Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Religion/Archive 1

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[edit] Any Help Would Be Wonderful!

Hi,

I know you are interested in christianity, and I recently started a new wiki over at wikicities which is on the subject of christianity. Christian Knowledge Base is the site.

The goal is to have a knowledgebase on christianity from a distinctly "C(hristian)POV" rather than the NPOV. It is not meant to be a mere Christian Encyclopedia, but to foster a real sense of community. I'd like to include things like current events, news, stories, and anything that would add to both an understanding of Christianity, but also its enjoyment. I'm looking for help to build a resource that could really enrich the lives of Christians.

I know you are busy but I am actively seeking new sysops/admins to help me build this site up, and I would be positively thrilled if you could contribute in any capacity whatsoever. Empty2005 00:19, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, good idea! Now those non-belivers can see what the LORD can do! ^^ --General456 13:21, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help develop Scripture Database website

I've been conceptualizing a Scripture Database website for several years now. I've finally gotten around to publishing a rough draft of the site online. It is wiki-based and would make a good compliment to Wikipedia scripture pages. Please use my dedicated talk page to discuss. --J. J. 19:38, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Xueta

A mess. See Talk:Xueta#A_mess. I'm pretty ignorant on the topic of the Xuetes. Perhaps someone here is clueful and can help fix the article? - Jmabel | Talk 23:52, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help with NPOV

There's currently a bit of an edit war at Mami Wata (an article about a deity of the African diaspora). One user, a member of an organization devoted to the deity, is, in my opinion, pushing pseudo-scholarship and a "voudun is real" POV. I am representing the Western anthropological POV, possibly making my edits also violate NPOV. I have never been involved in a relgious edit war on Wikipedia before, and I'm not at all sure how to proceed. We both believe very strongly in our version of the the article. In short, I would appreciate if cooler heads could stop by and help us iron out the differences we have. -- BrianSmithson 15:17, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Key articles for Wikipedia 1.0

Hello! We at the Work via WikiProjects team for Wikipedia 1.0 would like you to identify the "key articles" from your project that should be included in a small CD release due to their importance, regardless of quality. We will use that information to assess which articles should be nominated for Version 0.5 and later versions. Hopefully it will help you identify which articles are the most important for the project to work on. As well, please add to your Philosophy/Religion WikiProject article table any articles of high quality. If you are interested in developing a worklist such as this one for your WikiProject, or having a bot generate a worklist automatically for you, please contact us. Please feel free to post your suggestions right here. Thanks! Walkerma 06:02, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help re:Raëlian Church

The Raëlian Church article is advert like and is clearly being written by them. Only one person seems to be involved in writing it - can anyone help? Secretlondon 13:40, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

It's not one article, it's an entire series. --Pjacobi 19:55, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ACIM

I think the A Course in Miracles article would benefit from more editors with religious knowledge. Please feel free to help out. Not a dog 13:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help with Gibborim article

I discovered this article Gibborim (biblical) and have been trying to improve it. The problem is I'm having trouble sepparting what is actually biblically based, what comes out of the teachings of Theosophy, and what is more modern new age belief. Any help would be appreciated Stephen Day 04:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Religion in Asia

This article is VERY stubby. Arch O. La ^{Grigory Deepdelver} 08:11, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject Religion Award

Please comment - WikiProject Religion Award. --JuanMuslim ^1m 03:22, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Yazdânism

Are Alevi, Yazidi, and Yarsan branches of common religion Yazdânism? Or is this a POV only forwarded by some Kurdish nationalists? --Pjacobi 19:54, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Membership list

Any project requires two things to be considered "active" and remain ineligible for deletion. They have to have some project-related activity on the project page or talk page in the last three months, and there has to be at least one listed member. Right now this project has no listed members. It might be a very good idea to add one. Thank you. Badbilltucker 17:04, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Holy Prepuce

Holy Prepuce is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy 23:49, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] End times

End times is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy (Talk) 16:22, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] religioustolerance dot org

I came across over 700 links to this organization, Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance. The site has a ton of ads but on the other hand, it has content (and a Wikipedia article).

Normally, such an ad-intensive site with so many links gets attention at WikiProject Spam for further investigation. Even if it's not spam, many links may often get deleted as not meeting the external links guideline. I've left a note at WikiProject Spam asking others to look at some of these and see what they think.

Even some non-profit organizations will add dozens of links to Wikipedia since links in Wikipedia are heavily weighted in Google's page ranking systems. (If interested, see the article on Spamdexing for more on this).

You can see all the links by going to this this "Search web links" page. I encourage you to look at Wikipedia's external links guideline then look at the links in the articles you normally watch. Also, if you don't mind, please also weigh in at WikiProject Spam with your opinions. If you see links to pages that you don't think add additional value beyond the content already in an article, feel free to delete them, but please don't go mindlessly deleting dozens of links. (Per WP:EL, links that don't add additional value should be deleted but that doesn't necessarily mean they're "spam").

