What religion are you?

[eabaker]

I soon found Atheism inadequate. Its too...absolute.

Absolute? Atheism is an extremely broad category. While it is inclusive of the absolute "there is no God" stance, it also includes agnostics, and anyone else who simply... is not a theist.

[Executive Hamster]

I suppose my definition of Athiest was incorrect then

[eabaker]

I suppose my definition of Athiest was incorrect then

Well, contextually it does often refer specifically to "I believe there is no God," so less an incorrect definition than a different one than I tend to default to.

[Malchik]

Catholic, currently agnostic/non practicing.

[Executive Hamster]

Anyway, I decided that its my life and I shouldnt be afraid of how people judge me, so fuck it, I officially joined the Satanic Temple, after considering it for a good while but fearing how my family would judge me..... well, I was stupid, cause mom thought that was rad as fuck. Dad...doesnt need to find out.

[Spirit Ghidorah 2010]

Anyway, I decided that its my life and I shouldnt be afraid of how people judge me, so fuck it, I officially joined the Satanic Temple, after considering it for a good while but fearing how my family would judge me..... well, I was stupid, cause mom thought that was rad as fuck. Dad...doesnt need to find out.

Welcome to the fold, brother! Officialis sodalis

[eabaker]

Anyway, I decided that its my life and I shouldnt be afraid of how people judge me, so fuck it, I officially joined the Satanic Temple, after considering it for a good while but fearing how my family would judge me..... well, I was stupid, cause mom thought that was rad as fuck. Dad...doesnt need to find out.

Welcome to the fold, brother! Officialis sodalis

Our numbers are growing on TK!

[Extreme Warhawk]

I am a Episcopalian Christian

[Voyager]

I am a Episcopalian Christian

Nice! I used to be an Anglican, too.

[LegendZilla]

My mom and dad were both raised Catholic but they decided to move on from religion and not pass it on to me.

[Voyager]

I thought I’d come back here again to describe my history with faith.

I was raised Anglican for most of my childhood, and was a pretty good Christian boy (even if I was very science you and asked many bizarre and intrusive questions about the bible) All this changed when I became a…

Teenage Reddit Atheist

I went through that phase from about 15 to 17. During this time I rejected theism and my past relationship with Christ, and tried to distance myself from my family. I regret this, a lot. By changing the status quo, relationships were hurt. Not just by becoming an atheist, but eventually reverting back to a religious state.

During the latter half of my atheism stint, you may remember a post of mine declaring my view of the world and the afterlife, in which I described what I believed to be true about the universe and it’s creator - an all loving, all accepting creator who after death would grant you total freedom in your own paradise. It’s a nice thought, and quite logical, but now I feel this was just my atheist self trying to negotiate with my theist self.

However, I did find my love for Christ once again once I reached adulthood. I read the Bible again, and just like I was a little kid, I fell in love with the Lord all over again. It was magical. The New Testament is my guiding force in this world.

I may have picked up some ideas along the way, like the Theory of God’s Ego Death, which is an explanation for God’s wrathful nature in the Old Testament and his loving nature in the New Testament, but largely I was back. Ever since then, my faith has grown stronger, and through my life I find myself praying more often then ever before, and thinking about Jesus and his teachings a lot more.

One man I can thank for this Christian renaissance in my own soul is none other than Elvis Presley. In recent months my fascination for Elvis has grown, and his songs have become among my favourites. Learning such an incredible and kind man was of faith warmed my heart. His gospel song ‘If I Can Dream’, which you can see in my signature, has become a sort-of anthem for my beliefs.

Anywho, I’m getting sidetracked. I’m blessed to have found the Lord after all the time I spent in the dark, and I’m glad to call myself a Non-Denominational Christian.

[JAGzilla]

^ Even if I can't share those beliefs (I'd like to, but I'm too cynically logical/proud/lazy), I'm glad you found something that works for you! For all the flak it gets for its less savory aspects, there's a lot of beauty and wisdom in the Christian religion. If it can improve your life and make you strive to be a better person, it's doing something right.

