[madnak]

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I assume this is a dig at formal education, as opposed to thinking what you want to think and never considering an alternative.

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How about an advocation of self-motivated learning that includes different perspectives and is represented by active understanding and imagination, rather than passive rote learning purely from one perspective (that of a PR squad) represented by trying to have the same opinion as the "authorities?"

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If you didn't catch it before, my education was based on religious texts and teaching us to think about the underlying meaning behind the passages. I don't recall ever appealing to the authority of one of my teachers. I simply stated that because, in my nearly 15 years of education, I never saw a Bible passage advocating an *unjust* war or Jesus claiming we should go out and kill in the name of Christianity, I choose to continue to believe that Christianity is not "pro-war". If disagreeing with an atheist/agnostic with no religious education about a religious topic is "appealing to authority" now, then I guess I will continue to appeal to authority....

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"No religious education?" Speak for yourself. I admit my main focus has been Protestantism (particularly Mormonism), because that's how I was raised and those are the views I'm most frequently exposed to. But I've done plenty of reading from different perspectives on Christian sects as far as gnosticism, on Hindu, on Buddhism, on Taoism, and even a bit of Shinto, Wicca, and Zoroastrianism for diversity. That's not an exhaustive education, there are many religions I'm unfamiliar with (including Islam and Judaism, largely, though their use of what's basically the OT means I have some clue about them). But to call me ignorant?

You're claiming to have an "education" in religion, and yet you admit all your knowledge came from one (clearly biased) source and was related to one specific (and controversial) religion! To me that's not education at all. Your Catholic school is irrelevant - those comparing it to Tom Cruise's "education" are doing so appropriately. The reason Tom Cruise is so taken in is because he's spent years listening to propaganda from one side of the issue, and has never bothered to explore other viewpoints. That's what we call fanaticism, or at least myopia. If you want to be respected as having an education in religion, you'll need to explain what you've learned outside of Nuns-'R'-Us.

(To be fair, you haven't appealed to authority. You mentioned your Catholic school when I challenged your interpretation of the Bible, which was valid.)