Religions?

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

Just one quick point on the math thing: It's a language I and countless others don't speak fluently. I've tried to learn it, partly to pass my classes and partly to satisfy my own curiosity, and I can't. I cannot force my brain to comprehend anything beyond very basic algebra. I cannot comprehend math, but I can comprehend stories. Yet one thing I've noticed about people who can comprehend math is that they usually have no trouble at all comprehending a story.

If religious texts were half math and half story, there would be people who could understand both, and people who could understand only the stories. Those people would rely on the math-capable people to interpret the sacred equations for them, leaving the door wide open for corruption as the math-capable people could conceivably tell the math-incapable whatever they wanted. We see similar problems arise in the Middle Ages, when the literate clergy told the illiterate masses they had to uphold unbiblical practices like indulgences and the Crusades. This problem was solved with the advent of the printing press and the rise of literacy, allowing people to read the Bible for themselves and provide a check against corruption.

If the Bible were half math, there would be no chance of staving off that corruption. People whose brains cannot comprehend math would have no way of telling math-capable clergy they interpreted an equation wrong. I'm of the opinion that God left his sacred book free of math so that everyone could understand it.

[Chaos he/him]

Different strokes for different folks, Twi. I would hope that a divine being would not simply dumb down eternal truths because some found them difficult to understand.

No religious text can be for me in its current state. Stories and platitudes are meaningless to me. Maybe a book everyone can read, but not a book everyone will care about. There are certainly a great many who will not find it compelling, and I've explained that the messages in the texts do not enhance my worldview. So, eh, shrugs. If there is an afterlife, I can be satisfied knowing that the things I believe were true, and no good or evil supernatural being can change that. Words are just words, and I would prefer to not be corrupted. I'll stick with things that are definitely true that require no leap of faith to decipher.

Also, as a math teacher, I firmly believe anyone can learn math. Some with great difficulty, but anyone can. Ultimately, academia always provides a solution for corruption, as there is the natural check of "hey, I get a doctorate and tons of notoriety by proving famous people wrong? Great!" (Though when it comes to a church, centralizing money and power in such a way... yeah, probably not a good idea. xD)

Edited June 12, 2015 by Chaos

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her]

I can't. I have tried. You don't know how many hours I've put into learning something I cannot understand, and I do not think putting something in a language anyone can comprehend is "dumbing it down."

[Comatose he/him]

No religious text can be for me in its current state. Stories and platitudes are meaningless to me. Maybe a book everyone can read, but not a book everyone will care about. There are certainly a great many who will not find it compelling, and I've explained that the messages in the texts do not enhance my worldview. So, eh, shrugs. If there is an afterlife, I can be satisfied knowing that the things I believe were true, and no good or evil supernatural being can change that. Words are just words, and I would prefer to not be corrupted. I'll stick with things that are definitely true that require no leap of faith to decipher.

 

And that is exactly why your viewpoint suits you, I think.  If you look at religion as fulfilling a need that people feel, then your felt need for definite truth is ill served by leaps of faith, and if messages from the biblical texts do nothing to enhance your worldview, then they aren't really doing you much good.  For me, common facets of religious expression are self improvement and a belief in principles.  In your discussion of mathematical certainty, and from other discussions of had with you, your belief system, even if it is not necessarily 'religious' does seem to fulfill this need.

 

I don't want to assume anything, so sorry if that was presumptive.  Just an interesting observation I had.  As you said above, different strokes for different folks indeed.   

 

This debate about the Bible does make certain assumptions about how and why people are reading it, and about how people percieve the divine.  Since I differ from both Chaos and Twi in how I see these things, I think I should take some more time to consider before weighing in too extensively.  For now, while I think truth is great, and many here have already demonstrated a certain amount of dedication to it, my personal relationship with the Bible is about something different than 'eternal truth'.  I think for me, it's more a means by which I examine my own perception of truth and morality.  This is informed by how I view the bible and its creation of course, so there are many good reasons why our viewpoints might differ.  

