No, you're smart for 19. Very important stuff you've learned, in my view. That's around the age I learned the most. Life was accelerated back then. BTW I'm 65 now.
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Religion Shopping
- Thread starter MetallicHue
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DylanF
A lad
Well thank you very much. I know I have a lot to learn still but I appreciate you taking your time to talk with me. I hope that as I grow, I continue to explore.
DylanF
A lad
I know you are the one that posed this question to begin with, but could I as what those experiences were that shook you?
Best wishes. Explore what? It's used in two different ways in religion talk. One is to explore different faiths and non-faiths mor philosophies. A deeper meaning is to explore yourself. I'm no longer exploring in the first sense, but am doing a ton in the second sense. So which do you mean?
DylanF
A lad
A small bit of both. I love learning things I didn't know previously about different belief systems, but coupled with that, I always want to understand what it means to be me. The good and the bad. My goal is to one day look back and be able to recognize my own accomplishments and have no regrets that I have missed anything important. I know I will always have regrets, but I seek to minimize them. If I can give everything its fair shot and grow a person because of it, I'll be happy.
Skwim
Veteran Member
I was a nominal Christian of the lowest sort when I was given a book written by Bertrand Russell called Why I am Not a Christian---a very popular book. I was struck by its rationality and the irrationality of Christianity and other religions. Consequently, I immediately dropped Christianity and the notion of god. Since then I've grown open to the possibility of a supreme being, but only slightly so, and now take an agnostic position.
My best advice is not to be caught up in need. Need can easily lead a person to latch onto and believe some of the most ridiculous panaceas up for sale.
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To answer your question specifically.
I was born and raised a Roman catholic and loved it until one day at school assembly the priest told us that we should all hate Jews as they were evil. I then abandoned Catholicism as intolerant towards other Faiths and became an atheist but still hungered for something that would bring all humanity together as one family and I found it and it has remained so for 41 years.
I am now able to love all and accept all unconditionally and not having to reject anyone at all. It’s a beautiful feeling to be at peace with all people whether religious or atheist as we are all humans. This is what my religion teaches me. To love all humanity and I have yet to come across a broader and greater vision than to embrace all humanity with their fruits, differences and imperfections as my own family.
Due to this my entire life has been one of contentment and inner peace. Even my marriage is now 40 years going strong.
MetallicHue
Member
I try for inner peace. But I only get it for very short periods of time. It’s something I struggle to achieve greatly. It’s really just due to my natural cynicism. I envy you. Thank you for sharing.
I was going to ask the same question.....what shakes a person's faith? I know what shook mine but it led me to a greater truth.
I was born and raised in a Mormon household, although I wouldn’t call it “traditional” Mormon. My parents were divorced when I was six or seven, and my mom was a convert. That said, I was a true believer and dutifully attended every week. I held multiple youth leadership positions, went on a two year mission to Japan, and continued to attend and hold leadership positions for almost twenty years.
Eventually, I started researching things about the Mormon Church online and soon realized it was a fake. It’s not what it claims to be. It took about another three years, but my family and I walked out in January 2014 and have never gone back. I don’t regret it one bit.
Since leaving the Mormon Church I’ve been in my own path. I guess I’m agnostic. I think there may be some higher power or force from which reality and the universe stems from, but I don’t know the nature of this power.
Eventually, I started researching things about the Mormon Church online and soon realized it was a fake. It’s not what it claims to be. It took about another three years, but my family and I walked out in January 2014 and have never gone back. I don’t regret it one bit.
Since leaving the Mormon Church I’ve been in my own path. I guess I’m agnostic. I think there may be some higher power or force from which reality and the universe stems from, but I don’t know the nature of this power.
MetallicHue
Member
I guess I kind of wound up there too. The thing I struggle with higher power is why let people suffer so much? Also how do people going through differing types of experiences get judged evenly?
I my teens I started as a great admirer of (hungry for) scientific knowledge. Around the age of 16 I started to get more curious about mysticism and philosophy.
At age 18 I considered that there could or should be a Central Supreme Consciousness behind/within the space-time reality.
At age 20 I happened to meet my Tantric Guru who shared my view of spirituality as a practical science rather than anything tied to religion.
It doesn't feel like I have done any "religious shopping", I've always hated shopping and been suspicious of religion.
At age 18 I considered that there could or should be a Central Supreme Consciousness behind/within the space-time reality.
At age 20 I happened to meet my Tantric Guru who shared my view of spirituality as a practical science rather than anything tied to religion.
It doesn't feel like I have done any "religious shopping", I've always hated shopping and been suspicious of religion.
I was a strong Christian believer, and now I am a strong atheist. What happened?
I turned eight.
Kidding, of course.
Ciao
- viole
BilliardsBall
Veteran Member
I grew up Jewish, became quite secular/skeptical, read the Bible as an adult, trusted Jesus for eternal life based on the Bible's logic:
1) No human can live in a utopia, since we continually hurt others
2) Jesus was the God-man, morally perfect, who died and rose for us
3) Those who trust Jesus are made morally perfect when He returns, eligible for utopia
Hello MetallicHue, and welcome to the forums!
When thinking about things like this, I've found it helpful to remind myself that religion, per se, is something of a Western construct. How we think about religion and define it is shaped by Western cultural norms. This may or may not reflect how religion is (or was) understood in other historical eras or cultures, and scholars of religion can't agree on how to define religion either. That complicates questions like what it means to "change religions." Where do you draw the line between cultural phenomena X and cultural phenomena Y? Ultimately, it's all pretty fuzzy and the stories we tell ourselves about this serve more as a method of articulating our identities than anything else. Certainly, this thing called "religion" (whatever that really is) has been central to personal and cultural identities for a very long time.
