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I bolded the bit that you and I evidently disagree on. Baptism (especially posthumous) is a ceremony that I think is nonsense and mumbo-jumbo, but I don't think it "means nothing". It's symbolic. There's intent behind it. Of course it means something. And in the context of performing this ritual on behalf of somebody who didn't ask for it and wouldn't want it while alive, I think that constitutes a rather insulting lack of respect for the dead.
Because people who politely describe themselves as atheistic and disinterested in religion usually don't want to display, and be associated with, the bells and whistles of religiosity either. Example: I'm going to assume that as an upstandingly progressive and tolerant citizen you don't have any particular hostility towards Islam, but neither do you let the teachings of Islam affect your daily life. Right? Splendid! From now on, your job description involves leading the call to prayer; you'll be cheerfully calling "Allahu Ackbar" through the intercom five times a day before leading the faithful to the prayer room where you'll distribute the prayer mats and demonstrating the correct orientation to face Mecca. What's that? You're not sure you'll feel comfortable saying words you don't believe in, and you'll feel like a fraud taking part in cultural practices that are just empty pantomime to you? How ironic; I thought you said that this stuff was meaningless to you. Huh, I guess what you meant was that you're Islamophobic. | |
Baptizing the dead doesnt make any sense from a Christian standpoint. Even if like me you only see Baptism as a symbolic act not the actual accepting of salvation, a person cannot freely choose to accept God after they are dead so there is no point to Baptizing the dead. | |
Yeah, yeah, this is a retarded idea, yadda yadda yadda. Let's get to the important part. 'Baptizing a Dead Atheist' or something akin to that would make for both an awesome .tumblr AND a great name for a rock band. | |
So, question. Suppose the world went crazy and it's the other way around. A Christian dies, and I piss on their grave or their remains (maybe on camera or in front of a crowd) to show their supposed god is powerless and non-existant. Would that 'mean nothing' and be quite okay? Because basically it would be the same act: Using a symbolic deed to claim a dead person for one's political/religious cause. | |
hmm odd since thats desecrating a corpse by pissing on it, the corpse was not involved in this situation whatsoever, besides you wouldn't be the first to piss on a grave nor would you be the last. so i have no problems with it. | |
Well, personally I wouldn't give a fuck. If anything I'd think baptizing me into a faith after my death would be detrimental to the faith. | |
Speaking as a true athiest I say: Who cares, he's dead. | |
I don't think it's about them being dead, and disrespecting a corpse. I think it's about disrespecting them as a person. From a non-theistic perspective, it is a harmless act, but from the perspective of the people doing it, they believe the person still exists after they die on earth, and are therefore violating the person's views. It isn't the actual act, it is the emotional/theological baggage it has attached to it. | |
It's not about his beliefs, it's about respecting other people's choices. It's like saying "Don't believe in our religion? That's okay, we'll just wait till you're dead and baptize you anyway!" | |
It certainly comes across as a desire to circumvent someone's free will. | |
His stepfather was an atheist? I'm missing something. How did Romney become a Mormon in the first place? Anyway, i'm iffy on this. An atheist doesn't subscribe to any religion and he'd probably roll his eyes and if he were still alive and saw it being done with someone else. While i for one think that some respect should be maintained for dying wishes, Romney never struck me as the most reasonable and respectful individual. I'm opposed to him doing this, but in the end pretending to save a lost relative is a form of coping with death, and while i agree this should have been done with prayer i can sort of understand why Romney would do this if he were sincere in his beliefs. | |
Well, they think they are being nice, and they certainly aren't hurting anyone, they should be punished for any laws (if any) that they broke and that's it. They may as well be baptising a rock. It means absolutely nothing. | |
This is how a zombie apocalyspe will start. Rage from the grave. I wonder if my pagan symbols on my grave will protect me. | |
If there is an afterlife, I hope the baptizing of bodies fills their heaven with corpses. | |
Comes from Anti-theism. You cannot support religion in any way in case you end up accidentaly spreading its influence, letting into the demands of the religious fanatics would just be counter-productive to his/their final goal.And even if its just words, people cant force you to say something. Thats just stupid. (Unless its in the job description) And I highly doubt -Saying the daily prayer- was a part of that in a nursing home. So you probably had an anti-theist in denial rather than an atheist. An Atheist (A good one anyway) wouldnt care in the slightest, it literally doesnt affect him in the slightest that he has to spew some nonsense aslong as it makes some old folks happy. That being said, I believe as much in baptizing a dead man as unbatizing one (Which is just as much as a live one mind you, but thats not the point). And if we have to go that far we are obviously better off by starting an upbatization of all the saints. Maybe Jesus himself. And then we start the holy/unholy babtizing war where each side fought as hard as they could to baptize and unbabtize all the past spokesmen for each side. Scientists and saints alike. The war would last for twenty (un)bloody years before somebody realised how stupid it was. And everyone lived unhappily ever after knowing they had wasted actual time in their life doing something so meaningless and stupid. | |
These people believe in TALKING SNAKES, 900 year old men, genocide is fine as long as gawd willins it, etc. Is THIS really surprising? | |
If he was a true atheist I doubt he would care. | |
If he was truly dead, I doubt he would care. But I guess being an atheist he wouldnt really care in life aswell. So not caring in life or death, he is ultimately out of fucks to give. | |
First off, I didn't realise charges were being pressed against them? Secondly, it doesn't matter that they think they are being nice, what they are doing isn't saying "I hope there is an afterlife and that you are happy in it", it's saying "For all of your accomplishments, beliefs, loves, hates, and experiences, we still think we are more qualified to decide your fate than you are (were, in this case)". I'm not saying it should be illegal (I'm not saying it shouldn't be, I haven't given it enough thought to go endorsing legislation one way or the other), I'm just saying it is incredibly disrespectful and they shouldn't have done it. | |
Thats my reaction. Sure its a little disrespectfull. In the same way if my family member asked for a small funeral and i had a bouncy castle with clowns and bears on unicycles instead with a thousand guests it would be disrespectful. Any idiot could see it would be a waste of time and that doing this to their family member is pretty much the same as the above. That said it doesnt make any difference really other than being an idiotic and humorous time waste. And marking them as a little creepy. I can wave some water around and bless ye in might cthulus name and id think it has the same effect. As long as my organs get out to people after i die do whatever the hell you want with me. I personally want to be either used for fertiliser for trees or medical research. Whatever floats their boat. Just laugh, im sure thats what the relative would do. At the end of the day hes dead now and he lived and died an atheist. If hes an atheist like me thats all there is to it.
