Ah, Religion - My Short Story

lukep said:
PS: Agnosticism is just a word that means: I like to keep all my bases covered, just in case... It doesn't allow you to feel as free.
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If that's so, then I'm not an agnostic and I'm not an atheist. Call it uberist.

I'm open to the idea of intelligent design...it's possible because it's impossible to understand what it feels like to be smarter than we are.

I'm open to the idea of living in a computer simulation. It kind of makes sense that everything that we physically observe is just information. The letters and computers and pens and pencils are tools to get the message (or data) across. If computers can process enough data to render a consciousness 'thing', then it's possible we're just a rendering.

I'm open to the idea that when we die, we die. black...void...a.k.a. who cares, feeling like a void would theoretically be in perfect equilibrium.

I don't know though. What I believe is that there's no one person that can save the world...it has to be a collective effort of peace and the willingness to learn together as a human civilization. And until that happens (never), the only thing we really have as individuals is our day to day life, the small moments that make up the whole. Learn from mistakes, capitalize on small moments of happiness, make money, wait (or fight) for world peace...in no particular order. If God shows himself to me (bone-dry sober), then I'll believe him. Until then I'll just happily wait to die and see what's next.
 


If you have come to the realization that you don't want or need to participate in that stuff anymore you don't need to convince them or prove them wrong in order to validate your own beliefs. As you yourself were once proof of, trying to debate them head on isn't going to change their minds -- it will probably just cause them to cling to their existing beliefs even harder. People need to come to their own conclusions.
 
in all seriousness, live ur life how ever you want you already wasted an hour creating this thread and I wasted 10 minutes replying to it.

religious is a personal matter.

my challenge to you and every athiest/agnostic out there. Do not discredit religion until you have tried every single one that exists. because like all the religions have claimed...THERE REALLY IS ONE TRUE CHURCH...that if jesus were to return to the earth today he will claim this particular church his own because this one religion is using his teachings properly and excercising his priesthood properly as he did when he was on earth.

If you search you will find that one true church I promise you.
 
SUP3RNOVA said:
That's all I'm trying to tell them. At least be open to the contradicting evidence and then THINK FOR YOURSELF, don't think what the Bible thinks about it.
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this. I have a very good friend who grew up in a fairly secular household who become religious, and I have no problem with that. He came to the conclusion himself.

Then I had a gf who couldn't think for herself and believed everything Christianity said without question because she was told to. That I had a problem with.
 
As a baptist raised southerner, who has gone through all of what you're talking about above.


You know what? All this ....

You need to step back for a second and think.

"Am I doing this to be right? Or am I doing this because I actually hope to changes someone's opinion"

"Is being right going to hurt my family?"

((cause lets face it... you're right... the bible has so many inconsistencies etc and you're never going to get a real straight talk answer from a convicted preacher like that))



Best youth leader I ever met could say "I don't know." He recognized problems with his own religion.



Religion SHOULD be INTENSELY personal
(tell your family that to get them off your back otherwise if you tell them you're an atheist or whatever they'll just pray for you all the time).

It's the evangelists that fuck it all up.

Find God your own way... or don't.

Personally for me: "For Man to attempt comprehension of the afterlife, is as the tadpole trying to understand the frog."
 
faith is believing in something completely even though you have plenty of evidence to the contrary.

a bit of kierkegaard could do wonders for your quandary..
 
cardine said:
this. I have a very good friend who grew up in a fairly secular household who become religious, and I have no problem with that. He came to the conclusion himself.

Then I had a gf who couldn't think for herself and believed everything Christianity said without question because she was told to. That I had a problem with.
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As a Christian myself, I have been pouring through this thread tonight, just kind of watching people's answers. Very interesting stuff for me.

Cardine, I like your perspective and appreciate you for it. It is totally ridiculous for anyone like myself to simply claim to be a Christian and believe everything they heard in church because that is just the way it is. Anybody who says they are a Christian and also says they love the whole Bible probably has not read it all. There is a lot of death and general awfulness, not to mention hell. I really hate that part. But I won't start at argument here about the validity of any of it. It would be moot.

SU3RNOVA, from your original post -

"I'm sure all of those points will lead to more points, and I'm sure that in the end, he will have an answer for everything. I'm also sure that every answer he has is going to come from the Bible, which is illogical for obvious reasons. But that seems to be the way religious people (Christians in this case) argue...they prove prophecies in their Bible with other prophecies coming true...in their Bible."



