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Do you believe in God?

Discussion in 'Chit Chat' started by anthonybg, Nov 7, 2016.

  1. ConnectedToWall

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    When I was a kid I believed in god. Not when I was really young, but around the age of like ten or eleven.
    Now I'm agnostic too. I think it's the most logical way of thinking because really there is no way to prove that there is a higher power or to prove that there isn't. I will say that I definitely do not believe in the kind of god that Christians believe in. I think a higher power would be less of a human and more of a spirit. Definitely wouldn't be some old white guy. They'd probably have no gender (though I do like to imagine god as a women, mother earth style).
    I think the important thing is just to keep an open mind. And I think that's what being agnostic is all about. It's this freedom to be able to explore all sorts of different ideas.
     
  2. YuriBunny

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    Nope.

    Never have. I was raised atheistically. As far back as I can remember, I've heard my dad talk about things like contradictions in the Bible to me. In school I used to tell the other kids that there was no God and it made them angry at me. I also told them that there was no Santa Claus. They got even more upset about that. O.O

    My grandparents are very religious and tried to take me to church sometimes, but I hated being forced along. They stopped when I started crying in church. It was so boring and strange, and it upset me.

    The kids at school gave my little sister and I cards encouraging us to attend church. They said that if we don't start believing we'd go to Hell. After a while they gave up on trying to convince us.

    I didn't actually know the word atheist until I was maybe ten years old. That was around the time that I realized believing in God was "normal" and that most kids' parents don't tell them that religious texts are full of lies. And I was absolutely shocked, because for me, the idea of a God actually existing seemed ridiculous. I didn't understand why anyone would believe it.

    I didn't feel any sort of pride in being an atheist until just recently, actually. I've been trying to learn more about religion and atheism. I find it interesting.

    Unlike my dad, I don't discriminate against theists. My dad thinks that religious people should all die, or something along those lines.

    As for what the Bible says about homosexuality, it could be interpreted in more than one way, and we have no way of knowing with certainty what the true intention/meaning is. Literature is often like that.
     
  3. richie96

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    Do you think God has really forbidden people? .. I always thought God loved every living creature. If He makes no mistakes ..
    ----------------------------
    He did forbid it in the old testament, but the laws of the old testament were null and void once the biblical character Jesus died on the cross. Nobody (who follows Christianity) is supposed to abide by the 'old law' or they are under a 'curse'. In other words, same sex relationships is not 'sinful' and not supposed to be condemned. I'd provide bible verses but... I'm too chilled at the moment. If he loved every creature... ah that's a topic for another discussion.

    He [God/Yahweh] has made mistakes, a prime example would be the flood if you recall the cause for the flood. An intelligent designer wouldn't design a flawed product [humans]. It's a simple case of writing a character with special attributes but writing a story that doesn't make them live up to said attributes, aka bad editing.


    I found out I'm agnostic - I do believe in the existence of a great power that's responsible for the creation of the Universe.
    ----------------------------
    What do you mean by 'great power' and what makes you believe in it's existence? I'm curious as you seem to have dismissed the belief in any god, what validates your current belief in a 'great power' over [x, y,z] god?

    I'm an atheist/secular humanist.
     
  4. Gaysibling

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    Nope, I was fortunate that my parents left it up to me to decide for myself rather than pushing me into a religion. My mother used to attend church, but I think that was more a social activity for her than a manifestation of belief. My father never attended church except for the occasional wedding or funeral. As a child when people told me they believed in god I always assumed it was in the same way they 'believed' in Santa or the Easter Bunny. I was genuinely shocked when I realised that many people really did believe. Even today I am still a bit startled when I find out that someone I have known for a while is religious . In general in this country religion is not much of a thing
     
  5. Deinna

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    Yes I do.
     
  6. DoriaN

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    Sometimes what we love isn't good for us, a person can love stealing and violence yet we know that's wrong or harmful. God doesn't make mistakes, but after mankind sinned we fell from the grace of God, and now we have a fallen world full of death and pain.

    Romans 8:18-25
    "For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience."

    'Religious' as a word has different connotations to people, but I do have a faith based on Jesus and the historicity of the Bible, basing my worldview on that. As such things of science and nature, morals, identity, and cyclical progressive history will fall on after that affirming or attesting to it.

    I do not believe all religions are the same at all or just have different names for things, because even the concepts of sin, heaven, hell, God, life, death, and salvation are all different. As an example Islam is anti-thetical to Christianity; they are mutually exclusive and diametrically opposed to one another. Allah is not the same god as the God of the Bible.

