The Puzzle of Religion

The Puzzle of Religion PDF Author: Douglas Hufschmid
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN: 9781794109117
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 140

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Book Description
It's fairly easy to see the ways in which science has advanced over the years, forming truths and laws that many people accept worldwide. Yet most religions resist change, and, in turn, most religions remain backward and divisive. Is there potential for better human unity if we demystify the puzzle of religion as we have demystified other puzzles? Douglas Hufschmid explores these topics and more in The Puzzle of Religion. With astute investigations into contemporary religious beliefs, Hufschmid seeks to unravel the ways in which religion must compete with other aspects of modern life, such as science, the Internet, and Hollywood. The Puzzle of Religion dives deep into the fascinating contradiction between scientific advancement and religious stagnation.The better we can understand our desire for advances within science, the better we can understand why the world's religions lack similar advances. Is it possible to develop a worldwide consensus on religion? For every human to hold the same set of truths-as is the case with science? As The Puzzle of Religion unveils, this consensus could be the missing piece in unity. It could be the last piece in the puzzle for world peace.

The Puzzle of Religion

The Puzzle of Religion PDF Author: Douglas Hufschmid
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN: 9781794109117
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 140

Get Book

Book Description
It's fairly easy to see the ways in which science has advanced over the years, forming truths and laws that many people accept worldwide. Yet most religions resist change, and, in turn, most religions remain backward and divisive. Is there potential for better human unity if we demystify the puzzle of religion as we have demystified other puzzles? Douglas Hufschmid explores these topics and more in The Puzzle of Religion. With astute investigations into contemporary religious beliefs, Hufschmid seeks to unravel the ways in which religion must compete with other aspects of modern life, such as science, the Internet, and Hollywood. The Puzzle of Religion dives deep into the fascinating contradiction between scientific advancement and religious stagnation.The better we can understand our desire for advances within science, the better we can understand why the world's religions lack similar advances. Is it possible to develop a worldwide consensus on religion? For every human to hold the same set of truths-as is the case with science? As The Puzzle of Religion unveils, this consensus could be the missing piece in unity. It could be the last piece in the puzzle for world peace.

The Puzzle of Christianity

The Puzzle of Christianity PDF Author: Peter Vardy
Publisher: HarperCollins UK
ISBN: 000820425X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
An excellent overview of Christianity, suitable for students (and teachers!) embarking on the new GCSE and ‘A’-Level Religious Studies specifications.

The Puzzle of Religion

The Puzzle of Religion PDF Author: Louis J. Hammann
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 175

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Book Description


The Role of Religion in History

The Role of Religion in History PDF Author: George Walsh
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351474847
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 171

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Book Description
This comprehensive survey of religion and its profound effects on history provides a historical context for in-depth analysis of theological, social, and political themes in which religion plays a major role. George Walsh first traces the rise and impact of primitive religions. He looks at Indian traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism and analyzes the Semitic tradition of Judaism and Christianity and the evolving conception of a personal God. He discusses the history and chief doctrines of Islam as well, with its fundamental respect for desert tribal values and its emphasis on both the authority of God and the brotherhood of believers. Walsh then compares Judaism and Christianity. He sees Judaism as marked by a profound ambivalence between the values of tribal, nomadic desert life and the values of urban civilization, individualism, and collectivism. Judaism is "this-worldly," but the Christian worldview is "other-wordly." Walsh closes with a timely discussion of the ethical, political, and economic teachings of the Judeo-Christian tradition, focusing specifically on their differing attitudes toward sex, reproduction, and marriage; their basic views of mind and body; and man's relation to God.

Making Sense of the Sacred

Making Sense of the Sacred PDF Author: James L. Rowell
Publisher: Augsburg Fortress Publishers
ISBN: 150646808X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
This work argues that there is a universal message that can be found in the study of religions. It offers a comprehensive examination of religions and their meaning, bound by the hope and affirmation that in some way they are universally connected. It affirms a universalism by wisdom, which contends that a moral and spiritual wisdom can be found in many of the world's religions.

The Puzzle of God

The Puzzle of God PDF Author: Peter Vardy
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317455037
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
The Puzzle of God takes a distinctive approach to the complex issues surrounding what it means to claim that God exists. It examines the different ideas of God in common use today, and applies these to the central areas of belief, such as eternal life, prayer, miracles, and talk of God's love, omnipotence and omniscience.

