Religion

[doppelgänger2]

Born and raised a catholic, unitarian universialist by choice. Therefor, I chose "other"

 

[Hello Cutie]

Well, I'm a shia muslim *waits for the terrorist comments with bated breath*

I'm not practising in the sense that the majority of people think practising muslims should be, and I get criticised alot for that, by both sides. I'm a Western muslim. I've been born and brought up over here, and I, nor any of my family (nor most of the other muslims I know) feel the need to have to be strict in our religion (the only time I cover up etc is when I go to the middle east to visit my family, and its not because I want to, but because I obey the Sharia law of the countries, which is completely different).
I don't cover up, I eat pork sometimes, I have tattoos, hell I even drink when I feel like it. I don't agree with the way alot of muslim people take their religion to the extreme and persecute people because they don't do it exactly as they say- infact I hate that any religion feel they have the right to do such a thing.

I am muslim, but I disagree completely with the concept of organised religion. I believe that organised religion is the cause of the majority of the world's problems, that most wars have been fought over religion, and I don't see how any religion has the right to tell another that they are wrong.
As for being a terrorist and blowing people up- the majority of us aren't like that, and you could say the same in relation to catholic and protestant extremists in Ireland who blow eachother up etc (or at least used to).

 

[Randy Giles]

I'm religious, but none of those really apply to me.

I was raised in the Mormon church but I believe that there's some truth in EVERY religion, or elements of truth, anyway. I do believe in God though, very much so.

Personally I think organized religion has been fiddled with too much, and it's a proven fact the Bible has been changed and altered by men throughout history, and most religious leaders seem to have their own agenda so I can't *really* blame people for being agnostic or atheist...evil or misled men twisting the truth to manipulate people...it's a sad thing but that's life.

 

[Monty]

I'm Catholic, and it's all pretty important for me. I miss a Sunday mass more than four times in a row, and I get itchy. It's a thing. 🙂

 

[Lily]

I clicked Christian - Other, since I was born and raised Catholic, but at about 16 I started to butt my head against the strong walls that were put up around any questions I had, I'm now happily a sometimes member of a very casual Baptist church (we meet for barbeques/potluck dinners for our services) and I love the fact that I get to have my faith in a greater power be accomodated rather than smooshed into a rigid little box. Catholicism still works for my mother and grandmother though, so I occasionally attend the big events (Easter, Christmas Mass etc) but it's not for me anymore.

 

[Mesektet Ra]

I was raised pretty agnostic. Religion was never a thing in our family - my parents wanted us to choose for ourselves, so we were never baptized. Both of my parents were raised Catholic and hated it so they decided to give us the choice.

I started becoming interested in Paganism, more specifically Wicca, when I was in grade school. Something about it called to me, I guess. It seemed to fit the beliefs I already had regarding nature and higher power and such.

So, ever since then, I've considered myself Wiccan. Lately I've been calling myself Pagan a lot, just because I feel it more accurately suits my beliefs. Wicca can get so twisted sometimes, and the term Pagan is just a blanket term that I prefer.

Even for my chosen religion I'm not really religious - I more observe than celebrate Sabbats, and I'm prone to celebrating other traditional holidays because that's how I was raised. I do make a point to meditate and at least work a little ritual on Samhain, because that holiday has always held a lot of significance for me. I'm attuned to it, I guess.

 

[LittleMissLikesToFight]

without going into a whole big thing... basically i was raised catholic, did my communion and confirmation, but later became athiest (do you even "become athiest?"). i am 100% in how i feel and i really hate when people make it out that atheists are antichristian... they are so polar opposites. How can i be anti something i don't believe exists? but yeah i get a lot of flack for it.

 

[*~Hell Mouth~*]

Despite studying Religious Studies for the past 5 years at school, I'm still not convinced there is someone or something out there. I'm the type of person who needs to see something to believe it, and until God or any other religious figure appears in front of me I doubt my opinion will change. I have the most respect for a person who are religious and that's their choice but well yeah I chose not to go to church, read the bible and everything else"¦

To be honest I wish I did believe in God, because my Nana died recently and I would love to know she is happy and in heaven but I just can't bring myself to believe that so yeah it does annoy me at times.

 

[eponinethen]

I am really not looking to get into a discussion about this again, so I'm just gonna say that I am very much an atheist, and then leave this thread.