    There are things outside of our grasp that we cannot always know for sure or be aware of, but I think since God loves us and doesn't want robots, He left a lot of clues and hints for us to find Him. If there was 100% solid hard un-deniable truth, we could no longer come to love Him with a pure heart, since like it or leave it we are forced to acknowledge or believe in God, and coercion is not love.

    If you're unsure what to believe or how things stack up, there's no shame in being quizzical and skeptical, a person should always know what they believe and earnestly study to learn and understand about it. You can take science, history, experience, and many such evidences to help form your view.
    1 Peter 3:15 "but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect"

    For myself, I see that the universe is finite, it had a cause, and I believe there is a supernatural realm and within a theist worldview it helps account for that. Science is just a tool, it does not prove or disprove God, so if a person chooses to worship science they'll never see or learn of the universe outside that box. I have had my own supernatural experiences, so I testify Jesus was and is, but my own experience can only go so far towards others.

    I suppose the last thing I'd briefly mention is on morality. I'm currently working on a thesis on the concepts of morality, but if there was no transcendental reason for morality (The nature+character of God), this world would be (and is) very dark and unbalanced (No true justice, especially if there's no accounting or judgment).

    There are essentially 4 platforms for morality, but in an atheistic worldview it only accounts for 2, Subjective-Individual and Subjective-Societal/Cultural. It means that operating under that worldview morality only exists as it's decided within a society or culture, and what the individual finds to be moral.

    I worked with a man that stole a $300 jacket from our employer. When asked on it he told me "It's only wrong if you get caught". He was 100% correct, if his worldview is also correct. In other societies what's wrong in one place (homosexuality) may be morally right in another (homosexuality), so 'morally' it depends on where you live.
    After that it falls to an individual's judgment, but in either case of society or individuality there is no transcendental reason for assuming something -actually- is moral or not. The same principle can apply to anything concerning theft, murder, rape, cheating (Be it in video games or something darker), etcetera.

    These are just some basic reasons why I believe in God and specifically Jesus. I enjoy talks on subjects such as these as I find them to be a lot more important and impactful than petty things. Thank you for your time and thread =]
     
  7. Browncoat

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    I find the idea of an anthropomorphic god to be laughable. If there is an entity capable of creating existence, I highly doubt it has any likeness to or cares anything about us psychotic apes.
     
  8. Quem

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    Yeah! I'm not the only one watching DarkMatter2525 here! I really enjoy them as well. =] He makes a lot of good points I think.
     
  9. WhiteWinter

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    I'm not atheist nor Christian but agnostic. I'm pretty sure somebody else explained what that is so nuff said
     
  10. hispanicninja9

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    I haven't thought too much about it lately, but I think I am an atheist.
    The Bible just says a lot of things that I don't agree with that can't be read in other ways. The concept of a god or an organized religion has often been created or, more often, adopted in order to control the masses. It's a pretty interesting part of history which I want to specialise in. Religions and their history are so wonderful to study.
    I used to believe in a superior force and I blame it on my catholic family. I've been baptized, later I took the first communion, had the after party at my house, and even went to catholic school from grades 8 to 10. I remember being 9 and wanting to make my own religion 'when I grow up', and my mother said I could not do that.
    I just never felt identified with organized religions. I had a catholic phase when I was around 14(obviously caused by my school), joined some catholic groups in Facebook, but I did not like at all their stance in homosexuality, as I identified as a bisexual at the time. A year later I was a deist. I believed there was a natural, superior force, just not the abramahic god we've been taught. Definetely not a anthropomorphic being.
    And now... I just think the concept of a god is kind of ridiculous. If we've got science to explain what the sun is and what's in the centre of the earth, why do we need a god? Why do we need to believe in a physical hell or heaven? We've got free will and then we've got consequences from our actions. We can all create life(some can't because nature is not perfect, but most of us can). Until last year I believed that that god or superior force was just all of us, and that because of it, we all deserved equal respect, at least initially. Now I think that even that is overthinking.
    We are just a biological mess and we do stuff because our lives are a curse deep down and we want to ignore it.
     
  11. CJliving

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    I do believe in God. It's the Bible I'm not so sure of! :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes: The Bible's been mistranslated before, and there are so many interpretations (like being left-handed=devil child, white people are supposed to enslave black people...>.>, or David and Jonathan OTP 4ever<3) so I just can't put that blind-faith in the Bible.

