Internet Dismantling the State Church In Finland 547
An anonymous reader writes "A Finnish secular web site that facilitates electronic resignation from the Finnish state church gained wide attention in the media this week. A gay rights TV panel discussion was followed by thousands resigning from the church. On Wednesday, 2633 people resigned through the web site, which is more than all the resignations in July. The Internet is secularizing the Finnish with increasing speed; over 90% of resignations in Finland go through the site administered and marketed by hobbyists driving Finland towards a secular, non-religious state."
Moral authority (Score:5, Insightful)
And note that what is driving people away is the immorality of the church. Which is ironic, given that the church probably defines itself as the high bastion of morality.
Re:Cool idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds nice but at least here in America the problems mainly come from protestant denominations, particularly southern and midwestern ones...
Re:Moral authority (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's not ironic as people automatically hold them to higher standards for exactly that reason.
Re:Moral authority (Score:0, Insightful)
No, it's not ironic as people automatically hold them to higher standards for exactly that reason.
So, people who go about telling how you should go about your life, cannot be held to a higher moral standard?
Huh.
Re:Moral authority (Score:1, Insightful)
No, it's not ironic as people automatically hold them to higher standards for exactly that reason.
I find that unlikely. In general they fail to meet common standards that people apply to themselves. The Catholic Church's attitude to covering up child abuse (seemingly in the belief that the law doesn't apply to their staff - how many other organisations would try to actively cover up for their employees, keep them on the payroll, and transfer them to work with children elsewhere, on receiving reports of child abuse?) but many smaller breaches of common moral principles are entrenched across a wise range of religious institutions e.g. widespread sex discrimination, to the point where they have succesfuly campaigned for exceptions to the laws that apply to everyone else.
Re:Fees (Score:2, Insightful)
The only thing that prevents me from leaving the catholic church in germany is the fee that I have to pay in order to get out. It's 30 (~42$) and a visit to the local court. I don't know if you have to pay a fee in finland.
No fee in Finland. I find it quite strange that an organization could charge a person for leaving it.
Re:Fees (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Cool idea (Score:2, Insightful)
Here in America the problems mainly come from people who believe stupid shit without demanding accountability from the people who told them the stupid shit. The stupid shit certainly isn't confined to one specific religious tradition or denomination.
Church tax?!? (Score:4, Insightful)
Living in NZ this astounds me! When I was a kid, mum used to give us coin each (20c, 50c or so) to put in the collection basket at our Catholic church. And I know some of the fundie religions (especially the evil Destiny Church) get all their fools to donate 10% of their income. But an actual church tax - now that's messed up.
I don't think there's such thing as paying to register/deregister at a church either.
Anyway, since I declined confirmation in my teens I'm now a reformed Catholic - an atheist.
Re:Church tax?!? (Score:1, Insightful)
It has been asked sarcastically, at least for the last decade, if companies in Finland have a chance to get to heaven when they go bankcrupt. If Nokia does face bankcruptcy, it'll certainly have good chances in the regard how much they have supported the state churches.
Then again, this may be a cleverly created joke by big companies, but the absurdity of the situation is - still - pretty obvious.
Re:Moral authority (Score:2, Insightful)
Since this exodus was caused by gay bashing it looks more like the morality the church preaches is no longer suitable for the modern times.
Re:Church tax?!? (Score:1, Insightful)
And I know some of the fundie religions (especially the evil Destiny Church) get all their fools to donate 10% of their income. But an actual church tax - now that's messed up.
What, you think NZ churches, including fake ones like Destiny, don't get tax breaks? It's the same thing -- just not quite so direct.
It's a good scam: pretty much any church qualifies as a "charity"; even though not many of them are; so they just need to get hold of that label, then hey presto! you're paying taxes to them.
Re:Moral authority (Score:3, Insightful)
What has the Catholic church got to do with it? This is about Finland, which is not a catholic country.
From the article:
.
Re:Somehow I dont think its a loss of religious fa (Score:4, Insightful)
And how many believers would choose to formally break links with their church for such small (considering the eternity...) savings?
