My belief was my whole identity. This god, the gospel, the bible, I loved them dearly, held them so close to my heart. This was my final prayer to god, written in my little journal from the Redemption group:
It is painful to re-read these things. The heart behind them was so desperate. What a pitiful creature I am, I was.
I want to grow closer to you and know you more each day. I want to live like Christ did with your will and purposes in mind. I want to trust you in all things and be anxious for nothing. Please take my shame and remind me that I am your child. Take my anger, my hatred, my confusion, impatience, lust, perversion, guilt, and shame and replace them all with yourself.
I hope my story was not too lengthy. It is beyond the scope and purpose of this site to give a detailed account of each step in my time line. I only wished to lay out my history, in summary. Now that I no longer share their faith, I am often faced with Christians who deny my past existence. If you leave the faith, I am told, then you never truly believed, or understood, or knew god. I wanted to establish that there is, in fact, a line between point "a" and point "b." I did have faith, and as time went on, I came to understand reality differently. I also wanted to touch upon the various ministries that informed my faith so that people can look into my background.
It is not my intention to convince Christians that they are wrong, nor do I believe this site serves to build a strong case against Christianity.
My purpose is for you, my dear friend, to not feel alone in your struggles and doubts.
Let your mind be unbalanced. Let it be flung into a world of endless possibilities! Let it be unhinged, uncaged, and as free as it can be. Follow the white rabbit until you find your place of equilibration.
I want you to understand one thing, and it is that when you kneel and pray, you are only talking to yourself. No matter your perception of who is there. It is you, beloved. There is no one else there who is going to hear you. There is no one else there to answer you. That is why you answer yourself, in your own heart. That is why everyone has a different deity, and each deity tells them their own secrets.
Imagination holds the keys to secret knowledge. And that is your god.
That is our god.
I just read all of your "from a to b" posts in one lump, so I'm going to comment here on all of them. Sorry if that 困るs you.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, I have to say your writing itself is excellent and this is clearly a thoughtful and interesting read. So thank you for that.
I think it's really interesting to see how intense you were in your studies of God, redemption, salvation, the Bible, and morality. I especially think it was brave and smart for you to come to the conclusion that Christian morality is not consistent or necessarily the only way to live. I think it takes a big person to look at something that has governed their whole life in such a big way, question it, and then draw conclusions that aren't necessarily agreeable to such intense beliefs. The screenshots you posted of people's responses to your questions prove thought that there is something flawed with church mentality, as I'll put it (because although there are people who just believe in Christianity, the people who go to church are the ones who are really crazily attached to the bible and these inconsistent beliefs, I find). The fact that some people so unwaveringly believe in the bible that they're willing to explain away it's inconsistencies and loopholes is something that has always bothered me. Reading your entries about that too, I was struck with the thought of really rich politicians, etc, who are super rich and have all these fancy things, yet still say that God and Christianity are things we need to live our lives properly. It's crazy to me how people can look at the Bible and church beliefs and say that those things are the rules that we should (are?) be judged by, and then live so opposite of those rules. I feel like you really picked up on that and were one of the few people with a smart enough brain to look at it and say, "hey, this doesn't make sense." I commend you on being brave and smart enough to not try to explain away the inconsistencies like so many other people do.
I'd like to see an entry from you expanding on the fact that when you pray or worship God, it's really yourself. That is an interesting point that I think people who are struggling with this idea of God/Christianity not being the end-all could benefit from greatly and find strength in. It would also be interesting to see you define "God" and "faith" as you see them now. I personally believe that what people see as a "God" is really just an energy. I don't think that there is a person in the sky at all or one deity that's judging us, (besides if God created us, why would he let us become flawed and sin? It just doesn't really make a ton of sense. Did he want to make a playset, like are we toys? Was he bored?) but instead there is an energy that kind of connects us and guides us and shapes who we are and what we're meant to be. I believe in a soul, but why does mine need to be saved? I think it's learning lessons and has learned lessons before I was even born, but why does there need to be one deity in charge of it? Well, I didn't mean to really just inject my personal beliefs into this comment, but there you go. Something to think about. Plus who really has all the answers anyway? I don't believe that God or Jesus ever spoke to anyone who's alive today, so how can they know what he wants? We're all just people trying to find answers together, and if we're all human, then we all make mistakes, so "people with answers" can too.