 

And there I went going into depth when I said I wasn't going to, haha.  I think what I'm trying to get at is that I don't see the two arguments as mutually exclusive.  The bible can have value for its messages and accessibility, without being a beacon of 'eternal truth'.  Again, for me it is important that the things I believe in don't prove themselves, otherwise that would take the work out of believing for me.  Others find a lot of certainty and truth in the bible, while others find nothing of note, and I think that's all fine, as long as needs are being met and people feel fulfilled.  

 

And now I'm going to cut myself off before this turns into another sermon...

[Kobold King he/him]

Different strokes for different folks, Twi. I would hope that a divine being would not simply dumb down eternal truths because some found them difficult to understand.

 

I mean no offense with this statement, so please don't take any... but I honestly don't see what you'd expect to gain from a book of sacred equations. Math is the base code of the universe, but how could you express concepts like kindness, love, or salvation through numbers alone? It seems to me a mathematical religion could describe the motions of planets well enough, but would be hard-pressed to preach anything else that makes a religion worth following.

 

I guess my point is, a love of mathematics is well and good... but isn't the unprovable idea that you can describe everything worth describing with numbers alone itself a leap of faith?

Edited June 12, 2015 by Kobold King

[skaa he/him]

Different strokes for different folks, Twi. I would hope that a divine being would not simply dumb down eternal truths because some found them difficult to understand.

No religious text can be for me in its current state. Stories and platitudes are meaningless to me. Maybe a book everyone can read, but not a book everyone will care about. There are certainly a great many who will not find it compelling, and I've explained that the messages in the texts do not enhance my worldview. So, eh, shrugs. If there is an afterlife, I can be satisfied knowing that the things I believe were true, and no good or evil supernatural being can change that. Words are just words, and I would prefer to not be corrupted. I'll stick with things that are definitely true that require no leap of faith to decipher.

Also, as a math teacher, I firmly believe anyone can learn math. Some with great difficulty, but anyone can. Ultimately, academia always provides a solution for corruption, as there is the natural check of "hey, I get a doctorate and tons of notoriety by proving famous people wrong? Great!" (Though when it comes to a church, centralizing money and power in such a way... yeah, probably not a good idea. xD)

Okay, allow me to be a bit like Sazed and offer you a religion, Chaos. There is a religion (let us call it Xism, after the common algebraic variable) that teaches that in the afterlife all who are saved receive (among other things) the gift of perfect knowledge, including a perfect understanding of the mathematics involved in the physics of God's creation.

Will you accept that religion?

 

(Just kidding.)

---

A small note on religious scriptures. You guys have been discussing the theoretical possibility of a god creating a holy book containing advanced mathematical truths, in contrast to the Christian Bible's apparent lack of advanced mathematical truths. But there seems to be a point some of you are missing: the Bible did not come down from heaven fully-formed upon the hands of the first Christians. The Christian Bible is just a collection of writings by actual people that at some point in the middle of the first millennium A.D. began to be seen by Christian leaders as useful tools for preaching the Christian religion. These include the Greek Septuagint translation of Jewish scriptures (the "Old Testament") and the writings of the earliest followers of Christ.

What this means is that the actual teachings of Christianity (passed down from the Apostles) were already known to the Christian bishops before they even canonized the Bible. This is very important, because there were indeed several writings that some had considered part of Scripture but others did not. There had to be a standard aside from Scripture to judge what was not part of Scripture.

So, if the Bible was written by actual people and carefully chosen by actual bishops and priests several hundred years after Christ died and more than a thousand years ago, of course it would not contain knowledge that people only discovered recently, like the advanced math that geeks like Chaos and I so very much adore. God being pro- or anti-Math has nothing to do with it, because God did not personally write the Bible!

The original role of the Bible in Christianity is not as a "magical book" that can be read by anyone to "magically" know religious truths (or any truth, for that matter). You don't just make your own interpretation of a certain verse and be confident of knowing what God thinks. Rather, the Bible is to be interpreted in light of what its compiler, the Christian Church, already teaches, not the other way around (as some people, unaware of history, seem to think).

Edited June 12, 2015 by skaa

[Chaos he/him]

I mean no offense with this statement, so please don't take any... but I honestly don't see what you'd expect to gain from a book of sacred equations. Math is the base code of the universe, but how could you express concepts like kindness, love, or salvation through numbers alone? It seems to me a mathematical religion could describe the motions of planets well enough, but would be hard-pressed to preach anything else that makes a religion worth following.

