Why do you believe what you believe?

[Analytic Mind]

I would like to know some other people's view points of why they feel they believe in God or don't. The reason I ask is because I would like to try to understand people's reasoning behind their beliefs in such things as God (or lack of) and religious practices.

[eriador]

http://www.philoticweb.net/phpBB2/viewt ... 760e6fbfe8

[suminonA]

I would like to know some other people's view points of why they feel they believe in God or don't. The reason I ask is because I would like to try to understand people's reasoning behind their beliefs in such things as God (or lack of) and religious practices.

For me it's all about consistency (free of internal self-contradictions), and necessity.

For the record, I have no need for unfalsifiable anything.

A.

[Analytic Mind]

i just checked that link eriador put up and that is where i put my own opinion if anyone else is interested in this subject.

thanks suminonA

[Slim]

I thought of the thread When/where did it start for you? instead of the one eriador linked to. Perhaps his fits your question better, but this is a good thread also.

[Bean_wannabe]

Originally, I suppose it was because I was brought up Christian. But last summer at a camp thing called New Wine I experienced some miracles I will NEVER forget, and my faith is all the stronger for it.

[wigginboy]

I believe there MAY be a God. I don't believe there HAS TO BE a God and I don't believe there CAN'T BE a God. I believe in the possibility of a God. When you ask why I don't believe in the idea as a whole, I only have this answer: I believe there MAy or MAY NOT be a God as defined, as loosely as is possible, by and deity-worshipping cultures. I DO NOT however believe in the necessity of RELIGION. Religion is, in essence, the existence of a set doctrine by which adherents to a faith express their beliefs. Why do we all have to believe the same way? Isn't the beauty in belief that we simply believe? Not what we believe? As to the existence of one or many Gods, there is only one logical explanation: WE DO NOT KNOW. We, as mere human beings, do not and CAN not know the nature of God. We can speculate, we can believe just about anything, but the truth will only be revealed when we die. Therefore, all the churches that govern by doctrine and tradition are just speculating, and all the churches that claim absolute reckoning of the nature of God are just pretending to know. We are unable to possess such knowledge.

[suminonA]

As to the existence of one or many Gods, there is only one logical explanation: WE DO NOT KNOW. We, as mere human beings, do not and CAN not know the nature of God. We can speculate, we can believe just about anything, but the truth will only be revealed when we die. Therefore, all the churches that govern by doctrine and tradition are just speculating, and all the churches that claim absolute reckoning of the nature of God are just pretending to know. We are unable to possess such knowledge.

Would you mind if I called you an agnostic?

A.

[jotabe]

Wigginboy, about the existence of gods, we do not possess a knowlege that is certain, testable and reproducible (i.e. scientific), but there are more kinds of knowledge than that one.

[Darth Petra]

What do I believe?

I believe in God. I believe he created the world. Evolution never made sense to me. I believe that Jesus died and rose from the dead.
The rest.....I'm not sure if God really loves us. I guess He does, because he hasn't destroyed us.
But maybe he just puts up with us. I don't know.

I've grown up being told that God exists, and that he loves me. If I didn't believe it, I'd have no reason for living. I think thats why I hold onto my faith.

[Wil]

I believe in both. I believe there is a God, not necessarily the God. I believe there is something else, but I'm not sure what that something else is at this point in time. I believe this because there have been things that have happened to me that I just can't explain any other way.

I believe in evolution also. I don't know how it can't make sense, the principle is fairly simple. Organic bodies adapt. We see it most readily in smaller forums such as viruses or bacteria that through the seasons change. Remember Avian Bird Flu? It wasn't a human based virus.. meaning it couldn't normally, easily infect humans. However, they were worried that it would ADAPT or EVOLVE into being able to infect humans and we had no way to help people infected with it. It DOES make sense to me, so I believe it also.

I don't know why it's impossible to not believe both. I do, and I find no conflicts exist. "Day" doesn't mean "24 hours" or "one Earth rotation" necessarily. It could have just been a way to express an idea that we can comprehend. Day could be a billion years to God. >.>

Ever see those shows that take Bible events and then explain them with science? Those are pretty cool to watch. They don't say the events couldn't have not happened through God, they just say "Here's how it probably did happen with science". God could still have MADE it happen, we can just explain it now.