No, those people shouldn't have been counted as members a long time ago. It's just that up to know they didn't care, even despite 1.3% (hey, good for some traditional services)
Re:Base Vs. Stakeholders (Score:4, Insightful)
..yet the pope pissed on Purgatory, stating that was not in line with the church's modern views.
Sorry, but RyanFenton is right. Faith and belief have little in common with organized religion. Organized religion is about manipulation, not faith.
So church does not equal faith.
But then, I'm against both.
I never knew... (Score:1, Insightful)
Am I the only person who is utterly flabbergasted that it appears to be that in most European countries, you're automatically enrolled in the state church without your consent, and on top of that, you pay -additional- income tax? Like... there's a line on your pay statement every month saying "Church Tax" or whatever? Amazing.
This accountability is a good thing all around (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm personally not religious, but I have no problem with people who are, as long as they don't act stupidly (being an American, this is something I see far too often). When taking a stupid position on a social issue can be observed directly to lead to a giant spike in defection, along with a corresponding giant financial loss, I think this gives the Church of Finland plenty of incentive to reconsider their social policies to keep up with social progress. Basically, they need to keep their customers happy for the money to continue to roll in. When opting out is easy, that just makes their work harder.
I have no doubt that this will be a good thing for the Finnish church in the long run, and it might be a good thing for the Christian religion altogether, because the progress that will be made by the Finns will, with time, possibly trickle into the church teachings in other countries.
Re:Moral authority (Score:1, Insightful)
So all other things being equal it's better for a child to be raised in a heterosexual same-race rich family
What's the logical step that you took to get to this point? Is there some proof that a racially diverse family is somehow worse than a uniform one? Or some proof that homosexual couples don't make better parents than heterosexual ones? The rich bit is well-studied though, so I'll give you that one.
Re:Moral authority ... of what kind? (Score:4, Insightful)
Ignoring of course who supposedly gave us that reason; an act which to fully get appreciated would need now to be... relinquished? OK... (nice how that faith works BTW, simply dispelling taking a broader look at what it holds dear, also just on the basis of where that look is hosted). And yes, congregations and their rituals evolved to induce mystical feelings, we know that. There are much easier ways if you want those.
Yes, people are generally bastards (which is of course the most straightforward reason why their gods and organizations are, too). However, certainly when looking at all the stats of positive societal factors, there is a very strong correlation between them and levels of organic secularism in a given place. BTW I can't speak much about French Revolution or Khmer Rouge, but I had a decently intimate insight into workings of European-area Warsaw Pact - and "strangely" enough, virtually all Party members were closet Christians, their kids baptized, attending services in the country, etc. With general level of religiosity still there and, at most, regimes usually trying to introduce on top of it their new state religions.
(there's another curious correlation BTW - take a look at a world map, take note of places which are historically strongly "old" Christian; now take note of places which had major problems with "communism" - notice any interesting overlap? I suspect it boils down to continuing reverberations of strong feudalism typical of those societies; certainly some sort of continuum - you thinking how it's a case of clear opposition, how it is sensible to use it as such, is another confusion on your part similar to one pointed out by the first of linked usenet postings)
Re:Moral authority (Score:5, Insightful)
Give me a time in history when people have held the church to a higher moral standard.
The church has been corrupt at least since about 300AD around the time of the Council of Nicea (and it was political before then). You want popes who kill and rape and are hungry for power? You want priests who abuse? You want catamites? You want greed? You want hypocracy? You want genocide? The church has it all. They are the poster boys for the Seven Deadly Sins. Why do you think they call them "Cardinal" Sins? Because all of the Cardinals commit them.
No, brother, the church has never, ever been held to a "higher standard". If anything, people have come to expect that priests will be alcoholic and/or pedophiliac/lazy/arrogant/greedy. It's become a cliche. We're pleasantly surprised when we find one who isn't.
And it's not just the Roman Church. If I say "pastor of a megachurch" what's the first thing that comes to mind? Some hairsprayed, holier-than-though, gay-hating, right-wing prig who gets caught sniffing crank off the butt of some rent-boy.
"Higher standard" my ass.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason that real Christians live seperated lives is that it helps keep down the tendency to sin.