I don'thave all the answers, and I hope he doesn't pretend to. And if all his answers come only from the Bible then he needs to sit down and think some more. Even the Bible itself (anyone see the irony in the fact that I am now using the Bible to quote a reason for not using the Bible?) says to test everything to see if it is true, and that verse does not mean by simply asking your pastor or finding another verse. it means to test it, pour over it, think it through, etc.

I could go about trying to answer your questions from my perspective, but that's not what your thread was about, so I will leave that be.

By the way, I hate most of the stuff in Religulous and Jesus Camp. Seriously, a Jesus theme park? Literally, "oh my God." Makes folks like me look like a dumbass. I actually attend a home church where we literally eat and live life together and help each other when we need it (we don't literally live together, we are just a real "community" I guess). Simple. None of the rest of that crap. I came to this point because I really do believe in God after much searching of my own, but I could do without all the fluff. But I digress.

Best of luck in your search for truth.
 
SUP3RNOVA said:
It just sucks that I can already foresee this destroying my family...all over one gigantic lie.
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Do you want your family to like you?
If you do, then don't challenge them.

I've tried challenging my family on their christian faith. Their brains couldn't handle the level of thought our discussions required and they got really angry.

Without typing so much here that you avoid reading what I have to share, just hear me out when I say from experience that you are only going to make your family dislike you.
 
SUP3RNOVA said:
I'd like any evidence from a non Christian-biased source proclaiming all the events that happened.
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supernova

what if I told you that I was 6'4 tall, 220 pounds would you believe me????

you would have to take my word for it correct?
you dont know how tall I am but you know I exist correct?

well what if some other WF member posted on here saying that I was only 5'7" tall? would you believe him? who is telling the truth?

The only way to find out how tall I am is for one of your friends that you "physically know" to come over to my house and meet me, then post on the forum saying that I am 6'4".


That analogy I just gave is called revelation, 100% of all churches believe it no longer exists that is why they are confused and the bible adds to the confusion. only one church believes in revelation, find them.
 
Are you guys saying there is No GOD?

Oh My GOD..........

The prophecy is coming true.. 2012 is near!!!
I am damn sure you were the cause of at least a dozen of those million dead Anchovies and at least a couple of these 200 cows.


See you in Hell...

AAAAC68Uoc8AAAAAAF_xog.jpg
 
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Solarus said:
Read books by Hitchens and Dawkins. While they can both be quite extreme, they can help shape the things you really dislike about religion, and usually give you enough ammunition to completely stump any standard priest/pastor.
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Also books by Ken Wilber. I'm also an agnostic in a family of Christians and these books clarified a LOT for me:

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-Everything-Ken-Wilber/dp/1570627401]Amazon.com: A Brief History of Everything (9781570627408): Ken Wilber: Books[/ame] (all theory)
[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Grace-Grit-Spirituality-Healing-Killam/dp/1570627428]Amazon.com: Grace and Grit: Spirituality and Healing in the Life and Death of Treya Killam Wilber (9781570627422): Ken Wilber: Books[/ame] (theory mixed in with a story - easier to read)
 
First, I think its good that you are seeking truth and understanding...I'd suggest if you are honestly interested in this to take time to process all of this, and don't feel any need to rush it. I see people jump in and out of all kinds of beliefs and relationships out of fear that they can't have any periods of what they believe is "uncertainty" in their lives, and it can cause a lot of problems. A few things to consider:

Just because a group of people (church you grew up in or people in a documentary) acts a certain way, that does not affect the truth or non-truth of a belief system (such as Christianity). Also, even if this pastor can't answer your questions, that does not mean God does not exist or that Christianity is necessarily invalid. And it sounds like a rather superficial group, no offense, so in reality, its probably an utter waste of time.

As far as inconsistencies, every system has them, including what most people fallaciously believe do not, such as science, history, and math.

I would never look to any documentary as a form of credibility to anything, but take note of the content.

Scientific "proof" is invalid and is in actuality, simply built on likelihoods and probabilities, which is obviously useful as a tool, but can not make any normative, moral or supernatural claims. Meaning, if a "supernatural" being existed, how would one measure, quantify, create a "natural" probability that could be considered "scientific proof" of that being. Supernatural means greater than or outside of the subset of "natural," so looking for supernatural in what we in our day and time call "nature" is a logical contradiction in and of itself. If "supernatural" does exist, one couldn't measure it with the "natural."