 

I guess my point is, a love of mathematics is well and good... but isn't the unprovable idea that you can describe everything worth describing with numbers alone itself a leap of faith?

 

Whoa whoa whoa. Hold up.

I have never claimed that math did any of those things. (Read again! I really didn't say that!) Math's claims are far less exotic. They are things like "a series of functions that are continuous which uniformly converges to a function F(x) is also continuous". I did say that math is eternally true, and will always be true, but I never claimed that it spoke of those things.

(But, then, I don't really require a book to tell how me to love or be kind, nor do I wish to be saved.)

I might be really bad at explaining--probably because I don't voice these opinions often, so I am ill-practiced at describing them--but it's not a math or science textbook that I want as a holy book. I'd just like some divinely inspired book to mention once, somewhere, that humanity can do a ton of good and discover a lot of these things. Vague hints.

You could sell it like: "I am God. By doing these few steps [vaguely explain scientific method], learn the nature of the world, behold its beauty that I created, and become closer to me!" That doesn't really seem out of place in a holy book. There's plenty of stories that have a very clear message to it. Why can't one have a message like this?

That's all I want. A hint. A small light where humanity can figure out the rest. To find this crazy glory in the natural world.

 

Okay, allow me to be a bit like Sazed and offer you a religion, Chaos. There is a religion (let us call it Xism, after the common algebraic variable) that teaches that in the afterlife all who are saved receive (among other things) the gift of perfect knowledge, including a perfect understanding of the mathematics involved in the physics of God's creation.

 

Will you accept that religion?

This has no practical difference to any religion that promises anything in the afterlife. It is not compelling because you can give me no guarantee that such a place exists. I will focus on making this world better because it's the only one we got, and not act in some arbitrary decision of what "good" is because of eternal salvation. This one is here, so I'll focus on that.

I do enjoy this, but I don't want to derail this topic further with my math ramblings. I am probably going to make a "Ask Chaos anything" thread where we can continue this.

(Sorry. I turned a religious discussion and ended up mentioning formal definitions of limits. Ooops...)

EDIT: Here's the aforementioned Ask Chaos Anything topic. If you want fun, you could ask why I'd prefer if the afterlife didn't exist Or really whatever you want. You're the boss.

Edited June 12, 2015 by Chaos

[Kaymyth she/her]

I'm familiar with Discordianism. That is what Will (Shivertongue), our graphic monkey, believes in.

But yeah, this. I don't need faith to be happy. It's just kind of how it is. Skaa's points are interesting, as he made me think, "what would be a religion I could actually believe in?" I wasn't saying that knowledge should be it, but it felt off to me that it lacked that entirely. But what could I believe in? I don't think anything. Worship isn't for me. I'm just not spiritual at all.

That said, if aliens came and said "hey do this, here's evidence why you should do these things," I would listen. But spiritual belief? Not for me.

 

 

I've been roped into helping with Discordian rituals before.  It's one of the things I love about my peculiar little church; we've got so many people walking so many different paths on the Ritual team that I'm always being exposed to something new and different.

 

But in my book, belief isn't necessary.  And religion (or lack thereof) is a deeply personal thing.  Ever notice something?  Nobody says, "I practice X religion."  They say, "I am an Xist."  What we believe or don't believe is a fundamental part of our identity.  I think that's a big reason why discussions on religion can spiral out of control so easily; it's hard to separate oneself from the thing you're talking about.

 

I can't. I have tried. You don't know how many hours I've put into learning something I cannot understand, and I do not think putting something in a language anyone can comprehend is "dumbing it down."

 

I think perhaps your problem has been teachers, because there's more than one way to teach math.  Not everyone's brains process concepts in exactly the same way.  The fail point wasn't you, it was that the lessons weren't designed for you.

 

I mean no offense with this statement, so please don't take any... but I honestly don't see what you'd expect to gain from a book of sacred equations. Math is the base code of the universe, but how could you express concepts like kindness, love, or salvation through numbers alone? It seems to me a mathematical religion could describe the motions of planets well enough, but would be hard-pressed to preach anything else that makes a religion worth following.

