This is nice, having other LDS people here .

I'd just like to add one thing.

Homosexuality is stated once again, in the New Testament, as an abomination, whereas Christ states that he was bringing a higher law than the law of Moses. Romans 1:27 from the New Testament states that homosexuality is an abomination, so it applies to us today. The law of Moses was for the people back then. Christ brought the higher law which we live by, but we can still see the symbolism of the law of Moses and why it was important, and learn from history.

Ygraine, I don't really know what to say to you... wow, i think that's a first. All I can say is that not everyone does feel the same way as you.

I can't tell you how happy my mother is that the Mormon missionaries came and knocked on her door. I can't tell you how happy I am. It changes many lives, and people will continue to try to help others feel the happiness that they have received through their religion.

The thing is, until you experience it, you won't know if you prefer atheism or ... religion. You can't make a judgment based on only one point of view. You need to consider the other possibilities and see what they could bring into your life.

I understand that it can get annoying, but (I don't know if you have, but if you haven't) maybe you should look into religion a bit more. Try it out. Then when people come up to you, you can tell them what you've experienced, and why you think you'd be happier without God....

I dunno, just an idea.

No, no, no, no, no....

One more mention of homosexuality here and I'll throw an absolute mental fit...and believe me, with my computer playing up right now and taking about an hour to make each post resulting in me having an extremely frayed temper, you really don't want me throwing fits...

Debate religion all you want guys, but no more homosexuality mudslinging - I locked the thread because of that and I won't hesitate to do the same thing here.

I don't have a religion. Never had and probably never will (although you never know what will happen)

I certainly don't believe that there's one god that has created the entire world. I just don't think that is possible, because if he can do it, everyone should be capable. It also doesn't make sense to me that if there were a god, why there's so much misey in the world. Wars raging on, hunger in development countries, terrorism all over the world. If there is a god that has the power to create the entire world, he'd certainly have to power to resolve those issues. If there was a god, that controls everything he should get in control of that first.
Also I think it's crap that there are a lot of people that tend to "blame" (don't know how to say that differently) god for everything that happens to them. If they get very ill or someone they know dies it is like: it must have been god's will. I just think that you should take your reponsibilty not that you're responsible for everything you do, but it's just too easy to say that it was god who caused it.

I feel therefore, much more related to the thinking of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Multiple gods for multiple things. Not that I worship Mars as a god of war or Venus as the godess of love, that not. For myself I think there aren't any gods and certainly not just one that controls everyone and everything that happens on this planet. It just doesn't make sense to me.

I've been on a Christian primary school and I've read the bible, but it didn't appeal to me. As far as I'm concerned there's a lot of old-fashioned crap in there (don't mean to offend anyone, but that's jus how I see it), although there are a few things I do think that are important (like treat someone else the way you'd want to be treated by someone else, that kind of things). Right now I'm at a Catholic high school, but we don't get any religion-classes specifically about Catholicism. We do have a sort of religion-class (which is very boring, but that's because of the teacher, the subjects can be very interesting), but that class is about all sorts of religions. And I certainly think it's very important to learn about (other) religions, to prevent conflicts between different groups. But I don't think you should be told by anyone what to believe, to be told what religion you should have. Many parents do that in some sort of way when they get their new-born baby to the church and get it baptized (never heard of this word, but it was in my dictionary ), for me that is the same as forcing you're child to have that religion. And I'm very glad my parents decided not to do it, and agreed on letting me decide for mysef.

I also don't believe there's somethinglike heaven and hell. It, again, just doesn't make sense that people will get judged by someone whether they behaved good enough to go to heaven or that they'll be send to hell. I do believe there's something after death, some sort of spirit-world where we'll go after we die, but I'm not quite sure what it is, yet. Maybe it'ssome sort of world where we all live together, watching over our beloved ones, sending them signs or maybe it's something completely different. I'll find out when I die (which is hopefully not soon) and untill that time I won't worry about.

You must not think that I do not respect other people's religions because of what I think, because I do. I think it is very important that you respect someone else, including his or her religion even if you don't share the ideas. I think you should at least try understand how the other feels about religion and don't reject someone by their ideas and their beliefs.

I hope nobody's offended by my post, if you are I'm sorry!

