Assignment

While I was reading Asma why we need religion, what stuck out to me the most was the section "Developing EON Perspective". In this section the author exclaimed on how religion helps reduces anger and other negative emotions by prayer, meditation, and other techniques(190). This caught my attention immediately because I grew up having severe anger issues, and there were times when I would explode and try to fight any and everyone who even looked my direction crazy. A way I coped with my anger was prayer(when I found God myself) and meditating when I didn't have access to a basketball and rim. When I said found God for myself, what I meant is that growing up religion was kinda forced upon me and I didn't really understand who God was and why everyone thought he was so important until I had to do time somewhere and I couldn't depend on nothing but God himself. Another example this section talked about was guardian aggression and vulnerability. Basically he exclaimed that as the guardian, we feel that it's a must that we protect the people we love from any danger that tries to come their way and if we have to show anger and rage then so be it. I'm overprotective over all my siblings because I've seen how cruel the world can get, and I wouldn't want them to see and go through the things I had to, so I feel that it's my priority to protect them from whatever the world tries to throw at them. Just like in the story when they were in China and a car drove very close to his son's stroller. Asma walked on the street and punched the side mirror clean off as an act of anger because we want to do harm to anyone who tries to bring harm to the people we love most.

Assignment

While reading Asma, “Why we need religion” the most significant thing to me that has pop out to em was about fear and terror management. The thing he was explaining between the Gods on page 168, he once stated that many fear or terror may come from the type of god we have and while patients are in the hospital and the ones that are near death some maybe fine with it because they have a god that is more so not a vengeful, punishment god then they will have a certain type of “religious comfort” and “god reduce depression and help patients meet physical suffering through greater resilience”.(pg.168).While others may have fear because they have a vengeful, punishment god and so towards end of their time they may become more depressed because they are to worried about the god punishing them for the things they have done.

The important thing about what Asma was speaking about many people have a fear a lot of fear when it comes to religion based on many people trying to go to heaven or hell and it’s God decision on wether you going  to heaven or hell. So many people fear god and his opinion to many means a lot and some people are taught God is a punisher while other are taught he’s lover and forgive you for all sins.

Alternative Assignment

Religion can generate different features, powers, and secondary products. Certain traditions can have certain meanings that pertains to each other at different periods in time. Smith went into further explanation on page 78 chapter 2 about how certain aspects may overlap when it comes to religion. "Not every religion engenders all of the items. Exactly which pf the following a religion pro dues depends on the interaction of the content and character of religious tradition itself with the particular social and historical context in which it is set." Religion can produce several different casual powers. The first power is identity. There's personal identity is distinct on the persons particular self concepts whereas group identity is the understanding of a groups characteristics within an institution. Another power that religion produces is community. Community is apart of religion because it brings people together with common backgrounds and interests. Another social power that religion creates is social control. Internalized self regulation is compliance with established norms of thoughts and behaviors through acceptance of importance through socialization. Religion has plenty of of powers and Smith gave us a broad identity of what some of them may be.

Alternative Assignment

Fear and Religion: The Impact

      One thing that Stood out to me the most is when Asma says, “terror management theory predicts that when an atheist is presented with a mundane choice between religious beliefs and her secular world view, she privileges her world view over religion” (168).  This is interesting because people who do not believe in God or a higher power tend to think that their view of the world is the only correct view, which it is not. When faced with the fear of death, people who don’t believe in God are forced to face reality and try to comprehend the what, why, and how of the situation happen using their own perspectives. To atheists, the idea of heaven or immorality seems ridiculous and silly compared to their worldview. However, as Asma indicates in his book, those who are “exposed to morbid priming and then asked directly to give a self-report, will usually stick firm and even double-down on their secular preferences” (168). From my point of view, being exposed to death can change a person’s whole life in a way that challenges their thinking about religion and forces them to face the fear of death and immorality. Based on how one view or acknowledges fear determines if they will turn to religion or stick with their secular beliefs. For some people who experience near-death accidents or trauma, religion can inhibit that fear by allowing that person to view “God” as the cause or the reason this is happening. For those who view God as a powerful being, the religion reduces the fear of death and immorality. I think this is important to acknowledge because all humans had some type of fear of death, but I think the viewpoints help shaped how we view death and the fear is based on the preferences of religion. Whether or not one believes in life after death, or the reasons behind why we fear death, I think it is important to address how religion not only shapes our view of death but impacts our management and sense of how we reacted to the idea of “Life After,” or “Death.”

The Exorcist

Personally I really enjoyed Rebecca's presentation, specifically all of the extra information surrounding the creation of and reaction to the film. The story itself revolved around religious themes, i.e. Regan playing with the Ouija board, becoming possessed, speaking in Latin, the actual exorcism.

What really caught my attention however were the stories about all the "accidents" which occurred on set. People being injured or even the fatalities really caused for the emphasis on the culture shock surrounding this movie. The idea that the religious core may have contributed to these tragedies says a lot about society's indulgence into faith. Whether there is proof or not, many will conspire that some sort of vengeful or demonic spirit were the cause, simply because of the film's main plot.

It's incredibly interesting to think about just how huge of a role religion and religious values play into the horror genre. Numerous films have been centered on an otherworldly creature, demonic possession, rancid spirits, and so on and so forth. This is why I feel that the two work so well together, since religion is such a widespread concept and has been so familiarized, it's easy to fit it into a scary setting since for so many it hits so close to home.

Justice Theme in The Punisher (and It's Relation to Jesus)

While watching the presentations presented in class over the last week, I heard so many things about each work of media that I had never thought about before, or simply thought was a pretty interesting take, but the one thing that stood out to me the most was Diamond's take on The Punisher (Netflix.)

