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svenson (101

)
02 Aug 10 UTC

Religion

This is not meant to be a religion bashing or promoting thread. Just meant to be a intellectual discussion on why people believe what they believe.

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svenson (101 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

This is not meant to be a religion bashing or promoting thread. Just meant to be a intellectual discussion on why people believe what they believe.

Myself, I was born Catholic, christened etc etc. I went to a Catholic school. And when I was old enough my friends and I eventually found our way onto the Internet (around about early high school). I do have to say people's opinions on the Internet and my friends did affect mine for a long time. I eventually came to consider myself Atheist about halfway through high school (though I didn't tell anyone really apart from my closest friends).

Then after a while towards the end of high school I wasn't satisfied with Atheism and kinda felt reassured by the presence of some sort of being. So I switched my views to Agnostic during my first year of University.

I just started to feel that organised religions like Christianity and Islam aren't necessarily the right thing for a lot of people, including myself. I do however fully support the right of such religions to exist. I don't believe in a God who would make so many ridiculous rules for us to follow and believe many of them have been placed upon ourselves by man. I think that simply being a good and moral person should be enough if there is some sort of after life. As I said in another post of mine, I'd rather burn in hell then spend my life following stupid rules (even if they were legitimately put down by a higher power).

I also believe that the God/Great Deity that religions worship are the same one.

That is just the story of my beliefs to what I believe today.

I'm interested in other people's beliefs and how they came to came to believe what they do today. So any stories? (no religion bashing please, although this thread will inevitably dissolve into that)

centurion1 (1478 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

I'm a catholic. I disagree with the church on many things. I'm still a catholic and go to mass on sundays and lecter.

De Gaulle (0 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

Catholic, but all practicing Catholics and especially the priests that abuse kids should be executed.

Seriously, all organised religion should be banned. Who needs someone to tell them how to worship? if you do, get a life and some free thinking

taylornottyler (100 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

I'm agnostic, but I lean more towards a Christian Science faith

Aussieboi (0 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

Agnostic here. I agree organized religion is a farce and nothing but a front for war mongering

largeham (149 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

I was born to Hindu and Jain parents, and raised as such, but then gave up my faith/s at around 13. Now I'm a dirty mix of atheist, agnostic, ignostic (not many people bring a good definition of god to a debate), apatheist (I don't care) and antitheist (I'm against organised religion). And yes, all these terms exist.

pastoralan (100 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

I note that we haven't seen a single story here so far. I'm curious to see what they do.

I read and studied a lot about a lot of different religions, and I came to see that they all require hard work and time spent learning. Whether you're Christian, Hindu, New Age, whatever...if you want to deepen your spirituality, you have to have discipline. Discipline means following rules you don't like, and it means putting other people before you in specific, concrete ways. You might understand it this way: "wax on, wax off." So I figured I might as well follow the religion I was closest to.

Later on, I started to see something in Christianity that I didn't see in other religions--a total lack of rules. But that's maybe another topic.

Octavious (2701 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

From what I've observed most people start believing in religion because the people that they trust tell them it is true (Come to think of it, most of the "facts" I believe in I do so only for that reason). Of course, as you get older you often find that you've invested quite a lot of time and effort believing in what you believe in, which can make a man reluctant to allow himself to stop believing in it for fear of looking like a complete arse who has wasted huge amounts of his life.

Crazy Anglican (1067 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

"no religion bashing please, although this thread will inevitably dissolve into that"

You're very perceptive, as can be seen below.

"Seriously, all organised religion should be banned. Who needs someone to tell them how to worship? if you do, get a life and some free thinking"

So, if all organized religion was banned everyone would be a "free thinker" just like you?

"Agnostic here. I agree organized religion is a farce and nothing but a front for war mongering"

Aussieboi that's just about as wrong as it gets.

Number one how do you know that it isn't the other way around and political factions aren't using religious rhetoric promote war. If there were no organized religions these factions would simply find another talking point wouldn't they?

Number two it's statistically insupportable. Take for example the United States (the most industrialized of all religious nations and vice versa). You'd expect from the nation with the most ability to wage war, among those that are religious, that we would be frequently waging religous wars. If you break down the wars that we've had few can actually be said to have been fought for religious purposes nor have many religions gained ground for any of the wars we've fought. It's actually more likely statistically for a an American citizen to be killed by a dog than it is for one to be killed in a war over religion.

Bob Genghiskhan (1233 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

Agnostic here, and pretty much never thought any organized religion had much of the truth.

