The Debate on God

Long story short, I used to be a UMC Christian. Now, I consider myself to be an atheist. The long version is in the spoiler tags.

Spoiler

I used to be a United Methodist Christian. I really loved religion. I would go to church every week excited to learn more about God and the Bible. I did many things at my church as well. I ran the multi-media center and I played handbells. I would also play my trombone sometimes during the services. I loved talking to all of the members of the Church and helping them out in any way that I could.

I was the youth group president. I convinced many of my friends to start attending the church and the youth group. The youth group leader was my second cousin.

Well, one day, one of my friends brought one of their friends. This person was openly gay. Well, the youth group director did not like this... at all. He started to go off on him, telling him that he was "going to hell" and that "god hated him". My friend's friend ran out crying. I didn't know what to do.. I had never seen anything like that before. I had never seen a bit of anger out of my youth director until that day.

A little over a year later, another one of my friends posted a project on facebook about gay marriage. She needed reactions from her friends... and she got reactions... here is the argument that followed.

It was this argument that caused me to question both my sexuality and my religious identity. My "perfect world" came crashing down. I realized that I was not straight. I realized that I didn't want to be a part of the church anymore.

Well, I began to leave the church. I also began to come out. I came out to my youth leader. He was not ok with it... but he said that he would never turn his back on me. He outed me to the rest of church, and now most of them act like they don't even know me anymore. Honestly, I'm ok with that.

I experienced a lot of harm from religion. When I first left it, I hated religion. I now have passed over that. I hold nothing against religion now. I understand that there are accepting churches. Religion is just not for me anymore. I did a ton of research and I came to the conclusion that I no longer could believe in the Bible or in God. When I first realized that I couldn't believe in God anymore.. I thought that my life was over. I was in a really bad spot. It was like being stuck in darkness. It didn't matter how much I tried, I just couldn't believe in God anymore. Since I accepted myself as being both gay and an atheist, I have been able to move on from all of the chaos that went on for a while. I felt free.

It seems crazy looking back now and thinking that I used to want to be preacher....

 

I do not believe there is a God, because of all that is happening in the world. If there was a God and we were his greatest creation and he cared enough to send his son to die for us etc etc the things that are going on now would not be happening.

 

How I feel about the entire God thing is this: I don't claim to know whether God exists or not. However, I personally hope that God doesn't exist. I'm not atheist, I just hope God isn't out there.
My reasoning, I've been through a rough time lately. There's too much insanity in this world. I was a little crazy myself. But if a God were to allow such madness to exist, wouldn't that make him just as crazy as I was, if not more? That's why I hope he doesn't exist.

 

After my father died when I was fourteen I have had the voice similar to what you described, more of a feeling that I could hear. It went away in therapy as I didn't need it anymore. My therapist said when you aren’t wound very tight you have access to things people are not. Most of the time the voice let me know when it was safe to do something and not always necessarily legal. The one time I didn’t listen I got my one arrest and a misdemeanor.
Other times I was just privy to information such as taking my college trig final when I forgot how to determine the Triangles lengths using the angles and other information given. Three questions with four possible decimal multiply choice answers and the little voice was right on all three. I felt this was given to learn to trust the voice I suspect was my father’s after death. In life he purposely acted crazy to scare people away especially me and my brother but I also could feel his presence as he could with me. Not just see him but feel in my head just like the way people feel someone is gay that doesn’t have any outward clues.
I gave up the voice along with the person I used be and until this thread forgot even having it.

 

People know the difference between right and wrong. The basic doctrine of most religions are of love, good will, and peace. They were also written long ago in different times by people that believe differently than we do today so yes a lot of the things in religious texts are outdated, but people today are smart enough to know the difference between right and wrong. There's even the fail-safe of a conscience, which admittedly is not present in all people, but for the most part people know when they're doing something wrong. If you steal something or you kill someone you know it was wrong. You can't tell me that a religious belief is responsible for a persons actions because that person knows that what they did was wrong. They may use their religion or strong misinterpretation of it as a means to an end so they don't feel bad, but everyone can tell when they've done something bad. Also, people are often misled by people that they trust and they trust these people because they believe the same things that they do and therefore are much more easily swayed. You are using very extreme cases as examples. Religions were made by people and therefore corrupted by people. Usually a handful of people who wanted to force their ways on others and make selfish gains. It isn't the religion that is bad it's the people who made it to be bad. As for people who believe in something that can cure them of illness or disease, they believe it because it gives them hope that everything will be ok and a reason to keep fighting. Even if in the end they lose it was worth the fight. Mind you I don't agree with people capitalizing on their hope I think it's probably one of the most immoral things on the planet, but it does give them something to hold on for. I've been on the brink of suicide before and I can honestly say that if it wasn't for the God that I believe in I wouldn't be here right now.