You are going to have to figure out not by "facts" because no "fact" is neutral and involves interpretation. But instead by considering how you can know what is true or false, while ignore your "personal filters" you may have built up out of an emotional reaction to something that happened to you, or that you did. Meaning, if your parents tried to be super Christians, but were instead abusive, or a pastor punched you in the face, that is not relevant to truth or non-truth as there could be Christians that did not do those things.
 
SUP3RNOVA said:
And to the person who said "Just leave them be, for the most part a religious person will live a good moral life, it's only a few that do bad, blah blah"...It's not about that, it's about the fact that you're stripping innocent children of their free will by teaching them literal fairy tales as divine truth...the whole idea of it is wrong. Religion in politics makes me want to spit up too.
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This is why some atheists get tagged, amusingly, as fundamentalist or extreme. Religion is something disgusting and rotten that has spent too long getting rich and doing what it wants, while being allowed to perpetuate the myth by indoctrinating children when they're too young to make their own mind up.

It's very, very wrong.
 
Sup3rnova said:
It's not about that, it's about the fact that you're stripping innocent children of their free will by teaching them literal fairy tales as divine truth...the whole idea of it is wrong.
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You're 100% right but the fact is you're so vastly outnumbered that you have no chance of doing a damn thing about it, ever. Not one little bit... And in time you'll learn that and grow less angry & more patient, like I can tell most atheists on this board are.

I was quite angry too when I first broke out, my family was catholic... So was my first fiancée, but thankfully my doubts by that time allowed me to dodge that bullet!

Rage filled me for a good half decade or so over this matter; it took time to get past how the world is... Travel though, & seeing how little christianity there is in other civilized countries helped me a lot. Asia is an awesome place to learn about this stuff.

-God- said:
This is why some atheists get tagged, amusingly, as fundamentalist or extreme. Religion is something disgusting and rotten that has spent too long getting rich and doing what it wants, while being allowed to perpetuate the myth by indoctrinating children when they're too young to make their own mind up.

It's very, very wrong.
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So speaketh the lord, our God. :p

-It's no different than what Hitler did to his youth, in every last detail, in fact. If only there were enough explosives in this nation to take out all the churches at the same time... ;) (Feeling a bit more of that old rage coming back for a moment there.)

Ah, good, now it's passed again.
 
tx2okc said:
I came to this point because I really do believe in God after much searching of my own, but I could do without all the fluff. But I digress.
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Without the fluff meaning...without the church ceremonies and that whole thing? Or without the crazy stuff like original sin coming from Man vs. Snake and eating off the tree of all knowledge?

There seems to lie another problem with most modern Christians I've come to know...they only pick and choose what they want to believe in. For instance :

Many Christians don't agree with the ideas of Creationism, and understand/accept evolution. "The people of that time couldn't understand science and evolution, so God made it simple for them" is the excuse used...I've used it before. Okay, so we're admitting the world wasn't made in 7 days because we KNOW it wasn't. But it makes perfect sense that it's possible for God to put himself into human form on a suicide mission to save humanity (and turn water into wine while he's at it), and believing that is the only way to be saved? That sounds just as ridiculous as "The world was made in 7 days." And much like we have science to disprove the crude science of the Bible, history over time will have revealed a much different story line...that nobody is "coming back" to save us.

bbywyboy said:
Scientific "proof" is invalid and is in actuality, simply built on likelihoods and probabilities, which is obviously useful as a tool, but can not make any normative, moral or supernatural claims. Meaning, if a "supernatural" being existed, how would one measure, quantify, create a "natural" probability that could be considered "scientific proof" of that being. Supernatural means greater than or outside of the subset of "natural," so looking for supernatural in what we in our day and time call "nature" is a logical contradiction in and of itself. If "supernatural" does exist, one couldn't measure it with the "natural."
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Scientific proof IS valid and it can negate false statements made by 5,000 year old text books. I understand not being able to understand supernatural in a natural world, so why are you trying to understand it? Given your own ruleset, you should never be able to understand religion because it exists in a place you don't. Going by that, you should have no idea what religion is the correct one, as we would have no evidence here in the natural world. Any evidence you have holds the exact same weight as the evidence the Muslim next to you has...and only 1 of you are going to heaven.

*COMMON SENSE BREAK : If you were God and had to write a holy text that people for thousands of years to come would follow, would you have a bunch of MEN write it, YEARS after the events happened? Why not just write it yourself and make it fall from the sky? Wouldn't that be RIDICULOUS?*

Blind faith is ignorance, end of story. If mankind was created for a reason, the reason certainly wasn't to worship 1 man for eternity.
 
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