A Civil discussion about Religion
 

First of all, I want to make sure that everyone has read that second word in the title. Please go back and read it again to be sure. This is not here to give anyone with a particular religious belief a soapbox to shout from. That does not interest me. If this thread turns in to a mess of name calling or simple religious bigotry I will ask for it to be locked and will never attempt a thread of a serious nature again.

That said, I ask the mods to give this thread a chance before closing it. A number of forums I've been on would likely lock a thread of this nature straight after the OP, but I'm hoping this community is mature enough (in terms of the relationships between its members) to respect everyone's views, providing they are put forward with a sufficient level of eloquence, and without the self righteous fervour often associated with such a topic.

Now, providing the tenuous assertions made in the above paragraphs prove to be true, I would like to begin this thread in earnest.


I am a fairly staunch atheist, and have been for a number of years. Religion was pretty much left up to me to decide from a young age, though like most children I was informed of the existence of a god, along with everything that goes along with it. Even from a very young age I became aware of the duality of existence; the world I saw around me (which is much like the world I see now, only bigger), and the world I was being told the world was (this involved Santa, god, fairies, angels, ghosts, and monsters). This duality confused me for a while, partly because I was being told the world was like this from the ultimate authority (parents), and partly because I genuinely wanted the world to be like that.

When I hit primary school I started to apply more thinking to the world around me and hit upon a fairly simple hypothesis; if I ignored what people had told me, and went off only what I could see and examine myself, would I ever come to the same conclusion regarding a god that other people were telling me was true? The answer I came to was no. I distinctly remember a vague sensation of trepidation when I let go of those ideas, neatly filling them under the "probably not true" section in my mind.

An interesting thought experiment is to imagine what would happen if a man turned up today, purporting to be the son of some god or another. I would like to believe that he wouldn't end up with a religion by the end of the century, although history clearly shows that to not be true.

My experiences thus far have left me with this view of religion: in all of its iterations, it exists as something that people want to believe. That fervent want seems to have become synonymous with the dubiously labelled "virtue" of faith. People have faith that the universe is how they want it to be because they simply cannot face the idea that it isn't.

I am not setting out to offend anybody, although I would ask that, if you are offended, you explain why what I have said offends you. To be as lucid as possible: I am not asking that in order to mock such sensibilities; I simply want to know why my standpoint of there being no god is inherently offensive to you. I do not find other people's belief in a god offensive, that is until it spills over into areas that it shouldn't.

The universe, the world, all of existence is full of exquisite wonder that every single human would do well to appreciate. I am saddened that such wonder is reduced to being the creation of a sentient being, it somehow feels as though that would rob it of its wonder.


There, that is a small taster (a good one I hope) of what this thread could be if people take the time to consider their responses, rather than let their emotions do the typing.

I ask one more time that we do not allow this thread to decay into spittle and rage.

Ha. This guy's funny.

We don't do this, man. Or, let me rephrase. We don't do this purposely. There is hardly a civil discussion about anything here in Off Topic. Especially not religion.

I'M AN ATHEIST.

Surely it's worth a try. I am genuinely interested in the though processes. I dare say if someone could argue the point well enough in regards to a god, I may be inclined to rethink my view. Although I don't think that could happen, I would certainly like to find out.

Nah. Down deep you're just like me. You know there is no way that anyone is going to make a convincing argument on the side of there being a god, because there is none to be made. It's a matter of faith versus logic, and therefor there is really no discussion to be had. We won't be talking about the same things. It just gives people like you and I the chance to feel really good about ourselves and our ability to put together coherent thoughts. No one, and I mean no one, starts a religion thread because they are genuinely interested in other people's point of view. You may think you are. But you aren't. This will turn into a fight. Feelings will be hurt, and I'll be there laughing the whole time. Not because I was right. I'll be laughing because I loooooooove religion threads. And that's all the reason we need to not have one.

The reason for not having a religious thread is because you don't believe that I could be genuinely interested in other peoples thought processes, and that I simply want the chance to laugh at others? If that were the case surely I would have been much more abrupt and baiting with my language.

I, as you rightly point out, am a person who bases the majority of my experiences within the realm of logic. However, I am also a creative person, and as such it pays to explore different methods of thinking, and what better way than to explore a prevalent method of thinking that I simply don't understand. I do not say that because I have written it off as "just stupid" I say that because I am at a position of ignorance.

