The fear remains...

I'm in the prosses of letting go of Christianity and religon in general.

It has been a slow prosses that reached a climax about one year ago.

I have been a Christian all my life, well pretty much, I knelt down with my father and accepted Jesus at age 7. I remember it very well.

I have never questioned the bible or the pastor or my dad, but now after about 4-5 years of serious thought and reasoning I'm ALMOST ready to pronounce my disbelief in all religion.

Just one thing.... I'm still scared of "Hell". When you have lived your life in fear of one thing above all others, its very difficult to wipe that thing completely from your mind. It's definatly is a major issue for me.

I'm mostly interested in feedback from others who have gone through this, or are going through it now. (esp. Libertine)

I know I'll get plenty of fire and brimstone from a few people, but its nothing when compaired with what I get from my dad, I promise that.

I mean no offence to Christians, but this seemed the best place to put this thread.

 

it wasn't so hard for me

my whole life I was raised christian, and I always had some doubt, and slowly that doubt grew, and I was a proclaimed agnostic, then as time went on I'm just like "what am I afraid of, they are just stupid irrational stories, fuck it" and became atheist

put it this way, if you go to hell it has all the cool things
fire
demon chicks
rock music
drugs
bacon

 

May I ask mate, why you no longer believe in God/Jesus/Hell and all that

 

We all go through that. Probably because that is one of the techniques used to keep the "saved" remaining christian.

"Aren't you afraid of going to hell? What do you have to lose, believe in christ all your life and you wont have to worry about hell! If there is no heaven/hell, the so what...if there is then you get to go to heaven!"
Good 'ole Pascal's wager - and flawed logic at that...

The more you take a logical, rational look at "god" as defined by christianity the more it seems he is only a creation of the human mind. There are just WAY TOO MANY contridictions in his character and actions to be the being christians claim him to be.

I don't want to start a huge debate here, so feel free to PM me if you want to chat in more detail regarding my POV. I was raised and educated baptist, so I have a pretty good idea of where you are coming from.

 

Sure you may. Its pretty complicated though. If I over simplified a bit I'd say that I like Sera Michele see to many contridictions in God and the Bible.

Really I guess its just the time in my life to seriously examine my beliefs. To me the God in the bible is really not a God of love at all, but one of fear. I don't want to live my life in fear. Unfortunatly losing the religon dosn't nessesarily mean losing the fear.

I don't know if I'm doing the right thing, but I am honastly trying to do what is right.

 

Was I asking you, mate?

 

Hi grimjivey ~ I just posted post #13 in the philosophy & religion section that might help a little. use this link..
http://www.hipforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=126697&page=2

The "hell" thing is just a load of absoloute scare-mongering rubbish used to control the mindless masses. Take a look at the universe ~ it is vast, expansive, eternal. Yet nowhere is there a wall, impediment, barrier or obstruction that is not man made! We are free to explore the entirety of creation in any way that we choose, and life is included in such exploration. All of the "retribution" stuff comes only from minds that think that way. Just because some paranoid people think that The Great Turtle will snatch them up and take them away to devour them and spit their bones into the fire doesn not mean that the belief is rational, meaningful, sensible, or actual. It is just the way paranoid people think. The real choice is between paranoia or rationality. Take your pick
Likewise SeraMichel ~ Pm or Email

 

I'll be praying for you!

 

Welcome Grimjivey, I can relate. I started coming to this forum about 6 months ago when I realised the old programing I got from religion, mainly the fear of hell and the devil, was fucking up my relationship with god, or my shot at enlightenment--however you want to put it.

It's like a wall I kept running into, or a leash that would only let me go so far.

Now I'm trying to figure out what it is, where it came from, what it was originally supposed to be.

So far I'm pretty sure skeptics and christains have both got it wrong.

Skeptics act like christianity's a hole they might fall into if they look over the edge.
Christians act like it's a tree they might get shaken out of if they look down at it's roots.

Maybe they're both right.

 

when people say this, what is the likely hood of them really including a personal prayer at the end of the day, i ask?

 

Just politely ryupower ~ How about he be given the freedom to find the truth that sets him free?
By "praying for him", Might you possibly be infringing upon his rights to seek and find in the way that suits him, rather than the way that suits you?
I know for myself that when christians say they'll pray for me, I ask that they do no such thing because their "god" is an evil god ~ if the "god" that JC said to pray to is the same one in the OT, keep him away from me please!

 

Yeah, The God from the Bible does not seem to be benevolent at all. This is probably my current biggest problem with Christianity. I have a hard time believing that a God who is perfect and can do anything and everything, would create us as imperfect people, then burn us for eternity for being imperfect.

