i asked for it and i got it. while the majority of the comments to this post were positive or neutral a couple of you voiced your opinion on my apparent heathenism. i’ve been thinking for the past couple of weeks how to follow up my post on Christianity and every thing i’ve written turned out to be this long-winded diatribe about growing up under the oppressive thumb of the Baptist private school system, being brainwashed, and wah!, listen to me whine about my blessed childhood. so here it is in a nutshell: i’m not anti-Christianity, i’m not even anti-God, i’m just starting to come out from everything that i’ve been taught as true and beginning to ask real questions. does this make me an atheist? no. does this make me a bad person? certainly not. will some family and friends shun me? probably, but thems the breaks for being of independent mind and free-will. i’ve been a sheep for so long and blindly followed the teachings of the church without stopping to say, hey, something just doesn’t add up here. i would rather be true to myself and my heart than pretend to be something that i might not be.
contrary to belief i am not in a dark place. in fact, at this time i couldn’t be happier. telling someone they are in a “dark place” simply because they don’t necessarily believe what you believe is part of the reason we have people ramming planes into buildings. i love and accept all of you for your beliefs and do not look down upon you, so is it right for you to do the same? i do not remember the Bible teaching “love one another, but only if they believe as you do”. hipocricy is a fickle madame. i don’t begrudge any of you your beliefs and welcome you to “pray for me”, but i ask this, spend your prayers on those who really need it: for abused and molested children. pray for all the innocents that die at the hands of disease, famine, war. pray that man can find peace, whether through religion or science.
the poster on Christianity was not intended to criticize, but to open a dialogue. last year when i went to see my family in albuquerque, a girl who sat next to me on the plane inquired about my religious beliefs. instead of engaging in a civilized conversation about God, Jesus, and all that jazz, she shoved pamphlets in my hands and lectured me on questioning “our Lord and Savior”. what did she accomplish? other than making me want to shove her body in the luggage rack, nothing. this kamikaze style preaching is grotesque and violating.
a friend of mine told me today “The reasons why religion is so powerful are many, but at the root is humanity’s need for its existence to mean more than living and dying. Religion answers that. It answers all of those questions. Those answers are wrong, but religion is easy to accept. It doesn’t require questioning, thought, or even an understanding, just acceptance.” maybe that is all there is to this life: living and dying. ashes to ashes.
April 11th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
The most I can ever ask of anyone is to question what you believe. Do you believe in Jesus, Allah, Budda, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster because you understand the teachings and have faith in some unknowable truth or is it because you have never considered anything else?
It is said that there is no such thing as a “Christian child” but rather “children of Christian parents”. This is true because children, no matter how intelligent, can not understand religion on a sufficient level to decide whether or not what they are hearing is true. They accept god, Jesus, and all the rest just as easy as they accept Santa, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. God sticks with them so well because they are getting told the “truth” about faith on a weekly basis while the other stuff only gets talked about once a year. It is hard to question that which the people you trust and look up to tell you is true your entire life.
Question what you know. If you do that and still come to the same conclusions at least you have an understanding of why you believe and you will be a step ahead much of the rest of the population.
April 11th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
So what is so bad or wrong about being a Christian, even if it’s not true in your eyes? Christianity brings hope and to many happiness. Even the Budda saw that as a good thing. To have someone to talk to about our deepest thoughts and fears.
However, you have to also consider the ethical system that Judeo-Christian beliefs give us. While I never claim organized religion was the best at following its own advice (100 years wars, the Inquisition[what a show]); it has to be argued that Christianity and other major religion ethical systems offer a broader guideline that I feel benefits this planet. Like it or not, believe in it or not, we are a product of that ethical system that has been around so long, it’s almost genetic(tongue in cheek).