yes, holding on to guilty feelings is unhealthy, which is why we try to bury it.

Quote:

Bury our guilt and each time we are rubbed the wrong way, they form a callus and so the average human psyche has layer upon layer of guilty calluses that form into a hard shell around what once was a pure and tender heart full of positive hope now dimmed by the layer upon layer of soot we accumulate around our hearts. Guilt is spritual cholesterol.

Great analogy; I would add that exercising spiritually is the best way to reduce spiritual cholesterol.

Quote:

For me religion is a prime perpetuator of guilt which it force feeds to coerce the masses. Christianity is nothing more then a system designed to distribute fat and force people to swallow it to clog their spiritual arteries. All organized religions are force feeders of this lard.

If you look past the religions/people that do use manipulation, I think just the opposite of what you are saying here. I also think you are over-generalizing religions. My religion has done exactly the opposite. Through exercising spiritually, I think we can remove the clogged arteries. The way I see it is that religions preach to us the things that actually clog the arteries, the process of clogging is always there within us and we are just reminded of it through religions. With that said, I understand there are some things that people within religions do that does create a weight that is not healthy for us and we have to determine for ourselves when such a person/religion crosses this line. To say this is the case from everyone within every religion is an over-generalization.

Quote:

Guilt for me is a fool's game. It is an illusion. Fools regret what they do and wonder what went wrong and pick at their skin in neurotic anxious respons to past mistakes and unresolved feelings. Picking at pimples is not good. All it does is leave big scabs and scars.

Not saying sorry to someone you have wronged is what leaves the scars. Unresolved feelings are what leave scars. Picking at pimples would be what I consider a poor way to remove our guilt; it does not remove our guilt permanently and as you say, it only makes it worse. I think there are ways to remove guilt more permanently and without the scars through religion.

Quote:

Guilt? Guilt is the opposite or positive energy.... positive thought..the decision to look defeat and failure flush in the face and say as Grouch Marx once said-"that is the silliest thing I have ever hoyd...".

You are right, it is the opposite of positive energy; however, without this negative energy, our net positive energy would not be able to become greater. How would we know how to change “negative” behavior if we did not have associated negative/guilt energy to help prod us to change?

Quote:

Guilt is what transpires when one chooses not to develop insights... that is to say, to learn from their failures and turn negative to positive.

Exactly, well said.

Quote:

Organized religion teaches people through guilt to repress their true feelings. Guilt is blocked energy. Blocked energy is negative not positive.

Not from my experience with religion. It teaches me how to do the opposite, to open up those feelings of guilt and remove them in a much more permanent way.

roobarb

Yes, genuinely being able to apologize to or forgive a person is both positive and healing and I believe at the pith and substance of most religions and healing principles.

I also would state you are dead on when you state I have engaged in gross generalizations about organized religions in my comments. Of course. Never met a human with a beard I liked. They make me nervous especially when they use words like truth, God, goodness, divinity, morality. Words of foreplay from a pedophile.

Oops did it again.

Its people I hate not your ideals. Don't mind me. Bark is worse then the bite.