Can True Liberals be Religious?

[F41]

It is said by most religious people we suffer on earth in order to appreciate and be saved by the grace of God (or gods). It is frankly an answer for their suffering. True liberals have a different idea of the cause and answer for the suffering of people. In other words liberals believe something can be done about the suffering in the world.

So, are you saying liberals believe they are the answer to all our sufferings and is our saving grace, therefore liberalism is God?

 

[LittleMammoth]

So, are you saying liberals believe they are the answer to all our sufferings and is our saving grace, therefore liberalism is God?

No I am saying that Liberals have a different ideas of the cause of suffering and different ways to alleviate it. Most true liberals would believe that a capitalistic society is one of the main cause of suffering so they would end capitalism to ensure true equality as opposed to equality of oppurtunity. This would help the general suffering of man kind.

Every political and economic theory is in itself a belief of the best way of life. Most moderates and conservatives believe capitalism is the saving grace. So I guess you can say yes liberal believe they are our saving grace but no more than moderates or conservatives think they are.

And as i stated before true liberals would not believe in a god or gods, instead their gods would become the well being of themselves and the rest of society. It is a different theory altogether which takes away any god(s) you can not have to answers especially if one combines the two. So no liberalism is not God, instead it is an answer which needs no God.

 

[F41]

So no liberalism is not God, instead it is an answer which needs no God.

Do all liberals feel this way?

 

[Apostle13]

And as i stated before true liberals would not believe in a god or gods, instead their gods would become the well being of themselves and the rest of society. It is a different theory altogether which takes away any god(s) you can not have to answers especially if one combines the two. So no liberalism is not God, instead it is an answer which needs no God.

I hardly think you are qualified to speak for the liberal masses... But in essence you are saying that liberals are their own gods..?

 

[steen]

Do all liberals feel this way?

No, Mammouth is making this up. This is another case of "If you are an X, then you should feel Y because I read that in a book." It is no different than a non-Christian telling you that "But if you are a Christian, you should...."

 

[Iriemon]

To be considered liberal, belief in a "good humanity" is inherent.

Disagree. The principle behind liberalism is that environment can effect whether there is good humanity.

In order to be able to come forth with ideas of true liberalism, such as complete social and economic equality, you would have to believe in a benevolent human nature.

This is not a true statement as to most liberals. Will you agree to the converse, that therefore an idea of true conservativism is complete social and economic inequality?

At the very least you would have to conclude that humans are not inherently bad.

I agree there were some adherents to behaviorialism in the 60s and 70s who posited that our personality is totally a construct of environment. This theory has been largely discredited, few liberals I know believe this is true. I think most liberals would agree that some (certainly not all) people are inherently bad.

The problem I believe this thread is running into is we are taking a definition based more on American Liberalism, in which issues such as universal health care are considered liberal, while true liberalism goes far beyond these issues.

I agree universal health care is a liberal position. Because we believe, unlike most conservatives, that environment does affect welfare (meant in the broad sense)

As for the topic of this thread I do not believe true liberals can be religious by any means. Religion as we can see throughout history has been the steadfast for the oppressed. Religion to these people was the one saving grace the only thing they could hold on to. It is said by most religious people we suffer on earth in order to appreciate and be saved by the grace of God (or gods). It is frankly an answer for their suffering. True liberals have a different idea of the cause and answer for the suffering of people. In other words liberals believe something can be done about the suffering in the world. These completely contradict themselves. Since there can not be more then one answer to the suffering of humans or the cause/reasoning for it, then true liberals can not be religious

I think there is some truth to this. There are many kinds of suffereing. I don't think that liberals pretend to think they can stop all suffering, of course not. But they do think that some suffering can be avoided.

The conservative view, as you have just said, is that suffering is goof for us because it makes us appreciate God. That's why they would eliminate funding for food, shelter, health and education. We liberals disagree that is the best course, or that is consistent with religion or God. You can find many references in the Bible about assistance to the poor and needy, that is completely consistent with a religious, Christian, belief system.

 

[LittleMammoth]

I hardly think you are qualified to speak for the liberal masses... But in essence you are saying that liberals are their own gods..?

