Religion

What are all of you? I'm personally an atheist.

Religion makes me head hurt, I can seriously give myself a headache thinking about it. I was raised Christian, my parents were Sunday school teachers, I went every week for about 12-13 years. So I didn't know anything different, I went to youth group basically because my mom made me. I started to hate it and only went for the snacks and juice. I started to see it as a bunch of hypocritical people who went to church once a week to make themselves feel better about the bad things they had done. I'm sure they mean good by it, but it just irked me.

I personally believe there's a God because it's easier for me to believe that than the Darwin theory. I would consider myself to have a lot of faith, so that's probably why it's easy for me to believe that. I probably have too much faith though, definitely in people, I like to think people are good but most of the time I'm proven wrong. It would be interesting to see what I would turn out being if I wasn't raised Christian. It's confusing for me because I don't support really any of the political views that the majority of 'religious' people do. The Bible says that homosexuality is 'wrong' but then it says to love your neighbor as yourself, don't point out the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye, when you have a plank of wood in your own', etc. I just see these people condemning everyone and it's like ..well look at yourself. I see religion as a personal relationship kind of thing, and I like to keep to myself about it. I don't like going to church and singing with every body. My mom is all worried about me because she thinks I worship Satan ever since I stopped going to church...haha.

Sorry I wrote so much, you can probably see how I give myself headaches thinking about this.

Its fine that you wrote a lot I can go on and on about it too. Mostly religious people bug me, going around talking about how Muslims are terrible and gays are ruining America, but you seem to be a cool person.

Yea, it's hard to admit you believe in God in a day where the majority of religious people are very condemning and just not friendly people. I've read a lot of the Bible and Jesus seems like a pretty cool person, and then I see these people saying they are trying to be just like him and I see basically no similarities. I'm not saying I'm better than them, but I do try to be tolerant and very open minded which seems to be more than those people.

It's interesting to discuss with people, but almost impossible when both of my parents are very conservative. One of my professors told me that I'm a very 'laid back' arguer, haha. He was like you get your point across, but geez you never get angry! I just don't show it on my face but inside I'm like

I was raised Catholic, I'm not one anymore though. I'd consider myself an agnostic theist because I still go through phases of extreme doubt but most days I do believe in a God of sorts.

I have a bit of a grudge against organized religion but not against all religious people. I have some friends who are Christians and great people, not judgmental towards homosexuals or non-religious types or whatever. I also know some people who do use their faith to defend their prejudices and it's kind of disturbing to hear the things they say--some of them honestly believe that condemning homosexuals or showing gruesome pictures of aborted fetuses to women who've recently had abortions are acts of love. Then there are the ones who know for a fact that they're doing what they're doing to inspire guilt and make people feel bad and still think it's the right thing to do. I have no clue which is worse.

Anne Lamott said in an article she wrote about the fundamentalist-Christian right that you can be sure that you've created God in your own image when he hates all the same people you do, and I'm inclined to agree.

billy pilgrim wrote:

I was raised Catholic, I'm not one anymore though. I'd consider myself an agnostic theist because I still go through phases of extreme doubt but most days I do believe in a God of sorts.

I have a bit of a grudge against organized religion but not against all religious people. I have some friends who are Christians and great people, not judgmental towards homosexuals or non-religious types or whatever. I also know some people who do use their faith to defend their prejudices and it's kind of disturbing to hear the things they say--some of them honestly believe that condemning homosexuals or showing gruesome pictures of aborted fetuses to women who've recently had abortions are acts of love. Then there are the ones who know for a fact that they're doing what they're doing to inspire guilt and make people feel bad and still think it's the right thing to do. I have no clue which is worse.

Anne Lamott said in an article she wrote about the fundamentalist-Christian right that you can be sure that you've created God in your own image when he hates all the same people you do, and I'm inclined to agree.

Yea, I definitely agree with what she said. Who is she?

She's an author, she writes novels and non-fiction books as well as a lot of articles and essays, which you can find online. She's a liberal Christian and a lot of her non-fiction is about religion and faith, but she's not dogmatic or condescending about it. Actually if I'm not mistaken the title for "Siren Song of the Counter Culture" by Rise Against came from one of her books.