Thanks for your help and for providing some second opinions. --A. B. 16:56, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Christianity

What is the Spiritual United nations and when and why was it founded? There is a complete story call it "her story" vs. "history," if you will. In 1994, the White Buffalo Calf Miracle marked the beginning of a new era. The woman of peace returns! After the prophesied Unity Festival with many tribes represented, Dean and i agreed together to start the Spiritual United Nations at the request and desire of the Hopi elders, such as Thomas Banyaca, and all people of peace, who are also considered Hopis. They said to bring peace we must have a spiritual United Nations who would listen to the voice of the poor and fatherless and to the indigenous peoples of the world. There is now a free web page with access to global warming papers that have never been censored by the government, because they were self-published. Check it out at: http://www.angelfire.com/hi3/spiritualun The spiritualUn has no fees, no signup, and is "in the spirit", prays for peace and is based on the white buffalo prophecies. There are links to white buffalo being born near Grand Canyon! Anuradhe 20:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC) anuradhe

Updates are needed to early christianity, numerous errors will need to be corrected.

[edit] WARNING

Be aware of manipulations by cultic groups or sectarian organizations in order to take the appearence of respectfull religious beliefs: For example, Sri Satya Sai Baba, or other false hindouists, Scientology, Theosophical society (Blavatsky was a friend of Thulé society which originated Nazism), and many other groups referenced as religions!? No this is abusing WIKIPEDIA free project. It is (especially for Sai Baba) like saying Marc Dutroux is a kids' defender... or Himmler being freedom activist!

Please only refer to real Religions, not business cults or manipulative so called spiritual beliefs.

Links for preventing further abuses: www.miviludes.org www.ciaosn.be www.prevensectes.com www.videosectes.fr.st www.icsa.org www.hemerosectas.tk www.ais-sectas.org www.culticstudies.org www.freedomofmind.org www.xenu.net www.antisectes.net www.unadfi.org www.sectes.net www.infosectes.com www.pseudo-sciences.org http://charlatans.free.fr

Comment - There is a problem with doing as the above unsigned-statement requests. Specifically, it would very likely be a violation of NPOV if we, outside editors, were to seek to impose our own opinions about what is and is not "true religion" (in any sense of the phrase) upon wikipedia. Also, unfortunately, there now are people (I know a few) who honestly believe the Necronomicon is a real book, even though it was clearly invented by H. P. Lovecraft. The lines between fiction and reality dim over time, and on that basis I think we are best served by neutrally applying ourselves to all articles which appear to relate to religion, whether or not we personally consider them to be legitimate religions. Badbilltucker 18:36, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Names of God in Judaism

Names of God in Judaism has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" from featured status. The instructions for the FAR process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. Sandy (Talk) 22:12, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Religious leaders

The current organization there is abit muddled, and needs some discussing how to deal with. I posted on general proposal for cleaning it up at Category talk:Religious leaders#Organization proposal, and more input would be great. I didn't address the issue of Religious leaders/religious workers/religious figures, but that is another issue that exists. Mairi 21:30, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Shakers FAR

Shakers has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. Sandy (Talk) 18:52, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Possible task forces

There is a possibility that, given the number of creeds that this project covers, we might create a few work groups or task forces (I'm uncommitted about the name) for various of the religions which this project now directly encompasses. I'm thinking right off the top about Baha'i, Iglesia ni Cristo, and maybe a few others. Would any of the members be interested in establishing such task forces. For creed which fall within the scope of any of our daughter projects (like Lutheranism, the Baptist church, Methodism), we'd probably want to check with their direct "parent" project (in these cases, Christianity), to set such up. Are there any work groups which people would like to see created? Badbilltucker 20:13, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Banner image

At least one of the Judaism wikiproject editors has objected to the use of an [:Image:7BrahmanMH.jpg] which could be considered to be idolatrous as being on the banner set for Judaism related articles. It would not surprise me if other people from Abrahamic faiths have similar objections. I suggest the use of a different image on the banner so as to minimize problems. [:Image:ReligijneSymbole.svg] might be a good one. JoshuaZ 19:59, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Being nice works both ways

When we want people to be civil to us, it's important to be civil to them (assume good faith, giving the benefit of the doubt, and all that jazz). The change to "See also" was a logical one, since the links are tagged to show only "Buddhism", etc. instead of what they should show "Buddhism project", etc. The heading "Related projects" is correct (well, one could still argue that point - are any projects really "related" in any way other than being on Wikipedia?). At any rate, the person who made the change while adding an interest to join the group simply made a change that seemed resonable to them and was certainly not vandalism in any stretch of that term. Nightngle 20:14, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I certainly haven't been following all of this ... but my observation is one long standing editor (Beit Or) edited the section heading from Descendant WikiProjects to See also with the edit summary this is the most that I can conceed. Later, another long standing editor (Badbilltucker) edited the section heading from See also to Related projects, and in their edit summary made a reference to previous vandalism (try to at least provide context next time you decide to vandalize a page). The new members (Nightngle and Kkrystian), if I'm not mistaken, have not made any edits to the names of sections. At least that's my take on the sequence of events. Kind Regards, Keesiewonder 21:33, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Ah! P.S. -- Welcome to the new members! :-) Keesiewonder 21:33, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I've actually seen the "descendant projects" on other project pages, even when the project listing them as descendants actually came after the project listed in the section of descendants. On that basis, I chose to copy what seemed to me at the time to be the standard procedure in such things. Clearly, this is an issue which may well be more of a hot button issue than others, and my own relative lack of tact for the past few days may have played a role, for which I sincerely and wholeheartedly apologize. However, as I have posted to the instigator a clear record of at least one guideline and two official policies which he clearly and explicitly broke in the instigation of this matter, I expect I shall return to my normal, sweet, loving, only vaguely homicidal (joke) :) self shortly. Badbilltucker 22:03, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments and history. I think that some issues are more a matter of opinion than willfully breaking the "rules" - one of those problems where folks are expected to both "be bold" and follow all of the policies. But hey, we've got that cool "re-vert" feature to fall back on! It's all good. :) Nightngle 23:21, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How to become a member?