[Eaquae Legit]

I've grown up being told that God exists, and that he loves me. If I didn't believe it, I'd have no reason for living. I think thats why I hold onto my faith.

I hope you find a personal, "real" reason to believe in God. And I mean that with all sincerity. I'm more with Socrates on "the unexamined life is not worth living."

[neo-dragon]

What do I believe?

I believe in God. I believe he created the world. Evolution never made sense to me. I believe that Jesus died and rose from the dead.
The rest.....I'm not sure if God really loves us. I guess He does, because he hasn't destroyed us.
But maybe he just puts up with us. I don't know.

If you believe that God sent his only son to die for us, I don't see why you wouldn't believe that he loves us!

And I think that evolution makes pretty darn good sense, but I've never understood why so many people think that only one or the other can exist. That is, God or evolution.

[Rei]

DP: I really do think it would be worth your while to examine your faith. You just painted a rather despairing image of religion: you suppose that maybe God loves us because he hasn't destroyed all humanity yet, and without God you'd have no reason to live. That sounds a lot like living just waiting for the axe to fall. As EL said, it is really worth it to examine your life and find a strong personal reason for believing in God. That way, when the storms of life come, you will have a firm foundation in what you believe, instead of finding yourself torn from your foundation and adrift on the sea.

[Darth Petra]

DP: I really do think it would be worth your while to examine your faith. You just painted a rather despairing image of religion: you suppose that maybe God loves us because he hasn't destroyed all humanity yet, and without God you'd have no reason to live. That sounds a lot like living just waiting for the axe to fall. As EL said, it is really worth it to examine your life and find a strong personal reason for believing in God. That way, when the storms of life come, you will have a firm foundation in what you believe, instead of finding yourself torn from your foundation and adrift on the sea.

I know. I've been trying to figure it out....I just don't know about anything any more. I'm not sure if I'm just following what I've been told, or if I'm really believing it.
On one hand, if I stop believing, Mom will hate me, and if I'm wrong in not beliveing, I'll go to Hell.
I mean, I'm supposed to CHOOSE what to belive, but I want to believe, but I feel like I can't.

[jotabe]

You don't really chose what you believe... what you can chose is your moral and intelectual standards. If any belief fails short of them, no matter how much you want to believe in it, you just can't.

[Darth Petra]

You don't really chose what you believe... what you can chose is your moral and intelectual standards. If any belief fails short of them, no matter how much you want to believe in it, you just can't.

So then how is it fair for God to send people to Hell if they can't help it? It just doesn't make sense.

[Janus%TheDoorman]

So then how is it fair for God to send people to Hell if they can't help it? It just doesn't make sense.

Kinda like being stuck between a rock and a hot place, isn't it?

In honesty, much of my beliefs come more from Buddhist, Daoist, and Confucian traditions than any of the Abrahamaic religions, though my family is Christian, and I can clearly see the influence that it has had on my outlook. The beginning came when I first started to question the concept of hell, judgment, and redemption through Jesus. The idea that the billions of followers of other religions were to be condemned regardless of the righteousness of their action was something I found completely unacceptable. More recently, I've begun to think of it in different terms - that belief in the Resurrection symbolizes not so much a desire to escape Hell, or acknowledging that you are born with "Original Sin", but instead merely acknowledging the inherently flawed nature of humanity, and choosing to seek a better path.

More than anything, I believe that God is the truth - nothing more and nothing less. It has no will, not in the same way we do. It's a pathway, a choice, and a purpose. It reveals itself to us through the experiences of our lifetime. I believe that, if there is a righteous purpose to our action, then it must be to seek that truth. Something that led me to this belief was not my dissatisfaction with the prospect of Hell, but rather my dissatisfaction with the concept of Heaven. I cannot, within the scope of my perspective conceive of an existence of eternal contentedness, bliss, and whatever else is promised in Heaven. Without fundamentally altering what drives us as not just humans, but sentients, this seems impossible to me.

Heaven then, can only be the fulfillment of a single promise - the presence of God, that is, truth. I cannot fathom what this might be like, but I can fathom it, and that's enough for me right now.