 

[Aethra]

I heard something once. It was basically the argument that there can't be a such thing as an atheist. In order to say something is "impossible", you have to have absolute knowledge of the subject, since "There Is No God" is an absolute statement. Since no one has absolute knowledge of God, no one can say "There Is No God."

I recently heard something similar, that proves almost the opposite. The concept of the nature of god raises a myriad of questions. Consider the question, "Can god create a stone so big that even god itself cannot lift it?" If the answer is yes, then there is something that god cannot do--namely, lift the stone. If the answer is no, then god cannot create the stone. Either way, there is something that god cannot do, and therefore, if there exists a god, it is cannot omnipotent.

I heard this a few months ago and I thought it was great, though there is probably someone out there who is able to disprove and/or find flaw in the logic. I've never been regilious myself; I actually prefer the religion of the ancient Greeks and Romans to any, though I am a lover of mythology in general. I'm mostly distant from all religions, and I'm torn in my feelings about it. On one hand, faith can bring people happiness, so I say rock on, just as long as those happy people don't try to convert me, or in any way force their faith on me. I want none of it. On the other hand, though, religion has been the cause of so many wars, disputes, and deaths throughout history, that it makes me wonder how it can be so good.

 

[palabravampiress]

Despite studying Religious Studies for the past 5 years at school, I'm still not convinced there is someone or something out there. I'm the type of person who needs to see something to believe it, and until God or any other religious figure appears in front of me I doubt my opinion will change. I have the most respect for a person who are religious and that's their choice but well yeah I chose not to go to church, read the bible and everything else"¦

To be honest I wish I did believe in God, because my Nana died recently and I would love to know she is happy and in heaven but I just can't bring myself to believe that so yeah it does annoy me at times.

I'm with you on the wishing I had a belief system thing. I think it would be comforting at times. Also, I think it would make understanding and interacting with religious people much easier. Religion is so tied to politics and to personality and even to community that I often feel like there is something wrong or defective in me because I just don't *get* it. I think *getting* it would make it easier for me to understand how religion works in our society and in the lives of friends and family members.

 

[Starlet]

I was born and raised Catholic as all my family is.
If somebody asks me what religion I am I say Catholic but truly I'm not very sure if it's what represants my beliefs the best.
I believe in God and He's very important part of my life. I pray every day but I'm not so much of a church person. I go there quite often as all my family does but I must say I don't have a need to be there every Sunday. This is because I just don't get many of the things priests are saying and there's also much stuff I don't agree with.
I haven't chosen any of the options on the list yet...

 

[RogueHunter]

Atheism is a religion as it is the BELIEF there is no God. Since there is no way to prove or disprove, it is up to the individual which stance you choose to BELIEVE in. The religious will freely admit that what they feel is a belief and not provable, but often that isn't the case with atheists.

As for the God lifting stone scenario it represents linear thinking. Our minds are finite and God my definition is infinite. We can't visualize endlessness since our minds only know boundaries.

Although religion has been involved in wars, it is mostly just an excuse for those seeking power. Religion itself has helped far more people than it has hurt. It has set nations into motion with altruistic agendas and it has given hundreds of generations a moral guide and value system. The abolition of slavery for example started as a religious movement. The United States was founded on the concepts of free will from the Bible. Many of the founding fathers were in support of an image of the Jews leaving Egypt as the official image struck on coinage, and there is a verse from Exodus inscribed on the liberty bell.
There is just so much we don't know and can't explain, it seems a little like the cart before the horse to dismiss the possibility. There is a saying and I forget who coined it at the moment but it goes something like ' a believer must explain one thing, if there is God, why do innocents suffer, for those who don't believe they need to explain everything else".

 

[Rowan Hawthorn]

Atheism is a religion as it is the BELIEF there is no God. Since there is no way to prove or disprove, it is up to the individual which stance you choose to BELIEVE in. The religious will freely admit that what they feel is a belief and not provable, but often that isn't the case with atheists.

I don't know where you're finding those religious who freely admit that, either, because it's certainly not the case with... well, hardly any that I've run into. In fact, it's the exact opposite - they'll often point to their own sacred writings as "proof" and get rather belligerent when it's pointed out that you can't prove SacredBook is true because it says so in chapter one of SacredBook (doesn't matter if it's your SacredBook or mine, the same rule applies; I could write a SacredBook and claim it's true in chapter one, but that wouldn't make it so,) point out that we exist, ergo their religion is true, otherwise how could we exist, etc. The question, "Then how do you explain <fitb>..." usually results in a tizzy when you explain <fitb> - because any explanation is unacceptable if it doesn't equate to "God did it." And I've heard the comment "Christianity isn't a religion - it's a personal relationship with God." (Okay, and that's different from a religion in what way?)