All I ask is that you take a step back and imagine, if only for a couple of pages, that a person could be genuinely interested in the religious frame of mind.

That's not the reason to not have the thread. The reason to not have the thread is because it will not be what you're asking for. There has never been a religious discussion on this forum that didn't turn into a fight, and I doubt there ever will be. I also don't believe that your intentions are as altruistic as even you think they are. I know that every time I gave the exact same explanation that you just did for why it was a good reason to have a religious topic it was bullshit, and every other time I read someone else giving the same explanation it was bullshit. We both know that there is nothing to be learned from it. If you're really curious then I would recommend going through The Classics thread and finding a few from there.

All my family are Christian and this was quite forced upon on, I hated going to church, and they controlled what music I listened to, tv shows I watched and video games I played. The TV thing was embarrassing, because I'd have friends talk about how amazing some TV show was and when they asked me if I watched it, well, I wasn't going to say "I'm not allowed to watch it" because then I would look like an ass, so I simply told them no not interested.

Despite how forced it was on me, I found the idea of God and all that to be ridiculous and not be believable, so quite oddly despite Christianity being forced upon me, I've always been Atheist. My family kicked up a fuss when I got into heavy metal and even had my nan whining at me one day over my Slipknot t shirt I was wearing. My aunty though is awesome, she is a Christian, but she keeps it personal to herself and lets me and all her friends get on their with their lives how they want.

Now don't get me wrong, it may sound like I don't like my family, I love my family but I just hate the way they try to force their religious beliefs upon everyone.

When it came to me coming out, my parents and my aunty were fine with it, with everybody else either kicking up a fuss or they pretend it is not happening. My Stepadad took me and my boyfriend (at the time) into the kitchen and got his Bible out and lectured us on Homosexuality and compared us to Paedophile and Murderers to which I told him "They hurt people, we are hurting nobody" My Nan even lectured me telling me it's just a "phase" and that I should never show affection to my boyfriend outside the house, she didn't take it well when I told her that we would hold hands when we went out and didn't believe me when I said that I know other LGB people locally who show their affection in public. One example I brought up was a lesbian couple I know but she argued that girls always hold hands when they are out but I do know that these girls are lesbians in a relationship but my Nan wouldn't believe me. Sadly I had a family member who kept giving me death threats down the phone which frightened me so much that me and my boyfriend (at the time) got in his car and ran away from my house for the night and then got the Police involved when the threats continued after we reluctantly came home.

Only my parents and my Aunty know I'm Atheist because I blurted it out one night when I was very drunk... My parents said that they accept my choice but they hope that I will change...

I can't see it happening myself. Considering I never ever ever believed in Santa...

I think religion is a comfort thing for people, like a reason not to be scared of death.

Would you honestly say that from a very early age you rebelled against the idea of religion? I remember vividly a time when I was very young, perhaps 3-4, with both my sister and I sobbing because we'd both come to the conclusion that we would be going to hell.

I think fear of hell was something I held for quite a long time, even to some degree after I had decided I was an atheist (I appreciate the paradox). When you realised you were gay, was religion of no concern to you by that point at all?

I mostly dislike religions, and Im sort of an agnostic I suppose, but I refuse to believe in something that isn't based on more than faith.

But we -have- had many of these threads, and they never went down camly. But hey, there's a first for everything! Maybe.

But I think Oanst is right... You wanna discuss religion to feel better about yourself. I see it as sort of poking at ants. Not that I compare religious people to ants, but this 'experimentation' atheists sometimes do...

I dunno, creating a sandbox religious thread just seems weird. x_x Maybe you could provide some sort of topic on it or something.

Edit: I really tried to be religious when I was a kid though, cos my best friend tried to get me into it. But it seemed really silly to me, and it never caught on.
He was trying to tell me that Id get the kitten I wanted if I just prayed....

If a topic would help then I would say that it should be Why do you, or do you not believe?

I'm not only interested in religious points of view. I am also interested in atheist point's of view too. Especially those that are different to my own.

Rebel? Not, rebel, just, never believed what I was told, same with Santa, never ever believed that and knew that it was just people buying me presents and putting them under the tree by themselves. When I released I was gay, Religion was only of concern to me in the sense of how my family cope given their beliefs. I don't mind people being religious, I just hate it when they try to force it upon others.

Religion has never been of concern to me, I was just forced to abide by my families rules on what I could watch, do, play ETC just because, well, they were rules set down by them.

