God - do you believe?

[Jamie's left hand]

I'm not a fan of religion.

I hate when kids are forced into being a Christian or Catholic or whatever when they are too young to know where they stand on the matter. That is the only reason why religion exists today, if everyone wasn't born a Muslim, Christian or whatever and made up their own mind what to believe they would look at the evidence and realise a supernatural power controlling us is very unlikely.

Without religion there would be no, Catholic - Protestant conflict, no Hindu - Muslim , Jew - muslim, Isreal - Iran and no Christians vs muslims. For good people to do bad things you need religion.

I also hate how Religion makes it seem like people are different, we're special and go to heaven. We're all animals and actually 70% identical to plants - do they have an after life too? No, they rot just like we do. It's also one of the reasons how people instead of holding the planet sacred hold their bible or god sacred.

Like we're on this planet and from all the millions of universes, and planets and, solar systems and stars - we're just far enough from the son with the right properties to support life - so a cell formed then divided and from evolution here we are. Yet somehow that's less amazing, despite science and overwhelming evidence you believe in magic. It's god that created all of this as part of a plan - i'll believe in god and miracles when i see one...

Years ago when no one knew any better i bet someone asked the question 'why are we here' and the only logical answer was that a higher power created you and put you here. But now we know better - it's evolution by natural selection - so religion should surely be forgotten as is happening in some countries.

I just think that some people waste their lives believing they will have an eternity in some sort of afterlife as written down by some ancient scribblings, plus even worse when they kill in the name of religion it's unbelievable the odds of you being alive is like however many billion to one and that's taken away because of this mad belief.

Great things can happen because of religion i know, i accept that people because of a belief in god stand by their morals - go to church and think how they can help less fortunate people than themselves. That's good but i just believe the negatives overwhelmingly outway the positives.

I do not like the fact that some religions and religious people assume that morals and ethics and living a good, honest and fair life has a direct correlation to religion. I live by all those means due to a conscience, nothing to do with a belief in god. I also believe in the theory that 'be good to others and good will happen to you' but relate this to simple psychology rather than the intervention of a deity.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Yes, I believe in God. If you don't that's cool.

[MisterOJ]

Yes, I believe in God and consider myself a Christian. Like Ser Scot said, if you don't that's fine. Maybe one day you'll change your mind and see things differently. That's what happened with me.

[straits]

The inception of religion in certain cases, and its effects, were not always undesirable. I believe the golden age of Islam really contributed to civilization, for example. Trigonometry was developed to calculate the correct direction of prayer; it happened to have other uses as well.

For good people to do bad things you need religion.

No, you need an ideal. Does not need to be religion. Blame it on the human behaviour, then.

I just think people waste their lives believing they will have an eternity in some sort of afterlife as written down by some ancient scribblings, plus even worse when they kill in the name of religion it's unbelievable the odds of you being alive is like however many billion to one and that's taken away because of this mad belief

I actually think that someone who is extremely opposed to religion is only of that opinion because of where they grew up; a person who is a hardcore atheist would, if raised in, say, Saudi Arabia, be a hardcore believer.

It is not the tendency of going one way or another which makes someone a 'stupid religious person', it is the inability to yield, concede and accept a different standpoint. Something that many atheists are guilty of as well.

And people who believe waste their lives? Euler? Newton? Either remove that or concede that you are wrong.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

reddit.com/r/athiesm is leaking.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

JLH,

For good people to do bad things you need religion.

I missed that quote. The starvation caused by Stalin in the Ukraine. The Cambodian genocide. The Rwandan genocide, the "great leap forward" in China? How were any of these "bad things" caused by religion?

[Errant Bard]

reddit.com/r/athiesm is leaking.

What does it mean? It sounds interesting regarding the influence of modern media on mainstream ideology and arguments (simplistic drivel being a probable result, as we see here.)

I missed that quote. The starvation caused by Stalin in the Ukraine. The Cambodian genocide. The Rwandan genocide, the "great leap forward" in China? How were any of these "bad things" caused by religion?

I would think that it depends on the definition of "bad things". Whoever wrote that piece probably would argue that either they were fueled by a "religion" or that they were not bad. (the great leap forward being "bad" is actually not a consensual opinion, nevermind on the same level as a genocide, by the way. Your anti-communist american kneejerk is showing :P)

[Sci-2]

I don't believe. The extent of my belief in the supernatural is based around the mysteries of consciousness itself. (No, not talking about psychic powers.)

This has been a long journey for me. I used to think all religions had gods that were real. I even thought they hung out.

When I was young I thought bad people went to Hell. Then I was informed that it's unbelievers who got to Hell, and God would sort out the saved and unsaved on Judgement Day....

My thoughts went to Dr. Mengele and so my belief in Hell waned. I also didn't understand how somehow who was, say, made into a child soldier could be judge fairly in the way Paris Hilton would be.

I was probably in 7th grade when I was forced to recognize that gods weren't real not every god humans worshipped could be real, and nothing in history was a definitive portrayal of God.

I still thought that some divinities were real - Shiva, Jesus, Buddha, maybe a few others.

In college I concluded there was one God, who no religion could grasp but was filled with infinite love for all beings. However, She (I decided God was female) was limited in influencing human actions and suffered as we suffered.