The only other interpretation of God that makes sense to me is the force that drives change in the universe - that which causes the four fundamental forces to act, time to flow, etc.; but I feel that's more a question of metaphysics, and perhaps regular physics more than spirituality.

[jotabe]

So then how is it fair for God to send people to Hell if they can't help it? It just doesn't make sense.

It isn't fair, so it simply is not compatible with a perfectly just God. Or at least, that's how i see it. The traditional image of God comes to us after the filters of too many centuries of theology that, while amusing and worth as an intellectual exercise, have fogged Him up. "Blind guides who guide blind people"...
Religion has been used as a tool of state, that much is clear. As an allied of governments, of temporal legitimacies, the different denominations had to make themselves the only true way, while the only true way is Jesus. But at the end, what does "following Jesus" mean? Is it publicly professing faith? or is it, like the son of that man, doing what his father wanted even though he had said he wouldn't?

The message of love has spread where the religions hasn't. Love has had to be integrated in most religions, because it's such a powerful force. And when you act out of love, isn't that what really matters, at the end?

This is just my belief, of course. I am probably just justifying myself, because religion, as i have been taught, wouldn't meet my standards of internal coherence. So, even though i consider myself a Christian, i can't call myself catholic, or protestant, or whatever. Because all denominations try to fill all the blank spaces with dogma, even if they fall in contradictions (internal or external). Blank spaces are uncomfortable, when you are trying to figure out what you believe... but it's better than otherwise, or so i think.

[Analytic Mind]

I think that people don't just go to hell because they commit sins/have those sins still on their conscience, it seems more likely that God would send someone to Hell if they just gave up on the struggle of leading good lives. I think that God wants us to try our best to be good people, because as human beings we can't be perfect. This is the way God made us after all, so don't you think he would be patient with us and not just send us to Hell automatically after sinning?

[Wil]

Something I always thought was interesting that my mother said: Hell is on earth.

I believe that THE hell, the fire and brimstone hell, is a lie. I believe it was added simply for the purpose of controlling the masses. It is easy to not get people to lie, cheat, steal, murder if they are faced with pain and suffering for all of eternity. Satan, Lucifer, the devil... for some reason many people believe that this BEING embodies evil and is the polar opposite of God. That he controls hell. Again, probably another population control tactic as there is nothing opposite of God, there is nothing 'drawing you' to do evil things. There is no snake whispering in your ear, simply free will.

I do not believe that God is simply good, as I said before, but I do not believe he is simply evil either. I believe the reason for being on Earth is to experience everything there is to experience. I believe our goal in life should be to experience all we can while living positive lives. I do not believe God will send you to hell for not believing for if he wanted us all to believe he would not have given us free will.

Now, as for what I said at the beginning: Hell on Earth. It is a simple concept. We can experience everything and anything on this Earth. If reincarnation exists, one could live any life and experience anything. We could live exceptionally happy lives, or live exceptionally painful lives. If God had this divine punishment in mind for a murderer or a rapist, it would be to send him back and let him get murdered or raped. The Hermetic belief, as far as I understand it, is that once you have become one with your True Will and have essentially 'experience enough', you become one with God.

So, yeah. I do not believe anything can be a sin against God simply because of:

Isaiah 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

It is simply a matter of learning what it is you are destined to learn or experience and do the best you can do in THIS life, here and now.

[BeansBrother]

Well, I feel that there are two parts to your question. Whether or not, and if so, why we have religious practices, and whether or not we believe in God and why, so I will address it in order, relatively speaking.

1. So I have religious practices... the normal Jewish things, you know, going to Passover Seder (that like Jesus' last supper), being somber on Yom Kippur, being exuberant on Rosh haShanah, etc. The question is, why do I? Well, I was raised that way, simple as that. I am a cultural Jew.

2. Is there a God? In my opinion, there is not. I really don't know why... probably just because I am a man (more like boy) of science, and I do not believe in all that mystical [insert hurtful swear word here].

[neo-dragon]

So then how is it fair for God to send people to Hell if they can't help it? It just doesn't make sense.

Does God send people to Hell, or do people fail to get into Heaven?

2. Is there a God? In my opinion, there is not. I really don't know why... probably just because I am a man (more like boy) of science, and I do not believe in all that mystical [insert hurtful swear word here].