[Voyager]

^ Even if I can't share those beliefs (I'd like to, but I'm too cynically logical/proud/lazy), I'm glad you found something that works for you! For all the flak it gets for its less savory aspects, there's a lot of beauty and wisdom in the Christian religion. If it can improve your life and make you strive to be a better person, it's doing something right.

I appreciate the love. My Faith is one of the things that keep me going. Whenever I’m stressed or have a bad day, I just kneel and pray, or read the Bible, and it really helps!

[Executive Hamster]

I really like your little history story, so Imma do the same for myself, keep up the discussion and all that

I will say that I relate very hard to the teenage reddit atheist comment, even though unlike you, Im still an atheist. Just a different kind. I used to be the type of person who would make jokes about putting the bible in the fiction section and yelling outside a church that their god isnt real. AKA, I was an asshole. This was around the same time I waws a more conservative leaning person politically, so double the asshole. But I digress.

Ironically, my entire history with atheism came entirely from the fact that I was born on the 12th of February, the same day as Charles Darwin. I went to a private christian school and absolutely still would be a christian if I hadn't been curious about who I shared a birthday with. Funny how those things work. I had at a VERY young age gotten super into evolution science and all that, by the time I was in 6th grade I understood taxonomy and paleontology and all that good shit pretty well. Aron Ra, the youtuber, was a big part of that.

Getting back to the whole reddit atheist shit, that was my teenage years, when I went down that "anti sjw" atheism rabbit hole on youtube. Super asshole, I was. But that was beginning to change around 2017 or so. In 2013 I had moved from a Christian school to a public school run by mostly Muslims and with mostly Muslim students which was a bit of a culture shock to me and introduced me to a different faith I knew little about outside of what I heard in the annual 9-11 documentaries. Adding to that was the fact that I wasn't the most popular kid in highschool and found myself being pushed into the only friend group that would take me in, a mostly LGBT group. Looking back, these friends saved my life in a very real sense, but IDK how the fuck they managed to tolerate me because I was the assholest asshole to ever asshole and regularly said super offensive shit.

But they were patient with me and truly showed me a different perspective, which influenced my beliefs a bit. I no longer felt that religion as a concept was inherently bad, though it certainly is used for bad things, and with Islam particularly I began to see the beauty of it and its followers. I had mellowed out quite a bit. I began calling myself agnostic, given its a less aggressive word than atheist.

How do I get from that to satanism? Part of it was discovering metal music, as cliche as that was, but its true. Particularly Ghost, which still is my favorite band of all time. But most of it was just a reflection of the beliefs I already held, which at that point fell in line with the 7 tenets. I always did personally take issue with the bible, which was forced opon me from birth and didn't really make any sense to me from a scientific standpoint, so satanism to me felt like a very natural reflection of itself, using imagery from Christian faith as a symbol of resistance to dogmatism and superstition, while simultaneously championing religious freedom and diversity. That felt extremely ME. Satanism became a home for me.

[Voyager]

I really like your little history story, so Imma do the same for myself, keep up the discussion and all that

I will say that I relate very hard to the teenage reddit atheist comment, even though unlike you, Im still an atheist. Just a different kind. I used to be the type of person who would make jokes about putting the bible in the fiction section and yelling outside a church that their god isnt real. AKA, I was an asshole. This was around the same time I waws a more conservative leaning person politically, so double the asshole. But I digress.

Ironically, my entire history with atheism came entirely from the fact that I was born on the 12th of February, the same day as Charles Darwin. I went to a private christian school and absolutely still would be a christian if I hadn't been curious about who I shared a birthday with. Funny how those things work. I had at a VERY young age gotten super into evolution science and all that, by the time I was in 6th grade I understood taxonomy and paleontology and all that good shit pretty well. Aron Ra, the youtuber, was a big part of that.

Getting back to the whole reddit atheist shit, that was my teenage years, when I went down that "anti sjw" atheism rabbit hole on youtube. Super asshole, I was. But that was beginning to change around 2017 or so. In 2013 I had moved from a Christian school to a public school run by mostly Muslims and with mostly Muslim students which was a bit of a culture shock to me and introduced me to a different faith I knew little about outside of what I heard in the annual 9-11 documentaries. Adding to that was the fact that I wasn't the most popular kid in highschool and found myself being pushed into the only friend group that would take me in, a mostly LGBT group. Looking back, these friends saved my life in a very real sense, but IDK how the fuck they managed to tolerate me because I was the assholest asshole to ever asshole and regularly said super offensive shit.