Ohh awesome, I'll have to check that out. Yea my dad is always ranting about liberal Christians and how he can't believe that Christians could have such views.

My father is Cuslim, my mother was raised Church of England, and I was raised Mormon (my mum converted when I was six). To say I've got a mixed religious background is an understatement.

I. Intensely. Dislike. Religion.

I don't believe in God at all, you live, you die, this is it. Get used to the idea. Life is shitty, people die, bad things happen to good people, good things happen to bad people. It sucks, but that's life. The trick is learning to play the game. Because it's all a fucking game, and if you don't learn to play, you'll end up getting played by it.

I've read widely on religion, including Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and some Buddism. I couldn't find anything I agreed with, the idea of a God or higher power how is somehow in control over me and my life just does not appeal to me. Then I read the Satanic Bible. I'd recommend it to anyone interested in any sort of Theology, it's a good opposing view to religion. I remember I read it when I was about 17 and I just felt like someone had taken all my thoughts and organised them right there in that little book. i wouldn't go about calling myself a Satanist or anything (well... maybe if I just wanted to fuck with someone) but I really do identify with the whole idea of being you own "God", and creating your own destiny, being the master of yourself and answering to no one.

Ok, I'm done now.

I used to be pretty much Atheist.. I doubted the existence of god so much I began to sort of fight the other side.. I never realized how stupid I was until somebody pointed it out to me.. I would instantly dislike somebody just because they were a believer or whatever.. Then I met a Catholic girl.. lol. We went out for a pretty long time and we sort of met in the middle on the whole thing. I now would consider myself Agnostic because all I really know is that I don't know. All in all, I would like to believe in the existence of a god or a higher power but there are too many religions and I know nothing about any of them. I was raised in the ghetto and my mom was a tweaker, I had no religion growing up.

I like to think of myself as a pretty open minded person and I try not to make any prejudgments of a person based on their religion because I hate it when religious people assume I'm a bad person and I have no sense of right and wrong because I'm not religious. I sort of sit right on the fence and at times I lean to one side or the other.. I hate the idea of people judging other people for what they believe.

I heard a Gandhi quote that I totally agreed with:

"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."

Yeah Gandhi was pretty much spot on with everything. He was celibate wasn't he?

Yeah, he was. He was watching his father while he was sick, and one night, his uncle came to watch the father and give Gandhi a little time off. He had sex with his wife while he was off-duty. His dad died a little afterward. Gandhi felt was really guilty and became celibate. He also said it was to learn love, not lust.

Damn, I had never heard that story. I wish he was still alive. I wanted to read that book about him, I forget the name though. I'm sure there's tons of books written about him...but my friend read one that she said was really good.

Yeah, i find it amazing how people can kill M.L.K, John Lennon, and Gandhi, yet people like George Bush get away...

I'm an atheist.

I think religion is the worst thing that human beings have thought up. It had a purpose long ago, obviously, but it's fucking 2008 and we have education. The fact that people can go to school and then go to church and not laugh their asses off is incredibly sad to me.

I've had friends of every faith, and of varying degrees of enthusiasm. My best friend I would describe as "psychotically Christian". But people are people. Their stupid superstitions don't ever have anything to do with their day to day lives.

I just refuse to discuss it. I don't see how there's any reason to. It's like spending time talking about Santa. Just a waste of time.

^ I like you, lets be friends.

ClockworkRobot wrote:

^ I like you, lets be friends.

It is done.

I'm definitely agnostic. I can't relate to any of the major religions and their requirement for blind faith, but I can't fully accept atheism, so agnosticism makes an excellent compromise.

JamaicaSka wrote:

I'm definitely agnostic. I can't relate to any of the major religions and their requirement for blind faith, but I can't fully accept atheism, so agnosticism makes an excellent compromise.

May I ask what you mean when you say that you "can't fully accept atheism"?

I only ask because it seems an odd thing to say, to me. Atheism is just non theism, no theism, there's nothing to accept, it's actually the idea of not accepting something.

