Lost my faith

[Ori]

So it has finally happened, i've completly lost faith in any higher power.
There is no specific reason for it, I just don't care anymore.

Has anybody else gone through the same thing?

 

[jimbob]

Why?...

 

[CaptainXeroid]

Yup. Back in college I stopped going to church. After a few years, I realized there was a void in my life that secular things did not fulfill, and like the prodigal son, I returned to my church home.

 

[ayani]

ori-

going through that right now.

talking to people helps. so does sitting down and working out what it is you do believe.

sometimes it helps to be able to find a secualr philosophy that speaks to you, if no theistic ones do.

 

[Ori]

Why?...

I no longer see God anywhere, metephorically speaking of course.
All I see is ignorance, hate, anger, mistrust, abuse of power, conformity to mediocrity, evaporation of love, war which has always been created primarily from religious convictions and a supposedly all powerful God sat on his hairy fat *** laughing.

 

[jewscout]

I no longer see God anywhere, metephorically speaking of course.
All I see is ignorance, hate, anger, mistrust, abuse of power, conformity to mediocrity, evaporation of love, war which has always been created primarily from religious convictions and a supposedly all powerful God sat on his hairy fat *** laughing.

most of these things existed long before the advent of monotheism...
i see it more as our inability to rise above and be better than our baser desires...

 

[EnhancedSpirit]

I no longer see God anywhere, metephorically speaking of course.
All I see is ignorance, hate, anger, mistrust, abuse of power, conformity to mediocrity, evaporation of love, war which has always been created primarily from religious convictions and a supposedly all powerful God sat on his hairy fat *** laughing.

I'm sorry you feel this way. I also went through a phase of atheism. It is kind of a long story as how I came back to faith. But I do know that feeling empty is the best way to receive any kind of higher place. There is always an emptiness, before you get filled up again.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

I lost faith in the Christian believes after the first 16 years of my life. I just wasn't happy living that life. I began to explore other religions, and have been happy following an eclectic pagan path.

 

[The Black Whirlwind]

well, if you guys have ever heard of the Self-Realization Fellowship, i was part of that for a while. they venerate jesus, krishna, babaji, uh, and some dude named Yogananda, who died about fifty years ago. I never really did fit in, there was no logic in their teachings, and i got really sick of their preaching. i went through a period of no religion for a few years, then i tried taoism, and now im at jediism. I dont think i could be atheist again, the Force is too great for me to deny it.

 

[anders]

So it has finally happened, i've completly lost faith in any higher power.
There is no specific reason for it, I just don't care anymore.

Has anybody else gone through the same thing?

No problem. You don't need a "higher power" than the reality in which you are living; name it "Nature" or "Dao/Tao" or whatever.

My view is, lead as happy a life as possible, but avoid to the greatest extent possible harming or insulting anybody or anything.

It would hopefully be difficult to find anybody disagreeing with that. If somebody however tells you, "you have to fear this or that unproven invisible entity", you can just say, "what about my life is disagreeable with yon spirit?" and listen to them saying that their ghost is so feeble that it needs your reverence. So, you still are the deciding power, controlling those fictious characters.

 

[Tawn]

Most faiths (from an Atheists perspective) are just ideas to help guide us through life.. which is why they all have a set of morals, commandments and whatnot. They also provide comfort in terms of your future (after death) and perhaps *some* control of fate - because you can always pray that things will turn out ok.

If youre disillusioned with your faith then perhaps its because you cant hold onto what you now percieve as fiction...

Most faiths though acknowledge the fact that humans are corrupt and abuse each other.. but its when you see the same thing happening in nature and the fact that nothing seems to be done about human misery that religion falls into doubt.

I cant really personally understand your position.. ive always been an atheist.. but I have never felt the need for there to be a higher power. I dont need that comfort and im happy with uncertainty.. - if you knew everything that was going to happen would life be much fun? - and so what if when you die thats it.. youre gone.. its probably not much fun sitting up in heaven knowing the suffering going on in the world.