 

I guess my point is, a love of mathematics is well and good... but isn't the unprovable idea that you can describe everything worth describing with numbers alone itself a leap of faith?

 

1+1=<3

 

There you go.  A mathematical equation for love.  And it's technically true!

[Haelbarde he/him]

1+1=<3

 

There you go.  A mathematical equation for love.  And it's technically true!

What do you mean 'technically true'. This a mathematical truth. Though the equals is not necessary.

 

I've not seen that before. This amuses me.

[Kaymyth she/her]

What do you mean 'technically true'. This a mathematical truth. Though the equals is not necessary.

 

I've not seen that before. This amuses me.

 

Eh, it makes it balance better.  1+1 is <3 doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

 

And it just occurred to me.  I doubt it's a truly original idea, but I think I thought of it spontaneously.

[Haelbarde he/him]

Eh, it makes it balance better.  1+1 is <3 doesn't quite have the same ring to it.

 

And it just occurred to me.  I doubt it's a truly original idea, but I think I thought of it spontaneously.

As in, 1+1<3 is more powerful/precise than 1+1=<3, though this is true. 'One plus One is equal or smaller than 3' is a true statement. But no, does not have the same ring at all. 

 

Maybe it isn't original, but it's the first time I've seen it, so upvotes for you.

[Voidus]

I identify as an agnostic atheist, which tends to raise issues with people who use a different definition of agnosticism. It's fairly common among atheists I know since they both have greek roots, atheism comes from the greek for god and literally means 'without gods' although it originally referred to anyone who believed in different gods rather than those who didn't believe in any. Agnostic on the other hand comes from the greek word gnostos which means 'to be known' and so an agnostic is literally someone who doesn't believe the answer can be known.

So basically I don't believe in any gods but believe that can never be known with any certainty, there are an infinite number of conceivable gods and no one could ever attempt to prove that none of them exist.

I'm confused as to how labling yourself as agnostic would be arrogant. It simply means that you believe there is a higher power, but not a certain one. It isn't arrogant at all.

 

That's a belief system known as Deism actually, the belief in a non-specific creating entity. Agnosticism means a lot of things to a lot of people.

 

Yes, there are.  I know some of them.   They generally refer to themselves as being Hellenic pagans, or just plain Hellenic.  There's a name for everything.

 

 

My husband is also an atheist, and he had a similar experience with an ex-girlfriend before he met me.  She kept trying to convert him, and it made him really uncomfortable.  They eventually broke up because of it.

 

Now he and I, we have a mutual understanding.  I don't try and convert him to anything, and he doesn't say he thinks I'm crazy when I talk about having Unverifiable Personal Gnosis experiences with deities.  It works well for us.

 

And I agree that while the hymns can be quite beautiful pieces of music, I can't sing them, either.  It's just too....weird.  My UU church has some songs and chants that we do, but it's a pretty different kettle of wax.

I get in religious discussion online quite a bit and I have to say that I find pagans to have some of the most diverse and interesting beliefs and we tend to get along fairly well since many pagans used to be agnostic or atheist.
Agreed on the hymns though, I went to a Lutheran high school and I always felt incredibly uncomfortable during them.

 

@Nait Sabes, I technically agree with Kipper. If theoretically there were a god (which I don't believe there is, but more on that later), then wouldn't they define what is right and wrong? Just a query.

Some beliefs claim so but personally I believe it to be a bit of a cop-out, it reduces gods love to moral tyranny, morality then is simply obedience.

