Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Are organized religions necessary!


Are organized religions necessary!




In my opinion, one does not need an organized religion to be able to have a private moment with his/her own god.

I have been doing research about the existence of a supernatural being for a very long time. In my research I have found out that the world is governed by sets of law of nature based on principle law of quantum mechanics (String Theory) which creates our material world and from that point the law of formation of molecules steps in followed by the formation of living organisms and then the start of evolution of those organisms to a higher class of organisms and then “natural selection” and so fort.

With that in mind, I came to the conclusion that up to the present time, there has not been any sign of existence of a supernatural power and if it exists; so far it did not interfere or participated in the order of the universe. In other word; the universe since its conception, at the time of “Big Bang”, has been operating based on strict and unchangeable laws with no interference.

But I do understand that we humans, as a social animal, need the presence of a companion in our life and for that reason human has invented the concept of god which I do understand and I do not object the concept at all. I personally have learned not needing such companion in my own life but for those who feel that they do need it, in my opinion, it is a good thing because; it gives the believer a psychological comfort and could even have therapeutic qualities.

But my objection is to the “middlemen principle”. Why a believer in god should need some dead people of the centuries ago as a middlemen to be able to cozy-in with his/her own god in his own private time at anytime, and anyplace!

Throughout human history, the organized religions have demonstrated themselves as a divisive element among people which not just created so many bloody wars but the leaders of most of these organizations have taken advantage of their own members for personal gains.

Why a person who calls himself/herself, for example, a Christian should need the Pope, Bishop, or Reverent to be able to have a private moment with his/her own god? This; I do not understand! What kind of services these individuals could provide for this very personal contact! The contact between god and the believer, even if one belongs to any organized religion, has always been a private matter anyway. Where do these so called religious leaders fit-in?

Yes; they do serve the purpose of explaining the concept of god to people. To do so; the passed leaders of organized religions came up with specific hypothesis but , as we know now, with the advancement of science in last several centuries the present accepted hypothesis, not just is not compatible with science but, it contradicts science.

This has forced the present leaders of organized religions to come up with a reasonable explanation which so far they could not and this will make the existence of these organizations obsolete. If in the future they do come up with a reasonable answer to this question, then the believers could accept them as only philosophers and nothing more.

Come to think about it; one does not need to find out the reason for the existence of god to believe in it. With above in mind, in my opinion, for those who feel a need for god in their life, they do not need any middleman to make their contact with their god. Consequently people should free themselves from these organizations which, as we have witnessed, they became the source of divisions among humans with devastating consequences throughout the human history.

Thank you Maziar

After I wrote the above article I received a comment, via email, from Sister A. whom she dose not wish her name to be mentioned for personal reason. After that we corresponded several times which Sister and I thought; it would be a good idea that we share our views with the readers of Payam. And I will copy and paste bellow.

On Fri, Jul 29, 2011 at 9:52 PM, <sisterams@aol.com> wrote:
Dear Mr. Maziar Aptin,

Let me first introduce myself.  I help with the proofreading for the magazine, Payam. I am a member of the School Sisters of St. Francis, an international religious order of Sisters.

I have read with great interest your articles and appreciate your research.  I wish to comment on some aspects. For example, the conclusion to your previous article:  "Consequently, people should free themselves from these organizations which as we have witnessed became the source of divisions among humans with devastating consequences throughout human history."  While this statement bears much truth, the opposite is also true.  For example, touring the United States, now in Los Angeles, is an exhibit called Women and Spirit showing the accomplishments of a three-hundred year period of women religious.  (See the Website.) Dedicated women have shown themselves to be capable leaders and administrators of hospitals, schools, colleges, universities, orphanages, and of social work. They have influenced thousands of patients, students, and clients.  Why have these women done so? What is the driving force? They have left their families, they have begged for funding, they have given entirely of themselves. They have achieved much. Why?

You object to the "middlemen principal."   Throughout the years women such as Hildegard of Bingen, St. Clare, Mother Theresa, Theresa of Avila, Elizabeth of Portugal and men such as St. Francis of Assisi, St. Dominic have inspired us as examples of piety, of dedication, and as guides.  They have shown that despite hardships, it is possible to love and press forward to be of service.

Therefore, while persons who under the guise of religion have been sources of division, there are wonderful beings who by belonging to religious organizations have together produced wonderful acts of love and service. When I joined the School Sisters of St. Francis there were 3400 women in this organization.  Now, we are old here in the United States and Europe; however, in India and Central America there are about 200 young School Sisters laboring, teaching, and nursing.  Thus, I have seen with my own eyes that women can work together to benefit society within a religious community.

I will look forward to future articles in which you continue to search and research.

