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Religion
Do you hold any spiritual beliefs i.e Christianity, Hinduism, Judaism, Wicca etc? Or is that a no, i.e agnosticism, atheism? Come and share your worldview and any meaningful personal experiences you wish.
If you are religious do you subscribe to a specific denomination? I.e a Catholic, Baptist, Mormon. Please be polite, everyone is welcome here at the table. |
I used to be Christian, but now I am agnostic. While I still hold onto a belief in some kind of afterlife and ghosts, I'm unsure about a God. Thankfully, I made a home in r/Atheism and have found support from a friend of mine who happens to be Atheist.
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I'm agnostic. I can't believe that there absolutely is or absolutely isn't a higher power because it is completely impossible to prove either. So my stance is "I don't know".
I have to say though, I don't believe that any higher power is something we could ever comprehend. It is the height of human arrogance to presume we could ever speak as to what a higher entity believes or wants. |
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Had a brief period of time where I identified as Christian but otherwise have always been agnostic. I do not think we can prove or disprove a god exists and I've just accepted it as something I will find out after death. I believe there is a higher power / afterlife in some manner but I can't prove that nor do I identify with a specific religion's beliefs.
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I was raised deep Southern Baptist. I went to church a lot with my paternal grandmother growing up. I realized it wasn’t for me around 13 or 14. I don’t believe there’s any sort of higher power, and if there is, I don’t think she’s anything like any established “God”.
Funnily enough, religion is actually what sparked my first, frequent anxiety attacks. One New Years Eve around age 8, I watched a movie about the rapture and was beyond traumatized. Any time I couldn’t find someone, I immediately started full-on panicking - I feared they had been raptured and I was left behind. This was a common occurrence from like age 8 to...12 or 13? I mean I had nightmares, sleepless nights, etc., just because I was so worried about it haha. |
I am a Christian although I subscribe to no particular denomination and I am a former Atheist. I was raised in a very strict religious family and had a period in my life where I ultimately rejected the notion of a God altogether. However, I have returned to my faith in recent years and I consider myself immensely spiritual. A life without God for me was a bleak one and my belief in Christ gives me hope and happiness. I believe in being a kind person and I believe that living to help other individuals is my duty as a human being. Furthermore, I believe that all of God's creations are special and worthy of respect. My religious views are also somewhat unorthodox, as I do not believe in hell or Satan or any inherent "force of evil", nor do I believe that only adherents of Christianity ascend to heaven. I think the gates of heaven are open to everyone and a lack of religion doesn't exclude one from the afterlife.
With that being said I have no way of proving if God exists for I truly don't know. My perspective is that if God is real then I will serve him and if God isn't, what have I got to lose? I must admit I find religious debates somewhat ridiculous because nobody truly knows and I think the question on the existence of a higher power will remain unanswered, which doesn't bother me. While I have no insecurity regarding my Christian faith, I consider myself to be very open-minded about other people's beliefs. |
Was born and raised Catholic but I've grown to have considerable disagreements with the Church. So much that I feel we need a 2nd Reformation movement to allow Priests to marry, Nuns or Women to have a greater role(Female Pope anyone?) and to do a far greater job, particularly here in the United States, at dealing with the growing Homeless/Hunger issues plaguing large swaths of the country. I see far too many 2nd Collections all going for things that don't go back into the local community and it sickens me to no end. I mean there's a relatively new Cathedral in Oakland but the city is swamped with people on the streets. For a Religion built on generosity to the poor, it definitely has failed in this regard.
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Born and raised in an absolutely Catholic (and supernatural- yes I am serious) country. Still can't (and won't) say this out loud irl but I am agnostic, with events supporting and/or questioning my beliefs everyday. In the end, it's all just a big "I don't know" and all I can do is respect everyone's opinion on the matter.
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I'm from a Catholic background but at the the same time I don't really consider myself to have had a Catholic upbringing. Besides my grandma and my great auntie (her sister) I'm pretty sure everyone else in my family is (at most) agnostic.
I went to a Catholic school but it was pretty much just like any other school in my opinion, we just happened to have a nun headmistress, some assemblies with religious themes and of course we said prayers at the start of lessons. That kind of stuff just felt like going through the motions more than anything and I'm pretty sure most of the teachers felt that way themselves too. Even in R.E. class it would have been perfectly acceptable for someone to say "I do not believe in any of this" as long as they weren't doing it to obviously try and piss off the teacher or something. As for myself I've always been very spiritual. I'm not sure if I believe in a creator being but I do believe in a higher power/realm of existence. My beliefs are more formed than than last statement but as they do change over time with my own changing perception of reality and are fairly personal I'll leave it at that. |
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What was mortifying, was when, as a very nonreligious agnostic, I got left in charge of two classes full of seven-year-olds for Liturgical Singing. Never again. |
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You being in charge of children to do something of that nature does sound odd though. In fact I wonder now how much would have been required of our teachers that did not hold religious beliefs. I'm trying to remember if we had prayers at the start of every lesson, I don't think we did but whether that was down to the teacher forgetting/being exempt because of not being Catholic themselves I do not know (probably the former since I imagine it wouldn't have bothered anyone who made the decision to work at a Catholic school in the first place). Anyway this is all another debate/topic entirely... |
I'm Christian.
I grew up in a household that wasn't very religious, primarily because of my mom just not wanting to go church or really partake in any Christian activities, but it was more-or-less on the basis of non-practicing Christianity as my mom did believe in God, as does my dad. It wasn't until my mother passed away three years ago that I turned to Jesus. I feel that my walk with the lord is what kept me up during a time that I would have otherwise been down. He's also been there for me in times of stress, such as last year when I was going through hardships with friends and also through an intense time while I tried returning to school. At the time, I never thought I was going to get out of the rut I was in, but with prayer I believe that it was God who has helped me get through such tough times since I opened my heart to Him. I don't always speak of my views publicly, so this post was kinda tough to make in the process. |
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I am not religious, and in fact would say I am an atheist. I was raised a Christian by my family. We went through a few different churches, the last one Methodist. As much as I tried, I could never "get" church. I believed because my family and community did. I would have never been able to admit to this, but looking back on it, I didn't have that belief for myself. No God ever spoke to me, and I never felt the "high" that people get in church services. Church was just a time of boredom to me.
It's a long story, but I eventually ended up an atheist. Me being raised as a feminist, LGBT positive (and then ending up in the spectrum myself), etc. really pushed me along. I was raised in quite an astounding bubble, where I didn't realize that the Bible was problematic and that many churches and believers were pushing forward extremely sexist beliefs, being anti-LGBT, etc. Once that bubble burst, I quickly rejected Christianity. The dominoes all fell from there. Moral rejection was my foundation, but from there I realized that the religion and deity didn't make any sense at all, and then that my 'belief' I had been raised on had no foundation. |
i am religious to some extent. i do believe there is a higher power and a God and that our paths are sort of...determined by the higher power, and whenever we go off our path and start to steer onto the wrong path the higher power tries to help us back onto the right one. i also believe in reincarnation to an extent. i don't have a label to whatever my religion is.
i was born into a family where my mom was a heavy christian growing up and my dad is currently an atheist and has been one as far as i can remember. he tried to push my mom's religious beliefs down and oppress her and it was not good. religion was never really discussed in my household when i was growing up unless if my dad was negative about it. thus i never explored religion until i was an adult, like 18 or so. i still dont rlly know what religion i am. i just know i am religious to some extent. |
I used to be a rather devout and emotional little Catholic, one raised with the firm belief in God as a vengeful being that had an unwavering unforgiveness unless the strictest tenets of Catholicism were followed to the exact letter. The Vatican was infallible and all of its declared proclamations were to be followed without hesitation, for any failure would be of utmost denigration to God. So on and so forth. Came from a very Catholic house with a very Catholic window, a Catholic Corvette and everything was Catholic for me and myself and everybody around, because we did not acknowledge another religion (religion, religion, religion...). But some things happened, some very bad things that I could not find answers for from a religious standpoint, and things changed. I never outright renounced my affiliation, but I could not justifiably place my faith in something I did not love anymore. And over time, that morphed into a genuine appreciation in the power of regular people to make their own way in life and a relative disinterest in the practices of organised faith and such. I still feel failed, but it's more a political and moral weight rather than a spiritual one. I'm okay now.
Nowadays, I am apathetic. I don't believe in any particular supernatural force, regardless of how conscious an actor it might be, but I do not consider discussions of religion relevant to my day-to-day experience, so I don't have an interest in being conclusive about those beliefs. At the same time, I am rational enough to say that my personal absence of observable supernatural phenomena does not exclude the existence of said phenomena, so I am not explicitly atheist by nature. I am just apathetic to practicing it in my own life and find that my own life experiences and my own readings of people much smarter than I am are sufficient enough to provide the moral standpoints I need to navigate through life, with questions of the supernatural being of little interest to me beyond the occasional midnight fear of failure = Hell. That's a remnant from my youth, of being driven by my family's brand of guilt-ridden Catholicism, and is not an accurate representation of what I believe the afterlife would entail, should such an afterlife exist. That all being said, as a student of history, I find the cultures and historical relevance attached to religions to be of great satisfaction to study, with special attention paid to Judaism. Something about the great reverence given to practicality and the results of one's own researches into the earthly and the divine is singularly fascinating to me. The history attached to that religion is enough to fill hundreds of lifetimes to the brim with study and I never tire of learning about it, despite my own disagreements with some of the practices attached to adherents. Matters of theology aren't of particular interest to me unless said matters are rooted in observable or academically rigorous processes, pretty much. That, and whether those beliefs are at the forefront of political changes I have a vested interest or relevance to. |
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I don't have a religion. I'm not agnostic either, so don't even mention that. I do believe in angels because that's what my grandfather is. I just don't care enough about it to get into it. it's always so confusing and nerve-wracking for me.
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I am a Christian, although I don't follow any particular denomination. I feel staying this way allows me to be more open-minded about some issues that certain religions or denominations would instantly have an answer to. I came to follow Jesus at a somewhat early age, and I've been thankful for this change in my life. I can think back to how I was prior to this...and I know I would be a very different person today. I try to treat others the way Jesus would have, although I don't always do that due to not being perfect. But it is due to this viewpoint that I always wish for the very best for anyone I come across and for them to be successful in life, as life always has a way to turn on people. I don't always agree with the viewpoints of other people, and that's been happening a lot more lately, but I always listen first before I speak (in fact, I sometimes take a while before speaking to think of the best approach to a question). I also don't believe in forcing people to follow certain religions, but I can certainly talk more about my beliefs for anyone that asks me. In other societies I probably would have been persecuted just for mentioning what I've said so far, so I am thankful for environments where I can mention what has shaped me to be someone that puts others before my own needs.
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I'm an atheist. Even though I live in what is still a Catholic country, my mom chose not to baptise me nor send me to religion classes at school so I could make an informed choice once I was an adult, instead of indoctrinating me from a young age when I didn't understand the stories I would be told. So eventually I grew up and, once I no longer believed in fairytales or magic, said stories sounded so ridiculous to me that, well, I ended up not believing in anything at all.
I'll add that my mom is just "non-descript" religious, believing in "a higher power" with no names or shapes (and profoundly mistrusting any established religions, especially after the Catholic Church supported a fascist dictatorship here for decades and now essentially act as a branch of the conservative party PP) and my dad is agnostic because he can't be bothered, so it's not like I had any familiar incentives to begin with. I did attend mass a few times when I was 12-14 but that's about it. |
I was raised a lutheran protestant (Christian) and everybody around me was too since it was the state church and we took it for granted. The church/chapels in our village hosted many of the activities kids could get up to after school, and nobody ever questioned it. My mum always talked about God being everywhere in everything and about the Christian values, how we need to do towards others the good things we want them to do to us. And other nice things the fundamental lutheranism stands for.
I was of course baptized as a baby, and went through confirmation in my middle teens - during which I got a reaffirmes connection with God and my spirituality. I really enjoyed the open, friendly, accepting nature of the Swedish State Church and affiliated organizations, such as the Swedish YMCA branch. The ideals they pursue are ones I will likely always agree with. They don't even look down on people who don't share their beliefs; all priests I've ever met here have been willing to discuss and listen to cynicals. Despite all this, and my warm feelings for the organization and its people, I have several years ago now rejected the religious grounds. I don't believe that there is a God in the sense Christianity (or any other world-size religion) claims, nor that Jesus was anything more than a charismatic man, leader perhaps even. But the more I learn about science and the world - and about people - the louder something tells me that we definitely have to have been designed in some way. To me, the idea that this whole world and our lives have just happened due to millions of years of happy accidents is just not plausible. I have no idea what this classifies me as, haha, maybe not a straight up atheist, but I also don't want to say I think it is likely that the Christians are correct in any meaningful sense. I'm just summarizing it into "there is something up there" :) |
My religion is Islam. Of course, I believe in god and strive to adhere to the guidance in the book.
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To answer your question specifically, there are certain things that I look up with regards to religion, and others that I don't bother with. For the parts that I do care to refer to, it has satisfactory details. |
Happy Easter Sunday to anyone who celebrates! I hope everyone has a blessed day. ^-^
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I'm a rather unreligious Jewish person. I don't go to temple or anything like that, but I go to cedars, and that's about it. We light a menorah, too, during Hanukkah. Tbh, I've never really been religious bc my mother hates religion...so. I never was allowed religious upbringing.
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I'm a Rodnover and proud of it. If you want to know what it is, Rodnovery is a pagan religion based on the original faith of Slavic peoples. I feel that it is my "true" faith and I'm more happier as a Rodnover.
I'm not open about my faith though. |
I was raised in a non-religious household, and I am an atheist. (The super "physical-world-only" type who doesn't believe in souls, afterlife, karma, things happening "for a reason" - anything spiritual or supernatural.)
Being an atheist my whole life puts me in a strange position, compared to those who deconverted later in life - on one hand, I don't feel as strongly about my irreligion, it's just something I take for granted (I've never had to come to terms with it after living my whole life another way, face tension with my family and community about it, etc.); on the other hand, it shapes so many more aspects of who I am and how I see the world today. In any case, I'm a minority among the minority. |
I think religion has and is one of the most destructive forces on the planet. It's a disease and I think the world would be a much better place without it.
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I'm not religious whatsoever, although I used to be.
It feels like I'm lying to myself if I try to believe in anything other than what's in front of me, what's real, and what I know. |
Staunch atheist. I’m not against religion by any stretch of the imagination though! I’m just wary of the ones that have actively hurt the people I care about, ya know?
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all I will say is that I most definitely believe in God. im not a church goer or anything like that in the slightest. just a strong belief in that there is definitely a higher power of some sort.
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I've grown from mere agnosticism to fairly radical anti-religiousness in recent years. Though it's not the idea of a religion I'm against (I do think all religions have at least some moral aspects that should just be common sense (but aren't), and religion is what brought people to create some of the most impressive works of art ever made), it's the repressive effect it has on those who impose their beliefs on people who don't bother with them. It may be partially because here in Italy you can feel the power of the Catholic Church in subtle ways everywhere and it contributes to fuel some of the most hateful parts of society, or more generally how in many cases the major religions have an opinion contrary to my personal political beliefs, so I could never see myself believing in something so radically opposite to my worldview.
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i would say i'm more agnostic than anything else. i was raised in a family that was christian (episcopal) but never went to church or forced their religion onto me (the only time that happened was when i was very little; we did go to church weekly and i went to a summer bible study/camp kinda thing and then my parents realized it was kind of shitty).
due to being raised that way i've always been distant towards religion. there was a time i identified as a laveyan satanist and then i kinda stopped being edgy and dropped it lol. right now i'm really looking into polytheistic paganism though, specifically egyptian. it's always interested me, and my polytheist friend is helping me out with it. |
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