As for my own story, in many respects I don't feel like my personal and cultural identity has really changed all that much over time, even if the "religion" labels one might affix to it have. What happened for me was more of a process of finding the cultural labels that fit who I already was. For better or worse, as an American I'm stuck in an Abrahamic morass where ideas about religion are heavily biased towards monotheism and Christian (especially Protestant) norms. That really limited my thinking about what "religion" was and what "god" was. I had to learn to deconstruct the Western construct of religion in order to see past that, which didn't happen until I was in college. Then, suddenly, religion wasn't equated with all these things I believed it "had to have" and I found a cultural label that fit me. It described who I already was, rather than me really "changing to" something.
That said, finding a cultural community and a label that matched who I already was certainly helped me explore aspects of that culture I might not have otherwise. That, to me, is the bigger benefit of putting a construct-label on yourself. It can structure your thinking in positive ways that facilitate personal growth. When it stops doing that, it's time to find a new label.
GoodbyeDave
Well-Known Member
I was raised in a very English Christianity: parents who believed but only went to church for rites of passage, plus daily services at school.
I spent a lot of time studying the Bible, theology, and the phenomenology of religion. Finally I decided that Christianity and the other innovating, monotheistic religions were all without acceptable evidence, so the answer was to go back to "old-time religion": polytheism.
I had reservations about Hinduism, we don't have a Shinto shrine or Chinese temple in London, so my practice was going to be solitary. So, back to the ancestral gods. We know little about the Celtic gods and the Germanic ones didn't feel right, so Hellenism it was.
If all that sounds a very intellectual approach, well, I'm a very intellectual person. It was only after I started worshiping the gods that I actually experienced them, but perhaps that's inevitable: if you ignore people, they usually ignore you.
I spent a lot of time studying the Bible, theology, and the phenomenology of religion. Finally I decided that Christianity and the other innovating, monotheistic religions were all without acceptable evidence, so the answer was to go back to "old-time religion": polytheism.
I had reservations about Hinduism, we don't have a Shinto shrine or Chinese temple in London, so my practice was going to be solitary. So, back to the ancestral gods. We know little about the Celtic gods and the Germanic ones didn't feel right, so Hellenism it was.
If all that sounds a very intellectual approach, well, I'm a very intellectual person. It was only after I started worshiping the gods that I actually experienced them, but perhaps that's inevitable: if you ignore people, they usually ignore you.
BenFranklinFan
Happiness is a journey, not a destination.
I was born and raised in the Roman Catholic Church and enjoyed it, the liturgy, that is. Despite my family being catholic, I have officially left the church. After reading Scripture and Theophilus Lindsey, I adopted the position of Christian Unitarianism. Reason was the ultimate reason why I adopted Unitarianism (Christadelphianism is extremely close to my form of Unitarian belief, though I am not affiliated with them)
FIRST I WAS A METHODIST AND WAS SPRINKLED FOR BAPTISM. LATER I BECAME A MEMBER OF A UNION CHURCH WHICH HAD MEMBERS OF NUMEROUS FAITHS, HOWEVER, THE PREACHER WAS ASSEMBLY OF GOD. AS I STUDIED THE SCRIPTURE I REALIZED THAT BAPTISM WAS BY IMMERSION AND BEGAN LOOKING FOR A CHURCH TEACHING IMMERSION. I FOUND THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH WHICH DID. NEXT I LEARNED FROM SCRIPTURE THAT BAPTISM WAS FOR THE REMISSION OF SINS. I WENT TO THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH PREACHER AND ASKED HIM TO RE-IMMERSE ME BECAUSE I DIDN'T UNDERSTAND THE FIRST TIME THAT IT WAS FOR THE REMISSION OF SIN (ACTS 2;38 AND THAT THERE ONLY ONE BAPTISM, EPHESIANS 4;5. LATER I LEARNED THAT THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH WAS NOT THE CHURCH OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. I THEN STUDIED THIS MATTER WITH THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH PREACHER AND HE ASKED ME TO BAPTIZE HIM WHICH I DID., I CONTINUED TO STUDY THE SCRIPTURE AND FOUND THE CHURCH DESCRIBED IN THE NEW TESTAMENT..AND WAS IMMERSED AGAIN FOR THE REMISSION OF SINS TO BE ADDED TO THE CHURCH WHICH IS HIS BODY, EPH.1;22,23. I THEN WENT BACK TO THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH PREACHER STUDIED WITH HIM AND BAPTIZED HIM AND HE LATER PREACHED IN THE CHUIRCH UNTIL HE DIED. THUS I HAVE BEEN SPRINKLED FOR BAPTISM AND IMMERSED THREE TIMES UNTIL I WAS SATISFIED IT WAS ALL ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURE. THAT WAS MANY MANY YEARS AGO AS I AM NOW NEARLY 88 YEARS OF AGE. I HAVE NEVER LOOKED BACK, I HAVE NEVER REGRETTED HAVING MADE THIS SEARCH. IN FACT I SURRENDERED A HEALTHY INHERITANCE TO DO THIS. THE SCRIPTURE READS; ''STUDY TO SHOW THYSELF APPROVED UNTO GOD, A WORKMAN WHO NEEDETH NOT TO BE ASHAMED, RIGHTLY DIVIDING THE WORD OF TRUTH.'' II TIM.2;15-----GOD BLESS.
TO BE DEEP IN SCRIPTURE IS TO CEASE BEING CATHOLIC, PROTESTANT, JEW AND CALVINIST
Atheist (because my dad was), eastern religion/philosophy (including yoga and the new age movement), Protestant Christianity, Catholic Christianity,... and now, my current non-religious non-atheistic view as deist monotheist agnostic panentheist (not pantheist).
If you are looking for a religion, find one that teaches truth.