Best wishes,
Sister A

Response from Maziar July 30/2011
Dear Sister A:

Thank you for taking time writing this letter to me. I admire the work that you and your organization and a good number of organizations like yours have done in the passed and are doing at the present time. I must admit that charity organizations in all three religions, particularly in Christian faith, have done a great deal of services to those in need which is very admirable.

But in order to determine the worthiness of an organization, it is necessary to asses its performance in entirety. It could be said that the charity arm of all religions is the only useful organization that has been beneficial to mankind, particularly the charities of Christian faith. In my opinion, Charity is the only organization of the Churches which is worth keeping. My objection is to the main powerhouse of all religions and their principle ideologies which has resulted in disastrous events throughout human history.

In human history it has been seen over and over again that “power” has been the major tool for corruption and abuses, and whenever the administrative power has been complemented with spiritual power the degree of corruptions and abuses had multiplied.

One should not forget the abusive behavior of Catholic Church in Europe during the long period of “Dark Ages”, beginning in fourth and fifth centuries A.D., nor should we forget the atrocities committed by Taliban of Afghanistan during their short reign when they used to rule that country, especially against women, nor should we ignore the barbaric acts of the present Islamic rule in my country Iran. One must visit the torture chambers of the Catholic Church in Europe, now changed into museum, to recall the atrocities of Catholic Church committed in so called “Dark Age” of Europe.


As a matter of fact, in my opinion, women are the first who should be denouncing the organized religions, regardless of which religion.  Because women has been put-down in all three major religions of today and became the target of the worst atrocities that one can imagine from Ebrahim to present day; first by the story of Adam and Eve, not that Eve was created as a second class citizen but has been shown as deceitful, and disobedient who became the cause of human race becoming deprived of living in “Heaven” and subject of god’s curse to a point that god did not want to communicate directly with humans any longer which the concept of “Messenger, or Prophet” was fabricated. So; implicitly we all should blame women for our miseries which these religions, even today, tell us that we should. Do you agree with that notion Sister! I definitely do not, maybe it is because I am an atheist, but religious people do believe.


As a matter of fact, the harms that have been done by organized religion were and still are multifaceted. Above all those atrocities through their administrative authorities, we must not forget the creation of warring organizations such as; Israelites, Crusaders, and Jihadists fighting against each other for thousands of years causing so many deaths, injuries, displacement, starvations of children, and destructions. It would be safe to say that great majority of wars among humans were caused by disputes over religious beliefs. Prolonged wars between Catholics and protestant in Europe, Sunnis and shiias in Asia are the prime example of that, so is the WWII Nazism which just in that war hundreds of millions of lives were lost, and so is the present day Alghaedeh terrorism which is making life difficult for everybody.

The organized religions; beside from their divisive built-in nature, not only they have been a tremendous obstacle to science and technology which has been proven to be beneficial to humans, they have shown such fanatical animosities toward it to a point that they have burned scientists alive such as; the sixty one years old Giorgio Bruno of Italy in 1,600 A.D. who confirmed Copernicus’s finding to be correct and he refused to repudiate his finding which we know now that he happened to be correct.

As you can see the harms that has been created and caused by the organized religions have, by far, surpassed the benefits that their charity arm has been producing.
As a matter of fact it was the advancement of science in Europe, beginning with the “Renascence of Italy in 13th century that brought people together, not only people of Europe, but all humanity got closer to each other through newly found commerce and needs for new products resulting from technological advancement that religions were always against and still are. It was again science and technology that created more comfort and better standard of living for humans that religions have failed to do. Please refer to my article “Why Civilizations Rise and Fall” published in last issue of PayameAshena. You can find that on their website as well.     

With above in mind, in my opinion, while your type of organizations are needed which could continue their work under different umbrella, the organized religions have proven to be not only harmful for humanity but in most cases detrimental.

Please do not hesitate in writing to me expressing your opinion in this regard.

Very truly Maziar Aptin

From Sister A to: Maziar August 13/2011

Thank you for your prompt response to my letter which I have read carefully and thought about it what you have written.  Attached you will find some of my thoughts:

Dear Mr. Maziar Aptin,

I appreciated your quick response to the letter I had written.  It is good often to analyze one’s beliefs and also the rational for these viewpoints.

While the data and references you cite are true, it is difficult to find any organization, whether religious or secular, that is without its previous faults and shortcomings.  For example, being a citizen of the United States has many advantages and yet looking at the history of the United States, there are many negative features; such as the European invasion of the Native American civilizations that flourished here prior to the arrival of the colonists, the importing of African slaves, the interference in other nations’ affairs in Iran, Central America, and South America, unnecessary wars, the denial of voting and human rights, and the list could continue. Despite all this evil, I remain a citizen of the United States, attempting in my way to bring goodness and peace to my sphere of influence.  Where would I move?

