Honest question from an atheist

Can someone explain what it feels like to be honest with yourself and "know" that god is real? What is it that makes you believe in god?
i dont have the capacity to feel this, i've tried (i do believe in the 'god gene' - that some are biologically suited to have religious faith while others are just not. that its about how your brain works. and i dont mean to offend any of you by saying this, as i know it wont affect your own beliefs)

 

Okay but first, for what it’s worth, I don’t believe in a “God gene”. I believe that all people are born with the ability to see and hear God but also believe that many children, one way or another, are disabused of it and have to relearn it, which can be done.

You want to know what it feels like so here’s an illustration for you.

Have you ever had the feeling that, when you are doing something, that you are not alone and you turn around and really good friend is there and he greets you with a big smile and you’re happy to see him again? That’s the way I’ve always felt about God, as a kid I didn’t use the word God, but as I got older I realized that’s who it is.

Have you ever read:
“Stopping by Woods on Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost?
"The woods are lovely dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep
And miles to go before I sleep."

The beauty that calls to us from everywhere is Gods voice.

Hope this helps.

 

Your sense of awareness is sharpened. Imagine watching leaves on a tree moving to the rhythm of the wind, and then imagine those leaves sparkling with an extra bit of life.

You feel more centered in the moment rather than feeling disconnected from your environment.

It's a lot harder to get angry and to hate. You can sense the silliness of human drama (including your own of course) a lot more sharply, and otherwise poor behavior can be seen as something innocent and childlike.

You also feel clear headed. You know that feeling that you can get when you hold two contradictory beliefs as true in your mind? Well, that type of stress is alleviated. You feel a lot more clear headed and it becomes a lot easier to think and to problem solve.

 

ok when you say "see and hear" god, do you mean like phisically see him in front of you and hear him? or see and hear him in your head when your praying? because the latter sounds like balony?

 

yeah people who belive are no better or worse then people who dont believe. they dont know anything that we dont know. they are not smarter or know any secret that you or i dont konw. they are just normal people who believe in god. thats it. i mean seriously, i feel exactly like you just described after doing acid at a concert!

 

Well if you believe in the Bible, it says no man can see god and yet live, which seems reasonable, so if you’re asking if we can physically see God, then no we can’t. As for seeing and hearing him in your head it’s not exactly that either, it’s more of a knowing that comes from without rather than from within.

 

No one is talking better or worse or smarter or secrets. The question was how does it feel and that's all we've tried to describe. After all feelings are one of the hardest things in the world to describe.

 

hmmm i don't know but it seems that many many folks who believe in a god get angry and hate quite a bit. in fact, their belief in their god and the attending scriptures and dogma is more often than not sited as the reasons for their anger and hate. they hate and are angry b/c this person or that group doesn't adhere to their belief system, blasphemes and offends their god. they go about persecuting nonbelievers and unrepent sinners. they deny gay folks their civil rights, bomb women's health clinic, fly planes into skyscrapers, riot over cartoons and make war on each other in the name of their god.

but it's nice that your spiritual experience with your god doesn't invoke those kinds of reactions in you. unfortunately that's not how it is with a lot of god believers.

 

A lot of what/who you are describing is "White Supremicists" in the last sentence of your first paragraph...most certainly not just your average person
that truly believes in God, and (can) sincerely call themselves a Christian.
I hate evil and feel anger but mostly sad when people perform atrocities to each other...such as what is on the news every night. That being said, I agree with the other poster that said it is more difficult to feel anger and hatred. Please don't judge a whole group of people (God believers) on the actions of people that don't even follow the principles of the bible.
I personally feel an awesome sense of security/peace that nothing but my deep belief in God Jehovah YHWY can give me...

 

First let me preface by saying that I don't know God exists. Anyone who says such should provide me with evidence. I beleive God exists. What makes me believe in God? For me it is ineffeble.

I think you do have the capacity. The two best ways I can describe my experience of God are the numinous and the mysterium tremedum. The sense of awe, fearfulness, mortality, inspiration you feel from the natural world, reading the Bible, receiving Communion. That is from God, we just take it different ways.

While I will not confirm the "god gene", I will say this. Every spiritual experience has a correlation in neural pathways. We experience God in our brains. Whether that means it is evolutionarily advanced over other animals, or whether it is put there by God, we cannot know.

 

I gotta tell you UC, I find this an inspiring and interesting post...I totally understand, and agree - in that I don't disagree with a thing you say.:hat:
Your "god gene" thought...I wonder if you are studying as a Jesuit.

 

If anything I'd be studying as a Basilian (all of the preists at the chapel I attend as Basilians, and they teach some courses at the Catholic College affiliated to the public University I attend).
EDIT: I get what you mean now . Nevermind...

Honestly, I got the "god gene" stuff from some Protestants in one of my classes on modern creationisms. I will not take credit for it. They were all science students in various disciplines (some students were also not Christians in this Christian theology class) and two of them are writing about neurology and religion for research papers.

If Jack Chick is right and Jesuits are currenbtly infiltrating Protestant Churches to input the names of their members into a Vatican super-computer I'd sign up in a heartbeat!

