Just to start some controversy

I think overall I've been relatively uncontroversial in my ideas. So I thought I'd throw something out there, and leave it out there for people to look at and maybe get angry at and I'll explain it later.

While I believe that embracing the ideal of love is probably the most important guide to salvation, I believe different churches rank as different value in their ability to guide people to salvation.

Here's my ranking of religions (this says nothing about the people who belong to these religions, or the fact that all these religions are valid belief systems, but rather it's a matter of my philosophical and religious agreement with the religions):

Christianity > Judaism > Islam > Sikhism > Hinduism > Buddhism > Agnosticism > Atheism > White power churches

Within Christianity, I have another ranking system:

Catholicism > Eastern Orthodox/Oriental Orthodox > Protestants > Mormonism/Jehovah's Witnesses

Now there are a lot of other religions out there, they tend to fit somewhere on my scale but almost all are above Atheism except those that are explicitly based on hate like the White power churches.

I'm a devout Roman Catholic, but I'm not one casually. I believe that while you should take in your parents' religion and the religion of those you look up to as a kid, at a certain age (probably starting around 7 (the age of reason by Roman Catholic standards when you start understanding the rituals that you do) and intensifying around 13 (when a lot of kids get Confirmed)) you have to really start looking at your religion. Now I don't mean throwing away your previous beliefs with no reason. After all, since you have motivations to do things in life you always have some beliefs, even if they're implicit, so why not start out with some explicit beliefs that you can actually examine and mold. What I'm really trying to say is you look at your beliefs, find contradictions, see if you can resolve them, if you can't discard one of the beliefs that caused the contradictions. Then you extend the beliefs to create new conclusions, again this will generate contradictions. Then you look at the beliefs that form the core of your beliefs, again this process will generate contradictions: resolve them. Finally you take the sum of that whole matter and decide what is the best course for you religiously.

I say this not with the idea that everyone should develop a complete religious philosophy all by themselves. Look, when you're having trouble with a math problem, what do you do? You consult a math textbook. But what if there are different schools of thought about that mathematics problem? You find an expert in math who you trust and respect. Math actually has a lot to do with religion since they're both based on axioms (basic beliefs) extended by logic (for those of you who scoff, I'd like to point out nearly all of modern logic is based on the work of the Catholic Church (CATHOLICS RULE! WOOOOOO!), and at this moment theologians are pouring over religious texts and applying the logic to explicate them). A lot of religious topics are hard to understand, don't be afraid to take guidance from people you respect and trust. Still you have to see if the commitment you make to a religion agrees with your basic beliefs and the ideas that you were able to work out. Moreover, if you have the time, look through and analyze the beliefs of the religion you adopt, and also others if you have more time. Of course, it could be you can't find any organized religion that agrees with your basic beliefs, I'd probably argue that's a flaw in your basic beliefs, but that's a philosophical matter in which I acknowledge that many rational, thoughtful people can come to different conclusions, and then you would have to take no organized religion.

Well, I sort of went back on my I'm not going to explain this rule. And to go back on it even further, I'd like to throw in a session I did earlier explaining some of my religious thoughts (most notably my problems with reincarnation and Buddhism). But I'm not going to explain everything (although you might have noticed that the religions I hold in higher esteem are those that are closer to Christianity, and the denominations of Christianity I hold in greater esteem are those that are closer to Roman Catholicism, but still there are additional reasons for my rankingology). Still I think this is enough to start some controversy.

Get mad or get Catholic! Come on!

My dogma ran over your karma or I ain't got no reincarnation

I always loved that quote "my karma ran over your dogma," although I don't think it actually means anything (if interpreted it could, but whoever wrote it or said it first probably just liked the car in karma and the dog in dogma). But anyways I switched it around so that it would better fit what I think. I believe in Christian dogma but not in karma. In this world where people are constantly saying there's no real difference in religions I'd like to point out the difference between my beliefs and others and I'd like to explain why and explore this.
I'm a Christian, and while some maintain Christians are not inherintly different from Buddhists/Hindus who believe in karma, I'd say there is a big difference between karma and forgiveness, especially since karma involves reincarnation and the Christian ideal of forgiveness involves Purgatory, Heaven and Hell (some might say that Buddhism isn't really about reincarnation, but you should be careful about the word "really," it implies that those who don't believe that are not truly Buddhist, it's fine if you say your belief in Buddhism doesn't include reincarnation or even that the correct interpretation of Buddhism is no reincarnation, but people shouldn't deny that those who believe in reincarnation don't belong to schools within the Buddhist range of thought (it's like the fact that I'm Catholic, but I recognize Protestants are also Catholic, even though I think Catholics are the best branch of Christianity). Those people tend to be Westerners (and I'm not refering to my friends who may have embraced some form of Buddhism, most of them understand that they simply believe in one variant and that there are others) whose exposure to Buddhism is highly limited (very few have actually read the Buddhist texts (and yes there are Buddhist texts, the basic ones are called the Tripitaka), I'm not saying I'm an expert, but I'm saying most of the people who claim to "really" understand Buddhism are not experts either). More importantly karma is sort of an exchange, you exchange a good act for a bad one, you balance your sins with your good deeds, what you do good comes back to you and what you do bad comes back to you so you have to do more good than bad with your life or in your next life. Forgiveness doesn't work like that. Forgiveness operates instantaneously, it means suddenly your sins are gone. It means that your evil deeds are washed away by the love of God. Yes there is often an obligation to do some act because of your sins but such acts are to improve one spiritually not to balance the scales. And while there is a Purgatory open for cleansing of the soul, there are no extra life times in Christianity, at least in most of the varients I'm familiar with.
Is this an important difference? Yes. Because it determines whether you value yourself based on your actions or based on your soul, it determines whether you try to make up for past deeds or simply try to live well in the future. It also makes a difference in focus between focusing on how you treat the external world instead of focusing on how you treat your soul. I'm not necessarily saying that Buddhists/Hindus are bad and although I think they are wrong they have a right to their views and honestly their views are pretty well developed and well thought through. Of the different belief systems out there Buddhism and Hinduism are pretty good ones, at least most variants are. All religions tend to have some bad variants out there and some bad, sometimes horrificly bad interpretations.
There is also another element to the karma versus forgiveness debate. This is more in the case in Buddhism and some less formalized religious beliefs than in Hinduism, but even Hinduism has it to some degree, especially in some sects, but karma does not require a deity to make it work. It can function in a purely mechanical universe. A certain mixture of good and bad deeds cause this or that to happen. On the other hand, divine forgiveness usually requires someone to forgive, and thus requires a God or gods. Of course, you can forgive yourself and leave it at that as well, but if you feel that good and bad have to do with something greater than humanity, you're probably going to need something greater than humanity to forgive. Of course, there are other reasons for belief in a higher spiritual power, but I won't get too much into that now.
My point is that there is a fundemental difference between karma and forgiveness as a means to dealing with sins and bad deeds. That difference guides our lives and because of that we should understand that difference. I think forgiveness is the superior school of thought and that's why I believe in it, but even if you believe in karma you must understand in what karma means. Of course, then again, people themselves often mix and match religious concepts, even ones so different as karma and forgiveness (even though sometimes their mixes don't quite make sense, but sometimes they create some pretty fancy systems of belief), but then you're creating a third way, which is neither one or the other. Yes, Virginia, there is a difference between religions, and you should understand where you stand, because where you stand should be how you understand your morality, which should be how you deal with your life.

That's enough for now. So take it to your head, take it to your heart, and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks!