Serious Religion

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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Harmonie said:
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.
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This might just have been from my Asperger's, but I never really understood how talking to God is going to do anything for you, since you are simply verbally expressing your hopes in a more spiritual sense. Likewise, I never understood why we would have to ask God for forgiveness for sins if, in accordance to the beliefs of Christianity, Jesus would've eliminated any sins by his execution and resurrection. I just never understood some of those things.
 
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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
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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" :)
 
Daenerys said:
Have you ever questioned it, or always believed it 100%?
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Yep, the book even encourages questioning to learn more ;D

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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
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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'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?
 
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.
 
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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