DGP ch15!

In a world were religion is such big part of people's lives and cultures, it is obvious that people would make big deals about this subject.  In this chapter of DGP it was very eye opening on how much diversity and different aspect people put into their religious point of views.  They described religion as having four important social beliefs being one gives people a sense of identity, two offers it's believes an interpretive framework for understanding the world's past, present, and future, three contains rules and standards that are supposed to guide the thoughts and actions of believers, and lastly four provides the methods for passing it's beliefs, rules, and institutions from one generation to the next.

I am personally not from a direct religious background so I really am not entitled to one religion, but I can say that I do like many of the beliefs that many religions present, but I am sad to say that I also have many negative views on religions as wells.  First I will start with the good aspect of religion which I actually really enjoy is that it gives people something to believe in.  Religion is a sense of hope for anything, it always gives people something to believe in and to use in a positive aspect, I mean let's face it, everyone needs something to believe in.  For example when all hope is lost people can always turn to their religion for a sense of hope and light so really do love the support system that it supplies people with.  Another positive aspect of religion that I really like is that it brings people together, it gives people a common ground to stand on and something to pull communities closer together.  Religion just has so many positive points that can bring so many different people together and closer as human beings.  I feel that religion has so many positive things that can bring people together, the overall ideas of religion are actually very positive and enlightening.

But I am sad to say that I also have some point of views on religion that are not so positive.  I do not really like the fact on how controlling religions can be, I mean ya they give people ideas on good beliefs, but I feel like they try to control people way too much.  Religions should be helping people live their lives, not controlling them, they do guide people in the right direction sometimes, but they can be a bit forceful.  Honestly just from my prospective is that religions just try to be in power of people way too much, but that's just me.

Overall religions will have its pros and cons like anything in life and this chapter has presented me with various different backgrounds and ways that you can look at them, but I am still entitled to my opinion.