Scared of going to hell

Unconditional Positive Regard. (That's why I put it in parentheses after the first time I used it.)

 

Faith and belief in God isn't a thought disorder. And no, the process of thinking and believing in somethign so hard that it actually might happen is *not* a thought disorder, and is *not* treated with medication. (Again, I exclude schizophrenic delusion from positive thinking and belief.) Furthermore, no, people who think this way don't necessarily need to be re-educated. Faith, positive thought, belief in what's possible can be helpful, and the power of intention does have both a neurochemical and physical basis. I'm not saying it works all the time or even most of the time, but, for example, in the study of immune response, mood, and perception, our thoughts have a pretty powerful level of control over what we experience. This is not even remotely controversial, and is validated both in the realms of biochemistry and physics.

 

Yeah, if we're talking about that, it's in the realm of a psychotic thought disorder. Depending on the nature of it, there might be some meds that would work, but in modern psychiatry, the focus is really on whether the delusion/disorder is interfering with every day life. If someone believes somethign that doesn't really impact day-to-day functioning, for the most part, the profession has the perspective that it isn't appropriate to intervene. There was a student that dressed like, and told everyone that she was a vampire, and seemed very sincere. One of the psych professors interviewed her at the request of one of the deans, and determined that while she had this delusion, she didn't drink blood, didn't bite people, and it was essentially harmless.

 

I'm curious... you took the leap of faith because it was represented to you that doing so would cure your depression, and make your life more fulfilling. And you did so, and you don't feel any more fulfilled or happy, and you're still depressed.

And yet... you want to make more disciples to a religion that hasn't done what it promised to do for you? So are you basically saying you want to encourage other people to convert to something that won't make them any happier, but will make them live in fear that if they don't do something that some group of people misinterpreting a book says they need to do... they'll burn in hell forever when they die?

Why on earth would you want to subject anyone else to that? For that matter, why would you subject yourself to that?

Again, I'm not bashing the religion; I'm being pragmatic. The religion did not do for you what it promised to do. So if it didn't do the positive thing, why would you believe that the negative thing would be true either? The internal consistency of the logic here doesn't make sense.

What would it be like to consider living your life the way you want to live it, on a basis of your own belief in yourself, your own trust that whatever happens after this life is OK if you are a basically decent person? Do you think that might influence you and help you to feel happier?

 

OK, then... let's go with that. What if you stay Christian, and die, and realize that it's actually Mormonism, or Judiasm, or Hinduism or Catholicism, or Native American shamanism, or any of the other thousands of religions, many of which absolutely insist that theirs is the only way, and if you aren't following their path, you'll go to hell (or some variation thereof?) The point is, you don't know you're correct. You think you are... but what if you're not?

I saw a quote on the Internet that said "Don't believe everything you read on the Internet" credited to Abraham Lincoln. Talk is cheap.

And people who weren't Jewish, or Catholic, or Mormon, that had dreams about those religions and converted as well.

And the same is true for other religions.

You do realize it's impossible to prove a negative, right? On any topic.

Agreed. The point I'm making is... you've adopted a religion that you've pointed out judges you and tells you that you can't be who you are, and can't love who you want to, so you're basically committing to being unhappy in this life in the hope that maybe this particular religion happens to be the right one that will benefit you 60 or 80 years from now. And, of course, there's also the minor issue that a majority of people in the world are adherents to beliefs that are different than yours. So basically, you're saying that everyone else -- a significant majority of everyone in the world, except the people in your religion -- are going to hell.

Step back for a moment and think about the logic of that. If your God is truly the accepting, loving, benevolent Creator that your teachings say he is, why would he create all of these billions of people, only to let the overwhelming majority of them die and burn in hell forever simply because they made a reasonable and sensible choice that a different religious belief made more sense to them than yours. Does that make sense? Likewise, do you really believe that if you'd kicked the bucket a year ago, before you found Christianity, that you would have spent the rest of eternity in hell simply because you didn't know? And if there are some obscure rules that say you get a 'get out of hell free' card if you didn't know... does that make sense? Does the whole thing seem like something your loving Creator would do?

I think if you look at it objectively, it simply doesn't make any logical sense when you dissect it and look at it.

Again, I'm in no way trying to tell you what to think, or what religion to practice, nor am I devaluing Christianity, because I know an awful lot of people who strongly believe in it... but happen to belong to a church that is sensible in its beliefs and actually follows the underlying beliefs that the Bible teaches, which is about love, acceptance, grace, and non-judgment. And I know plenty of others who practice other beliefs as well. And I seriously doubt any of those, regardless of what particular flavor of religion they follow, are going to end up in Hell because they happened to pick wrong.

What I am saying is... it's very possible that *all* of these religions have basic parts of it correct, and there are multiple paths to the same place.

This basically falls back on William Glasser's Choice Theory, which in a nutshell, asks if what you are doing is working, and if not, do you want to change and do something that is working. It does not sound like your current beliefs are working for you, and it doesn't seem terribly sensible to say that, because you decided something 6 or however many months ago, and that somethign isn't making you happy, that you have to stick with it for the next 80 years out of fear that if you don't, you'll go to hell. That's simply not a very happy way to live your life, and if you really think about it, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense that your Creator would actually intend for things to be that way.

 

So you're going to blow off my entire post with that one line of response (which Benway has already addresed)?

Please understand... the point I'm making here isn't to make you wrong, to challenge the validity of your beliefs, or anything of the sort. You've said you are unhappy, and my focus is on the logic behind the decisions you've made, and whether they are effective in helping you to feel happier. Nothing more.