When I was a child of around about 10 or 11 years old, my stepfather persuaded my mother to send me to Sunday School and get indoctrinated in the genteel Methodist Church which my stepfather resolutely skips every Sunday. I fancied myself something of intellectual prodigy at the time, and detested my stepfather with the white hot, absolute rage of which only children and psychopaths are capable. So, I took this as a challenge. Within 4 or 5 weeks, I had checked out every book in the church library I could find about non-Christian religions. Then, I checked out books from the public library on other religions, and decided that I would convert to Islam. Well, not really Islam, per se, as much as a version of the Nation of Islam (think Louis Farrakhan, Elijah Muhammad, etc) that I could apply to myself despite being about as caucasian as possible. So, two months into the Sunday School experiment, I'm calling myself "Abu Jamal X", bowing down to pray towards Mecca five times a day, and greeting everyone with "As salaam aleikum". I did not have a third month of Sunday School. I stopped being a "Muslim" within about a month or so of the Sunday School experiment ending.

Miro Klose (595 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

I am a rationalist.
Religion is made by man, there is no "beeing" out there. I have to smile when people tell me they "feel" something has to be there, after speaking to religious people or agnostics it allways turns out their "beliefs" result from a need of something. Some just can´t handle death, some are still suffering from their religious childhood and others (especially agnostics) are not able to give their lifes any meaning, so they need some kind of un-falisieable leck of knowledge.

I never felt the presence of a supernatural beeing, people claiming they do are missintpreting their consciousness and fill the "whole" of understanding with their indoctrinated thoughts. I am just to rationalist and curious to make the same mistake.

Miro Klose (595 )
02 Aug 10 UTC

*un-falsifieable

baumhaeuer (245 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

Confessional Lutheran here.

I would have to say people believe what they do because they want to. The truth (we're not good people and we can't reform ourselves) is not something that makes anyone feel good, so they do not want to believe it, so they don't. That's why divine intervention is the only thing that gets people to believe the truth, which is why Christianity has any following (and that divine intervention does not consist of a warm, fuzzy feeling, or "feeling" God, in case anyone was wondering). That's why, in this religion, all the work is done for you (like pastoralan said). Instead of being good so that you are saved, you are saved so that you can be good.

svenson (101 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@bob: that actually made me laugh, hilarious.

"From what I've observed most people start believing in religion because the people that they trust tell them it is true (Come to think of it, most of the "facts" I believe in I do so only for that reason)."

Scarily true. I was only Catholic when I was younger because... that's what I was told was right. That was "the truth". If I was raised by crazy Satanists I'd probably think sacrificing small children was perfectly okay and normal.

That's one of my reasons why I became agnostic. I realised that my beliefs only came from my social structure and background and realised they were essentially based on nothing other than hearsay. I didn't disagree with the fact that there is possibly a higher power (although, again, this just comes from my social structure) just that why he exists and who he is and why he made us etc could possibly just be made up by a crazy loon thousands of years ago for all I know.

Crazy Anglican (1067 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@svenson & Octavious

It seems that both of you, by virtue of having rejected the religious beliefs that you were brought up with, refute your own claim. Look at it like this: Svenson, if you were brought up as a Satanist you think that you would not have rejected that?

Octavious (2701 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@ Crazy A

I have never rejected any of my religious beliefs as I never really had any. I grew up in the typical English environment where mild Christianity is considered a perfectly respectable belief system but there is little motivation from friends and family to join it. Consider, on the other hand, that I had grown up in a community with a strong belief in a certain religion and I had adopted that religion enthusiastically. If I started to develop doubts later in life those doubts would have to overcome the painful idea that I had been very wrong for much of my life, and the even more painful idea that my family and friends have also spent their lives being wrong or (even worse) lying to me. Given the choice between exploring those doubts and potentially unlocking a world of pain and ignoring those doubts and carrying on as normal, I expect most people will choose the latter.

Crazy Anglican (1067 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@ Octavious

Doubt is part of any belief system. Most of the atheists I have spoken to admit to some doubt as well, it isn't as if one can put off the human propensity to doubt by taking on one set of beliefs or rejecting another. Doubt in and of itself doesn't prove anything.

That does give me a springboard to my own story to add though:

Crazy Anglican (1067 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

In my earliest recollections we did not belong to any church (from aboutthe time I was four until about the time I was six). We joined the Episcopal church and I began to go to Sunday School. That was all pretty run of the mill, including having my Mom as a Sunday School teacher and taking delight in asking the most esoteric questions that sent her to the priest more than once. Here is, I think, the disctinction between my particular parish and others. I was never discouraged from asking questions or posing dilemmas. As such a lot of the atheist arguments that I've encountered later in life sound a bit familiar and fall under the heading of resolved issues. When we went into high school level Sunday Schools we began studying different versions of the same scripture and were asked what we thought, which lead to some really good debates and discussions.

