Time and again we receive enquiries by email. Often they are students who want information for a school assignment, and we answer them factually. Sometimes they are questions that we have already answered on our website and to which we then refer. Sometimes it's sweeping insults that we have a good laugh at and don't otherwise respond to.
I find the ones that force us to think seriously first the most exciting. Among the latter is this one:
Dear Sir or Madam,
My name is xxx and I am currently studying Educational Science and Religious Studies at the University of Potsdam. Within the comparative studies module, I asked myself the question on the topic of understanding religion: "To what extent does the understanding of religion differ in communities that take a critical stance towards religions?" In this regard, I wanted to find out from you what official understanding the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster Germany e.V. has of religion.
With kind regards
Understanding of religion?
Does this mean how we understand our "religion"? Actually, everyone knows that we don't see ourselves as such, but as a worldview community. So is it more about our understanding of the worldview? Or is it about our understanding of religion, namely that of our religious satire? Or about our "ethical compass"?
A reference to our 8 ALWMs and the 10 offers of evolutionary humanism seemed quite appropriate. But the student was not satisfied with that and added:
....Thank you for the quick feedback, regarding my question. However, I still wanted to inquire what religion is in your eyes. For example, what constitutes a religion? Or to what extent one can distinguish between members and believers of religious institutions? Or whether a religion also has to have an institution?
That made it clearer and easier to answer.
Starting from the old saying of Karlheinz Deschner"That faith is something quite different from superstition is the greatest of all superstitions." we had long recognised, there is not the least reason to distinguish between faith and superstition. Something is noticeable, however, that what is called faith takes place in an organised form, superstition rather not. From this, our own definition of religion had developed:
Religion is organised superstition.
This does not necessarily require institutions, but rather "enlightened people" who claim to have received their enlightenment directly from gods, devils or anyone else. This is then proclaimed as the sole, unchanging truth and followers are won over.
What constitutes a religion? It is generally claimed to be indispensable as a moral-ethical source. How absurd. Of course it can be a moral-ethical source, but, as practice has shown and continues to show, not one of particularly high quality. By no means, however, is it necessary in order to act ethically. This has not only been proven by the almost godless GDR, which failed as a state, but whose people nevertheless for the most part had their creditable ethical principles. This is also shown by the example of the Christian missionary who went to the Amazon region to proselytise a primitive people. He was so taken with the way of life and morals of the indigenous people, who knew neither the word nor the practice of religion, that he abandoned his faith and stayed with them.
What constitutes religions are rather dogmas. Dogmas are prohibitions of thought and prohibitions of thought hinder social development. We have been deducing from this for a long time:
Religion is harmful to society.
Nevertheless, we recognise that everyone is free to profess and practise a religion. But only in a personal environment and without the claim of wanting to make one's religious dogmas those of society. We are therefore not only in favour of the separation of church and state, but above all in favour:
Separation of state and religion.
It is also interesting to ask to what extent one can distinguish between members and believers of religious institutions. I think that somehow the question of how far one has to distinguish between them resonates more strongly. A survey in the 1990s showed that about 10% of Catholics describe themselves as atheists, and as many as 20% of Protestants. So this distinction makes sense. So not all church members are really believers. There is the tradition, the pressure of the environment or simply the fear of losing one's job. According to church labour law, you can be fired if you leave the church.
Conversely, not all non-denominational people are atheists either, because many a believer already lives his faith alone and without an institution. It would be nice if there were more of them.
One last point is important to me. There should be no special rights for religious organisations. Neither in the labour law mentioned above, nor in other areas of law or in the form of organisation. The churches must be deprived of their status as public corporations and made subject to the law on associations, which would be conceivable as traditional associations.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)