So there was never a point in your young life where you took what your family told you at face value? Why do you think that is?

What I hate the most is when people call Atheism a religion....

What about "Religious Beliefs"? Is that ok?

Nope. I don't know either.

Im not sure what you mean... Atheism is not a religion of any kind.... Atheism isnt something that fills the hearts of many people. Unless they are atheist activists...


Atheism is just..... someone living their life without the religious aspect x_x

I think religious beliefs is ok because it is asking what are your beliefs on the topic of religion, I think Atheism is a religious belief because it's not believing it but it is on the subject of religion.

I think I came to conclusion I'm at with religion by being in the position where I could poke at the idea long enough until it started to unravel in my mind. Having grown up having a large number of arguments with my mother from a young age, I learnt that the only way to get any ground is to argue back. I think that helped me a lot in that respect. It also allowed the idea that "parent's aren't automatically right" to fit in my head also.

I don't think Atheism is a religious belief, it's the lack of a religious belief.

Until God comes and says hello to me, there is no convincing me.

I don't think that makes me Agnostic either, because I don't think it can ever be proven that God exists and I can't see him saying hello to me.

Oh, fine. Fuck it. I'll participate now.

I wish the word atheism didn't even exist even though I tend to identify myself as such. Do we need a word for not believing in Santa? What about not believing that in the year 2037 Patrick Stewart will rise from the dead, and dance to the tune "Now This is Christmas" by John Lennon? It just seems silly that I need a label for not believing something that is obviously not true.

Not true... It only revolves around religion because religion makes such a huge part of the world. It forces atheists to be included. In a world without religion, atheism would not have any ties to religion at all. Religion would be non-existant. That's the point of view you have to understand about atheism. For many, atheism is just a standard way of living, and are only classified as atheists because for many, being unreligious doesn't make sense.

Just because someone is an atheist, it doesn't mean they took an action against religion. One doesn't have to have a religious standpoint to be atheist, although many atheists do have religious standpoints. But they don't necessarily go hand in hand.

That's what I think anyway.

Exactly, so it is on the topic of religion if you see what I mean.

But that doesn't make it a religious belief. Mainly because it's not a belief. I don't put faith in atheism.

I think Jenny has quite eloquently explained that Atheist is a religious term because, without religion, there wouldn't be atheism.

Even the word Atheist essentially means no god.

Really? Where?

Alright. It's a religious term. Not a belief. I'll concede that much.

No, because you ignored everything else I said that tied up around it.

Atheism and religion are only related. But atheism isn't a religious belief. It's someone who simply lives, and doesn't include religion in his life.

Now, one can choose to include religion in their life through debate and such. But atheism is a standalone item, and shouldn't even need a name.

Edit: Also Oanst explains it much better than me x_x

XD

I believe in God,
I'm a baptised Catholic but I rarely go to Church,
Since the last God debate I guess I've grown a little more relaxed about religion in general. Hopefully, no moody shit down this end. I guess we'll see, no promises.

I spent the first 16 to 17 years of my life as a member of the mormon church, going to church every sunday and going to young mens every tuesday, babtised at the age of 11, I even got to the point of blessing the sacrement and was about a year away from going on a mission.

eventially my mother and sister managed to convert me to christianity and for a few short months I belived every word that was said by the ministers at the particular church my mum goes to, then I came onto one of the religious threads in this forum and bullet magnet completely shook my view on the accuracy of the bible, then I decided to form a belief system of my own which was basically god in the gaps, and whenever I was unsure of something I tried to think it through logically but I always belived there was a god and he was a fair god.

but when my interest in science got stronger and I decided to find out as much as I could about the scientific view of the universe, and there were less and less things that I could give credit to god for, I eventially found myself beliving in a god who was created with the universe rather than him creating it, and he mearly adjusted matter and maybe the laws of physics to start the long process of the earth being formed and life starting, and then hasn't done anything since.

it was when I got to this point that I decided to abandon my blanket belief in a fair god definately existing and decided to belive only what can be accurately determined, and I could find no logical path to beliving in god or the afterlife, so I take the stand point of atheist untill proven otherwise

That's redundant, just so you know.

A man who refuses to believe in God when faced with infaliable evidence isn't an atheist, he's pretty much an idiot.

