Comments on: Can Religion Make You Happy?

By: Sanket Sunand Dash

Sanket Sunand Dash — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 08:29:32 +0000

The post assumes that people follow/not follow religion to be happy. But my experience says that that truly devout look upon themselves as tools of God. They wish and strive for the fulfillment of God’s plans and acknowledge that God could fulfill God’s plans without using them. Happiness is a by-product of striving to fulfill God’s plans and can be sacrificed if God’s plans so demand. This attitude may make them happier but this attitude does not put happiness as the highest goal and acknowledges that God’s plans and their happiness may be divergent.

By: Lelys

Lelys — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:24:56 +0000

I liked the post and Elisa’s answer too!
My stand in religious issues is agnostic. I can’t relate to religion as an issue of logic, tough it is not merely an issue of feeling either. it’s about faith and that has a lot to do with trust. What makes it scary for some and bliss for others is that true trust doesn’t come from any book or set of rules, tough many religions are practiced like that.
I see religions dealing with issues that each and every person deals at some point, the big issues that come with birth, death and basically: what is the point for me or everyone else being here?
From religion you can, if you want (or are raised to) get the easy answer as given. Then there are us who (with or without religion) deal with these issues and question their standpoint on a daily (ok, maybe on a yearly) basis.

By: elisa freschi

elisa freschi — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 13:07:28 +0000

Interesting post, as usual. However, I dissent with the basic assumption that religion is comforting. It may, on the contrary, be quite threatening to oneself (think at Kierkegaard or at film director Ingmar Bergman). More in general, I am afraid that what you identify as typical of “religion” is instead typical of (many?) religious people. These people obey to their religion because they do not want (perhaps for good reasons, such as the terminal illness you mentioned) to ponder long about it. But they would cling to a political ideology in the same way. On the other hand, many people understand religion as a constant questioning of oneself, of God (god) and reality in order to become aware, e.g., of His/Her (his/her) will.