(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The One Question Religions Have Never Been Able To Answer... [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-09-01 There are about 4,000 known religions practiced on our planet, and an appallingly low number of them consider me to be a deity. And that’s not the only thing they have in common. One obviously commonality of all religions is their belief in and worship of a supernatural entity or entities with amazing powers, the sort of powers that most 6 year-olds dream of. They can fly, they can live forever, they can just decree that their favorite teams win the championship. Most appealing to 6 year-olds and me personally (the Venn Diagram overlaps almost completely), is the ability to smite their enemies. I’d give anything for that power, and I’d be smiting like nobody’s business. In fact, it’s even possible that you yourself would wind up smote. So watch it. In fact, most believers think that their particular deity’s powers are unlimited and perpetual. Their God or Gods can know and do literally everything. And apparently, they take this ability very seriously. For example, they can number the hairs on each of our heads, My number is 11. They know, and keep track of each and every thought thunk by each and every thinker in the world at all times, and they hold us accountable for every one of them. I’m still probably being held to account for the thoughts I had about Ms. Barna, my stunningly gorgeous 7th grade math teacher. Not only can they know everything, the vast majority of Gods are invested enough in each of our daily lives that they intervene on a regular basis. Most religions believe that if you have some ailment, infirmity or struggle, God, if asked, can just zap it away, although he or she or they may make you wait awhile before they do it. They can (and, apparently do…sometimes) help us with our finances, our relationships, our careers and our children’s behavior. Oh…and most important of all, religions people generally believe that if we say, do, or believe the right things, God will make sure we go to a happy place after we die. However, while deities can do amazingly good things, sometimes bad things happen. For example, while God is working with you to stop you from drinking again, she is also summoning up an earthquake that crushes 50,000 people to death instantly in Turkey. Or, while someone in Rome or Paris is receiving a blessing, the folks living in Pompeii start hearing a rumble. These horrific events would seem to be an extremely strong indictment of an all-powerful being that is actually controlling events here on Earth. They raise serious questions. But religions have become quite adept at answering, or at least brushing off such intellectual inconveniences. “God has a plan” or “God works in mysterious ways” have become quick go-tos religious people use to explain all the ghastly things that God, if he is in control of events, does. To me, that seems to let God off the hook too easily, but that’s the subject of another article. Yes! There will be more! Your prayers (except for the “no earthquake” ones) have been answered! There is however one question that seems to stump believers every time I ask it of them. And I’ve never heard an answer more satisfying than “Fuck off Leach”, which I hear a lot, in a variety of contexts. And that question is this: Whatever different beliefs the various religions have, they all seem to agree on one thing. And that is that God is all about planet Earth. I grew up Jewish, we used to pray to God as “the king of the universe”, but all of his activities and all of his buddies, like Abraham or Moses, were Earthlings. The Christian Bible similarly says Jesus is the “ruler of the universe”, but Jesus was born and did all of his work right here, on Earth. It is the same for all the major religions. But here’s the thing. There are about 100 Quintillion planets in the known universe, give or take 6. Scientists believe that at least 1–5% could support life. That means, just some quick math here….carry the 4….comes to….a LOT!! A lot of planets could theoretically support complex life forms like ours. Trillions of them in fact. Statistically at least, it is extremely likely that there are other intelligent life forms in the universe. And they are all just chomping at the bit to get here so they can draw circles in our corn fields. So what happens if we discover other sentient beings in the universe? What does that mean? Jesus, Allah, Zeus, all talk a lot about critical theological events occurring in Jerusalem, Galilee or Sparta. Not so much about life on Kepler 62-F or Teegarden’s Star c. What relevance do Christianity’s or Buddhism’s teaching on, say... human sexuality, hold for beings that might not reproduce sexually? What do we make of the admonitions not to eat pork on a planet with no pigs? Or ONLY pigs? How does God number the hair on heads of creatures without heads? And how does God demand faith in or obedience to him or her when folks on planet Proxima Centauri B have never heard the Gospels or read the Ten Commandments? In other words, would discovery of intelligent life on other planets immediately and completely render all earthly religions void? Would God still exist, but relegated to merely being king of the Earth while those on planet Gliese 667 CC (we really have to get better at naming distant planets) have their own God or Gods? This presents critical, indeed existential questions for religions that started before humans understood anything about space or the cosmos. And it would seem troubling for the devout to know that a central tenet of their religion, that God reigns supreme over the universe, could be definitively disproven at any moment on any day. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/1/2190909/-The-One-Question-Religions-Have-Never-Been-Able-To-Answer Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/