What should I do in order to become a member of WikiProject Religion? Kkrystian^talk 23:18 (UTC+1) 21 Dec 2006

Presumably, just sign up. - Jmabel | Talk 20:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Shakers: Featured article review

The featured article Shakers is currently undergoing featured article review. In the course of that, User:Rjensen took it upon himself to make a massive and (in my view) ill-advised cut. Not particularly my area of work, so I thought I'd draw attention to it here in hopes of getting someone involved. See Talk:Shakers#Massive deletion. - Jmabel | Talk 20:15, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New WikiProject?

How do I go about starting a new one? Specifically to concentrate on the Satanism articles. They're controversial and need some attention (positive rather than "Hey this isn't MY belief"). WerewolfSatanist 18:54, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Omar khanah

Sorry, I can't seem to find this wikiproject's "to do" list, if any. Omar khanah needs some educated fixing up, as right now it seems to be very inflamatory and POV. Thanks. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 15:55, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but why does this article strike you as a religious one? Personally, I think it should be deleted, since it doesn't seem to be about anything. Nightngle 16:43, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, it seems to be one faction's nasty opinion of another faction. Certainly it's a horrid article, but I don't know enough about the subject to honestly say it's just non-notable nastiness. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 16:46, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

It's confusing to me as well. Personally, I think it should be deleted. The content could be added to a "Middle Eastern slang terms" article is such a thing exists, but on it's own, I don't think it's notable or worthy of being of a stand-alone article. I tagged it for deletion, so we'll see what happens. Thanks for clarifying. Nightngle 17:06, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 18:16, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fictional religions?

I don't want to take responsibility for removing the Wikiproject Religion template from D'ni, if the particpants in this project think it appropriate that it be there, but perhaps it should be pointed out that the D'ni are a fictional culture in the Myst series of computer games. (The D'ni are monotheists, worshiping a god named Yahvo, who may or may not be identified with the Judeo-Christian YHWH.) Are other fictional religions going to be a part of this project? Cactus Wren 06:17, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I acknowledge the question you raise, and, in fact, it was a question which I considered when placing the banner there. I decided to include the banner on that page, and in fact on those of all the fictional religions, for the following reasons:

(1) The majority, if not all (I forget) of those articles had yet to be assessed. Given that the scope of this project is the Category:Religion, of which the Category:Fictional religions, is a subcategory, I perhaps presumptuously decided that any relevant assessment would be better than no assessment at all. Certainly, any article can benefit from having a greater number of editors focusing on it.
(2) Any well-constructed fictional religion, which I believe from the article this one is, reflects the personal beliefs of the creator of the religion on the general subject of religion itself. As the scope of this project is intended to deal with religion in all of its forms, we would be remiss if we did not pay attention to these written discussions of the subject as well, particularly because:.
(3) As a former religion student of the school of Mircea Eliade, I am aware that several of the "fictional religions" are created by individuals who are allowed by the nature of their work to engage in rational speculation about the subject of religion which many of the professionals in the field are obligated by their professional standing to avoid. Certainly, Robert Holdstock's Mythago Wood series, particularly the novel Lavondyss contains a very clear, punchy summary of what could very well have been one of the early influences in the development of the religious impulse. Having said that, I'm not sure exactly how to include that particular idea in any articles, but I believe we may be able to reasonably do so somewhere down the road. If not, a link to that article from some other article, with perhaps an expansion of the article to more directly deal with that subject, are certainly possible.

You are, of course, completely within your rights to remove the banner if you believe that it's inclusion is not appropriate to the subject. Thank you, however, for your polite inquiry on the subject. It is refreshing to see that at least some editors are capable of manners. Thank you again for your polite question, and it is my sincerest hope that you continue to enjoy working on all the articles you find of interest in the knowledge that I and this project, to the degree that I can speak for others, will not seek to assert our own prejudices or presumptions on the rational content of the articles. Badbilltucker 15:18, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

My vote would be that we have a lot to cover with the religions of the world, so until we're done organizing those, we should probably not include fictional religions too. Nightngle 18:15, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

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