I suggest you look into all faiths.. perhaps atheism or agnosticism is good for the time being.. it may make more sense.. and who knows.. you may go back to Theistic beliefs in some time...

 

[ayani]

You must spread some Karma around before giving it to Tawn again.

dang! i love the way you think, Tawn. thank you.

 

[Snowbear]

So it has finally happened, i've completly lost faith in any higher power.
There is no specific reason for it, I just don't care anymore.

Has anybody else gone through the same thing?

Did you truly have that faith in the first place?

If so, did you really lose it, or did you actually leave it (as in walk away... give it up)?

Yes, I have gone through the same thing (see one of my first posts on here)...

 

[Scuba Pete]

The valleys exist that we might appreciate the mountains.

Peter denied Jesus three times before he found his real faith. Without his denial he would have never seen just how shallow his faith really was.

 

[michel]

So it has finally happened, i've completly lost faith in any higher power.
There is no specific reason for it, I just don't care anymore.

Has anybody else gone through the same thing?

Oh yes ! sure I have, when I was seventeen or so - like you I suppose, I thought 'life is not 'fair'' would things really be like this if there was a God - who declared that we are all 'his children' ? What kind of a God would set up a world with so many obvious 'trials' for some?

I sat down, read books, dicovered Buddhism (Which sounded good to me), and literally 'made up' my own way of looking at things - which includes a belief in reincarnation. The belief I have in reincarnation is there because of the premise that a God (any God could not be so unjust as to have a fly covered child born in Etheopia (Foe example), to a malnourished Mum, who can't even care for herself let alone a baby. Compare that to my life (although I'm 'screwed' mentally - but that's a set of events I don't particularly want to go into), in which I was born to parents who were well nourished, lived in a comfortable house ...etc - it seemed to make no sense. As I say, this is where the idea of reincarnation 'stepped in' - to legitimise the apparent unfairnesses in Life.

My belief in reincarnation - well, I'll cut and paste the belief, rather than have to go through the whole analogy .
"We are here to grow; all life is attuned to growth, perpetuation, and lastly to decay. By definition, the 'Almighty being', 'God', the 'force of nature' - I call him God- promotes growth. Spiritual growth as well as physical growth. That such a being would shower some with advantages beyond the comprehension of those born devoid of any hope of anything but the most basic form of existence is contrary to the essence of such a being. That is one of the reasons why I believe in reincarnation - to me it is the only possibility.


I used to explain my Idea of the life of a soul by comparison with that of the life of an individual, in his own lifetime. When a baby is born, he is cared for by his mother until he is able to go to kindergarten, from which he will progress to increasingly demanding places of learning. At each stage of scholastic evaluation, he can either be promoted, or go through the same content again until he is deemed qualified to progress.


For the mothers of babies, read God of all Souls; for each year in school, read each incarnations on Earth (maybe elsewhere?). Using that same analogy, life as an adult in a field that he has chosen is the same for the soul who, by his own choice, commits himself to a particular task of self improvement. The last stage, at the end of all the lessons that are to be achieved lies the ultimate incarnation; I would propose those of Jesus Christ, Buddha....any example of a magnificent being in whatever religion. Basically they all have very much in common; they have all reached the same level of competence and are ready for 'the next step'. Whatever that is; we, with only the understanding of matter we can see can only begin to imagine what lies thereafter."

I think that if someone disproved reincarnation irrefutably, that I would probably be an agnostic.

 

[EnhancedSpirit]

I no longer see God anywhere, metephorically speaking of course.
All I see is ignorance, hate, anger, mistrust, abuse of power, conformity to mediocrity, evaporation of love, war which has always been created primarily from religious convictions and a supposedly all powerful God sat on his hairy fat *** laughing.

Ok, I'm going to attempt to help you see, because you have asked.