I don't mean to bring this to a personal level at all Dana, but homosexuality was only brought up about two times, and that is because it does play a big part in religon. It wasen't whether or not they hated homosexuality or not, they simply said that their religon(in the bible) says that homosexuality is an abomination, which does relate to the topic at hand.
I agree with Potter Artist that most of the things meant just what they said in the bible, that it was unhealthy to do some of those things, such as the pigs, and other certain kinds of animals.

I'm a muslim, and proud!!! A lot of stuff in my religion my friends dont agree with, but thats just them. A lot of people have said, that God made a plan for us all. A lot of people believe so, but I don't. I believe that God did not make a plan for us, but he knows what we do in the present, have done in the past, and what we will do in the future. I believe that he lets us do what we want, without interfering. I myself, do not believe in homosexuality, but I respect other peoples beliefs on it. I know some homosexuals, and the way I think of them doesnt change. They're just people. As for Jesus being God, noooo. It is not possible. I believe Jesus is a messenger of god, not a son, or actually God. If any of you hqave read the bible, you'd know that a story is in there, where Jesus is moved around by the Devil. Would God ever let the Devil move him around? I personally dont think so. I know people of lots of different religion, and I respect them all. Some of the stuff they believe in, I might not agree totally with, but I dont see them as different, and I don't question why they belive what they do.
Sorry for the life story there!
~xx~

I think Methodist Christianity is the closest thing to what I believe. I believe in Jesus and I think I believe in God (not god but God) however I do not believe in all entirety the Bible, I do not believe that it was God inspired. I believe that the Bible was made by the men in power who used it as a way to subdue their people, a way to say behave yourselves or you will be cast into hell. I simply do not believe that a God of love would himself (meh) or have others commit such things as mentioned in the Bible, and to use my favourite quote "I believe in a God, not a book."

I am a Roman Catholic and Proud of it! I definately believe all of the Bible's contents. But thats just what I think.

Righto, well I'm a Roman Catholic, but not a very good one according to my friends . I grew up going to Catholic schools and basically being told why all the other religions in the world are wrong. This really upset me - I hate it when people bash other people's beliefs. So I pretty much think that the important part is not what you believe in, but that you believe, ya know? I believe that all religions worship the same god, they just have different ways of doing it, and maybe have different names for their dieties. There are many aspects of my religion that I really don't agree with, especially the judgemental ones (many of the people I know are hardcore Catholics & this is why they think I'm a heathen ). Anywho, I pretty much think all religions are acceptable.

After a great deal of discussion amongst the moderators, we have arrived at the decision to lock all of the real life issues threads. It is not a decision we have made lightly.

On behalf of all the moderators, I would like to sincerely apologise that this action has become necessary, but we all feel that there is just no choice.

This is primarily a Harry Potter Forum and although we do have this Just Get Away From Life forum for you to discuss whatever you would like to, we all feel that many of these threads are becoming out of control, nasty, personal and are detracting from the spirit not only of Harry Potter, but of this site as a whole and are moving us away from the reason we all came here in the first place.

We foster a pleasant and friendly environment here and have worked very, very hard to maintain that through our rules, but we really feel that these threads are doing far more harm than good. I am very aware that some of you posting here have been PM'ing each other, thinking that the moderators won't see you being abusive, but we always get wind of these things and this has been an additional reason for our decision.

We really don't mean to be stepping on anyone's fun here and we do feel very sorry for those of you who truly enjoyed the debates, but unfortunately, these threads have just caused far too much hassle, have taken up way too much of our time behind the scenes in sorting out problems and this has taken us away from where we need to be - mediating the HP discussions. Unfortunately, it just appears that, try as we might, we cannot get everyone to understand the difference between debating and being aggressive and confrontational and I'm afraid that we just don't have the time to devote to these anymore. All these threads do is create tension, animosity and arguments and that just isn't conducive to the type of environment we're trying to maintain here.

Again, we apologise sincerely that this has become necessary, but we really hope all the contributors here will understand.

Please don't PM the moderators about this - our decision was unanimous and final and we won't be retracting it. Also, please do not create any more threads like this as they will be closed down and the rules will very shortly be changed to accomodate this new decision.