I really found it insightful how she came up with a connection between The Punisher's form of quick Justice and Jesus's form of belated eternal justice.
Before seeing her presentation I'm not exactly sure how I would have related Jesus to such a violent character, but afterward, I could see the relation. (If I came out of this with the right assumptions of what she was getting at with her presentation)

I think the idea that some people would rather have a Jesus who provides quick judgment/punishment for their actions is pretty spot on. It definitely gave me something to think about.
The presentation, as well as some of the other ones in the class, also made me feel as if every movie/show about somebody who enacts justice, or about a vigilante character could be related to Jesus and religion in general in some way or another.
All in all, I think that the analysis of the film was overall interesting and thought-provoking.

The messages within The Walking Dead

The Messages Within The Walking Dead

Diamond Allen

            After seeing my classmates presentations I realized that religion is apart of every show and movie. Even the topic I presented in class shows that even though you may not see religion right then and there, there's always underlying religious messages in movies and TV shows. I really found Aj's presentation on The Walking Dead interesting. His presentation on The Walking Dead made me look at religion/ God in a more supernatural point of view. The clip when the pastor broke down crying because he knew what he did was wrong, and not the christian way of going about the situation regardless the outcome. This made me think back on how people in today’s society tend to lose their minds and become “lost” when they're afraid. When I say lost, I mean that people take off their God given glasses to walk down his path, and put on their human glasses causing them to take actions in fear without using prayer as a guidance tool for help.
I am a big fan of zombie movies, and I thought about the question AJ posed to us in class when he asked “What would I do if I were in the pastors shoes?” This question was really tough for me because the Godly thing to do would be to help the families try to escape, but also helping these families try to escape would result in everyone dying including me. In a way I look at the situation as telling you to pick your sin and live or die with it. I say this because me knowing if I help these families, I’m basically committing suicide because if I go help I’m going to die right along with them, and it says in the bible that suicide is an automatic ticket to hell. But not helping the families and watch and hear them scream as the zombies tear them apart would remain on your conscious forever not knowing if you could’ve did something to help instead of being fearful and selfish. Living in a world like that though I might just have to let the families die because if I die, I won’t be able to help fight and try to find a cure for the disease.

The Punisher

When you think about it, you never realize how religion is apart of basically every movie and/or TV show. You can go to the movies and watch a comedy or romance movie and not even realize there’s aspects of religion in them. You can watch a Marvel show on Netflix and not realize that some characters have aspects of religion in them. I thought Diamond’s presentation on the punisher really opened my eyes to how we want Jesus to be. We see jesus as a higher power and some of us worship him. I found this interesting because she was able to relate Jesus to the punisher and sort of say that the Jesus we want is the punisher. We basically want Jesus as the punisher because he gives out quick deaths to those who are guilty in any kind of way. Jesus can’t provide us this because he died for our sins and because of this we won’t get the quick punishment that we long for. we would just have to sit through the pain of knowing what should’ve been done wasn’t set in stone. The Punisher is what we all want he is the justice system that we need in a way. Nowadays cops can get away with killing innocent black people and regular white people can get away with killing black people, and there is never justice for these families. Our justice system is controlled by white men and women who are easily bribed with money to make a verdict that isn’t fair. The Punisher see’s wrong as wrong and the guilty guilty, there isn’t any second chances when it comes to the punisher and I believe that’s what we need.

I think being able to pull religion out of a character that is driven by revenge is interesting because, from what was shown through the trailer all he wanted to do was get revenge for his family. In hindsight he was a character who was focused on justice and getting rid of evil doers but in his own way of a correct punishment.

Walking Dead

Aj to me had a real good presentation over the walking dead and the things he spoke about on why many people enjoyed the tv show and even the religious things that can relate to the tv show. And i do see a lot of things that can relate to what we talk about class because walking dead could be like a myth that people have believed in for quite awhile and some people till this day think that it’s possible it could happen . I would just ask why do you think people may believe in having zombies all around the world affecting people? or What observations have you made about zombies that make people seem so interested in them?

I never really realized how much Religion is involved with entertainment. After viewing all of the different presentation it stuck out to me that religion can be tied to nearly any movie film. The film that was presented on Thursday from Dan's presentation about Aquaman stood out the most to me.

Aquaman being the lost king from Atlantis reminded me of  a Jesus like character. Born from his mother who fell in love wit a man on land disobeying her roots in Atlantis. Aquaman was loved by the people on land and the people from underwater. Everyone knew that in order to leave in peace they would need his help. Aquaman was the sole leader and had the right to be crowned king. I see Aquaman relating to Superman in so many ways. The unhuman like powers, mythical parents, immortal and both have a lover. The movie is overall one of my favorite superhero films so far. 

Using religious topics as entertainment

I enjoyed Brandon's presentation on the movie Legion. I have seen his film a few times, but I had never thought of it in the context that we discussed in class. I thought it was interesting the role reversal of angels as bringers of death and destruction. And the idea of a child being the savior of the human race, like Jesus Christ, was.
What I found interesting about the religious aspect of the movie were Michael and the angels. Many of us know that Michael the Archangel is the angel responsible for sending Lucifer to hell after he disobeys God. In this film, Michael makes the same choice as Lucifer in a way by violating God's order to end humanity and instead sides with and defends humanity. 
Another fascinating portrayal in Legion was the angels who were demon like setting out to destroy mankind. We tend to think of angels as messengers, holy, and as protectors. This film turns that all around and makes angels something evil. However, knowing that angels are messengers of God and responsible for carrying out his plan and owing him total obedience it is understandable that the angels in the film would carry out Gods plan to destroy the world without question.