The world around you is a mirror of what is inside of you. I don't want you to react to what I tell you now. I want you to think about it for a while.

When there is something that bothers you it is usually something inside yourself that you do not like, and most likely wouldn't even admit to. Once you can label, and assess these parts of yourself, bring them to light, you will no longer be 'haunted' by them in the things around you.

I'm not suggesting that the bad things around us are figments of our imagination. Bad things happen all the time, but why do you feel the way you do about it such things? It's not about how the world treats you that matters, but how you react to it.

So, what are you mad about? What ever it is, you gotta get over it. What ever you feel ignorant about, seek wisdom. Loss of trust, and loss of love, are very hard to get past. And there is only one way to get past hate, and anger and war: and that is FORGIVENESS.

We avoid Forgiveness because we have the mistaken idea that forgiveness means we condone or agree with the actions of others! Forgiveness does not mean letting others abuse you. Forgiveness does not require that you extend trust. This kind of forgiveness is not dependent on the other person changing.
Forgiveness is:
---It is letting go of any expectation that the other person will change.
---It is letting go of any expectation of apology, or recognition and acknowledgement of wrong-doing.
---It is acknowledging to yourself that the other person acted in the only way that they knew how, for their own survival and lesson.

Once you get rid of these negative feelings (known as the 'devil' by several religions), the world around you no longer seems so bleak. Even the bad things you will see as differnent. You will eventually learn the meaning of 'every dark cloud has a silver lining'.

It appears from your discription above, that you have not lost faith in God, so much as lost your faith in mankind. Don't give up on these poor souls, for they know not what they do.

 

[devodave]

So it has finally happened, i've completly lost faith in any higher power.
There is no specific reason for it, I just don't care anymore.

Has anybody else gone through the same thing?

I was once very religious but now do not believe in or care if there is a higher being. I still enjoy studying world religion because it is interesting to me and a big part of human history. In fact, I feel more fullfilled now that I don't take the myths literally.

 

[Tawn]

When there is something that bothers you it is usually something inside yourself that you do not like, and most likely wouldn't even admit to. Once you can label, and assess these parts of yourself, bring them to light, you will no longer be 'haunted' by them in the things around you.

A lot of religions (Christianity especially) work on the principle of making their followers feel guilt. You have all sinned in the eyes of the Lord and must ask forgiveness.. Confessions.. etc.. etc.. Seems to me that this makes people more pliable and suggestible.

Theres a quote thats particularily apt.. I quite like it but cant remember who its from: 'All men are guilty of the good things they didn't do.' You cant feel guilt over things you have no control over - but you can about the things you perhaps could have done..

Whats worrying, and is highlighted in the second sentence of what ES says, is that through religion you can essentially 'get over' the problems you see in the world. Sounds like ignoring the problem to me.

If you see bad things happening in the world around you then surely it is much better to do as much as you can to solve these things.. rather than looking inward to try to make yourself feel better about them. Many faiths actually do a lot of charity work to try and make a difference.. so you shouldnt feel hatred towards the church. However, I assure you action will make you feel a lot better than introversion.

 

[Alexander]

Hey Ori. I'm going through the same thing.

It's not easy. I don't know about you, but the thing that scares me the most is how mad I get. How angry I get when my family and I are watching TV and the news comes through with some kind of disaster, an earthquake, an eruption, a war, a bombing, and I hear from around me, "That's sad, someone should do something about that." *click* And I see that kind of apathy everywhere.

But then I see the same apathy in me and it scares the crap out of me. And then I realize that my anger makes me no better than any of them. I get angry when people judge others and then I judge them. I looked everything I hated about the world in myself. And that's when I lost my faith.

Same for you?

 

[Alexander]

Tawn

Good post. But I don't think that's what haunted is supposed to mean there. I think by "not being haunted by them", it means that you no longer lose yourself to the feeling of hopelessness and the utter inability to act. You overcome this kind of, "It's worthless, a lost cause, there's nothing I can do attitude.