Where did you learn about the subject of religion?

[Spiderman]

Interesting. Where do you think they learned stuff?
When we think about it, a lot of what we "know" comes from what is basically hearsay and gossip. Scary!

Very good point! That is why im grateful for your forum where pagans, Atheists, Muslims, agnostics, and people of other faiths can balance me out!

 

[Quintessence]

The first memory I have of learning about different religions was when I was really little and learned that there was a thing called Jewish people and they had their own language. I went home and told my mom I wanted to be Jewish because, as far as I knew (I was less than 5 or so), Jews were the same as me but they got a language! My mom set me straight on that one, haha.

D'aw. You know, it's interesting to consider the clear-mindedness of children. Their responses are less influenced by education/indoctrination by culture and society. Just raw, though perhaps naive, responses to simple information. And you gotta admit - Hebrew is very cool.

My next memory of religion is when I started reading mythology, a year or so later. I got so into it that I became a little polytheist. I tried to replicate the kinds of festivals and holidays I thought they would have, I developed symbolism, and essentially worshiped the scarab as the creator and sustainer of life, along with some other gods.

You were aware of the mythology being about religion? I ask because it's not uncommon for mythology to be presented as not religion. It tends to be presented as "that stuff primitive people did back then and we don't take it seriously now." I had no conception of Greek mythos being the foundation of a world religion until much later in life.

 

[Quintessence]

It was in my late teens when I became fascinated with a peculiar kind of "religious experience" outlined in the Psychedelic Experience of by Drs. Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert and Ralph Metzner. To my profound surprise I seemed to make some headway and the resulting experiences led me on my quest through the various religions. I am completely self taught and rarely even mentioned my experiences (after the initial burn period, that is) or talked to others about religion. I had little interest in what they thought as they could not possibly imagine where I was coming from. It took me awhile to realize that. You have to understand I wasn't seeking information. I was seeking confirmation! I needed to know that I wasn't the only one going through this odd adventure into inner reality as failure to do so would likely have resulted in a serious messiah complex.

This part really stood out to me. I think a lot of us start seeking information about these things for - dare I say - selfish reasons. And a bit part of religion is, after all, making sense of the world around us, right? Making sense of it... for us... so we don't go crazy. It doesn't always happen that way, of course. Diving down that rabbit hole might just make us pop back out more crazy than before. But it usually seems to go all right.

 

[bobhikes]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

(as a side note, this isn't intended as a thread about who has the bigger credentials than the other guy; it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)

Learned Religion From: Family, Religious youth education, Read the Bible, Read the New Testament, Read Greek mythologies, Norse mythologies, Celtic mythologies, Dianetics Ron L Hubbard, Other New Wave religions (my dad's a fan), Read the Tao, The RF, Other Religious forums, Romes web site, Working in the Catholic Church. Joseph Campbell. Experimenting in different religious churches. Talking with others openly about religion. Seeking the answers myself.

Religion However like several others things in my life is a continuous open education.

 

[YmirGF]

This part really stood out to me. I think a lot of us start seeking information about these things for - dare I say - selfish reasons. And a bit part of religion is, after all, making sense of the world around us, right? Making sense of it... for us... so we don't go crazy. It doesn't always happen that way, of course. Diving down that rabbit hole might just make us pop back out more crazy than before. But it usually seems to go all right.

For me, at least, it was a case of having such incredibly profound experiences that those around me simply had no idea what I was babbling about. Like with the experience of Oneness, understanding it intellectually is not really possible due to the immense range of connections intuited and the resulting emotional impact. It is a transformative experience, so talking about it to others who have not experienced it is frustrating on many levels. For starters, the novice is often in no position to clearly articulate their perceptions... even for otherwise skilled communicators. It's like trying to describe the texture of the colour purple, or finding words for things that defy description.

Again, for me, the therapeutic aspect of this was when I consciously decided to stop discussing what I was going through, as I could not adequately describe my experiences. Immediately, my frustrations subsided. It took many long years before I found myself back on my feet and almost magically suddenly able to express very abstract ideas in ways that were intelligible. Well, I like to think I am being clear, LOL.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I was raised loosely Christian (Church of England).
More specifically, I got religious education at primary school (even though it was a public school) by the local Church of England. The religious instructor also invited kids to come and joins either CEBS (Church of England Boys Society) or GFS (Girls Friendly Society) which was basically church scouts. Which I did. Got all my prayer badges, etc. Yay me!

So in a formal sense, religious instruction was limited to Church of England. It's typically an epically bad idea to include religious education with schools. Unless the school is a religious one, and can therefore focus on a single religion.

PS. If the whole recruitment for church scouts in a public school thing sounds wrong to you, join my club. The fact that the leader (same guy as doing RE at the school) turned out to be a pedophile just adds to the cliche.

 

[The Sum of Awe]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

(as a side note, this isn't intended as a thread about who has the bigger credentials than the other guy; it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)

In general, I think it's in our nature to pass these concepts down in the background of it all. Some naturally base their world on religion and others base their religion on the world. In either case, the information of religion is the water being carried along by the current which is the world itself.

