Welcome, I think you will like the Mikraite concept. I will try to answer your questions here, but I encourage you to visit one of our
Online Bible Readings where you can talk to us directly.
I started CoAlpha because I wanted men to get together to work on an alternative to feminist culture. The idea just didn't work. I organized Skype meetings and almost no one came. People in the private forum proved unreliable. There was little discussion of concrete action. So I decided that I had to study history to see what worked in the past. And the answer is religion. All sound cultures in history were based on a sound religion.
Why is this? I think because religion is really a package of the components needed to make a group work. Let's start with rituals, like keeping the Sabbath. One of the points of such a ritual is to show who is really committed to taking action for the group. If you ask someone who kees a religion's rituals to do something for that religion, you can assume he will do it. And conversely, someone who doesn't keep the rituals generally can't be counted on to do anything for the group. This is specifically discussed in the Old Testament where the Sabbath is described as being a sign of commitment. But rituals are more than a sign, they are also training exercises. If a person becomes accustomed to doing something on behalf of religion regularly (weekly), they are actually training themselves to follow the rules of the group in general. And this makes it mentally easier for them to do other things for the group and generally makes them more committed to the group.
Another obvious benefit of religion is weekly meetings.
Religion is also very important for women. Women are naturally conformist, so a good religion provides a good group to conform to.
Our Mikraite group is not Christian. We follow the Old Testament. One reason for this is that Christianity and the New Testament require certain beliefs, but the Old Testament doesn't. The Old Testament only regulates actions. So there is no requirement for you to believe in the existence of God. You can read more about my views on God in
God for Atheists.
To see how effective religion can be, you can read my
Mennonite trip report. Since it is very difficult to start a successful religion, our Mikraite plan is to leverage an existing religion like the traditional Mennonites and convince them to allow us to associate with them without us having to become Christians. This gives us most of the benefits of their culture without having to accept their beliefs. So if you find a wife abroad, having her join us at traditional Mennonite services and having her associate with Mennonite women would have strongly anti-feminist influence on her without her having to hold their beliefs.
I hope I have answered some of your questions. Let me know if I missed anything, and I will try to answer it.
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