Also you really need to be careful with you're wording. I'm not trying to be rude but when you say things like "Believing in false things is just bad", though I understand what you're saying, it could very well end up with someone attacking you because it does sound like you're saying that everyone's religious standpoint is "wrong." There's no right or wrong answer here it's what people believe so please be careful because no one wants to have their feelings hurt and beliefs belittled and we don't want anyone to attack you because they've misunderstood what you said.

 

I'm a Theist because I have reason to believe there is no proof a deity DOESN'T exist.

 

I'm atheist because I see no evidence to support a deity. That aside, even if you could prove the existence of one, I wouldn't worship a deity that lets all the shit of the world happen.

Burden of proof lies with the person making the positive claim, which would be the Theist.

 

I really haven't said what I believe yet so I guess I'll give a rundown. I spent a really long time in ignorance to religion and believed it caused wars and "If there was a God why would he let me be so miserable and let the world be awful" all that kind of stuff, so I was really an atheist/agnostic, but then I had several teachers that taught the abrahamic religions and eastern religions and it really made me question what was bad about it. I'll post this transition from not believing to believing in a spoiler tag

Spoiler

Obviously I was still little when the whole War on Terror started and all this hatred and violence was occurred because of religion and it was just a back and forth hate battle between Christians and Muslims and as I grew up and went through school it only got worse as you learn about all the terrible things that people have done because of what they believe. My mom never took me to church much, but the times that I did go it scared me because when I went all I heard about was how I was going to hell unless I did x,y, and z. All this stuff sort of compounded together to make me really just not believe in a God that would allow the world to be so terrible and then send us all to hell because we didn't do all the things it says in the Bible so I just stopped believing and I didn't believe for a really long time.

When I got to High School though I had a Geography class with a teacher that I still love and respect to this day because he was so informative. He did a lot of religious studies and philosophy in college and as we learned about different areas we learned about the religions and their beginnings and how these religions were spread throughout the world and what places typically have a higher concentration of a certain religion, you know stuff like that. It was just such an informative class and I learned so much about the world's religions and philosophies that I started to question everything more. I stopped looking at it through an ignorant lens and really learn things. So I started looking for a religion that was right for me. I went through everything just to try to figure out what felt right and... nothing did, but there were aspects from many of the religions that I liked and believed in and eventually I cam up with this:

I believe there certainly is some higher-power in this world that helps and guides us when we need it the most and a lot of times does things for us indirectly. I believe that we do have a soul that is released when we die and it can travel across all the plains of existence, through time and space and all realities and latches on to a new body or can exist however we choose to in plane of creation. It's really zen to me and brings me a lot of comfort to think of things that way. It also explains a lot of every religion to me about how everything can connect and become one.

I know I'm probably totally insane, but I enjoy it.

 

I believe in God because it is reassuring to know someone is always there, watching over you, and religion gives you a purpose to live your life as the best person you can.

Unfortunately, some people believe that being the best person you can means following random rules in the Bible like the one about homosexuality. But the real teachings are actually really inspiring.

 

How do you decide which ones are the real teachings?

 

Yes, but I was making a point. There is no tangible evidence for or against the existence of a deity, therefore this debate will inevitably reach an impasse.

 

You could say the same thing about unicorns and fairies and magic.
There comes a point where you have to say "to continue believing this would be very difficult to reconcile with other things I know about the world."

 

I've had reasons to believe in a deity of which I find unnecessary to post as they are very personal life experiences, therefore if I have beyond a reasonable doubt and I have more events in life that point to Theism, I will naturally be drawn towards it more than Atheism. Just like if you have more reason to believe a deity doesn't exist, you will be more drawn to Atheism.

 

THIS!

 

I'm an agnostic atheist. I am very certain that God in the traditional sense, as a moral entity watching over mankind, doesn't exist.
But I do believe that with our current knowledge, what happened before our universe came to be i.e. what created it, is transcendental and thus we can't rule out a creator creating it, unlikely as it may be. I would rather believe in a multiverse but I'd like to think of that as a question of preference.

 

I have already explained my reasoning behind this quote to someone else. Also if you have no evidence AGAINST a deity, you are doing the same thing.