Personally, what I know of religion almost entirely came from personal experience with the world. It's there for everyone to see, but only noticed by looking at it from a certain angle, and I, like most people here, look at the world from that angle.

Oh, and I can't discredit the Internet. That's been a major source of my understanding of the topic, because religion is the least anticipated subject in the area I was born, raised, and currently live.

 

[lovesong]

You were aware of the mythology being about religion? I ask because it's not uncommon for mythology to be presented as not religion. It tends to be presented as "that stuff primitive people did back then and we don't take it seriously now." I had no conception of Greek mythos being the foundation of a world religion until much later in life.

It's funny, I've never been able to see it as anything but religion. It wasn't until much later (around middle school) that I came to realize that most people see it as the stuff of fairy tales. I started reading mythology on my own, it wasn't presented to me, so I guess that's why I was able to interpret it for myself. I asked for one of those children's mythology books and read it because I liked it. It just seemed to make so much more sense to me. Obviously I was too young to sit and compare the tenets of various religions, but it just clicked with me inside. All I knew was that it was nice, and felt good, and made me happy. I really don't know how I knew it was religion though, maybe it said so in the book and I just ran with it, or maybe it was just some kind of calling, who knows.

A fun side story to this:
Before middle school age I had never done any reading on the idea of magic, other than what was in the mythology books. When I got to be around ten or so, maybe a little younger, but still after my little affair with polytheism, I got heavy into basic magic, having no idea that it could possibly conflict with any religious beliefs (I had gone back to being a Christian after being put in church again). But somehow, during that polytheism affair, I had figured it out, kind of, a little bit. One of the rituals I developed was to drip red wax onto a leaf and throw it into the wind while singing to one of my scarab gods. My idea behind this was that bugs ate leaves (I didn't know scarabs didn't eat leaves, I was only a few years old), and by dripping wax on it I was setting my leaf apart and showing that I put thought into giving the god some decorated food. I also thought that if I only ate natural food that was native to the areas of my heritage, I would be able to connect more with the gods because they were natural things, and that they would give me good dreams and extra strength. I was a funny kid.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

(as a side note, this isn't intended as a thread about who has the bigger credentials than the other guy; it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)

Well, I really didn't learn about religion until I'd say about sixteen or seventeen when my mother decided to take us to church to be the perfect family but never went herself. I studied witchcraft (as an interest), christianity mostly, and later buddhism. I didn't know what religion was just what the rest of my family who are christian say about other religions they didn't care for.

So later in life, I learned each person has their own religion. "What's that?" I asked once. I concluded it was a practice. (First it was a study-given I studied Christianity. Then I learned it was a Path. Since I practiced Buddhism. Then it became a practice but not necessarily a religion just yet)

I didn't hear about it formally until we had choices to take religious electives in high school. I wanted to take religion in college but at the time the government didn't want to pay for religious courses (separation between church and government). Now they do.

But religion was a political word at the time. I don't think I ever knew what religion was until I became Catholic, when was that, five years ago now. So, religion has gone through different definitions in my brain: an isolated word, to political, now a personal practice.

Religion is a personal experience. You can't be taught that. You'd have to live it, really. That's the best way to be taught the word. It would have been good, though, to get some comparative religion education back when as we have now.

 

[David T]

"it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)"

That's a very very very good question and not easily answerable unfortunately. If I had an easily understandable explanation it would fit how we generally understand and thus would not answer the question. I could give an incredibly difficult explaination not easily understood because it would not easily be understood in context to how we generally understand. A bit like saying " I could be incredible accurate, but not relevant I Also could be relevant but not accurate.".

 

[Milton Platt]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

(as a side note, this isn't intended as a thread about who has the bigger credentials than the other guy; it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)

I grew up in a non-religious family. When I was older I read the Bible and then poked around in a few of the other religions. I could find no substance. There is no way to demonstrate that a god exists, so I decided to declare myself an atheist, for lack of a better label. If sufficient evidence ever shows up, I am willing to change my mind.

 

[Milton Platt]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

(as a side note, this isn't intended as a thread about who has the bigger credentials than the other guy; it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)

By going to several different churches with the neighbor's kids when I was young, and later by reading various books over the years. I have no credentials to flaunt. If you need credentials to understand religion, then I already see a flaw with religion.

 

[ajay0]

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

I had read a lot of books, but I gained the most wisdom from the company of an enlightened master.

Book reading can be said to be of a tactical nature in gaining wisdom, but true wisdom strategically speaking has to be gained from the company of a sage or saint.

 

[Geoff-Allen]

Book reading can be said to be of a tactical nature in gaining wisdom, but true wisdom strategically speaking has to be gained from the company of a sage or saint.

Interesting ...

The Buddha did it all by himself meditating under a tree,

I agree most people probably need some guidance to achive nirvana.

Al the best.

 

[ajay0]

Interesting ...