It's the actual disbelief in a god that atheism requires that I don't like. I'm not sure enough that there's no god or some other supernatural deity or something to call myself an atheist.

I think religion can bring a lot of good (good morals, willingness to help people etc), but on the large scale of things it appears to be doing more harm than good; mostly due to blind faith. When people will do anything blindly without questioning their actions simply because a priest or someone tells them that "god wants it to be so", for me that's when religion becomes too dangerous and it's the reason I can't find anything in the major ones.

I wish I had a religion, some-one or something to look up to, for that feeling of elation; but it's just not on the cards. Yet I can't bring myself to fully denounce religion like atheism requires, so agnosticism is for me.

i think it's funny that the Christian faith talks about God making everything and everyone but then we bring up do magic...and chrstian extremists freak out.

i'm still waiting for my Hogwarts letter FWI.

walkingmakesyoustrong wrote:

Yeah, i find it amazing how people can kill M.L.K, John Lennon, and Gandhi, yet people like George Bush get away...

true true true!!!!

if i had to catagorize myself as anything it would be buddihst, i suppose. i dont believe in a god, or heaven and hell, i strongly believe in karma and reincarnation.

i had a lot of friends in high school who were really religious, and would get mad at me when they would start praying or talking aobut god and they would ask my opion, i would lok at them and tell them i dont ebleieve in a god, to me he or she doesnt exist. they started alot of fights.

JamaicaSka wrote:

It's the actual disbelief in a god that atheism requires that I don't like. I'm not sure enough that there's no god or some other supernatural deity or something to call myself an atheist.

I think religion can bring a lot of good (good morals, willingness to help people etc), but on the large scale of things it appears to be doing more harm than good; mostly due to blind faith. When people will do anything blindly without questioning their actions simply because a priest or someone tells them that "god wants it to be so", for me that's when religion becomes too dangerous and it's the reason I can't find anything in the major ones.

I wish I had a religion, some-one or something to look up to, for that feeling of elation; but it's just not on the cards. Yet I can't bring myself to fully denounce religion like atheism requires, so agnosticism is for me.

Well, that would be the definition of agnosticism, then.

I was only asking because some folks actually think atheism is a religion or a belief system. It's amazing how convinced people are of that, which I suppose seems easy enough with motherfuckers like Richard Dawkins running around like some kind of half-assed intellectual version of Jim Jones.

Would you agree with the statement that it is impossible to know which is the truth?

I've never really understood the arguments from agnostics myself, as I hold to the idea that if something is not obviously true, then you should presume it is not true until it can be shown to be obviously true. I don't mean to say that absence of evidence is evidence of absence, but that an absence of evidence means that a thing just isn't worth bothering with. Of course, this only works in terms of general concepts, like theism, but it makes sense to me. For example, there is no evidence that a giant chimpanzee lives in the apartment above me, but why would I bother looking for evidence of it? There is a rather high probability that there is no giant chimpanzee because as far as I know, in all of human history, no giant chimpanzees have been encountered in urban settings. Therefore, there isn't one, and if some evidence should turn up, I'd certainly love to hear about it.

Replace "giant chimpanzee" with anything.....Santa, the Easter Bunny, a man named Joe who lives in a cloud somewhere over Sri Lanka......the point is that agnosticism seems, to me, to be a suspension of judgement in a situation where judgement is crucial. Either there is a God, which means holy crap, there's an omnipotent being controlling everything, or there isn't a God, which means that it's up to us humans to fix things that we've broken. I suppose my point is that people should live their lives based on a reasonable assumption of what reality is, and if it is, in fact, reasonable that a God exists, then we're doing everything wrong. Since it seems more reasonable that there is no God, then it seems reasonable to stop building churches, stop giving money to churches, and to stop allowing decisions to be made on the basis of a morality that seems rather arbitrary, considering.

I suppose this idea leaves no room for agnosticism because it demands practicality in action.

At any rate, this is just my argument against agnosticism. Feel free to call me a dumbass. That's how we get to new ideas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster

I WAS TOUCHED BY HIS NOODLY APPENDAGE.