Papabear #77386
<< S/he must be using some weird Fundie definition of "weird." I agree, Scientology is very weird, and I agree, demon worship is weird. Both of them involve the belief in imaginary beings, but in that, they are no weirder than Xianity.
What's so weird about atheism? Not believing in fairy tale creatures or ridiculous ideas like the trinity is rational, not weird. >>
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Papabear, I would say that Scientology is immensely weirder than Christianity. It got its start when humanity was much more ignorant, so its endemic irrationalities were (for the time period of its creation) not so obvious, especially since it grew out of still older beliefs.
Scientology, however, was created in the 20th century, out of whole cloth, by one man -- a science fiction writer who said, years before the fact, that he would love to invent a religion, "because that's where the money is." Despite all the advances of modern science and knowledge of how the universe works, people flocked to this new sci-fi "religion," and even the news that their faith's founder had made such an egregiously self-incriminating remark was simply ignored.
The details of the two faiths, Christianity and Scientology, differ widely in terms of details, but they are about equally absurd -- however, the latter began AFTER humanity had learned quite enough to show from the outset that all of its tenets were nonsense -- and still it prospered. Christianity prospers because of centuries of momentum as much as anything else.
So, at least in terms of origins, I'd say that Scientology is weirder by far than Christianity.
Oh, and just to cover all the bases here, I definitely think demon worship is weird, too, but I don't think I have ever heard of any actual people doing so, ever, outside of vague fundie claims that prove groundless. Worship of a Celtic goddess would be slightly less weird than a worship of demons, I think, but not particularly less so than Christianity.
And to call atheism "weird" says a lot more about the person saying so than about atheism itself. Rationality is a laudable trait; very little in this world gets accomplished without it, so it puzzles me no end that it is so often criticized and belittled when applied to religion.
~David D.G.