[18th Shard he/him]

I'm a Mormon. I follow the tenets of my faith and believe the doctrine I have learned since I was a child. That isn't important to me as an indicator of my faith. I see many times people (not implying that any here, merely people I know personally) say that X religion is what you believe because you have been taught that. And while that is true for some people, I personally choose every day to believe as I do. I personally choose each day to live my life in accordance with what I have been taught because I know without a shred of doubt in my mind, that it is true. That may be a bold statement, that I know, but I do. People can know things falsely, but that doesn't change the fact that for that person, truth is what they know. Regardless of whether you believe that knowledge to be valid, I know from personal revelation that Jesus is my Savior. Whether or not you choose to believe he is your Savior is up to you. However, I believe in agency as well. Defined in Mormon terminology as the free will to choose your actions and attitudes (though not the consequences of said actions), agency is the most precious gift we have been given. It is the gift to grow, to choose who we are. And I value every person in this thread's decision to choose to use that agency to be a better person. Because I believe God doesn't judge us on what we have said, done, or professed, but on who we are, and every one of you is a better person because of what you believe. I believe in a perfect God, who knows that your life is different from mine and thus your experience and knowledge are different than mine, and he will give every person an opportunity to decide in the afterlife whether or not what they believed/worshiped is actually my God. I love C.S. Lewis's Narnia books, and I believe that what he had Aslan do in the Last Battle is similar to what Christ will do in the Final Judgement: he accepted that one honest Calormen (I forget his name) because though he worshiped Tash, he worshiped him as a true believer would Aslan. 

 

@Chaos and others: I understand that math doesn't imply a why, that it doesn't show love. And that is fine. Math and religion go hand in hand - math is the who, the how, the what, the when. Religion supplies the why. Math is the law of the physical realm, religion the law of the spirit. 

 

Edit: As to whether God determines morality, I would say no. God does not make something moral. However, the God I believe in is perfect, and follows and expects his children to follow such a perfect moral law. God tells us morals that exist outside of him.

Edited June 12, 2015 by 18th Shard

[Kaymyth she/her]

I get in religious discussion online quite a bit and I have to say that I find pagans to have some of the most diverse and interesting beliefs and we tend to get along fairly well since many pagans used to be agnostic or atheist.

Agreed on the hymns though, I went to a Lutheran high school and I always felt incredibly uncomfortable during them.

 

Eh, we've got our share of bad apples, same as the rest of 'em.  In any group, you're always going to get a few outliers who think they know better than everybody else.  Mostly I roll my eyes and move on.

 

But I do think that a lot of us will sometimes come across as too fierce.  There is a fairly sizeable subset of people on one neopagan path or another who turned that way because they were hurt in some way by the tradition they were raised in.  As I said, every group has their share of awful people using the religion to justify hurting others, and some of the ones hurt react so strongly that the run as far and as fast as they can the other direction.

 

So if any of you ever do come across someone on a pagan path who has a strongly negative reaction to whatever religion you might be, please bear in mind that it most likely is borne from the pain of their own wounds, and nothing that you yourself (or even anyone who you would be willing to claim) did.

[sun tzaro]

People expect the wrong things out of religion.

 

Every person, living or dead, religious or atheist, has had their own moral code. Each of these "personal moral codes" is different.  What one person finds "right" can be very different from what another finds "right". Consider how much culture and society have changed in the last thousand years, you can expect that the people of a thousand years ago had wildly different definitions of"right". You can expect that the people of a thousand years from today will have just as wildly different definitions. (Philosophers try to systematically define a moral code. Unsuprisingly, they all come to very different conclusions.)

 

That's something that I think nearly anyone can agree on.

 

So why do people expect that God will agree with them? Why would God's will - a will that has existed for over a thousand years - bend to fit what you want and expect?

 

 

I can't say about any "goodness" outside of gods, but that would be more because I don't think "good" or "evil" are even useful concepts.

However, there's certainly truth totally independent of any divinity. Mathematics is a purely human constructed set of things that will always be true (and it is constructed. Mathematicians make up definitions, and from those, derive truth).

The fact that religious texts, the divine inspired truths, lacks mathematics, which will be forever true, regardless of religion, regardless of if we are all dead... It bothers me a lot. These books should contain these eternal truths, and they don't.

 

Addressing this specifically, math is not a truth created by humans. It is a discovery and exploration of truth. All the math we know now has existed since the birth of earth (by God's hand). Humans have simply mapped it out (and I don't say simply to discredit mathematicians. Considering my own field of study, I owe a great deal to math). 

