faith shopping

i think this should go here, but i appologise if it shouldnt - any mod feel free to move it to a more sensible place

ive got a friend, sho's just come out sayign shes a lesbian, and her lifes a mess right now, and shes asked me for advise on (im not going to give he rlife story - twould take too long) bu tone thing she asked me abotu was religion, so i took her along to my church for a few sundays, and she says she wants to believe in a religion, but she doesnt believe a heaven can be possible - now, i am fairly knowledgable in certain aspects of paganism and wiccan, and obviously being christian i can talk to her about that, but she isnt really warming to any of those, so im looking for a religion to suggest to her which wil follow her belief process

she doesnt believe in heaven, but is rather comforted in the idea of reincarnation

she doesnt believe that a "god" is trying to make her life better

she doesnt really understand complicated processes (ie reading the bible and understanding teachings in her life today) i dont mean this to be blunt, but she's not very clever bless her

she doesnt know how to prey

she's had no experience of miracles



basically she wants something to believe in and have faith in, but she also doesnt wan tto change her lifestyle (she drinks a bit, smokes quite a bit, eats a lot, shes gay - although not in a relationship at the moment, she doesnt hold with people trying to control her or tell her what to do) and doesn't want to do anything too drastic

so, the reason why i started this is because, i would like to know if there are any religions out there that a person like this could possibly be attracted too

thanking you in advance

C_P

Wow, that's really asking for the easy way out. I'm a firm beleiver in finding the religion that is "right" and then changing your habits, not finding a relgioun that fits your habits, so I can't relaly help out too well. Sorry.

Aqualung said:

Wow, that's really asking for the easy way out. I'm a firm beleiver in finding the religion that is "right" and then changing your habits, not finding a relgioun that fits your habits, so I can't relaly help out too well. Sorry.

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I'm gonna have to agree with Aqua on this one. If a religion doesn't invoke some sort of change and improvement to your life, why bother?

Just 'cause someone finds and believes in a religion, including Christianity, doesn't mean they *know* God.

Even if your friend finds a religion that fits her lifestyle doesn't mean she will find peace from it. It also doesn't mean she'll have found whatever it is she's looking for.

Yep. I think you should really encourage your friend to change to fit whichever faith she chooses. That will give her a lot of satisfaction, knowing that she has done something like that, changing her habits for something greater than herself. If you just say to her "look. Here's a religion that exaclty fits you," and she doesn't have to change at all, that is likely to not do here any good. But changing yourself to fit an image that you think is better than the previous one is a great boost.

thanks guys, ive always believed faith comes before understanding

it was just that i felt i needed to present her with like a perfect religion for what she wants - how naive does that sound?

C_P

i dont think she'd really warm to my faith. to many good deeds you have to do...

corrupt_preist said:

thanks guys, ive always believed faith comes before understanding

it was just that i felt i needed to present her with like a perfect religion for what she wants - how naive does that sound?

C_P

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Well, naive or not, everybody hopes to make everybody else happy with as little work as possible on both ends. Happiness that you don't have to work for is a good thing, but it just doesn't work that way.

How is this coming along with your friend? Has she found anything which helps her spiritually?

She could do what I did and simply believe what she wants to believe. The sense of community isn't great but I found it immensely spiritually fulfilling.

Fluffy said:

How is this coming along with your friend? Has she found anything which helps her spiritually?

She could do what I did and simply believe what she wants to believe. The sense of community isn't great but I found it immensely spiritually fulfilling.

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not brilliant, shes not even sure what she wants to believe in, so i think ill give her some time to sort her own head out first

I agree with the others about the whole "easy way out" deal. With that said, I think she might be interested in Buddhism.

I think maybe your friend should concentrate on finding her true happiness first. It doesn't sound like she knows what she's looking for. Maybe she could take a look around here, there might be something that peaks her interest.

I've found the Tao te Ching really helpful. I have a more philosophical translation or two that stick away from right or wrong, and tend towards understanding the natural ebb and flow of the world/universe.

A good site:
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/gthursby/taoism/

There are a lot of different kinds of translations here with a different spin on things. This is because over the centuries, pure taoism has been infused with the teachings of Bhudda, as these filtered into China from India and Tibet.

Hope that helps