In the same way, I feel that as a School Sister of St. Francis, in union with hundreds of other extraordinary women, we can bring pressure and in some ways influence society and call to task the male structure of the Catholic Church.  This has been shown endless times.  For example, the Sisters taught black children and Indian children in their schools, the Sisters participated in civil rights’ marches; the Sisters formed an organization called Network to promote civil rights and to promote social justice.

As you point out the principal ideologies of the church have resulted in disastrous events throughout human history.  While this is true, the Catholic Church also transmitted and preserved valuable information with the monks in monasteries meticulously coping books, by producing works of art, and producing music. Strong individuals such as Francis of Assisi, Dominic, Hildegard of Bingen, Ignatius of Loyola spoke out powerfully against poverty and ignorance and organized followers to combat the social evils of their times. In any organization or within a nation there are positive aspects and negative points. 

 Early in my convent and college education I was fortunate to have had scripture scholars who pointed out in our Biblical studies that the Old Testament was a literary document with a collection of stories to be viewed within its cultural and historical settings. Thus, it was a document telling of people searching for answers, solutions, and morality.  Therefore, it was not to be taken literally, but as a further search of truth.  As for the New Testament, Jesus preached peace and justice and historically we can find evidence of his existence.  If church leaders had followed his example, the corruption and the evils that have become part of history, would have been avoided.

I can not go back in history to correct the evils that have existed; I can only deal with the present time.  Therefore, I follow the teachings of Jesus and I have connected myself to a group of religious women who through education, health reform, social action, and the arts have attempted to deal with social ills, human trafficking of women, abuse of children, injustice of women’s rights, and poverty.  Through organizations such as Network and Call to Action we attempt to change the powerful structures of the church, confront the Tea Party, and heal parts of our society.  This is not an easy task.

Again, thank you for your response and for your challenge to examine my beliefs.

Best wishes,
Sister A. Steiner 8-13-11


Response from Maziar August 15/2011

Dear Sister A
Thank you for your response. I can see that you are an educated and highly intelligent lady dedicated to your charity work which I admire very much. But I am afraid that I can not accept the justification that you are trying to make for the mistakes made by organized religions and its disastrous end-results.

Comparing the atrocities committed by religious organizations, supposedly founded to promote peace and unity among humans, with the atrocities committed by world empires, motivated by greed, is unjustifiable. Even a single murder, torture, or mistreatment of any human-being under the principle rules set by religions is unacceptable because this type of actions are the exact opposite of the purpose of the formation of religions. In above; I highlighted “Principle rules set by religions” to exempt the mistake made by individual members of those religions.

For example; you mentioned teaching of Jesus which in my opinion is far superior to those of Moses and Mohammad. But even Jesus, like Mohammad, wants to send all none believers to hell. He also has said “whoever is not with me is against me", in other word, my way or highway which is common belief and practice in all religions. Religions do not leave any room for negotiation or compromise and it is that principle which has been creating divisions, breading conflicts, wars, and disasters.

 As I said before, one should not pass judgment on the performance of an organization by looking at only one or two good or bad features or “teachings” of the organization but should look at the totality of its performance and its effects. The end result in Christianity was formation of Crusaders resulting in century long wars, the period of “Dark Ages” in Europe resulting in all those atrocities that we already talked about.

As I mentioned before, the charity arm of all religions is beneficial to humanity and should be kept and operated under different umbrella but the rest of it has proven itself to be harmful and must be disregarded altogether.

As I mentioned in my article; I myself am an atheist but I wrote that article, (the subject of our discussion), to address the people of Iran who are Muslims and are not able to live without a god and who also have seen the real Islam and are seeking for an alternative. I tried to show them that the alternative would be; they could worship their god without a need for any middleman, namely a mullah.

I am sure that the fouls belief in the existence of a supernatural being will soon be realized. It eventually will happen; it is only mater of time. The history has shown that prior to the invention of god of Ebrahim, people who used to believe in Enn, Inky, Zeus, etc. eventually wised up, even though they were thousands of time more certain that those creatures existed, to a point that they used to shed the blood of their beloved teenage daughters for those imaginary creatures. Such ignorance! Such a waste. Now when we look back we know how wrong they were but they did not know.

By the same token today over three billions worshippers of god of Ebrahim and another few billions who worship some other god or gods do not realize how wrong they are. While I do not see much difference between god of Ebrahim (Jehovah and Allah) and Zeus and others; the principle concept is the same then why the formers are mythologies and the latter is still worshipped!   

Sincerely Maziar Aptin
Note: For information that how Islam was introduced to our ancestors, please read داستان ابوسلیم 
It is written in Persian. You can download it for free.http://maziaraptin.blogspot.com/2012/02/blog-post.html



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