In essence I am going more along the lines of Marx when he says "Religion is the opiate of the masses" He is saying relgion is the cure-all for the masses which he would not agree with. Marx would contend that a classless society would cure many of the ills of the world but religion would cloud this relization so religion would have to go. This is why during the reign of the French Revolution, in which there were many true liberals, the church was one of the first things to get limited. They believed that the religious reactionary peasants would have more loyalty to the clergy then the actual state.

I agree there were some adherents to behaviorialism in the 60s and 70s who posited that our personality is totally a construct of environment. This theory has been largely discredited, few liberals I know believe this is true. I think most liberals would agree that some (certainly not all) people are inherently bad.

To put oneself into a truly Liberal society it is self defeating if a human's nature is bad. In essence there is only one thing that seperates conservatives from liberals. Both agree that freedom is important, though both have different definitions of freedom either the negative or positive view on freedom. Where they differ is Equality, conservatives will want more order then equaltiy since human nature is inherently bad order is needed.

Take this basic political compass for Example. Choice one of each Order or Freedom, Equal or Freedom. In basic principle a libertarian would choose Freedom in both cases, while a reactionary would Order and Equality. Conservatives generally choose Order and Freedom, and lastly Liberals choose Freedom and Equality. This is a rudimentary compass and admitedly extremely rough.

Another argument for this would be ones view on the possible inheritance of estrangement. To be truly liberal you would have to take into account humans sociability. A liberal would believe that humans are naturally sociable in order to create an equal society. If humans are naturally sociable then the estrangement which we see today was learned. If estrangement is inherent then there is no way humans could be truly social creatures. I am not a huge fan of Rousseau, but I believe his theory on the social contract and the general will descibes liberalism in essence. The basis for his theory is that Humans are good in the state of human nature.

I agree universal health care is a liberal position. Because we believe, unlike most conservatives, that environment does affect welfare (meant in the broad sense)

My point with universal health care is most liberals would go far beyond just Universal Healthcare. This seems to be the limit of American Liberals expansion to the left. Most American liberals agree that universal healthcare is a right, but most do not think of or realize one of the basics of health is shelter and food. Liberals would have to first fix these basics of health before attacking medicinal health.

I think there is some truth to this. There are many kinds of suffereing. I don't think that liberals pretend to think they can stop all suffering, of course not. But they do think that some suffering can be avoided.

I just realized I came across as if I was saying liberals could stop all suffering which as you point out is of course not true. I just wanted to clear that up.

You can find many references in the Bible about assistance to the poor and needy, that is completely consistent with a religious, Christian, belief system.

I agree with this, I believe this is why I have heard many people say Jesus was a communist or even Jesus is not a republican. I do not disagree with the teachins instead I disagree with the institution of religion. Most of the great American liberals were deist, so they believed in a benevolent god, but were anti-religion. Two of the best known Deist were Jefferson (though he never outright said it) and Thomas Paine.

As you probably know liberalism, conservatism, and reactionary is on a sliding scale what was once considered liberal can be now considered conservative. I place the liberal deist on this scale, since I would say the majority of people, or atleast christians, are deist in some sense. I do not mean to say that the majority of people are anti-religion, instead most people who consider themselves to be of a certain religion do not go to church or even necessarily live by its teachins. For example France (I could definitely be wrong on the numbers, but I did read them somewhere and am not pulling them out of my butt) but i believe somewhere around 90% of the people in the country hold themselves to be catholic yet only 10% attend church.

I think one of the main problems we are running into here is the definition of liberal. I think the majority of people here are using U.S. liberalism as their definition while mine goes much more left then that. I know many of people who consider themselves to be liberal yet I would only consider two of them to actually be so. Not to change the subject of the thread I think what would be necessary to fully discuss this current subject is to give a definition of liberal since they vary from person to person.

 

[Iriemon]

As you probably know liberalism, conservatism, and reactionary is on a sliding scale what was once considered liberal can be now considered conservative

Agree. I used to be conservative. Now I'm liberal. I haven't changed.

I think one of the main problems we are running into here is the definition of liberal. I think the majority of people here are using U.S. liberalism as their definition while mine goes much more left then that. I know many of people who consider themselves to be liberal yet I would only consider two of them to actually be so. Not to change the subject of the thread I think what would be necessary to fully discuss this current subject is to give a definition of liberal since they vary from person to person.

Good luck with that!