 

Anyway, the point I'm trying to get to is that it is your expectation that religious texts should contain mathematics. You place value on math. God values love and compassion over knowledge and its pursuit (First Corinthians 13:2). 

 

 

Specifically, I want my religion to teach me that I am in danger of having a very miserable life after death unless I do certain things that I am truly capable of doing.

 

This is what you want. Although it this is what God delivers, he does not deliver it as a result of your desire for it. Your post was great though.

 

For me, it has always been important that my faith and service be based on love, not fear.  Believing in any sort of hell or eternal punishment takes choice out of the equation for me, because then my faith would be based on the fact that someone more powerful than I could exert that power to punish me should I fail to meet certain standards. 

 

This is your expectation of faith, but that doesn't change the words of the Bible: God punishes the unbelievers along with the wicked (Revelations 21:8).

 

If God exists, then why would he be concerned with what you want and expect? If God exists, then his will has existed for many, many years. Why would it change to fit your standards?

 

"Never again will I curse the ground of humans, even though every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood."

 

I assure you, God thinks very little of your inclinations. (Whenever I use that accusatory your, I mean your's and mine and everyone else's).

 

People accuse the Bible - and by extension, God, of many things. Of misogyny, bigotry, hatred, and cruelty. Things against the modern progressive mentality - which is a part of a great many people's personal moral codes.

 

Maybe these accusations are true. Maybe they aren't. But whether or not they are true, and whether or not you agree with them, does not change God's will.

 

This might seem obvious, but apparently it's not.

 

This is far from a problem with just atheists. It's a problem with believers as well.

 

Churches and pastors interpret scripture in ways that appeal to their congregations' moral code. A very liberal church will the push interpretation of the Bible that its churchgoers will want to hear - Matthew 18:32 is more important than Leviticus 18:22 . A very conservative church will push a different interpretation of the Bible that its churchgoers will want to hear - Leviticus 18:22 is more important than Matthew 18:32. 

 

I am fond of my own church, because I believe it does good according to my own moral code. Donating to the charities like the Red Cross may mean that a great deal of my money is squandered, but when I donate to mission trips in my church, I know my money is going directly to help fellow members of my congregation build bridges and schoolhouses in Haiti. That doesn't mean that my own church isn't guilty of the above.

 

Personally, I base my own religious beliefs on my own reading of the Bible. Of course, my reading is always subtly colored by my own moral code, but there are times when my own moral code comes directly into conflict with what God wants of me. And in those times, I do not try to change God's words to fit what I want. Instead, I realize that this conflict is representative as a failing of my own faith. If I truly believed, I would obey completely.

 

I think a proper way to summarize it is this: What you want does not change reality. To say that you disagree with a religion for such and such reasons is irrelevant. 

 

If you believe in God, then you believe God is real.

 

If you believe God is real, then you believe in what God commands, and what you want does not change what God commands.

 

God's commands often differ from what you want. Faith is not an easy thing to follow; our personal moral codes are not easily changed. That's why God rewards the faithful.

 

If you believe in a religion just because the religion agrees with you, then your belief is not faith, but an exercise in ego.

Edited June 13, 2015 by sun tzaro

[+Slowswift]

[content]

 

Wow. That was a great post.

 

I'm a Mormon. I follow the tenets of my faith and believe the doctrine I have learned since I was a child. That isn't important to me as an indicator of my faith. I see many times people (not implying that any here, merely people I know personally) say that X religion is what you believe because you have been taught that. And while that is true for some people, I personally choose every day to believe as I do. I personally choose each day to live my life in accordance with what I have been taught because I know without a shred of doubt in my mind, that it is true. 

 

Love this. Your post was amazing!

 

 

Anyways, I figured I'd add a bit more to what I've said regarding hymns.

 

Doctrine and Covenants 25:12 says:

 

 

12 For my soul delighteth in the song of the heart; yea, the song of the righteous is a prayer unto me, and it shall be answered with a blessing upon their heads.

 

So there's definitely a spiritual part to it, in addition to my normal love of music. But I do see why the lyrics would make some people uncomfortable. I do love the words, but a lot of it for me is the music itself. The tunes speak to me more than just the words ever could. 

[Voidus]

Wow. That was a great post.