This image made me chuckle. | |
I think most of the Escapist, and world for that matter, fails to understand that Mormons don't automatically say "Dead Grandpa Joe is now a Mormon" so much as "Dead Grandpa Joe, who never heard about Mormonism in his lifetime, now has the choice to listen and accept it if he wants". Ignore your own beliefs concerning an afterlife and just take a moment to understand what these baptisms represent: an invitation and a choice, nothing more. | |
The guy's dead... Does it matter if some people perform an act directed at him that he'd disagree with were he alive? They're doing it with the best of intentions, and they're not hurting anyone. | |
Unless their ritual actually damned him, contrary to their expectations. | |
Using that logic, anything you can do following someone's death should be avoided.
Not in the mormon faith. | |
This is pretty disgusting. I was unaware the moron church did this. | |
I get the argument that 'he's dead, why should he care' but i think its more about abusing the man's legacy. They are using the fact that he's not around to speak out to rewrite his memory into something more appealing to them and i can think of no greater act of disrespect. I mean, it would be just as outrageous to say Wilbeforce was pro-slavery, or appropriate Churchill's legacy to support far-right causes (i'm looking at you BNP). Furthermore, i would argue that something doesn't necessarily have to have a victim in order to be a dick move. | |
Oh wow... This is just repulsive, I wish I never knew about this happening. | |
And this is a perfect example of the rhetorical wiggle used by many atheists. They believe there is no god. But they also want to feel superior to religious people. And acknowledging that theirs is a belief takes away that ability to feel superior. So they claim to merely "lack belief". "No, man, I'm not doing the exact same thing as you and making a completely unsupportable claim about the nature of the Universe! I just don't believe. That makes me better than you, because I'm like, more logical and stuff." But then they eventually give up the game by behaving like your friend. This isn't all atheists, maybe not even most atheists. But damn, there are a lot of atheists (particularly on their internet) whose atheism is slipperier than a greased eel. As for the baptism thing, on a certain level it's wrong but it's also completely inconsequential. I just can't fathom how people get worked up about it, and I think it's probably more culture club bickering than actually dealing with a problem. It's kinda like that Taiwanese group that was all upset that some priests at the Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo claimed that some spirits of Taiwanese people were enshrined there. Meanwhile a few hundred yards away there's a museum that says that Chinese people are incapable of governing themselves and were therefore happy that the superior Japanese invaded. Somehow all of that gets a miss, because a guy in a large hat next door is waving a wand and saying things that don't agree with what the guy in your club says when he wears a large hat and waves a wand. | |
What logic? I just stated another possibility that was just as speculative as the possibility of the Mormon's action being helpful. I think you ought to not do anything other than what the person would want.
Seems about as likely as post-mortem baptism helping. | |
What's the point if you're not getting baptized by your own free will? All your doing is putting your dead father in water. | |
Eh. I don't think he wanted it, and by being an atheist, he probably voiced that opinion. In a spiritual sense, I think they did the equivalent of raping his soul. | |
And I made the point that said possibility should not disincentivize the act.
He would most certainly want it if he was sitting there in limbo.
Sure, he probably didn't want it, but what does that matter?
You are aware that they don't actually dig up the corpse and submerge it in water, right? Okay people, why is it that the moment someone is being baptised after they're dead, that's a horrible thing to do, but baptising infants who are actually alive but get no say in the matter, and raising said infants under heavy influence of the parents' religion, is seen as perfectly acceptable? | |
But you have not admitted that the opposite possibility should not incentivize it either. This is inconsistent. If they're wrong, nothing happens or it's negative. If they're right, something positive happens. Therefore they do not have a justification to do it other than assuming that they are right. Given that the one they are purporting to be affecting did not want their 'help' in life, that assumption is not an appropriate justification for their behavior. | |
My point is that "Nothing happens, or something negative does" is true for every action you take in life. You took a step? Maybe you doomed some unfortunate sould who was residing in that piece of gravel. So if we take the liberty of burying the body, why shouldn't we allow the mormons to say a blessing for the dead? | |
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I don't really see the point in baptizing a dead person. I mean, if they're dead, isn't it already too late?