This Is Interesting

[Glitter650]

Our ritual was written with the intetntion NOT be a scripture based ritual, as our foudners wanted our organization to be non sectarian.

[James]

Whats funny, is that not only would you need to be atheist to have a problem with this, but be a kind of militant atherist.

I mean if you are just a non-believer, then the words are just words bereft of importance and only have meaning from an aesthetic point of view.

A little like the pledge of allegiance. Ok you don't believe in God, maybe there is no God, so what does it matter if you say the words?

[MysticCat]

Originally posted by PhiPsiRuss
Phi Psi never abolished such membership restrictions, because we never had them.

True of quite a few GLOs, I imagine.

I used the quote not to show the existence of exclusion on religious grounds in all or most GLOs prior to Sig Ep's abolition of its religious restrictions, but to show what a prospective pledge could find on Sig Ep's website. It doesn't seem unreasonable that someone might read this and assume, however incorrectly, that religion (or lack thereof) would not be an issue with regard to Sig Ep membership.

[sugar and spice]

Originally posted by James
Whats funny, is that not only would you need to be atheist to have a problem with this, but be a kind of militant atherist.

I mean if you are just a non-believer, then the words are just words bereft of importance and only have meaning from an aesthetic point of view.

A little like the pledge of allegiance. Ok you don't believe in God, maybe there is no God, so what does it matter if you say the words?

We've discussed this on GC a couple times before and while some non-Christians don't have a problem with it, some do. You definitely would not have to be a militant atheist to feel uncomfortable. I'm not going to call someone wrong for sticking with their religious beliefs.

I'm sure a number of the people here would feel a little bit uncomfortable if they were forced to, say, swear on the Koran during their ritual?

[WCUgirl]

I've found this topic to be quite interesting.

*I'm going to be as vague as possible because I don't want to give anything away unitentionally. What I'm about to say isn't secret, but I just want to try to be vague to be safe. If, after reading this, you feel you need to make a corrective statement, or say, "Hey, the religion you're referring to is Buddhism" - fine, go ahead, like I said, I'm just being vage to be safe.*

Background: I am Presbyterian. When I was pledging, we never learned that we were founded as a "Christian" or "non-Christian" sorority..anything like that really. We did learn that a few of our Founders were members of a certain denomination. I had never heard of this denomination, so I didn't think much of it. When we got to the initiation ceremony, we did not have to worship space ships or drink the venom of snakes or anything like that. I never had a problem with anything that I learned or was revealed to me.

Okay, so I was reading this thread yesterday, when I realized that I still had never learned anything about that denomination of those Founders. Well, I did some digging, and it turns out 7 out of 10 of our Founders were this denomination!!! I would then assume that our ritual and a lot of our stuff is based on principles of this denomination.

So I proceed to do some research on this denomination, and I have to say that its beliefs are pretty much opposite (well, not all, but one biggie) of what I believe. However, a lot of the ideals of this religion could be classified as Christian or non-Christian (you could find this ideal in any Christian religion and you could find it in any non-Christian relgion). So I don't have a problem with those ideals...and I noticed a few of those have a heavy influence on a lot of the stuff our sorority is based on. So no, I don't really have a problem with anything. Not yet anyways. Suffice it to say at the next initiation ceremony I'll be paying extra-special attention to see if I hear something that is like, "oh, okay, now I know where that came from, and I disagree with it." But even if I do find something, I'm not going to run out and desister because of it.

Am I making any sense?

I did not join my sorority based on what religion it was founded upon...and if I had, well, there may not be a sorority that coinicides with everything I believe. And if there is, it may not have been on my campus when I attended, so I might not have gotten the chance to join. I don't think that by my joining something that has been influenced by this certain religion makes me now a firm believer in this religion - I'll just embrace it as part of the history of Alpha Xi and chalk it up as epanding my horizons, so to speak. It does sadden me that I may never get to meet our Founders in the "afterlife" (because what I believe and what they may have believed is different). Also, just because they were a certain religion doesn't mean they didn't strictly adhere to its principles - I know that as a Presbyterian I agree with most things but there are a few issues on which I take a different stance. I think AXOAlum said it best by saying that my sorority life is separate from my religious life.