At that point, right about the time I took my first job, I stopped going to church with any regularity. This lasted until about ten years. I came into contact with people of various faiths and continued the habit of discussion and debate. About this time I found the author C.S. Lewis and quite enjoyed his works. At this point I did all of the things that you are supposed to do to become an atheist. I went to college at a state school, I befriended non-Christians and developed quite a respect for other religions and philosophies.

Crazy Anglican (1067 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

From there I was faced with a choice of which one to follow or to reject them all. I found no reason to reject any of them, they all brought their own strengths, but like pastoralan, I found in looking at other religions that the one I began with stood out as different. It isn't about following rules. The very criticism that we pick and choose supports the notion that the rules aren't as important to us as the acceptance of salvation and making the effort to grow toward an ideal.

Bob Genghiskhan (1233 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@CA

I can't really say I was brought up in any religious tradition whatsoever. My mom is the most secular Jew I've ever encountered, my stepfather hasn't been to church for worship purposes in probably 35 years, and neither of them share with me a propensity to ask questions of faith along religious lines. I've always been something of an anomaly within my family for my interest in religion. However, my interest in religion is pretty much entirely secular; I do not have the gift or curse of faith.

abgemacht (1076 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@CA

From reading your story, it seems to be that although you have faith in a higher power, you don't really subscribe to a particular organized religion. Have I understood you correctly?

The_Master_Warrior (10 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

@ Miro

"beeing"? Really? Spelling fail. Miro - 1

Evangelical Lutheran here. I believe that all religion is based on blind faith, and no one is going to find evidence that proves or disproves the existence of a higher being. There are facts that may strengthen one side or the other of the higher being/no higher being debate. But no proof either way. And I believe that's how God meant it to be. Who wouldn't be a Christian if there was irrefutable proof that God existed as the God of Christianity?

abgemacht (1076 )
03 Aug 10 UTC

""beeing"? Really? Spelling fail. Miro - 1 "

TMW -1 for being a spelling nazi

"Who wouldn't be a Christian if there was irrefutable proof that God existed as the God of Christianity? "

Probably a lot of people. If the OT is true, then God did a lot of shitty things. I bet there would be people that wouldn't follow him.

The_Master_Warrior (10 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

Everyone except asylum residents would. If there was irrefutable proof that you would go to hell unless you were a Christian, you would be crazy not to be. I'm not suggesting that that's the case. I personally believe that people who haven't even been exposed to the Gospel (think a little village that's the ass end of nowhere) will have a chance to reconcile with God when they die. People who openly and knowingly reject the faith, however, go to hell.

svenson (101 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

@CA I meant that as an example of how your social background changes who you are and what you believe in. My faith changed because I was exposed to different social contexts as I grew up.

If I was a Satanist and only grew up around other Satanists throughout my upbringing I do not think I would have doubted it. However if instead when I grew up around other people not JUST Satanists my views would likely change when I see that other people see that its not okay to sacrifice children.

I think that its true for anything not just religion. What you believe is true is simply your interpretation of the facts that those around you supply to you.

Jamiet99uk (808 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

@ The_Master_Warrior: "I believe that all religion is based on blind faith, and no one is going to find evidence that proves or disproves the existence of a higher being."

Why believe in something for which there is no evidence? That just seems so..... stupid. I don't mean to be insulting, but one of the things which defines us as humans is our capacity for rational thought. Belief without evidence is irrational in the extreme.

jman777 (407 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

For once I agree with Jamie. That is silly in the extreme.

Jamiet99uk (808 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

And that's my "story", for the purposes of this thread. I am certain, for practical purposes, that there is no such thing as the supernatural, including God(s), but also other crap like ghosts or astrology. I have come to this view because in my 29 years of existence I have never seen, encountered or heard anything to suggest that there is even the smallest possibility that such things exist.

There is no god, there is no afterlife, the physical world is the whole game, and I've got better things to do than worry about things that don't exist.

Jamiet99uk (808 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

@ jman777: "For once I agree with Jamie"

Eventually, everyone agrees with me once.

The_Master_Warrior (10 )
04 Aug 10 UTC

I said "evidence that proves or disproves". I didn't say there wasn't evidence that suggests something (one way or the other)

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93 replies

Miro Klose (595

)
08 Aug 10 UTC

Homosexuality is no choice

I am confused how much religious and far right propaganda sneaks into the forum.

42 replies