(no subject)

[rowyn]

Trickster took this belief selector quiz. Normally I don't go in for quizes, but I decided to give this a try. My top five results were:

1. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (100%)
2. Liberal Quakers (77%)
3. Orthodox Quaker (76%)
4. Unitarian Universalism (73%)
5. Reform Judaism (67%)

My bottom five were:

23. Taoism (33%)
24. Jainism (27%)
25. Nontheist (24%)
26. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (23%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (11%)

So. I'm definitely not a Jehovah's Witness. Well, that's a relief.

I thought it was pretty telling that the quiz never asks questions like "Do you believe in the divinity of Christ?" or "Do you believe in {name of deity of your choice}?" The theme seems to be that it doesn't matter who or what you believe in, so much as 'what is your divine kinda like' and 'how does your religion expect you to behave'.

Mph.

Comments

[prester-scott.livejournal.com]

...thus asserting that religion is valuable chiefly (or only) as emotional therapy and community belonging. That it could be a philosophical construct, a mode of spiritual experience, or a path of self-transformation is missed, obviously.

[rowyn]

Yes. I think that sums it up quite nicely. Thank you.

Spiritual Enlightenment

[awolf.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's missed at all.

Spiritual enlightenment like you describe (a philosophical construct, a mode of spiritual experience, or a path of self-transformation) is available to people in any religion. At least, as far as subjective reports go, it seems to be.

So those sorts of things don't really differentiate one religion from the next. Whether or not they're more important is an interesting question, but they're certainly not relevant to the quiz.

Trickster

There are some questions on beliefs just without detail

[(Anonymous)]

On the first page of the quiz, there are questions about the attributes of God and the universe (why is there evil, are there souls, what type of consequences are associated with actions ....) I think that the problem with the survey along the lines you've described is not that is fails to ask about beliefs, but that the questions it chooses are not well designed to focus on Christian beliefs. For example, a Christian would probably be choosing among these answers for question 1: --Only one God, a corporeal spirit (has a body), supreme, personal God Almighty, the Creator --Only one God, incorporeal (not body) spirit , supreme, personal God Almighty, the Creator. --Multiple personal gods (or goddesses) regarded as facets of one God, and/or as separate gods. None of these accurately reflects the concept of the trinity since the 3rd choice implies more separateness than traditional Christian belief. There are some places to be more specific, though. For example, selecting one human incarnation in question 2 is a close approximation to saying that you believe in the divinity of Christ (or at least I can't think of another major religion besides Christianity which has a single human incarnation of God). I don't think the quiz was designed nearly as poorly as you two do since I think its goal is to sort out belief systems which the author may not have heard of in advance in addition to the traditional beliefs of major American religions. To do this, the questions have to be broadly worded. It's true that none of the questions ask about specific beliefs: "Should the record of Mohamed's life (the Sunna) take precedence over directives of Imams?" (i.e. are you a Shiite or Sunni Moslem). In practice, though, there are too many such questions which would need to be asked to cover all major religions and still leave the survey of reasonable length. There are also more detailed surveys available in some categories which become visable after you click on one of the denominations that the first survey selected. One that I saw was on kinds of non-theists. So, the author at least understands that this problem exists. Perhaps there are similar surveys on Christian denominations which do ask more detailed questions. I don't think that the approach of focusing on general attributes denies the possibility that a religion is an internally consistent philosophy which is adopted by its adherents based on their beliefs and desire to live by its rules. Those types of attributes, though, don't lend themselves to identifying which religions share general values similar to a given person's. Someone with strongly held specific beliefs and a community with which he worships doesn't need a survey to identify that community. I see this, instead, as suggesting places where someone with general beliefs who has not yet found a community might explore to see if the other aspects of those religions are a good fit. I don't see anything wrong with this process. It always struck me as unfortunate that most people are born into their religions and make decisions about how observant they want to be, but not about whether that religion is the best choice for them. If surveys like this help even a handful of people to find a religion more in line with their preferences (whether those preferences are related to views on doctrinal, social or even cultural issues), I think it has a useful role. Disclaimer: I'm an athiest myself, and have somewhat cynical views about how most (but not all) people choose their religious affiliation and the effects of religious doctrine on human progress, but that doesn't mean I'm evangelical about my beliefs. Telnar

Re: There are some questions on beliefs just without detail

[(Anonymous)]

Ouch -- "Don't auto-format didn't do what I expected" Here is is again:

On the first page of the quiz, there are questions about the attributes of God and the universe (why is there evil, are there souls, what type of consequences are associated with actions ....) I think that the problem with the survey along the lines you've described is not that is fails to ask about beliefs, but that the questions it chooses are not well designed to focus on Christian beliefs. For example, a Christian would probably be choosing among these answers for question 1:


--Only one God, a corporeal spirit (has a body), supreme, personal God Almighty, the Creator

--Only one God, incorporeal (not body) spirit , supreme, personal God Almighty, the Creator.