Never forget Clarke's 3rd law: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic". Just because our science can't explain certain things is no reason to reject the possibility of their existence.

[BeansBrother]

Oh, you misunderstand me. I am basing my opinion off that. I know that there are things we do not understand in this world, but I do not believe in God and I believe that sometime in the future we will be able to explain it.

[neo-dragon]

Fair enough.

[jotabe]

Does God send people to Hell, or do people fail to get into Heaven?

As far as we know, all we are: our feelings, our memory, our personality, our will, our existence... is destroyed together with the body, completely disorganized. To bring us to eternal life, an act of resurection is necessary. So, it would be an act of God to bring someone back to life so he could go to hell, literally.

[neo-dragon]

Does God send people to Hell, or do people fail to get into Heaven?

As far as we know, all we are: our feelings, our memory, our personality, our will, our existence... is destroyed together with the body, completely disorganized. To bring us to eternal life, an act of resurection is necessary. So, it would be an act of God to bring someone back to life so he could go to hell, literally.

That may be your interpretation of things, but I think that resurrection is of the body. I always figured that if there's Heaven and Hell and we have souls that dwell in one of those places after we die, those souls were immortal from the time they were created. So if our souls exist and have to go somewhere after our bodies die, does God say, "you messed up so I'm sending you to Hell as punishment", or does he say, "I tried to save you from Hell but you didn't let me."?

[jotabe]

But if we have an immortal soul, what good is it? Our memories, our experiences... everything is hardwritten on our body, our brain. A soul without a brain would be blameless. Look at the people whom Jesus resurrected, even one like Lazarus, who spent several days dead. When they came back, they didn't have stories to tell about how their immortal soul had been on the waiting line for the Judgement Day. They were simply dead (yeah, i know this comes straight from the Watchtower, but you have to agree they have a veeeeeeery strong point there. Soul immortality, instead of resurrection of the soul, is something that only entered into Christianism through the Platonism).

Even if you say that our soul has been set to store our personality and our memories, often our reactions come from certain connections written on our bodies. Something other than our physical body wouldn't react the same, unless you make it to.

Since our body doesn't have any supernatural ability (no physical being can have any interaction on the supernatural realm, and viceversa, unless you are one supernatural being allowed), our body, no matter how evil we act, ¡sn't able to corrupt our soul. It would be an act of God (or an angel... but very few angels have free will, and not the ones that accomany human all the time) who would corrupt our soul by writing it with our selves.

Edit:

"I tried to save you from Hell but you didn't let me."

That sounds too much like an abusive person. God created Hell. He has the keys for it. He decides who goes and who doesn't go. Saying that is a horrible rationalization.
If He created our souls, he can destroy them too, and save people the abhorrence of hell. "I don't like you, so you are dead forever."
If our souls are truly immortal, like He, then He didn't create mankind, then He has no right to dispose of us whatsoever.

[Darth Petra]

Right. I've been avoiding this forums so I can avoid this thread, so I can avoid the question. But, I can't avoid the quesion, so there's no use in avoiding the forum.

There is a God. The universe is too mindblowingly complex for it to be otherwise. It all fits together so neatly that it seems to me there HAS to be a designer. But that was never the question. I never doubted God's existence, only His character. I've talked this with Graff, my youth pastor, and he managed to clarify things a bit.
He said that I need to stop thinking in terms of what's fair and what's not. He says that God always has a legitemate reason for things, but we don't always as humans, understand those reasons. We've sinned, and therefore offended God. It would be fair of Him to wipe us out completely. It is His mercy that keeps us alive.

That still leaves the question of "what if you can't make yourself believe?"

Faith was a lot easier when all I needed to know was "Jesus loves me!"

[lyons24000]

This is something I wrote to someone a while back who was not a Christian who questioned the entire "hell" doctrine.

There is no such thing as hell!

First, I want to tell you that "God is love." (1 John 4:8, 16) Imagine a person is being roasted on a hot iron plate. In his agony he screams for mercy, but nobody listens. The torture goes on and on, hour after hour, day after day—without pause! Whatever crime the victim may have committed, would not your heart go out to him? What of the one who ordered the torture? Could he be a loving person? In no way! Love is merciful and shows pity. A loving father may punish his children, but he would never torture them!