The Reluctant Messenger of Science and Religion

The Reluctant Messenger of Science and Religion PDF Author: Stephen W. Boston
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 1462065589
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description
Science teaches evolution. Genesis describes creation. Christianity, Judaism, and Sufism teach resurrection. Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sikhism teach reincarnation. The Reluctant Messenger of Science and Religion resolves these paradoxes. Chester and Lydia meet in a debate. One wins. One loses. Neither are ever the same. Lydia discovers a secret from her past that destroyed her family. She tries to ignore it, but her nightmares won't let her. Chester's greed for gold and revenge lead him to ancient knowledge which the powers of darkness fight to suppress. When the information last came to light, thousands died. Somehow, Chester must safely reveal it to the world. "This is the most inspirational story I have ever read! Honest!" Clint Hoadley re: www.reluctant-messenger.com

The Attraction of Religion

The Attraction of Religion PDF Author: D. Jason Slone
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1472529685
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 271

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Book Description
Religion is an evolutionary puzzle. It involves beliefs in counterfactual worlds and engagement in costly rituals. Yet religion is widespread across all human cultures and eras. This begs the question, why are so many people attracted to religion? In The Attraction of Religion, essays by leading scholars in evolutionary psychology, anthropology, and religious studies demonstrate how religion may be related to evolutionary adaptations because religious commitments involve fitness-enhancing behaviours that promote reproduction, kinship, and social solidarity. Could it be that religion is wide-spread, at least in the modern world, because it helps to facilitate cooperative breeding? International contributors explore the philosophical and theoretical arguments for and against the use of costly signalling, sexual selection, and related theories to explain religion, and empirical findings that support or disconfirm such claims. The first book-length treatment that focuses specifically on costly signalling, sexual selection, and related evolutionary theories to explain religion, The Attraction of Religion will be an important contribution to the field and will be of interest to researchers in the fields of evolutionary psychology, religion and science, the psychology of religion, and anthropology of religion.

Finding Pieces of the Puzzle

Finding Pieces of the Puzzle PDF Author: Ronald A. N. Kydd
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
ISBN: 1621890600
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 284

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Book Description
Climate change. Radical politics. National debt. Globalization. What do Christians have to say to the big questions we all face? Whatever they try to say, they will be seriously handicapped if they do not know their own story. Finding Pieces of the Puzzle will fill the knowledge gap. It breaks away from the usual manner in which history is written. Here is a sweeping overview of the story of Christianity that takes the reader to parts of the world seldom visited, that watches as the message of Christ encounters cultures as different as ninth century Persia and sixteenth century Kongo. The story is carried from the first to the twenty-first century by a series of mini-biographies--a young woman facing martyrdom, a boy from a little French town who becomes Pope and launches an army, an African-American who uses a successful international trade network to combat slavery. The glory, the confusion, the shame, the holiness of Christianity are all here. As the pieces are slipped into place, the puzzle begins to make sense. Watching Christians of the past face their challenges helps us understand who modern Christians really are.

Faces in the Clouds

Faces in the Clouds PDF Author: Stewart Elliott Guthrie
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0195356802
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 335

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Book Description
Religion is universal human culture. No phenomenon is more widely shared or more intensely studied, yet there is no agreement on what religion is. Now, in Faces in the Clouds, anthropologist Stewart Guthrie provides a provocative definition of religion in a bold and persuasive new theory. Guthrie says religion can best be understood as systematic anthropomorphism--that is, the attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman things and events. Many writers see anthropomorphism as common or even universal in religion, but few think it is central. To Guthrie, however, it is fundamental. Religion, he writes, consists of seeing the world as humanlike. As Guthrie shows, people find a wide range of humanlike beings plausible: Gods, spirits, abominable snowmen, HAL the computer, Chiquita Banana. We find messages in random events such as earthquakes, weather, and traffic accidents. We say a fire "rages," a storm "wreaks vengeance," and waters "lie still." Guthrie says that our tendency to find human characteristics in the nonhuman world stems from a deep-seated perceptual strategy: in the face of pervasive (if mostly unconscious) uncertainty about what we see, we bet on the most meaningful interpretation we can. If we are in the woods and see a dark shape that might be a bear or a boulder, for example, it is good policy to think it is a bear. If we are mistaken, we lose little, and if we are right, we gain much. So, Guthrie writes, in scanning the world we always look for what most concerns us--livings things, and especially, human ones. Even animals watch for human attributes, as when birds avoid scarecrows. In short, we all follow the principle--better safe than sorry. Marshalling a wealth of evidence from anthropology, cognitive science, philosophy, theology, advertising, literature, art, and animal behavior, Guthrie offers a fascinating array of examples to show how this perceptual strategy pervades secular life and how it characterizes religious experience. Challenging the very foundations of religion, Faces in the Clouds forces us to take a new look at this fundamental element of human life.