(continued in the next comment)
I think that Christianity in America has been fueled by this flawed mentality that we're not allowed to change our beliefs or opinions. You find it all the time in politics. If someone votes one way on one bill, and then opposes their own opinion later, they get so much backlash. What if they learned something along the way that made them change their opinion? What's so wrong with that? I think personal growth is very important and that means changing your opinions and thoughts as you learn more. I think this can be applied to Christians too. If people want to question and change their ideas about faith and God, it's always met with "no, you're wrong, this is the way it has always been and is." But why? Why can't Christians grow and learn more and change their ideas about God as they learn?
DeleteAlso, final thought, I think that some church cultures do hold value for people. For example, my boyfriend identifies as a Christian and goes to church sometimes with his grandparents and everyone sings church songs together at his family gatherings. However, I don't think he really believes in God. I've asked him about it a few times, and he doesn't really believe there is ONE God who is sitting there judging us all. That being said, I've learned from him that maybe there is some value in churches who are more about community and family. They are the ones who can teach us that we have to give back and help other people. They say it's for God and it's God's will and everything, but they are doing nice things for other people, and I have no problem with that. I like churches that put emphasis on doing things out of the kindness of your heart, and although it is in the context of God, they do teach good messages to their members about community and family values. I feel that unitarian universalist churches tend to do this with less context of God (since they kind of accept everything), and I can see the value of teaching people those good lessons.
That might have been a sort of ramble-y comment, but I just wanted to put some stuff out there for you to think about and comment on. It's interesting to see your experiences and what your thoughts are now, so please feel free to reply and agree/disagree with me on anything and everything! (:
Thank you so much for taking the time to read and give a detailed response! I really appreciate it! Sorry for taking so many days to get back to you. I had been busy. C:
Delete"I'd like to see an entry from you expanding on the fact that when you pray or worship God, it's really yourself."
I intend on it. I'd actually like to study what others have written about the imagination and the power of the mind, and write a book about my own experiences. But once you begin thinking about and understanding the concept of "imaginary friends" and WHY religions exist (as a response to death, suffering, and imperfection as men understand it), you begin to understand the idea of god more clearly. I believe imaginary friends are a shared human experience. And that becomes obvious when you realize that gods are simply, and have always been, that; a product of imagination and a need for someone to care for and listen to you. This means that most Americans, whether or not they realize it, have imaginary friends.
But I didn't want to go too into detail on this site. Having your god called an "imaginary friend" is IMMEDIATELY insulting Christians because it is consistently used in a derogatory manner by atheists. I strongly disagree with this use of the term. Atheists are on to something, but they themselves are not fully appreciating and understanding it; they simply use it as an insult. So I wanted to avoid the term.
"I think that Christianity in America has been fueled by this flawed mentality that we're not allowed to change our beliefs or opinions."
Absolutely. I only touched on it briefly, but it has a lot to do with people wanting ANSWERS. Perfect answers, absolute answers. They want to be plugged into something that gives order and meaning to their lives. I think we all crave this. All minds want to make sense of reality. I want answers. I'm just no longer deluded into believing that I HAVE the answers.
But people are dissatisfied if you cannot offer them answers that are more meaningful to them than the ones they already have. If you tell them, "there isn't a god. We are the product of the universe," they do not perceptually understand how that could be possible. It scares them. What if there is no life after death? What if I cease to be as I know me, and become dirt, or a tree, or a bird, or a bee? HORRIFYING to a lot of people! I understand that, so I do my best to respect them where they're at while challenging them to ask more questions. C:
"Also, final thought, I think that some church cultures do hold value for people."
Oh yes! Definitely, I know this for sure. But as someone who has spent so much time as a Christian, I make distinctions in my mind between different church cultures and groups. And, more important than what I think, Christians themselves who are fundamentalists or orthodox (which is more who I was writing about when I referred to Christians; the bible-believing sort) will distinguish themselves from Unitarians. They consider it more of a humanist Christian cult. They consider them separate.
But there is no denying that Christians interpret and understand Christianity differently, depending on how they have been raised and what they know at any given time.
Thanks for inviting me.
ReplyDeleteI think I've gone down a similar path as you. It's not unusual that humans look for a higher power. After all, we've been doing it for tens of thousands of years. We're curious about what happened before we got here and what happens after we go.
ReplyDeleteI think at it's best religion makes us better than what we would otherwise be. At it's worse, of course, horrible things can happen.