At what point is religious freedom trumped by other considerations? Should religious adoption agencies be able to deny their services to gay couples? Should churches be forced to perform gay weddings? Should pharmacists be able to refuse service for the morning after pill? Should a photographer be fined for refusing to photograph a gay wedding? Where should religious liberty extend and where should it end?
Religion that is practiced at home in private and does not seek to press others into belief can safely be left alone. The moment it steps outside it needs watching. If it is given any lift at all, it thinks it should persuade others to believe. If it gets any power then it begins to force others to believe. Dissent is crushed because dissenters are "evil". Individual choice disappears in all things and we all have to live by "the book", or else!
In the 21st century we still have plenty of primitive practises within religion.
Gender,
Celibacy,
Discrimination against gay people,
Preachers of hatred,
With our wider understanding we should be closer to religious tolerance & finding a way to educate, the narrow minded fanatics that distort the common good messages, that have been put into action through religion.
I'm not religious myself, but some of the most decent people i've met have had religion as their direction & guidance.
Just because religion has it's share crazy people among it's ranks, and those who refuse to modernise, shouldn't mean we should slate it all the time.
Last week on Foreign Exchange ( http://www.foreignexchange.tv/ ) they had a group of (non-American) womens' rights activists on -- and in Malaysia, one of them reported that a huge controversy broke out just a couple years ago when the country's first-ever proposed anti-wife-beating statute exempted Muslim husbands from prosecution.
Checking.... 
on June 19th, 2008. Tags: freedom, religion
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