I don't think organized religion should have such a significant place in society in this day and age, but my faith in God is tantamount to who I am and the decisions I make. I believe science and logic and other fun words to make me seem pseudointelligent are the only absolutes we should use to make important decisions and leaving things up to fate is asinine. Vocal, militant atheists get my goat just as much as The obnoxious conservanazi faithful, but I'm quicker to yell at an atheist for not shutting the fuck up because that's just me.

I am now proceeding to never ever enter this thread again because I always ALWAYS get riled up at the idiocy and consternation that gestates. Good day.

but I have not been faced with infaliable evidence, or any evidence for that matter, if at some point in the future I am faced with infaliable evidence then I will most likely reconsider my point of view

I think it's probably impossible to excise the idea that we all have something out there watching our back from the collective conciousness of humanity, but I wish people would shut the fuck up about it.

OANST says some very good points - It's rare that people can discuss religion in a civil manor without feeling angry or upset, and from what I've read here while lurking, what he says is true. If you look at the past few posts for example, you have a few people admitting this, in a way.

Nobody can agree on anything because there are as many different tastes as there are people - It's like the constant debates over everything else that's different, such as colours or cars or games consoles or football teams or whatever. People love to debate, they love to argue and disagree - Opening a topic like this is asking for trouble here IMO.

But I'll bite the bullet and leave my contribution:

Reading this - And in fact, any religious discussion - Has made me glad that I was given a choice at a young age, and was brought up to believe what I wanted to rather than having anything forced upon me.

I've chosen to believe that religion is a waste of my time, that the reason why we're here and that life exists isn't that important (must there be an answer to everything?), and that scientific discoveries and theories make a lot of sense to me as an explanation of how the universe works even though there's a lot of ground that we haven't even looked at yet.

But it is amazing that we are here, we should make the best of it, be what we all can be, discover ourselves, try new experiences - We should try and make the most out of our lives and be as happy and as kind to each other as we possibly can, then die happy knowing that we enjoyed ourselves and without regrets. These are the morales that I run my life by - There doesn't need to be more of a "why" than that.

As for there being a god? We don't know and don't have a way of proving it as much as we don't have a way of disproving it either. If there is a god, it probably won't be anything like we imagine it to be. But as we all know, religion is a lot more than just that.

IMO religion was something made up as an early answer to how things worked before we understood things better, and also as a form of law to keep us all in order. We owe a lot of our culture to it, sure, but it's something that's passed it's sell-by date, and we aren't prepared to let it go. But that's fine - Religion in itself isn't a bad thing. People can believe in whatever the hell they like if it helps them sleep at night - It's what they do with it which is harmful. They use it to manipulate people who don't know better, use at as an excuse to go to war, use it as a cover to perform morally bad acts, and shove it down other people's throats - That's what I oppose, rather than religion itself.

Also for example I mean no harm with what I've just written, but I can guarantee that someone, somewhere out there would find it so offensive that they'd want to hurt me. I don't find that acceptable either.

True, but, if somebody says "What are your religious beliefs?" You not going to say "No" are you because it wouldn't sound right. I think of Atheist being like a label for a person that does not believe, in the same way that people could be labeled as Christians, Muslims, Hindu's ETC. I think atheism can be seen as a religious belief because it is a belief in nothing.

That's right, you'd say "I have none."

I don't believe in any religion, I've never have.

It has never really been a part of my life. When I was young our family liked to say they were Christian but weren't really. We've never gone to chruch or been sat down and been read the bible so in my opinion we never were.

Also, It really is impossible to talk about religion without someone getting annoyed and angry, thats probally another reason why I don't beileve. Its just not worth it.

why is it that religion gets people so angry when people don't agree? I'm guilty of these unwarranted feelings too, although I don't quite understand why.

Oh fun, we haven't had one of these in a long long time. I'll try not to ruin it for you Gl1tch.

I grew up in a household where religion wasn't mentioned at all. To this day I don't know if my parents actually believed in god or not. I did go to a christian preschool for 10 years and that same school did everything it could to 'teach' (though I prefer the term indoctrinate, religion has no place in a preschool) the word of god as if it was 100% reality and fact.

So because of that I was forced to read a picture bible when I was 5, color pictures of the exodus and pray to god every single morning (except on weekends). And I genuinely did for a while though looking back I can't say I took it too serious even back then. There used to be this annoying railroad crossing near my house that was closed 40 minutes of every hour. I remember one morning where I prayed to god to fix that son of a bitch so me and my mom wouldn't have to wait so long all the time. So yeah, at some point I didn't take it very seriously anymore and considered the bible story as just a story. My own logic, even at age 7/8, told me that just words in a book didn't actually make the story true. Why would the bible be any different than say, Aladdin? And my teachers didn't exactly go out of their way to deliver more evidence.