If you were walking in a jail and you saw this torture, what would you do? If you inquired as to what the person was being tortured for and the torturer said, "Because he didn't believe in the judge who could sentence him to this torture," honestly, what would you think about this judge? If you inquired further and the man said, "Well, a while back he got a parking violation that he didn't pay off. He was fined a fair amount and then after he paid the fine we decided to torture him for the next forty years," that would be unjust, right?

Imagine that jailer is God. The man being tortured is a man who has just died. Let us say this traffic violator was a doctor who saved countless lives, gave much to those in need, even adopted two children from poor countries, and showed himself to be a good husband, father, friend, brother. In short, he always helping others. However, this man was not "saved by grace". Is he deserving of being tortured in hell for all eternity? Absolutely not. If "God is love" as the Scriptures say and "perfect is his activity" (Deuteronomy 32:4) then would He be a kind, merciful God if He tortured this man for all eternity because he wasn't "Saved by grace?"

Furthermore, torturing people with fire was something that God never even considered. Speaking of people who would burn their children in fire as sacrifices to God, Jeremiah 7:31 says of the practice that this was something that God "had not commanded and that had not come up into [his] heart." Yes, God had never even considered the thought of people being tortured with fire, much less forever.

Even the idea that the soul lives on after death is something completely foreign to the Bible. In fact it says, "The soul that sins-it itself will die." (Ezekiel 18:4) At Ecclesiastes 9:5 the Bible says, "For the living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all!"

The soul dies? The dead are conscious of nothing at all? If people did go to hell after they died then that would completely cancel out those verses. Then where does the doctrine of hell come from? From mistranslations of the Bible! There is no hell in the sense that people who claim to be Christians teach. The concepts of hell in the Bible were completely different from what Jesus and the apostles thought of as hell. Plus, ask yourself, is it really a just punishment to torture people for all eternity for something they did for just seventy or eighty years of their life? Let your morality be the judge. If our morality says "no" then God, who is perfect and loving, would likewise say no, right?

Then what is the punishment for sins? Romans 6:23 tells us: "For the wages sin pays is death..." Yes, we pay for our sins upon death. James 1:14, 15 says, "Each one is tried by being drawn out and enticed by his own desire. Then the desire, when it becomes fertile, gives birth to sin; in turn, sin, when it has been accomplished, brings forth death." Romans 6:7 says, "For he who has died has been acquitted [acquitted, NWT and HCSB, footnote; KJV, NIV, and others say freed] from his sin." We have paid off our "debt" of sin by dying. Do you torture someone for incurring a debt after they have paid it off? No. They are free to go after they have paid their debt.

So, is death the end, since it is unconsiousness? No. Acts 24:15 says, "I have a hope toward God, which these men themselves also entertain, that there is going to be a resurrection of the righteous and the unrighteous." (See also John 5:28, 29; Revelation 20:12, 13) Almost everyone who has ever lived will have the opportunity to get another try without Satan to distort anything.

You can take that or leave it. But you see, people always ask, if only those who are "saved by grace" will go to heaven and all others will go to hell, the what about those people who never heard the gospel?

Good question! Many, unfortunately, cannot answer that question for a surety. They linger between 1) God sends them to hell anyway, 2) God allows them to go to heaven to learn about him. They say this but they aren't sure. However, you can believe that God does have a way for these people who never hear the gospel. When they die, they will be resurrected again so that they can have the opportunity to hear the Truth.

What a wonderful God we have! "Perfect is His activity!"

[Jebus]

Analytic Mind? Jesus H Crist that's the gayest f****** name I've ever heard.

[Analytic Mind]

I always enjoy hearing from people like you, they always give me something interesting to analyze. Are they just people who have unsatisfying lives and therefore take comfort in putting others down, or do they have nothing better to do in their worthless lives then scour the internet for someone to piss off.

[lyons24000]

For Jebus, none of the above.

No one can say why Jebus does the things he does and we stopped trying to understand a long time ago. We accept it (or ignore it) and go on with our lives. If you are here long enough, you'll learn to get used to it and not take it as an offense.

Shame on you, Jebus, for treating our Newbie friend that way. No dinner for you tonight.