But they were patient with me and truly showed me a different perspective, which influenced my beliefs a bit. I no longer felt that religion as a concept was inherently bad, though it certainly is used for bad things, and with Islam particularly I began to see the beauty of it and its followers. I had mellowed out quite a bit. I began calling myself agnostic, given its a less aggressive word than atheist.

How do I get from that to satanism? Part of it was discovering metal music, as cliche as that was, but its true. Particularly Ghost, which still is my favorite band of all time. But most of it was just a reflection of the beliefs I already held, which at that point fell in line with the 7 tenets. I always did personally take issue with the bible, which was forced opon me from birth and didn't really make any sense to me from a scientific standpoint, so satanism to me felt like a very natural reflection of itself, using imagery from Christian faith as a symbol of resistance to dogmatism and superstition, while simultaneously championing religious freedom and diversity. That felt extremely ME. Satanism became a home for me.

That was pretty eye-opening, to be completely honest. It's shown me a different world view, and although we may not agree about the nature of the universe, I absolutely respect it and your belief in it. If I may add some more onto my story... (btw, 'science you' in the first paragraph is meant to be 'sciencey' but autocorrect screwed me over and I can't edit it. It just bugged me so I'm correcting myself here lol)

Funny thing is, despite my girlfriend not confessing to the Faith (from what I know), she's also another factor that nudged me back. She's such a sweet girl, and one that I'd want to raise a family with. She's always so kind and loving, and I would move mountains for her. She reminds me of what Jesus taught, and that has inspired me to live the way I do.

[JAGzilla]

Bumped to continue the conversation from the Unpopular Opinions thread.

[Voyager]

Well… I kinda forgot what we were talking about… the issue of the death of the firstborns?

I genuinely love discussing religion with people, it’s one of my favourite things to discuss. Much more than politics anyways. I love hearing differentiating stances on things, and I’m open to all. Christians, atheists, satanists (spicy atheists), buddhists, jews, muslims, etc etc. I love to hear everything they have to say.

JAG, if there’s something you’d like to discuss or debate, I’m all ears. I’d love to have a conversation with you.

[JAGzilla]

Well, how about we go back to the original statement that God is evil. It's difficult to argue against this when you take God's all-knowing nature into account. He knows in advance which people will go to Hell, yet He creates them and lets them hang themselves anyway.

He is also all-powerful. He can do literally anything. If He has such a problem with human sin, why not turn the entire concept of sin into soap bubbles and let them float away? Why nail His son to a two-by-four? Why was that, of all things, the solution He went with?

[StardustGenius]

Christian Anarchist. No masters, no rulers.

[Voyager]

Well, how about we go back to the original statement that God is evil. It's difficult to argue against this when you take God's all-knowing nature into account. He knows in advance which people will go to Hell, yet He creates them and lets them hang themselves anyway.

He is also all-powerful. He can do literally anything. If He has such a problem with human sin, why not turn the entire concept of sin into soap bubbles and let them float away? Why nail His son to a two-by-four? Why was that, of all things, the solution He went with?

God wants a true, real connection with His creations. If God made us so that we will always follow Him and do the right thing, it is not real love. Think of it as a toy robot dog. It is programmed to give a set of responses, and it gives the illusion that it loves you. But it doesn't. It didn't have a choice. A real dog on the other hand, makes a choice. It learns to love as you show it love back. God didn't want us to be like that. He wanted a meaningful connection with us, so He gave us a conscious choice. We can either choose to love Him or choose to not love Him.

And again with sin, that gives us the choice to love God or not love God. No sin, we'd all be like robots. God wants us to have the choice and I think that's one of life's greatest gifts. That our loving creator gives us the choice.

Jesus is also God, so it was sacrificing a part of Himself. He lived as one of us and died as one of us. Unimaginable suffering so everyone, sinner or not, can have a free pass to Heaven.