So let's not give too much credit where it isn't due, shall we?

 

[RogueHunter]

The definition of Faith itself is BELIEVING without seeing. I haven't met anyone that has tried to make a rational argument that a bible proves anything and you might want to point out to them that if the bible proves it, then they have no faith. By people acknowledging faith they are stating a personal belief. Obviously you're going to have people that argue the 'truth' in their beliefs whether its over their favorite pro athlete, political views or the best ice cream.
Insisting it is true is a matter of irrationality and thats certainly not limited to the religious world.

 

[Aethra]

The Bible contradicts itself with every turn of the page. It's rather annoying to me. I personally don't understand how people live their lives by something so indecisive. I mean, come on, there are two versions of creation!
Don't mean to offend anyone, I just have issues with it.

I'm sure there are both believers and atheists who try to prove the existence, or lack thereof, of a higher power, and there have been for millenia, though not all do. Some do admit that it is merely what they feel. This makes me think that the only group which doesn't try to prove anything is the agnostics, as they are resigned to the fact that it is impossible to prove it either way. That makes agnostics seem like the most logical of all to me.

 

[slayerpower]

I am Jewish, my mom is Jewish and so is her whole family. But I've never been to synagogue and I never had a bat mitzvah. I don't celebrate Yom Kippur (Jews fast all day and go to synagogue and pray to God that he forgives them for their sins), though I plan to do the whole fasting thing later in my life (I still live at home with my mom and she'd be upset if I skipped eating for a day). I do celebrate Passover and Hannukah, though. Part of me thinks I don't practice Judaism as much as I should, but internally, I'm very religious.

 

[JCC]

Atheist/anti-Theist.

 

[TabulaRasa]

Loaded question...I was raised Roman Catholic. It took me a while to really realize for myself what I truly believed in. I checked Athiest. I am a, if you can't see it, or touch it, I can't believe it! I feel like I want there to be a God, because I'd hate to deny him if he really did/does exist. But I just can't help it right now.
And I do normally say, I have faith, blah, blah, but I don't mean faith in God, Jesus, the bible, whatever. I just mean that things will go well. So, yes, athiest.

 

[InsaneMystic]

Other, once more. I call myself a free pantheistic mystic, I'm not signed up with any "thought club", but I'm very secure in my faith in a higher power I call God (or just Daddy 🙂 even though I do NOT think of God as male in any way) and strongly influenced by the teachings both of Jesus of Nazareth and Siddharta Gautama. I couldn't keep myself functional for a day as either an atheist (whom I find amusing, since I 100% share RogueHunter's view that Atheism is a religious belief in itself, so atheists claiming to be anti-religious are sadly deluding themselves IMO) or an agnostic (whom I respect, even hold in awe, as I never fathomed how they deal with the threat of solipsism in a world that they never can know anything about, if they abstain from ever making some kind of "leap of faith").

What I'm clearly not in favor of are people who claim that their beliefs are "the truth". Having mentioned solipsism before, I strongly hold the opinion that the objective truth about anything cannot, ever, be known by any human being or other physical entity we know. God Itself, if It exists, would be the only exception (in my conviction, objectivity/omniscience is the more important "mark of Godness" than omnipotence... if I ever happen to meet an objective entity, I will make myself its willing slave immediately and regard its word as literal gospel and THE LAW, no matter whether said entity would also be omnipotent or not). Thus, while I'm certain that the spiritual path I walk on is the one that works best for me and for now, I don't consider it to be "the truth", as I have no idea what "the truth" is, and firmly believe that the absolute earliest opportunity for finding out about it is after the death of my physical body, given that that one is firmly anchored in subjectivity...

Regarding the "stone paradox": there really is a simple (well, as simple as these things go ::grad:: ) logical solution to it. An omnipotent being (be it God or whoever) could create a stone so large that it fills the entirety of the space-time-continuum, leaving no physical space in relation to which any lifting might occur. So there.

@ SocialSuicide: Do you know you (as most people, sadly, do) misquoted the Marx line? It really goes "Religion ist das Opium des Volkes" (transl. "the people's opium"). Not just nitpicking, it DOES change the meaning. :wink: