Communion

[maggiebee]

Just home from our Communion Service. Found it very uplifting and it was great to have visitors from Zimbabwe with us. They sang unaccompanied and their voices were just wonderful. I'm always amazed that when some churches in the UK struggle, the churches in many African countries have congregations in the high hundreds.

[jourdain2]

When we arrived here late in March, we found several 'Happy New Home' cards waiting from various friends. Amongst them was one saying 'welcome' from the members of the local church. It's not 'happy clappy', more sort of 'progressive traditional'. with a lovely lady vicar. We both sang in a (secular) choir in France and were asked to help to start a singing group at the church.

Yesterday, came home after service feeling very contented, surrounded by friendship - and happy after a round of applause for our tiny group of songsters. The congregation is increasing slowly, youngsters are having a picnic on the village green next week. I felt uplifted as well.

[Khandro]

jomifl; You choose the surveys which suit your argument, and statistics don't prove much at all, pace Ed Miliband. You also set great store by IQs which don't mean too much either, I've known people with a very high IQ who couldn't boil an egg.
Intelligence, contrary to your belief, isn't the highest of human attributes.

[naomi24]

Khandro, //Intelligence, contrary to your belief, isn't the highest of human attributes. //

I’m reluctant to say this … but did you really mean to say that?

[vetuste_ennemi]

"Intelligence, contrary to your belief, isn't the highest of human attributes.".
Indeed not, Khandro. But concern for truth ranks pretty high, don't you think? As do concern for our fellow man, our common world and the living things we share it with.
Intelligence (in the sense of the faculty for reasoning correctly) is a rather valuable aid in (not to say a necessary prerequisite for) analysing our social, moral and political problems and adjudicating among proposed "solutions" to them.
Reason is a light shining on a dark road; it does not determine our destination, but it does help us to get there. (VE paraphrase of an Aristotle metaphor).

[mikey4444]

jourdain2....I am a well known atheist here on AB but I found your post at 18:00 rather delightful ! You are obviously very happy and content, which is what we all should want in life. Thanks for sharing that with us.

[jomifl]

Khandro, what makes you think you know what I believe.. Do you have any stats on that?

[Khandro]

jomifl; No I have no stats on what you[i believe, and I don't have stats even on what [i]I] believe, but your implied syllogism; 'Intelligent people are not religious, I am not religious, therefore I am an intelligent person' isn't really watertight.
Re. IQ, v_e you are quite right about those qualities. If one was given the choice to be incarcerated in extreme conditions with someone whose main attribute was a very high IQ, or someone who was kind, caring and had great fortitude and an average IQ, who would you choose?

[jomifl]

Khandro, your reasoning is abysmal, not only do you make unjustifiable assumptions but you draw irrational conclusions from those assumptions. Have you by chance been associating with jesuits?

[naomi24]

Khandro, I’d choose someone who was kind, caring, had great fortitude, and a high IQ. A high IQ doesn’t preclude the rest, as you appear to suggest.

[jomifl]

Chinese whispers have nothing on answerbank, from a joyful celebration of communion to being locked up with Khandro...are we chained to the wall too?

[jomifl]

V_e, Naomi, It seems there is a higher human attribute than intelligence but we aren't being told what it is. I expect it is as much higher than intelligence as apples are to pears.

[Svejk]

^Bags me next to Naomi if we are. ;o)

[Svejk]

To be honest, I'd take a good heart over intelligence.(and I know what I'm talking about)

[naomi24]

I don’t understand the implication, regularly propagated here, that people without religion are devoid of kindness and compassion. Can someone please explain?

svejk, will you bring the wine, or shall I? ;o)

[Khandro]

n. read my choice of alternatives again carefully.

These distinctions were well outlined in Star Trek between Mr Spock and Capt. Kirk. The former having an extremely high IQ, approached every issue with nothing but pure intelligence and Kirk often sacrificing some rationality in favour of his more 'human' attributes.
I actually know a real person who in climbed into a blazing tank and pulled out a badly injured man and dragged him to safety just before the fuel caught and the whole thing blew. (Awarded for valour).
Spock would have figured that this was an irrational act because the likelihood was that they would have both been killed and the 'Enterprise' would then be without two members instead of one.

[naomi24]

Khandro, I’ve read them – and I still don’t understand why you seem to think intelligence precludes the rest. In fact that surely insults the intelligence of the faithful, doesn’t it? (I don’t believe any of us is Mr Spock).

[jomifl]

Khandro, using a fictional alien from a space fiction tv series of dubious merit as an example of human character is possibly stretching credulity a little. When people rescue others in situations of danger it is an expression of the human instinct of altruism.

[Khandro]

jomifl; fictional characters and actions are frequently used to demonstrate human behaviour, I'm sure I could make a long list (another thread?) but immediately springs to mind; Oedipus complex, The Micawber principle , Fagin's pound of flesh, Doubting Thomas - or maybe he was real!

[jomifl]

As you said...fictional, we know the principles it seems that the proof of you assertions is lacking....again.

[naomi24]

I’m not asking for ‘proof’ – just an explanation for why Khandro seems to think that intelligence and an absence of religion precludes beneficence.