A New Religion Idea!!!!!!!

[Nuh Uh]

my personal belief is that (me being agnostic) that the bible is more of an "aesops fables", as it was made to give you guidelines on a good life, and the story are to teach you morals, not to be taken literally. the bible is basicaly: here are some stories of people who done things that were either stupid or brave. take the advice given, dont do this/do this, and you will lead a good honest healthy happy life.
the book is just guidelines, not history. they are just stories to teach. people back then were poor and simple, and did not understand, so these stories were made to teach them in a basic manner.

I believe, from both personal experience as well on a purely intellectual basis, that there is intelligent design and spirit and that these two concepts, such as they are, are not mutually exclusive. Furthmore, I believe that the Pentateuch (as well the lesser known Heptateuch), and the greater body of the Ta-Nech for that matter, are factual, and with only minor elements of distortion. This latter issue is, IMO, partially due to a fundamental difference in consciousness between the reader and the seer; and being a point upon which I will spare you further elaboration.

I can't prove to anyone that Jesus or God is real. A person may, upon their own recognizance, inspired of emotional need or intellectual induction as it may be, come to the conclusion that God exists; or, in a singularly more rare and unique instance, have God tap them on the shoulder with a not too ordinary "hi there".

 

[TheFourGuardian]

Great Wonder Ideas
Vatican City
The Kabba Stone
The Sacred River
Dome of the Rock
Notre Dame
Cologne Cathedral
The Parthenon(not new, but now religious)
Mt. Olympus
The Sphinx
Temple of Ra
Mount Sinai

Ah, there's one shrine I'm trying to remember in Japan. I believe they destroy it every twenty years.

 

[Plotinus]

That would be the Ise Shinto shrine in Mie Prefecture.

Personally I think it's rather peculiar to put Shinto - a pretty minor and parochial religion - into the mod, whilst leaving out Confucianism - arguably the most influential system of thought in the entire world.

 

[Nuh Uh]

As a side note: I find your scenarios really appealing, Plotinus. You obviously have a semblance of mastery on their historical import, and I feel confident that an enjoyable level of detail bordering upon realistic simulation would shine through your work. Having ditched my Civ3 because I couldn't stand the combat system, I have decided to retain my Civ4 as the matter is somewhat improved and I see a lot of potential for modification. That said, do you have any Civ4 scenarios in the make? What is your position on the suitability of Civ4 for scenario and modifcation purposes?

 

[Red Door]

First of all, the Bible is definetly an ethics code. No one has ever said its an account on history.
What us catholics believe is that you cant prove thet God exists, you have to have faith that he does.
Ise shrine is going in. Thank you for that informantion.
@Plotinus:Confucianism is not a religion. Its an ethics code. Shinto is personally not my first choice. I thought of something while eating my Thanksgiving Dinner tonight. What if we put in Native American beliefs.
You know, like Earth is equal to all.
It would be cool to see that modded in.

Update to Post 1, added Wonders and UUs for each religion, something we havent discussed very much.

 

[Nuh Uh]

First of all, the Bible is definetly an ethics code. No one has ever said its an account on history.
What us catholics believe is that you cant prove thet God exists, you have to have faith that he does.
Ise shrine is going in. Thank you for that informantion.
@Plotinus:Confucianism is not a religion. Its an ethics code. Shinto is personally not my first choice. I thought of something while eating my Thanksgiving Dinner tonight. What if we put in Native American beliefs.
You know, like Earth is equal to all.
It would be cool to see that modded in.

Update to Post 1, added Wonders and UUs for each religion, something we havent discussed very much.

I would argue, as per its constitution, it provides an ethics code; although, that first and foremost its an account of the greater mechanism of reality, being innately a spiritual one, operating at the furthest reaches of our awareness.

I really like the Animistic Native American religions. Especially, the Navajo and Hopi.

 

[Plotinus]

[Nuh Uh] Thank you for the comments! I don't have Civ IV yet so I don't exactly have any scenarios in the works for it... especially as my computer isn't beefy enough to run it, at least not yet.

I won't be doing any more scenarios for a fair old while, at least, as I'm very busy these days. I've made the two that I really wanted to (and am currently working on an update for the first). But if I were to do any for Civ IV, it would have to wait some time, because there aren't the resources yet for this game - units, leaderheads, and so on - that make a scenario really worth doing. It seems to me that Civ IV has great potential for scenario creation, but its problem is that it is so difficult for making really new graphics, and you need new graphics to make a good scenario. So it will be interesting to see what happens.

[AlCosta] There's obviously more to the Bible than just ethics - where's the ethics in, say, Judges or Chronicles? I agree that Confucianism is mostly ethics, but it's certainly far more than that, as anyone who has been in a Chinese temple will know.

By the way, the belief that God's existence cannot be proved has been condemned by the Catholic Church since the First Vatican Council. The official Catholic position is that God's existence *can* be proved. But I think that is one of those official views that most actual Catholics disagree with, and certainly virtually all Protestants seem to think that God's existence cannot be proved. I'm not sure what the typical Orthodox view is - I should think it would be something along the lines that God's existence doesn't *need* to be proved in the first place!

 

[Quinzy]

newgrange
big jesus statue in brasil

(i'll think of more soon)

 

[Red Door]

Quizny:Good Ideas!

 

[Quinzy]

"kamakura no daibutsu" or "nara no daibutsu" (big buddah statues)
the Palitana temples (jainist, but could be added)
Mount Taylor (navajo holy site)
Blanca Peak (navajo)
San Francisco Peaks (navajo)
Hesperus Peak (navajo)
Lumbini (buddhist holy site)
Bodh Gayav (buddhist)
Sarnath (buddhist)
Kusinara (buddhist)

 

[bl_onyx]

The expansion of religion in gameplay is a very interesting idea, so I just want to put in my five cents worth, although it might be not very balanced.

What about the splinter religions not being founded when a tech is discovered, but that players can decide themselves to split of the religion from the previously single religion, and your own cities would convert to the new splinter religion.

The original founder would then lose the benefits of line of sight and +1 gold for the cities in your empire, and you would get a massive penalty to diplomacy. I'm not sure whether you should then be allowed to get a shrine of yourself (as you are only a splinter), but at least you can develop a religion if you're not on the spiritual track, and it would be a nice way to elicit a war with the other player.

 

[Red Door]

Welcome to CFC! Yeah, thats what is going to happen with the religions.
Quizny, thank you for those wonder ideas.

So now, does everyone want Navajo religion in? (This means taking Shinto out.)

 

[Quinzy]

is there a limit to religions? cos i think you should put it in a "tribal/ethnic animism" section. that way you can have voodoo and all iroquoi totem thingy and aztec "grr, i'll eat yer 'art, grr" and other native american tribal religions.

 

[Red Door]

I dont think there is a limit. However, we do not want too many religions because then people will all have different religions. We will also have to re-size some religion boxes.
Some choices right now for Native American religions:
Aztec
Navajo
Iroquois
Voodoo
I was personally thinking of two choices, North American and Voodoo.

 

[Plotinus]

Voodoo is hardly native American, being a combination of West African religion and Roman Catholicism...

 

[Red Door]

I was thinking of one of those tribal religions in the Amazon.
Voodoo was the best word I could put on it.

 

[Red Door]

So are the two Native Religions Aztec and Navajo?

 

[Quinzy]

they'de be the best ones i'd say.

 

[Red Door]

Anybody got names for them?
They're not very easy to name because they're not widespread religions.

 

[Quinzy]

navajo is well, Navajo
it actuall might be better to have Mayan religion, as that was thr father or the aztecs.
name-wise i'd call it Tenochian