 

 

Love this. Your post was amazing!

 

 

Anyways, I figured I'd add a bit more to what I've said regarding hymns.

 

Doctrine and Covenants 25:12 says:

 

So there's definitely a spiritual part to it, in addition to my normal love of music. But I do see why the lyrics would make some people uncomfortable. I do love the words, but a lot of it for me is the music itself. The tunes speak to me more than just the words ever could. 

The lyrics never made me uncomfortable, I don't mind people professing their faith (Though personally I believe faith should be a perosnal issue, not something that you loudly profess in public but given that hymns usually occur in church they're in a room full of like minded people anyway so I suppose that makes sense to foster community,) It's just the whole expectation that everyone joins in that troubles me. I've never asked anyone to sing aloud that there is no god if they believe that there is, or passed judgement upon people for refusing to do so. I know it's not everyone in the congregations who does it but there are definitely quite a few people who will silently stare and judge you if you're not singing along and it just makes me feel incredibly uncomfortable, I don't mind going to church and listening to sermons or even bowing my head when others are praying but I'm not going to profess to believe something that I don't believe and I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

[+Slowswift]

The lyrics never made me uncomfortable, I don't mind people professing their faith (Though personally I believe faith should be a perosnal issue, not something that you loudly profess in public but given that hymns usually occur in church they're in a room full of like minded people anyway so I suppose that makes sense to foster community,) It's just the whole expectation that everyone joins in that troubles me. I've never asked anyone to sing aloud that there is no god if they believe that there is, or passed judgement upon people for refusing to do so. I know it's not everyone in the congregations who does it but there are definitely quite a few people who will silently stare and judge you if you're not singing along and it just makes me feel incredibly uncomfortable, I don't mind going to church and listening to sermons or even bowing my head when others are praying but I'm not going to profess to believe something that I don't believe and I don't think there's anything wrong with that.

 

I totally get this. Makes sense.

 

Yeah, since I'm in a congregation it's easy to sing. Just... don't ask me to solo, kolo?

[Lightsworn Panda he/him]

I am a firm worshiper of The Great Panda Overlords, who are Destined to Rule and Conquer All.

 

In all seriousness, I'm atheist, although I don't consider it a very important quality that defines me.

 

There's a surprising number of Mormon Sanderfans here, more than I expected.

[Blaze1616 he/him]

I mean no offense with this statement, so please don't take any... but I honestly don't see what you'd expect to gain from a book of sacred equations. Math is the base code of the universe, but how could you express concepts like kindness, love, or salvation through numbers alone? It seems to me a mathematical religion could describe the motions of planets well enough, but would be hard-pressed to preach anything else that makes a religion worth following.

 

I guess my point is, a love of mathematics is well and good... but isn't the unprovable idea that you can describe everything worth describing with numbers alone itself a leap of faith?

 

I'm not going to explain in detail my lack of religious beliefs, suffice to say I agree with Chaos in pretty much everything he's said. I do, however, want to share with you, Kobold, that math does explain love, or rather can be used to do so. On my first day of Differential Equations the professor strolled into class wielding nothing but a piece of chalk, and proceeded to explain the true beauty of math, and then to prove to us that math was as beautiful as he claimed, mathematically explained love. It was awesome, and one of the best days of my college life.

[Voidus]

I'm not going to explain in detail my lack of religious beliefs, suffice to say I agree with Chaos in pretty much everything he's said. I do, however, want to share with you, Kobold, that math does explain love, or rather can be used to do so. On my first day of Differential Equations the professor strolled into class wielding nothing but a piece of chalk, and proceeded to explain the true beauty of math, and then to prove to us that math was as beautiful as he claimed, mathematically explained love. It was awesome, and one of the best days of my college life.

It's always a sore point when people say things like 'maths can't prove love' for me, I understand what the person is trying to say, and in a sense it's true, maths only deals with numbers as an abstract concept, applying that maths to the real world however can explain pretty much everything in my opinion (Certain axioms aside). Although we don't know how to use it correctly in some cases, but that's a flaw with us and not one that should be shared by an omniscient being.