    For me, I look at the world He created. Animals don't have original sin right? So they're still 'perfect' in their creation. There are over 1500 species that have some form of homosexual or trans-sexual practices. So how tf am I supposed to believe that being gay or trans is a sin?

    Also, when reading the Bible, take everything with a grain or 5 of salt. The Old Testament has been pretty much 100% overriden by the New Testament (including the 10 Commandments, which were replaced by the "new convenant" with Jesus aka the 8 Kindnesses). In the New Testament, the passages that people point to against homosexuality, are Paul's letters to the Corithians. Paul's words, not God's.
     
  12. AnAtypicalGuy

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    I would say I'm atheist/agnonstic: I'm mostly doubt God exists, though I wouldn't say anything for certain simply because there's no solid proof against his existence. I used to be very religious (grew up in a Catholic family) until bad thing began happening and never quite stopped. Also I became more aware of the state of the world, and concluded that whether a god exists or not, I didn't want to worship anybody that could stop at least some of the world's problems, but does nothing about them.
     
  13. Poroyl

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    I'm an atheist. I do, however, deeply respect the religious beliefs of other people, provided that they respect me, too. There has to be a fundemental respect present for it to work.
     
  14. LakanLunti

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    I cant deny it, I still believe in Him. I consider my faith dead already, and I have (so far) no plans on trying to revive it. Im good living without Him in my life so that's that
     
  15. SabreBear

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    I don't believe in a god; no. I used to though, given that I was brought up in an orthodox Christian home. I was extremely devout, going to church twice a week (once on Sunday, and another time for youth group). Each night I'd read my Bible, do an activity in a workbooklet my mother gave me, and say a few prayers. I actually have read all of the King James Bible other than Revelations (as I found it too creepy).

    Perhaps it's because I read majority of the book that I began to lose my faith? A lot of the tenants were outrageous, and oft would make me sad. It was a lose process - me losing my faith, but now I don't understand how I ever could've believed it in the first place. Still, it helped me grow as a person, so I guess it wasn't all bad.

    Even when I was devout I never hated gay people. My mother tried to instill homophobia into me but failed. (Also, kinda off topic, but she never really told me what homosexuals were until much later. So she'd go off about how homosexuals were terrible, and I had to jump to my own conclusions as to what she was talking about. That conclusion? That homosexuals were people who only had sex had home. No joke. That's what I believed until people told me otherwise.)

    I was transphobic though, but in hindsight that was absolutely me being defensive.
     
  16. Tritri

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    No, I don't believe in God. There is no reason to.
     
  17. Snow

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    I'm not religious, but I am spiritual. I believe in spirits.
     
  18. AlexanderDragon

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    Not a god per se, like, not an otherworldly force that created/is watching the universe, but I believe in the unity of the universe. Who knows how the universe was created, who knows how we got here, but I feel like the universe is all one big entity, and we're just smaller pieces in that entity, and we can use meditation and the like to refocus with the whole of the universe, "become one" if you will. It's nice to be reminded every once in a while that I'm part of something big.
     
  19. Joelouis

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    I'd like there to be reason for me to believe in God, or even a higher power but I'm scientific in my belief of the universe's origin and existence.

    Say there are a hundred religions in the world. The vast majority of those will claim that theirs is the only true religion and that all others are completely wrong. So if 99% of them are nonsense then what would be the chance of the remaining 1% being true?

    The only hope I have of any form of afterlife is through the strange world of quantum mechanics.
     
  20. KYSS

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    I don't. I find the concept of the abrahamanic god ridiculous there's no one watching everything you do there's nobody making an auditory of your farts .
    2000 years ago it was something people used to justify whatever casual thing that happen. And of course people believed everything that was shoved in front of them you just needed to be an skillful manipulator an that was it.
    My other reason is that the bible was wrote by men as every other text that has been written over the last 10000 years. That is why there are inconsistencies on it. Way before than the abrahamanic religions were born the sumerians had their own trinity, which I guess is was an idea that these religions reused later. The concept of god has hundred if not thousands of names it's just a matter of geography.
    I believe if there is a creator force it doesn't intervene in human matters not does it cares. And of course is by no means the character portrayed in the bible. A character and a creed that has been distorted by the church over time to keep people in control and thus assure power for themselves.
    Also why it has to be anthropomorphic? That just sums how big the human ego is.