Oliver J. Hanau
Rimrunner wrote:

And at least in my religion/faith, a strong point is made of the quality of one's acts being representative of the quality of one's faith.

Rimrunner
Your latter statement is essentially what I'm talking about. I have this notion that if people thought this way, they would be more critical of people who performed violent acts in the name of religion, and of religious sects that seemed to encourage violent behavior.

Oliver J. Hanau
Unfortunately, some people are misled enough to think that, say, crashing two planes into a couple of skyscrapers is a pretty nifty idea and demonstrates the strength of the faith of the "martyrs" who sacrificed themselves and some infidels/heathens.

Rimrunner
The problem with that, of course, is that a lot of people seek religion in order to learn how to act--to find guidance for their behavior.

Oliver J. Hanau
Do you think so? I always thought people sought religion to find out why they're so freakin' unhappy in their lives or find out why they're "here."

Rimrunner
This has traditionally been one of the roles of religion.

Oliver J. Hanau
I always thought that was the consequence of what I mentioned above. "If you want to be happy/saved, do this and don't do that."

With all the math I've been doing lately [*] it makes me want to rephrase it somehwere along the linew of, "Their acts should be justified in themselves, i.e. 'good.'"

Rimrunner
Then once we've defined good, we can knock off for a beer.

Oliver J. Hanau
I was trying to be facetious. Of course, this logic works for anything, including the WTC attacks.

Rimrunner
Or maybe we should knock off for the beer first, since it might help our deliberations.

Oliver J. Hanau
I did that on Sunday night when I first tried to reply to this, but I'd just gotten back from watching "A.I." and was still too confused.

Rimrunner
Yes. It's one of those thoughts that sounds pretty, but I'm not sure it's really a valid statement. I get those from time to time. Most of the time I just write them down and think them over myself

Oliver J. Hanau
I know that feeling. "Did anyone ever think about what the TITANIC did to the ICEBERG?" sounded good, too, but I've yet to find a situation to apply it to. Usually, I write that stuff down and try to use it in a screenplay, but never do.