The Buddha did it all by himself meditating under a tree,

I agree most people probably need some guidance to achive nirvana.

Al the best.

Buddha had the company of saints to learn from, though they were not sages. If he had met a sage, it would have shortened his learning curve by a couple of years.

 

[syo]

research and luck

 

[janesix]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

So, denizens of the forums - where did you learn about this thing we call "religion?" Who or what taught you what you know about it?

(as a side note, this isn't intended as a thread about who has the bigger credentials than the other guy; it's more of an introspective exercise to help us understand why we understand things the way we do)

Weird, I can't really remember. I don't think it was at home. It must have been from friends at school.

 

[arthra]

While many subjects are part of general public education, religion is often omitted from this education. From there we might ask the question - since we don't get good basic education on what religion is from our public schooling system, where does the information we have come from? Who taught us the things we believe we know about the subject of religion? Do we even know? Can we pinpoint that? Did we learn it from random talk and hearsay of others? From some friend that was particularly influential in our lives? Maybe some book from the public library? Where did we develop our understanding from?

In my case my family was Baptist.. from my Grandfather to my parents ... I suppose my Grandfather was the standard as he read the scriptures before sunrise and beginning his work day... Of course I attended church and was baptized...

As I began reading more I came in contact with other religions and friends who were interested in practising Yoga and meditation...

Still later in life I had choices to make about military service, education and profession to follow and I decided a non-violent path was for me . I also chose social work.

Still later in life I became aware of racial segregation and economic exploitation of people and on reading about the Baha'i Faith in the library became a Baha'i and married in the Faith and raised my children according to Baha'i principles.

 

[crossfire]

I took an early interest in anthropology, sociology, and mythology as a child--I studied anything I could get my hand on.

 

[Sundance]

What an awesome q, Q (no, this is not a pun. Unless........naaaa. )!

Hmm...where did I learn about the subject of religion? Three places.

My parents, especially my mother since I was raised a Christian (of no specific flavor). She schooled me on the very wonderful Teachings of Jesus Christ. I loved reading The Bible (I even slept with my Bible tucked under my pillow ), going to church, listening to Christian music, all of it! To this day, I still do these things (minus going to church). I treasure their importance as incalculable in informing my relationship with God as well as giving me my characteristically positive outlook on life. The sad part of it was that my mom wasn't too open to other religions, although my mostly absent father (Rastaman) was and is. It was he who sowed the seeds for much of my current understanding of God (Different Names, same One. Different conceptions, same Ultimate Reality.)

Another place I learned about religion was at school. When I was in sixth grade, I had a class called ‘World Cultures’ in which my teacher – Mr. Hulka – taught us about different cultures and religions. I absolutely loved his class! Just to have learned about far away places and different ways of understanding the world was and is still absolutely exhilarating for me and I'm very grateful for it! I was introduced to Judaism, some more Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Taoism, Confucianism, and Shinto. I was always eager to embrace other religions and cultures, though they were different from mine, but this class really drilled it into my head. Two religions I really enjoyed learning about were Islam and Hinduism!

With Hinduism, I never knew any religion could exist with multiple different facets of Deity at the same time! I was amazed!

Now with Islam, it absolutely blew my mind!!! So familiar to me, but yet, so different, so new! I read some basic info about Islam: they believe in one God, Allah (Yes, the very same God as in The Bible!); they believe in Angels, the Scriptures of the Hebrew Bible and their Prophets as well as in the Gospels and Jesus Christ, too! I was spiritually floored. I so eagerly wanted to know much more!

The class taught me that all cultures, religions, and languages are beautiful! That diversity should be cherished and celebrated, not looked down upon.


The third place I learned about other religions was through books. Me, I'm a complete bookworm. I love books, I love reading! From when I had been in sixth grade onwards, I was determined to read about many different religions. I ended up running the whole gamut, A to Z, checking out books in my high school's library and renewing them, often times more than once . Unfortunately, my parents NEVER approved.

Although I had initially missed a very important one, the very first Non-Christian Scripture I had read was...THE QUR’AN. It was beautiful, cover to cover. The first words I had read in practically every Sura were:

In the Name of God, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful.

I discovered that The Qur'an was telling many of the same stories as The Bible, with the same people, except with various differences.

Another one I read was The Bhagavad Gita, my first Hindu text. Gita completely changed my perspective on the world and my existence within it! It reminded me that I was not solely this physical body, but I was a soul, a spirit. It spoke to me deeply. It even made me open to the idea of reincarnation!

In all my searching, I had picked up this book about this Faith called ‘The Bahá’í Faith’, and I thought, ‘Hunh? Ba-whaaaa?? I think I recall it from somewhere.’ I started to read more about it and everything just clicked. There was a quote that really stirred my soul (still does) from a man named Bahá’u’lláh from His Gleanings. I even know it by heart, after 5 years. It was the first one I ever read from Him! I didn't know it then, but four years passed and I ended up accepting Him as the Promised One, the Messenger of God for our Day and Age. The rest? It's history as they say.