Maybe people wouldn't have such a problem with Christians and other religious folk if they were out in the world living the way they believe they should even with temptation around them, where otherwise can see them behaving kindly and peacefully and living a wholesome life? You know, kind of like Jesus did?
If the only way you can keep yourself from doing what you consider wrong is to hide from it and pretend it doesn't exist, that doesn't make you good in my opinion, it makes you weak and likely a hypocrite who would jump at the first opportunity given to do whatever it is you consider wrong.
Re:Moral authority (Score:3, Insightful)
Something to keep in mind (Score:1, Insightful)
It bears remembering there is a massive difference between asking God to guide you in your execution of your own ideas, as did the framers of the constitution, and saying that you, defacto, speak for God, as do the current crop of TV ministers, evangelical shock troops and various self-anointed crusaders (of all nationalities).
I would ask such militants why their deity has adopted such a hands-off policy towards the suffering of the innocent in the world (especially the children) but the rules of Faith neatly circumvent their obligation to provide a cogent reply. And, from the clouds there comes also no answer.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it is only true that an ancient work of fiction alleges this. Homosexuality is a normal part of human existence. In terms of incidence its slightly more common than, say, red hair - is being ginger also wrong?
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:3, Insightful)
The reason that real Christians live seperated lives is that it helps keep down the tendency to sin.
If the reason you don't sin is because you avoid all temptation, and/or because you desire reward or fear punishment in the afterlife, you have accomplished nothing. Christianity fails to be a moral religion because it preaches that kind of pseudo-morality.
Re: They Will Be Sorry (Score:3, Insightful)
That's some pretty weak propaganda. Did you know there are proportionally more Christians than atheists in prison? The church is evil. We have the law. We have social values. We don't need AIDS-promoting magical crooks to rule us anymore.
Re:Moral authority (Score:4, Insightful)
I have never seen that in practice. I don't think a church based on RTFM would be very popular. Protestants still go to church and still listen to a preacher give a sermon on what he (or his parent organization) interprets a set of verses to mean.
One of the Catholic Church's arguments during the Reformation was that people needed help interpreting scripture. Now they went further to say that because of this regular people shouldn't have access to the text, which is going too far and does tend to foster the Church's self-serving tendencies. But most people who care about what the Bible says do seek help in interpreting it, and it's opaque enough to allow hundreds of denominations with differing beliefs to flourish.
Sola scriptura looks good on paper, but the fact that the Bible supports wildly different interpretations means it is less clear on many important issues than Luther realized.
Unsubscribe link != atheistic epiphany (Score:3, Insightful)
The Internet is secularizing the Finnish
If the internet is secularizing the Finnish, it isn't through this website, except for by some bureaucratic technical definition. This website is allowing those who had already been secular to easily make an official declaration of such, but it's not like devoted god-fearing true believers are finding this site and saying "you know, this internet form makes a good point. I guess since it's easy to unsubscribe from the church now, I don't believe in God anymore."
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:3, Insightful)
There is a reason it is called the 'Old' Testament.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:3, Insightful)
However, you are quite correct, secluding oneself from the world isnt really being faithful to what the bible calls for, either.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not like the question of homosexuality is the only moral question the bible got wrong. The bible condones slavery, stoning people to death for not observing the sabbath, and lots of other bad stuff. A careful reading shows that the bible is just full of stuff that most moral people now find wrong.
Most Christians decide right and wrong the same way atheists do: modern secular liberal thought that since the enlightenment has told us it is wrong to harm other people.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:5, Insightful)
And what is the Bible's argument that homosexuality is wrong? Oh, wait, there is no argument. The authors of the Bible just expect us to believe it on faith. And I will not condemn people on such a basis.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:5, Insightful)
But the Bible is objectively wrong about a great many things. Perhaps if that weren't the case, people would give your Bible-based arguments more credence.
As it is, I could just as easily quote L. Ron Hubbard to demonstrate the "wrongness" of a great many things that you probably don't see anything wrong with. Both sources have similar credibility.
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No, it means you don't understand irony. (Score:3, Insightful)
- Gregory House, M.D.