Anyone Else Here Without Any Religious Background Ever?

[Revoltingest]

Did they wear the Jewish tartan?
Scottish Jews Have Their Own Official Tartan

How about that!
But no, I didn't see one.

 

[Trailblazer]

You're in good company.

I forgot to mention, I am also a rebel.

 

[Hermit Philosopher]

My family was without any religion.
I was born not believing, & remained so.
Now, I read threads here about experiences in churches, temples, etc.
It's all gorillas in the mist....entirely foreign to me.
Anyone else here who finds religions to be utterly alien?

I can be tolerant of religions & believers at a distance though.
But I've had unsettling brushes with religions.
A couple....

I once worked as a sexton in a Methodist church...very
creepy...the accoutrements...the clothing...the preaching.
And they're one of the less bizarre flavors.

Attending a niece's bat mitzvah, I had a barely controllable
visceral urge to escape the religion & politics of it all.
Never again. So her younger sister was later blessed with
my not attending hers.

I come from an atheist background. The first time I ever entered a church was in my late 20s, when I attended a friend’s wedding. It was a Protestant church and neither very spiritual or religious.

Humbly
Hermit

 

[savagewind]

My family was without any religion.
I was born not believing, & remained so.
Now, I read threads here about experiences in churches, temples, etc.
It's all gorillas in the mist....entirely foreign to me.
Anyone else here who finds religions to be utterly alien?

I can be tolerant of religions & believers at a distance though.
But I've had unsettling brushes with religions.
A couple....

I once worked as a sexton in a Methodist church...very
creepy...the accoutrements...the clothing...the preaching.
And they're one of the less bizarre flavors.

Attending a niece's bat mitzvah, I had a barely controllable
visceral urge to escape the religion & politics of it all.
Never again. So her younger sister was later blessed with
my not attending hers.

That is so interesting. The post, I mean. Were you the bell ringer of the gravedigger? I shall guess. Gravedigger.

 

[Revoltingest]

That is so interesting. The post, I mean. Were you the bell ringer of the gravedigger? I shall guess. Gravedigger.

Gravedigger Billie is a different Simpsons character.
Although I look more like him than Willie. (It's the hair.)

 

[savagewind]

I meant or LOL. Thank you!

 

[savagewind]

Gravedigger Billie is a different Simpsons character.
Although I look more like him than Willie. (It's the hair.)

G That is a cipher.

 

[A Vestigial Mote]

I'm not able to follow your explanation, but I'm not claiming that secular things are religious or that politics and religion are necessarily always the same thing. I'm also not claiming that church and state cannot be separated. For someone who's never been in a religion there are some parallels.

Political beliefs can determine religious beliefs.
Why the relationship between religion and politics is more complicated than you think

All I am getting at is that a person's decision to support various causes or efforts that they believe will further the success of the U.S., has, at its root, far more verifiable pieces of information associated with it than the types of beliefs in things that religion usually brings to the table.

For example, someone wanting higher taxes for the rich can go gather actual facts and figures, cite other countries where certain strategies may already have been employed, etc. Religion has none of this going for it - and most often questions about its abstract material are met with "answers" that end up being just more abstracts.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

You're an American. There's that. Its technically not called a religion, but it is.

That's a good point. I've suspected for a while now that Americanism is actually a religion , or will become one.

 

[savagewind]

That's a good point. I've suspected for a while now that Americanism is actually a religion , or will become one.

It is a religion for some people. I think that it can be (wrongly) associated with Freedom. It will never become a religion for everyone and I feel sorry about that.

 

[Revoltingest]

It is a religion for some people. I think that it can be (wrongly) associated with Freedom. It will never become a religion for everyone and I feel sorry about that.

They're applying a metaphoric definition.
This thread is about literal religion.

 

[amorphous_constellation]

It is a religion for some people. I think that it can be (wrongly) associated with Freedom. It will never become a religion for everyone and I feel sorry about that.

Like what do you mean

 

[savagewind]

They're applying a metaphoric definition.
This thread is about literal religion.

Who knows what that is? My guess. Nobody! We do know for sure that so much of religion is just business as usual.

 

[savagewind]

Like what do you mean

Someone posted that America is a religion. Or, maybe I am hallucinating. I am for what Jesus taught. He says, "freedom". I am for that. Is anyone else?

 

[amorphous_constellation]

This thread is about literal religion.

Yeah but , maybe we don't really know what that means, even from our historical vantage point. I think that maybe , endogenous religions snuck up on early nations. And so , likewise with us. We end up generating beliefs and practices and don't even realize it. If an anthropologist from the distant future were to look any one of us, how do we know that they wouldn't conclude us to be idiosyncratically spiritual

 

[Kenny]

Tell me about it.

Basically, as a family, we never went to church and didn't talk about God. The only time I remember any acknowledgment of God was when the newspaper said the earth had reached its half-life and my dad said "Let's thank God". Other than that, just a BIG family bible on a coffee table that was never read or opened.

Due to circumstances, my two brothers and I found ourselves interned in a school in Spain for one year when I was in 6th grade. Church service was mandatory... and in Latin. It was Greek to me.

I married my wife at age 20 and she, having been raised a Catholic and finally learning enough English, we finally went to a Catholic Church when I was about 22-23. Their messages didn't mean squat to me. One hour of kneeling and standing, and sitting, and kneeling and standing and sitting.

At age, 28 I gave my life to Jesus Christ at a non-denominational church on these three thought premises:

1. "My life is going from bad to worse, I need to try something different"
2. For some reason I did believe that Jesus died for my sins and was resurrected and thought, "It won't hurt me to confess Jesus as my Lord"
3. "The Bible is either false or true. I will start with 'it is true' and then test the sucker. I will find out soon enough if it is true"

It's still true.

 

[InChrist]

My family was without any religion.
I was born not believing, & remained so.
Now, I read threads here about experiences in churches, temples, etc.
It's all gorillas in the mist....entirely foreign to me.
Anyone else here who finds religions to be utterly alien?

I can be tolerant of religions & believers at a distance though.
But I've had unsettling brushes with religions.
A couple....

I once worked as a sexton in a Methodist church...very
creepy...the accoutrements...the clothing...the preaching.
And they're one of the less bizarre flavors.

Attending a niece's bat mitzvah, I had a barely controllable
visceral urge to escape the religion & politics of it all.
Never again. So her younger sister was later blessed with
my not attending hers.

I was raised in Catholicism with all the rituals and trappings of religion. I had to search through the confusing maze of religion and escape to find and know the actual living and personal Creator God.
You on the other hand are more fortunate and could seek and go directly to God and skip the religion, if you so desire.

 

[Revoltingest]

I was raised in Catholicism with all the rituals and trappings of religion. I had to search through the confusing maze of religion and escape to find and know the actual living and personal Creator God.
You on the other hand are more fortunate and could go seek and directly to God and skip the religion, if you so desire.

I skipped seeking entirely.
To observe & investigate without desire suits me.

 

[InChrist]

I skipped seeking entirely.
To observe & investigate without desire suits me.

Why have you skipped seeking entirely, if you don’t mind saying?
And do you mean you just have no desire for religion, except to observe & investigate it? Or do you mean no desire to seek or know if there is a God that exists?

 

[Revoltingest]

Why have you skipped seeking entirely, if you don’t mind saying?

I felt no need for supernatural beliefs.

And do you mean you just have no desire for religion, except to observe & investigate it? Or do you mean no desire to seek or know if there is a God that exists?

Both.
If there are any gods out there,
they're not sending me signals.
So there's nothing to investigate.