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Reason you left

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
What’s the biggest reason people leave religions?
Is it:
1. They disagree with the religions teachings?
2. They believe that God doesn’t exist?
3. They have found their own spiritual path?
4. Other

biggest for me is #3


I have to say other. What drove me from religion [christianity] is the people
 

McBell

Resident Sourpuss
I have to say other. What drove me from religion [christianity] is the people
giftbox-winner.jpeg
 

Estro Felino

Believer in free will
Premium Member
What’s the biggest reason people leave religions?
Is it:
1. They disagree with the religions teachings?
2. They believe that God doesn’t exist?
3. They have found their own spiritual path?
4. Other

biggest for me is #3
I will say 1) and 3).
But mostly 3...because they still feel culturally attached (unconsciously surely) to the religion they were brought up with.
 

crossfire

LHP Mercuræn Feminist Heretic ☿
Premium Member
Politicizing the religion. There is a reason why I hold multiple religions, and that Pastafarianism is my political religion. ;)

Sacred Clown traditions are the best ones to face down the political beast, imo.
 

SalixIncendium

अग्निविलोवनन्दः
Staff member
Premium Member
What’s the biggest reason people leave religions?
Is it:
1. They disagree with the religions teachings?
2. They believe that God doesn’t exist?
3. They have found their own spiritual path?
4. Other

biggest for me is #3

1 and 3 apply to me with regard to Catholicism as I was raised to understand it. However, I would have been nice to know a Catholic mystic like @Vouthon in my formative years, as he has shown me an entirely different perspective on the religion.
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
What’s the biggest reason people leave religions?
Is it:
1. They disagree with the religions teachings?
2. They believe that God doesn’t exist?
3. They have found their own spiritual path?
4. Other

biggest for me is #3

Other 1) deeper study proved it wasn't what it said it was
2) A change in circumstance, like marrying into another faith
3) People in it are toxic
4) Church or organisation changes, and you can't go along
 

Windwalker

Veteran Member
Premium Member
What’s the biggest reason people leave religions?
Is it:
1. They disagree with the religions teachings?
2. They believe that God doesn’t exist?
3. They have found their own spiritual path?
4. Other
Hmmm.... not easy to pin down exactly. Number 1 would apply more to the teachings of the groups that adopted the teachings of the religion. To try to put that into words, I like what Ghandi said, "'I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.'

Had I been exposed to a more grounded, reasoned, and mystical understanding of the Christian religion, I might have been able to find the nutrients I needed to grow on my spiritual path I had begun. Instead it was more about being on the 'winning side' of good versus evil, correct beliefs vs. the heresies of everyone else but us, evangelizing everyone to convert them to the religion, and all that fledgling war on culture garbage of the Christian Right beginning in the early 80's. Yuk.

Belief in God was not the problem. Belief in their teachings about God was. Finding my spiritual path through that bramble patch of self-righteous otherism, back to what I was hoping to find in the first place was a pretty lone path spanning decades.

I like what @SalixIncendium had to say about encountering someone like @Vouthon back then. I think that would have probably been a better beginning. Instead, most whom I encountered were either clueless about the mystical, or mistook ecstatic experience as God affirming that they were the chosen ones in some ego-validation effort.

But perhaps, all that was what needed to be for me. Who really knows. Growth and strength sometimes requires hard obstacles to overcome.
 
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King Phenomenon

Well-Known Member
Hmmm.... not easy to pin down exactly. Number 1 would apply more to the teachings of the groups that adopted the teachings of the religion. To try to put that into words, I like what Ghandi said, "'I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.'

Had I been exposed to a more grounded, reasoned, and mystical understanding of the Christian religion, I might have been able to find the nutrients I needed to grow on my spiritual path I had begun. Instead it was more about being on the 'winning side' of good versus evil, correct beliefs vs. the heresies of everyone else but us, evangelizing everyone to convert them to the religion, and all that fledgling war on culture garbage of the Christian Right beginning in the early 80's. Yuk.

Belief in God was not the problem. Belief in their teachings about God was. Finding my spiritual path through that bramble patch of self-righteous otherism, back to what I was hoping to find in the first place was a pretty lone path spanning decades.

I like what @SalixIncendium had to say about encountering someone like @Vouthon back then. I think that would have probably been a better beginning. Instead, most whom I encountered were either clueless about the mystical, or mistook ecstatic experience as God affirming that they were the chosen ones in some ego-validation effort.

But perhaps, all that was what needed to be for me. Who really knows. Growth and strength sometimes requires hard obstacles to overcome.
Unfortunately there’s people in all groups or non-groups that one would not get chummy with
 

King Phenomenon

Well-Known Member
1 and 3 apply to me with regard to Catholicism as I was raised to understand it. However, I would have been nice to know a Catholic mystic like @Vouthon in my formative years, as he has shown me an entirely different perspective on the religion.
Yeah there’s a lot of people in the world that people have a difficult time getting along with from all walks of life and beliefs or non-believes
 

King Phenomenon

Well-Known Member
Christianity I left as it was horrible for me. I was a Southern Baptist, on a path to become a pastor, I had a lot of inner turmoil, severe depression, I was tormented with dreams of going to hell, and things only kept getting worse. I wanted to die and prayed god would let it be. Getting educated outside of the highly insular world I was in started to crack my faith, as I learned so much of what I was taught was wrong. I turned to the Bible for guidance but the violence, genocide, rape, and other atrocities committed by god and those he ordered to commit them was another harsh blow to my faith. And my life kept getting worse.
I still remember thinking to myself, making the choice between the god and church I had always known and what was up until then the only thing I really knew, amd putting that all behind me.
Amd I found there is some truth to that idea of needing that religion and god for morality, because once I gave it up the uptight, prudish ways came to an abrupt end. I got into music like Pantera and White/Rob Zombie, started going to Ozzfest, started cussing, guilt free sexual thoughts and masturbation, and my personal library grew exponentially even as all the Christian stuff was discarded.
I don’t recall Jesus or god ordering hitler
 

ChristineM

"Be strong", I whispered to my coffee.
Premium Member
Yeah there’s definitely some people who are fanatical and unhealthy to be around Not only in religion but everywhere else unfortunately

I have rarely come across a non religious fanatic, politics as well as religion has a tendency to produce them. I have had the misfortune to encounter many religious people who are most definitely unhealthy to be around.

Unfortunately there are far more religious people taking the fanaticism of their religious books to heart than there are non religious people.

And as @Vinayaka said they "have no clue about it, not realising their own toxicity."
 
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