So by the time I was 9 I refused to pray anymore and that got me into serious trouble. Got kicked out of class on several occasions and had to see the head of the school who asked my why I refused to pray. When I told her that I didn't believe in god, she looked at me wondering why 5 years of brainwashing had no effect on me at all.

So yeah, that's my early years story. Today my stance is simple. Organized religion, like cristianity, is a dangerous thing. Billions of people but their entire life in the hands on a being they only hope exists. They base everything they do on the words in a book and refuse to take action on anything because it's 'god's will'.

In extreme cases people even kill in the name of their god, justified or not (that's a different discussion all together). But when people start killing in the name of a being for which the only evidence is words in a book, something is wrong in the world.

If you ask me, the world would be a much better place without any kind of religion. But people will always need something to hold on to because death is a scary thing. Since the bible was written we know that the sky is not heaven and that the inside of the earth is not hell. We know what the sun and the stars are but we don't have a clue on death. And as long as we don't, people will cling on to any book that tells them they will have a good afterlife if they just behave. And that's fine, as long as it's your own choice.

Unfortunately religion is taught as fact, not as faith. Parents who tell their children about religion don't mention that there might just be a tiny chance of nothing being true. They don't mention that it's a matter of faith. It's taught to children as a fact of live, both at home and in school, and that's what pisses me off most of all. Children don't get to have a chance to decide for themselves. Their faith is decided for them and if they don't see the logic, someone will make them see it.

I simply can't understand how mere writing in a book can convince any adult that the story is true. The only reason religion still exists is because of the mass indoctrination of children. Children will believe anything, doesn't matter if logic doesn't support it. As long as there's no clear evidence against their ideas. It's the same reason kids believe in Santa or the Easter bunny. They are told from a very young age that these figures exist until at some point they see their parents hiding the presents. If only that would happen more often with indoctrinated children. A point in their life where they go 'wtf, this makes no sense at all'. I'm very thankful that I got to that point early in my life.

So yeah, the one thing I'd like to tell children in a religious environment is this: One day you're going to learn some shocking news about Santa. When that day comes, think long and hard about everything you've been told about god.

Because religion has a very firm grasp on society. Like gays not being allowed to marry and people hating gay people in general. That's a rule that comes straight out of religion and many people are opposed to that and fight it. On the other side you have the religious guys defending their believes.

It comes down to the fact that religion influences everyone's lives, even those who don't believe in it. Me and billions of people with me don't like that one bit, so we fight and snap at it until it decided to go away or leaves us alone. Until that happens there will always be clashes.

I don't have a religion. For as long as I've known, my family haven't either. In the past, I did believe in God, but that was down to my primary school, which emphasised Christianity and praying to God every day. I went along with it because I thought it was right. When I got older, I stopped believing in God, just like I stopped believing in Santa and the tooth fairy. It's quite ironic that I don't believe in God because the idea of it fascinates me. The idea of Heaven and angels to me is awesome and (forgive me) magical, but I can't expand that view enough to actually believe in them. Science also fascinates me, especially space and the stars and planets. Science is more believable to me because well, it makes sense and applies to absolutely everything in the world. It's a poor reason, I know. I guess I need to think it through more. However, this view could also be seen from religious people about God and Heaven. I don't think my view will ever change, I'd like to believe I could start putting faith in a religion, some day. I'm happy enough how I am at the moment.

Probably because religious beliefs can make up a significant amount of a person’s attitude, moral values and lifestyle. Most religions define what a person believes is right and wrong, and provide a set of rules to live by.

Religion also serves as a sort of comfort, with people taking the idea of an afterlife/deity as comfort for the terrible things in the world, not to mention the thought of death.

That’s pretty big stuff, so having another person come along and tell you you’re wrong can shake you up big time.

(also responding to a few posts after that one)

On the other hand, I've got a problem with Atheists who don't regard it as a belief system. Atheism is the belief that God does not exist. It may be impossible to prove that God exists, but it's equally impossible to prove that he doesn't. Claiming otherwise is arrogance.

I should clarify that statement by pointing out that I classify myself as a firm Atheist. It's going to take a long post to explain that in more detail, but it's late here and I'll leave it to tomorrow.