[Orlion Blight he/him]

*peeks into thread* Ah, good, seems like the talk on hymns has died down

[the Gleeman he/him]

I'm a Southern Baptist and have actually, seriously researched other religions/atheism. I'd like to have conversations/debate with others on this topic so... PM me, would you kindly. 

 

The largest evidence of belief for me in Christianity comes from historical happenings. Unlike Islam, Hinduism, etc, there were no benefits to being an early christian. The early church had no benefits in upholding a lie if Christ had not at least seemed to have been risen and appeared to many in the church. The evidence being first found by women, an unreliable source at the time, also adds credibility to the story as does the fact that even the Jewish leaders and Romans admitted that Jesus had died and that his body was no longer in his tomb. The early church was persecuted quite heavily-- it was disadvantageous to be a Christian at first thus leaving little reason to live a lie. This creates a reason for the early church to at least believe that Christianity was real and that Jesus the Nazarene was right in what he claimed. 

 

Food for thought. I can add more through PM. Just my own thoughts after "Kingdom of Heaven" style revelations. 

[yurisses]

I voted "atheist/agnostic", though I call myself a non-believer. Atheism has become strongly associated with a movement more than a (lack of) belief, and I don't like the baggage it sometimes carries.

 

My mother is Catholic (I was baptised), but my family didn't go to church often. A critical point in my gradual loss of faith came around the time public discourse on gay marriage grew omnipresent in France, the opposition stronger than in any of Europe. I heard a bunch of very hateful people, who also claimed the Bible supported their intolerance! This made me ask some serious questions; ultimately, I lost my faith not because of the religious but because I simply no longer found any reason to believe in God (atheism/loss of faith came with very little stigma around me); even if I had, I'd have had no way to know which one.

 

Funnily, the LDS Church isn't a big thing in Europe, and for most of my life I didn't even know it existed. Later on I was exposed to it through the sneers of other people, and the media. It wasn't until I read Brandon's books that I actively looked into what Mormonism was and how Mormons were like, which made me gain a lot of respect for a religion from which I'd never met a member.

 

However, since I'm rather socially liberal and social issues tend to make all sides upset, I am sometimes made uncomfortable by various Churches acting as driving forces of social conservatism, and the LDS Church is one of them. There is more to life than politics, though, and I try to prevent political positions from letting me know great individuals.

Edited June 18, 2015 by yurisses

[ljósmóður she/her]

I voted "atheist/agnostic", though I call myself a non-believer. Atheism has become strongly associated with a movement more than a (lack of) belief, and I don't like the baggage it sometimes carries.

 

My mother is Catholic (I was baptised), but my family didn't go to church often. A critical point in my gradual loss of faith came around the time public discourse on gay marriage grew omnipresent where in France, the opposition stronger than in any of Europe. I heard a bunch of very hateful people, who also claimed the Bible supported their intolerance! This made me ask some serious questions; ultimately, I lost my faith not because of the religious but because I simply no longer found any reason to believe in God (atheism/loss of faith came with very little stigma around me); even if I had, I'd have had no way to know which one.

 

Funnily, the LDS Church isn't a big thing in Europe, and for most of my life I didn't even know it existed. Later on I was exposed to it through the sneers of other people, and the media. It wasn't until I read Brandon's books that I actively looked into what Mormonism was and how Mormons were like, which made me gain a lot of respect for a religion from which I'd never met a member.

 

However, since I'm rather socially liberal and social issues tend to make all sides upset, I am sometimes made uncomfortable by various Churches acting as driving forces of social conservatism, and the LDS Church is one of them. There is more to life than politics, though, and I try to prevent political positions from letting me know great individuals.

 

+1

 

I identify as socially liberal (and politically left-wing) but also as a Christian. It can be a tricky balancing act sometimes for certain but, to me, my belief in a fair and equal society in which the poorest are protected and human rights are respected grows out of my faith. Because I believe that humans beings were created purposefully by a loving creator, I believe that each and every person had intrinsic worth and that their worth should be nourished and nurtured. Jesus is my model for how Christians should respond to their society and I think sometimes the church forgets that He was pretty revolutionary in his response to the poorest, the most vulnerable and the dispossessed.