Denying God's existence in our brain is silly. Where people have taken the "god gene" though is that God is just in our brain. Religious experience is just neurons firing. I say it is that, and more...

 

God in our genes for the proof? God is in our genes as I read it for shear longevity, but the longevity gene may be there in the interpreation of our property worked on, and alas we are just fighting against our property decaying by the 'god' gene.

 

If you were in a state of knowledge, belief would by definition no longer be necessary. Other than a belief in the reality of one's own experience.

It's possible I'd say to have experiences of knowledge where there is no doubt - but experiences pass, and one then has to have belief in the experience I suppose.
I don't think there's many people around who are permanantly situated in knowledge of God. I think mostly that those who profess they have no doubts are not being entirely honest with themselves.
Also the same people say often you need faith - but why, if you have no doubts would you need faith?

I don't personally go for a 'god gene' type explanation. Because sometimes people suddenly get 'belief' in middle age even.

 

First of all, don't feel you're deficient in not "knowing" that god is real. You're in good company, including I think Mother (Saint) Teresa. There may or may not be a God gene. I bet there's a God, but I can't honestly say I "know" there is one, and my feelings about it vary from one day to the next. I had a life-changing experience of intense closeness to God, and I've never looked at the world in the same way since. What I can say for sure is that I had an intense life-changing experience. That's all I know and all I think I need to know.

 

For me, it isn't a feeling at all. In my mind, I have come to the conclusion that a higher power exists because there is no other rational explanation for the high degree of complexity that is found in the universe.

Faith is a shortcoming, not something to be proud of.

 

well I dont feel deficient, because im not envious of those who are religious - just curious as to how they can genuinely acknowledge (to themselves) that they have faith in a god.
When it comes to these things, i need to be truthful with myself, as to what i really believe. And i suppose i worded the question wrong - i know that no one "knows" god is real unless they believe he has spoken to them or something. but rather, i am sure that i dont have the capacity to have faith in a god (anything else supernatural.) Now if you rely on the validity of your personal experience in which you believe he came to you - ok, that is a perfect answer to my question as to why you have religious faith

 

Perhaps something is missing here because.. thats the reason? The complexity of it? Why is that you don't just acknowledge "ok, i dont know how everything works, but there is scientific reasoning for it. so maybe its just too complex for my own brain?" - thats kind of how i think

 

i don't know.... i think that you can "know" and not "believe" in something higher.... but its not a mind thing at all... there is a Swamiji at a temple by where I live and he talks about the concept of "shraddha" which is often mistranslated as "faith" ... but he says its more beyond your thinking...it is something you can feel in the pit of your stomach and deep within your heart to be true and real and undefinable.....you can reason and ration all you want whether or not a Divine something or other exists. Personally, I, myself, can have those doubts also... they involve creating words and names and forms-- ritual, belief, dogma... I have many atheist friends with good reasoning...I understand. But at the same time.. there is that feeling deep within us that I personally couldn't explain ... that you just have this feeling that there is a Divine Reality and whatever it is, despite any religious ideology, is true, real, and permeates everything...and even to say those things about it limits it.

I understand this thread as in that it is hard to understand something you cannot feel, touch, see, hear with your senses.... there are a host of reasons to not believe in a God and they all make perfect rational sense.... but you often need those little "beliefs" or faith that there just might be something spiritual worth investigating.... and if you work hard and honestly, and look deep within yourself (doubts and all...and there will be many) ....you may find yourself developing this "shraddha" that I was talking about...this feeling...that there is a great Love within you and it is everywhere. There is no hard, fast, rational belief or reason for it... but its there and you love it in spite of all your rational mind... like loving a flower even though it doesn't need your love and it doesn't benefit either way from it.... you have no need to love a flower...but you do and you want nothing from it. To me, that's what "knowing" God exists means... it means Love beyond all words, descriptions, dogmas, and beliefs....and you can feel it within you...like a silent and strong power....and I think any kind of religious experience (such as worship, singing, Mass, what have you) are ways to manifest that Love. I think anyone on a form such as this can have deep-seated faith in the power of Love... whether or not they understand or wish to acknowledge some sort of spiritual source is to their own personal experience....

...I am no learned spiritual teacher...this is just what I have learned from my teachers and my experience....

 

I don't think the two approaches are mutually exclusive. The complexity of it, more specifically the awesomely orderly complexity of it, is something that has caught the attention of lots of inquiring folks, like Einstein. To say, "Oh well, no big deal. There's probably a naturalistic explanation for it all which scientists may figure out some day," seems a bit "ho hum" in the face of the mindboggling wonder of it all. In the words of astronomer Fred Hoyle, there's just too much about it that looks like a "put up job". On the other hand, to give it a beard and a plan for us seems to me to be going too far on the basis of orderly complexity alone. I believe in Something Big Out There, but I need a lot more than just a complex, orderly universe to connect the dots between the Cosmos and Jesus. I haven't really done that yet, and I recognize that. So does that make me an agnostic or, as I prefer to describe myself, a Christian? I don't see a particular need to resolve that question.