--Multiple personal gods (or goddesses) regarded as facets of one God, and/or as separate gods.

None of these accurately reflects the concept of the trinity since the 3rd choice implies more separateness than traditional Christian belief. There are some places to be more specific, though. For example, selecting one human incarnation in question 2 is a close approximation to saying that you believe in the divinity of Christ (or at least I can't think of another major religion besides Christianity which has a single human incarnation of God).

I don't think the quiz was designed nearly as poorly as you two do since I think its goal is to sort out belief systems which the author may not have heard of in advance in addition to the traditional beliefs of major American religions. To do this, the questions have to be broadly worded.

It's true that none of the questions ask about specific beliefs: "Should the record of Mohamed's life (the Sunna) take precedence over directives of Imams?" (i.e. are you a Shiite or Sunni Moslem). In practice, though, there are too many such questions which would need to be asked to cover all major religions and still leave the survey of reasonable length. There are also more detailed surveys available in some categories which become visable after you click on one of the denominations that the first survey selected. One that I saw was on kinds of non-theists. So, the author at least understands that this problem exists. Perhaps there are similar surveys on Christian denominations which do ask more detailed questions.

I don't think that the approach of focusing on general attributes denies the possibility that a religion is an internally consistent philosophy which is adopted by its adherents based on their beliefs and desire to live by its rules. Those types of attributes, though, don't lend themselves to identifying which religions share general values similar to a given person's. Someone with strongly held specific beliefs and a community with which he worships doesn't need a survey to identify that community. I see this, instead, as suggesting places where someone with general beliefs who has not yet found a community might explore to see if the other aspects of those religions are a good fit.

I don't see anything wrong with this process. It always struck me as unfortunate that most people are born into their religions and make decisions about how observant they want to be, but not about whether that religion is the best choice for them. If surveys like this help even a handful of people to find a religion more in line with their preferences (whether those preferences are related to views on doctrinal, social or even cultural issues), I think it has a useful role.

Disclaimer: I'm an atheist myself, and have somewhat cynical views about how most (but not all) people choose their religious affiliation and the effects of religious doctrine on human progress, but that doesn’t mean I’m evangelical about my beliefs.

Telnar

Re: There are some questions on beliefs just without detail

[rowyn]

I think that you've taken more words to say pretty much the same thing Prester Scott did, only without implying "This is a bad thing." The survey was very much a "choose your own religion" thing. No, it's not good at identifying Christians, and no, it's not good at identifying Muslims, or Jews, or Shintoists, or people who worship Greek gods, or whatever. If you came to this quiz with a specific set of beliefs, rather than a touchy-feely sense of "I think the universe ought to work like this", the quiz doesn't know what to do with you.

Now, there's something to be said for this--after all, those who have a specific set of beliefs probably aren't shopping for a religion, anyway.

It just feels to me as though, if you're going to shop for a religion the way you look for a car, based on "how it fits my needs" ... Well. Shouldn't you just admit you're a nontheist and be done with it?

Not being a member of an organized religion is different from being a nontheist

[(Anonymous)]

I don't agree with your assumption that everyone who is shopping for a religion is really a non-theist.

It's easy for me to imagine someone who has general theological beliefs, but is unhappy with the religion into which he was born. Such a person might want to try to "shop for a religion ... based on how it fits [his] needs" without thinking of this as a cynical exercise at all. He simply hasn't discovered the right community with which to worship yet and wants one which shares (most of) his values and beliefs.

Religion is more than hierarchies and buildings. I believe that a person can be religious without having ever attended a church/synagogue/mosque....

Telnar

[ripner.livejournal.com]

I ended up with a 100% match to Mainline to liberal Christian Protestants myself as well.

I'm Roman Catholic as far as my real reliogion goes, but I really don't go to church or support it t all as there are so many things I disagree with as to how the Roman Catholic way of thinking is done. (Homosexuality, role of women in the church, etc etc etc) and have been curious for a while about exploring other christian groups, although I don't think there is anything Protestant around me.