How could God allow hell to exist? Believe me. I think a lot about hell, and I can imagine nothing even close to as torturous as that. Why would a God of love do that to his children? I would argue that even the most heartless and cruel of villans (Hitler, Stallin etc.) do not deserve an eternity of tourture.

I definatly am not sure of myself at this point. The world is much more complicated when you don't have a religon to direct your thoughts and actions. Every dicision must be made on my own, and as a result I make mistakes.

ryupower, go ahead and pray if you feel moved to do so. Like I said, I'm not to sure of myself at this point. Maybe I am making a mistake I'll regret for eternity, I don't think so though.

to each his/her own...

 

Hey, as soon as you realize that the christian god isn't real, hell becomes unreal as well. Hell is just a tool for keeping you in line, what kind of creator of the universe would send his creations to eternal, unending torture. Seriously, you want to escape from the fear of hell? Simply ponder that idea for a while. If you created everything, and then made people, whom you love like children, would you send them to hell for things like "they didn't believe in you"? Would you send the majority of the human race (not only in the present, but throughout history) to eternal torture because they didn't have the right cultural mythology? Even as a faulted human, I find it impossible to imagine myself doing that to anyone. Think how much more love and compassion and mercy the Creator must have than lowly me or you. That some people actually believe God damns us to hell blows my mind.

I find heaven and hell to be states of mind, not places in an afterlife where we spend eternity. Hell is the ego mind, selfish, small minded, angry, and scared. Heaven is the enlightened mind. After death, no one knows what happens, just because lots of people believe a given thing doesn't make it the actual truth. I say, life, not death, is the time for living. Find heaven in the Now, so your life will be well lived.

 

unfortunately belief isnt as simple as that... the brain doesnt WANT to change its belief, and the deeper the nature of the belief, the less likely it is to be swayed by even logic.

no belief goes deeper than conservation of self. for humans with ego, this means the process pf afterlife

 

Wow man... Your 22 years old?

I'm 30 and just now reaching that point in my personal beliefs. Either your ahead or I'm behind. Just Kidding, seriously the above pretty much sums it up for me currently.
I think that your beliefs should always be open to change, I hope I always have room to listen to logical arguements from other veiwpoints.

StonerBill, I also agree with you...

"unfortunately belief isnt as simple as that... the brain doesnt WANT to change its belief, and the deeper the nature of the belief, the less likely it is to be swayed by even logic."

Yeah, logiclly I don't believe Hell exists, but on a deeper level the underlieing fear of God is much harder to shed.

 

I hear what you're saying, with this illogical, deep seated fear. It's ingrained in you, and will take some time to get past it. Contemplation and introspection are the key, meditation can help, or you can just keep pondering both this god and his hell, as well as your reasons for belief and whether it makes you happy. That is the point of all this, right? Religion is there to make us all happy, to make ourselves better and happier, and thus the world a better place to live. If one's belief set does not acheive that, then we need to change those beliefs. Use the old doctor's question: is it getting better, or is it getting worse? That should be the guidepost.

Keep at it bro, it may take some time, but it'll be worth it, and you will someday remove this fear that is with you.

 

Don't feel bad...I'm 56 years old and am only now reaching a point in my spiritual life where I can let JC back in to be a part of it. A good, hardcore Christian upbringing will do that to a person...the fear part never really goes away...it gets in your genes.

Fundamentalist Christians box themselves in with their absolute rejection of anything but their own beliefs, and when asked questions that they cannot answer, or are confronted with the ill-reasoning behind their beliefs, they pass the blame back by stating or implying that the questioner is under Satan's influence, or go on the fear offensive with blasts about Hell and Damnation. If this doesn't work, they play the Biblical Prophecy card. If there are some prophecies or events in the Bible for which there is demonstrable physical evidence, that's still not proof that the Bible is absolute and that all the other prophecies will occur as described...it's just proof that there is evidence that may support the historical veracity of a Biblical event.

 

Are you saying that you are a christian but you don't believe everything in the Bible, if this is so I think it is very healthy. I'm not a christian and never will be however doesn't christ preach above the power of love above all else, this can't exist with the concept of hell, to me a person believes in love or they believe in hell not both.
people have said to me that they only preach to me because they love me enough to stop me going to hell, a love like that is conditional and nonsense and keeps people away from the divine.
as for 'fear' I know married people who have been told as children that sex is dirty and wrong and now although rationally they know this not to be the case they still have difficulty making love.
fear has been inbreed in you accept christianty or abandon it you will still have to keep challenging the fear.
there are some spiritual execises you can do around this but i won't discuss them here if your interested you can p.m me too.
i hope this thread continues the way it has and doesn't turn into yet another battle ground
S

 

No, it's just residual superstition at this point...kind of like having a black cat run across the street in front of me once in great while.

 

Most non-christians don't believe in prayer at all! So what's the harm?