The Power of Religion to Unite Always Impresses

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More data from the front regarding religion's power to affect human relations.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-22386778

"April 2013 was Iraq's deadliest month since June 2008, the United Nations mission in Iraq says.

It said a total of 712 people were killed, including 595 civilians, in "acts of terrorism and acts of violence" last month.

Iraq's Interior Ministry puts the total death toll for April at 245 people.

An army raid on a Sunni anti-government protest camp in northern Iraq last week has triggered a sharp increase in attacks.

Baghdad was the worst affected governorate with a total of 211 killed and 486 injured, the United Nations Assistance Mission For Iraq (UNAMI) said in a statement released on Thursday.

The mission says Diyala, Salahuddin, Kirkuk, Ninewa and Anbar were the next most affected provinces.

A spate of bombing attacks in the last two weeks has left more than 200 people dead and scores injured.

Fourteen members of a Sunni militia opposed to al-Qaeda were killed in two attacks by militants near the western Iraqi city of Fallujah on 1 May.

At least 18 people were killed and dozens injured by five car bombs in Shia-majority provinces of southern Iraq on 29 April.

The latest figures come at a time when tensions are high between Iraq's Sunni and Shia, amid claims by the majority Sunni Muslim communities that they are being marginalised by Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's Shia-led government.

More than 20 people were killed in clashes between security forces and Sunni Arab protesters in northern Iraq on 23 April.

The violence erupted when security forces raided an anti-government protest camp in Hawija, near Kirkuk.

There was also widespread violence before the 20 April provincial elections - the first elections since the last US troops withdrew at the end of December 2011.

Dozens were killed in bombings targeting mainly Shia areas, and 14 candidates, most of them Sunnis, were murdered.

Although levels of violence in Iraq have dropped since the heights of the insurgency in 2006 and 2007, current unrest is more widespread than at any time since the US military withdrawal"

[Dos Equis]

Additional data from the actual front regarding religion's power to affect human relations.  Every week, one church helps "over 1,000 New Yorkers with a hot, nutritious meal, and access to Counseling and Referral (C&R) services."  

http://www.holyapostlessoupkitchen.org/Frequently-Asked-Questions-FAQs/

[syntaxmachine]

Additional data from the actual front regarding religion's power to affect human relations.  Every week, one church helps "over 1,000 New Yorkers with a hot, nutritious meal, and access to Counseling and Referral (C&R) services."

http://www.holyapostlessoupkitchen.org/Frequently-Asked-Questions-FAQs/

Is it the religion (by which I mean a cluster of causally related ideas with specific properties which we apply a label to, e.g. 'Christianity') causing these people to behave this way, or are they simply decent human beings? This is relevant because the point here is to measure how certain ideas (in this case, religious ones) cause people to behave, not simply the way religious people behave.

Also, it goes without saying that handing out a bowl of soup here or there does not override the suffering being generated in Iraq -- from a strictly utilitarian point of view -- because of religion.

[Dos Equis]

Is it the religion (by which I mean a cluster of causally related ideas with specific properties which we apply a label to, e.g. 'Christianity') causing these people to behave this way, or are they simply decent human beings? This is relevant because the point here is to measure how certain ideas (in this case, religious ones) cause people to behave, not simply the way religious people behave.

Also, it goes without saying that handing out a bowl of soup here or there does not override the suffering being generated in Iraq -- from a strictly utilitarian point of view -- because of religion.

I think the churches serving their community are motivated by a desire to help people. 

What point are you trying to make by highligting violence in Iraq involving Muslims? 

What I posted didn't show that someone was "handing out a bowl of soup here or there."  It's church helping over 1,000 people a week.  That's one church. 

Here's another one:

In 1990, a single family in need found themselves at the door of St. Barnabas Episcopal Church. The woman and her children were invited by parishioners to the church kitchen where they were promptly fixed a meal.

The idea for a soup kitchen was born.

Since the first day it opened, the Soup Kitchen has been a reliable source of food for the hungry and has never wavered from its mission to unconditionally feed the hungry in our community. The service has grown to meet the needs of those we serve. The Soup Kitchen now provides meals four days a week. The daily meals served averages around 156, and the monthly meals served ranges from 2,218 to over 3,000 meals.

http://www.stbarnabasmcminnville.com/soup.htm

I could give you numerous other examples of involving medical care, clothing, and a host of other things involving community service.  Those are things that "affect human relations" much more than Muslim being killed in Iraq.