After that, my idea of God was that God was the Mind made manifest in countless bodies undergoing reincarnation. So we were all God, and God was Us.

Further consideration about reality slowly melted those ideas as well until I became an agnostic. That last one, that God is Us, is probably the only God I *could* believe in...but I don't.

[Pebble thats Stubby]

I don't believe in God, but I know a lot of people who do, and I have seen the positive influance this has had on their lives.

Sometimes faith and beilief can be a great comfort, give hope and inspiration. Yeah so it may be a placebbo to You and I, but that don't make it bad, or wrong or wasted.

In fact I have often been kind of jellous of those that have found this spirital connection, its something I don't think I will ever experiance. Its certainly not something to be ridiculed. - yeah maybe the extrmists do, but there are extremists on everything all over the world not just religous ones.

[All-for-Joffrey]

Don't we have this thread like every 3 months?

[Eponine]

Maybe one day you'll change your mind and see things differently. That's what happened with me.

Do people ever say this when they don't actually mean *I think you should* change your mind one day?

[Ser Greguh]

Ooh, a fresh topic! :)

Humans are gifted with the intellectual capacity for curiosity which we use, in part to examine, to ponder, and in some cases to understand and identify patterns in the world around them. Those answers are often insufficient to our psyche, and often leave in their wake additional questions as the granularity of our understanding of the universe becomes finer and finer. In the presence of these insufficient answers, individuals have taken it upon themselves to bypass that process of intellectual understanding and fabricate instead a series of answers that consist of tautological nonsense. This nonsense forms the intellectual basis for all religions in history.

The most clever and awful of these individuals have erected a social structure around their nonsense upon which the acceptance of that nonsense is used both as a metric of social acceptance, and as a form of existential bribery with which certain behaviors are encouraged and others are discouraged, always to the benefit of that structure, and with the promise of punishment from outside our full understanding in the face of non-compliance, and never with any pretense of fairness nor subtlety.

Though I disagree with many of the sweeping statements of the OP, the sociological and intellectual consequences of such nonsense permeating our discourse are devastating.

[Darth Visenya]

I was bought up Catholic, but realized it was a load of rubbish early on, do I believe in God in the traditional Christian sense?, no, do I think there could be something out there?, it's certainly a possibility, I think the correct term is Spiritual but not Religious?.

If people are Religious, that's fine by me as long as they are a decent human being and not a babbling self righteous douche then their beliefs have no impact on my life whatsoever and if it helps them in theirs, great.

[E-Ro]

No, I am not religious at all and dont believe in any god. I never talk about it though, im not one of those guys that argues with religious people over how I think they are wrong.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Eponine,

I hope people end up where they need to be to be the best version of themselves if that's atheism, more power to ya.

[Errant Bard]

Its certainly not something to be ridiculed. - yeah maybe the extrmists do, but there are extremists on everything all over the world not just religous ones.

If you ridicule someone who has an imaginary friend, you could ridicule religious people, but truly, it's a childish reaction, and their belief doesn't define who they are, it's just a part, an hopefully small one.

Don't we have this thread like every 3 months?

More often than that.

[MisterOJ]

Do people ever say this when they don't actually mean *I think you should* change your mind one day?

I believe everyone has their own path they have to walk. It's not up to me to decide what that path is. I believe that God has already laid that path out. And who am I to argue with God's plan for you? You'll wind up wherever it is you need to be in the end.

[Eponine]

Eponine,

I hope people end up where they need to be to be the best version of themselves if that's atheism, more power to ya.

Yeah, I appreciate that, Scot, for real. But, imagine someone in front of you telling you something about themselves - doesn't really matter what. "I'm Muslim". "My favorite color is green". "I have two children". "I like mushrooms". If your response is "maybe one day you'll change your mind about that" - can you really view that as being a neutral statement with no value judgment attached? How DO you feel about mushrooms? You know, next year, you could have changed your mind. True statement. But awfully weird thing to say to someone. (Actually I'm really invested in your views about mushrooms, don't judge me).

[Jamie's left hand]

The inception of religion in certain cases, and its effects, were not always undesirable. I believe the golden age of Islam really contributed to civilization, for example. Trigonometry was developed to calculate the correct direction of prayer; it happened to have other uses as well.

No, you need an ideal. Does not need to be religion. Blame it on the human behaviour, then.

I actually think that someone who is extremely opposed to religion is only of that opinion because of where they grew up; a person who is a hardcore atheist would, if raised in, say, Saudi Arabia, be a hardcore believer.

It is not the tendency of going one way or another which makes someone a 'stupid religious person', it is the inability to yield, concede and accept a different standpoint. Something that many atheists are guilty of as well.

And people who believe waste their lives? Euler? Newton? Either remove that or concede that you are wrong.

Alright i changed it to 'some' there are countless religious people i admire like MLK and Newton!

If everyone grew up natural then and looked at the evidence so took a rational decision i think Religious people would be in the minority. But the fact is that this doesn't happen and in America 80% of people are Christian and half of them don't believe evolution should be taught. It is almost impossible for an atheist or not believer to get elected into any form of politics

[S John]

I don't know.