Mano,
Your idea of religious believers’ motivation is not accurate. As a recovering Christian (sober for 8 years now), I can tell you that Christians do not, by and large, desire to “impress” their god when they make impressive buildings or statues. Rather, the desire is to honor their god in the same way a statue might be built to honor a president, a remarkable civil servant, etc. It’s the same as the motivation that prompts people to hang a huge image of Lebron James on their building, which had nothing to do with trying to impress Lebron, and everything to do with promoting pride and loyalty among the fans. The motivation is very similar for Jesus statues, and I think it’s perfectly understandable in that light.
Posts like this give religiously inclined people a good excuse to dismiss you as willfully ignorant of their beliefs and motivations, because if you wanted to know why they made the statue, you could easily ask them, and none of them would say it’s to impress their god. They then can feel justified in ignoring the rest of what you have to say about religion, which I think is a real shame, because your posts are usually very insightful.
I hope this was constructive criticism. Perhaps you could do a post on how Jesus statues serve the same purpose as giant images of Lebron James. That would really goad the religious because they know it’s true. I am enjoying the series on free will, by the way. I like how you include appropriate skepticism even of evidence that supports your view.
Mano,
Your idea of religious believers’ motivation is not accurate. As a recovering Christian (sober for 8 years now), I can tell you that Christians do not, by and large, desire to “impress” their god when they make impressive buildings or statues. Rather, the desire is to honor their god in the same way a statue might be built to honor a president, a remarkable civil servant, etc. It’s the same as the motivation that prompts people to hang a huge image of Lebron James on their building, which had nothing to do with trying to impress Lebron, and everything to do with promoting pride and loyalty among the fans. The motivation is very similar for Jesus statues, and I think it’s perfectly understandable in that light.
Posts like this give religiously inclined people a good excuse to dismiss you as willfully ignorant of their beliefs and motivations, because if you wanted to know why they made the statue, you could easily ask them, and none of them would say it’s to impress their god. They then can feel justified in ignoring the rest of what you have to say about religion, which I think is a real shame, because your posts are usually very insightful.
I hope this was constructive criticism. Perhaps you could do a post on how Jesus statues serve the same purpose as giant images of Lebron James. That would really goad the religious because they know it’s true. I am enjoying the series on free will, by the way. I like how you include appropriate skepticism even of evidence that supports your view.
Cheers.