This I Believe

There's been a lot of threads lately about religion and belief. I've noticed that many people have been questioning other people's faith. I wanted to start a thread about telling what we believe in, rather than debating what others believe.

There's a series on NPR called "This I Believe", which takes people from all walks of life, some famous, some not, and lets them state what moves them, what dreams they aspire to, what their core faith is. Guess I'll start...

I consider myself a Christian, in that I believe in a higher power, and that Jesus of Nazareth was one of this power's many manifestations among us. I believe that we should love others as we would want to be loved. I call this higher power God, and I believe that many other people call this power by many other names. I believe no one person has the corner on Truth, and that one of our purposes in life is to constantly seek Truth, to understand that which we cannot fully comprehend. I believe I have gifts which I must use, and flaws which I must overcome.

My beliefs are pretty simple. They also touch every aspect of my life. I'm interested to know what others believe in.

I believe in coyotes and time as an abstract.

I believe in peyote and time as a construct.

I also believe that everything will be pretty cool in the end.

I am an atheist and have made some negative comments about religion on the forums, but I have studied religion a lot and come from a very religious background so I think I have a balanced view.

I believe that there is no god in the Christian sense.
I try to live my life along the same lines as Jesus (as I can't think of a better example that has ever been set), but I don't believe that Jesus was a God, or that he even existed in the sense of being the person/diety that most people believe him to have been.

I believe that many parts have been added to the Bible over the years, so some of the messages that people believe are from God, are in fact from the minds of some pretty twisted old (male), preists from several different previous civilisations. Therefore I believe that one necessarily has to ignore big bits of it and try to figure out the "real" message as opposed to just taking everything literaly.

For instance IMO the biggest message Jesus had, and the one he repeated almost the most, was "I am not God." (or words to that effect), yet this is the opposite of what most Jesus followers believe today.

I believe that the incongruous extra bits, where he says that he *is* God, and performs "Miracles" (come on!, miracles?) were added later as they stick out like the proverbial sore thumbs in any analysis of the text.

To me, the entire point of what Jesus stands for was that anyone can be that way or do what he did, and his "message" is that we should all at least try once in a while (but maybe stop short of the crucifixion part).

The idea that Jesus is a God always seemed blasphemous to me in that it twists the message the other way entirely. If Jesus is a God, then we are all "not worthy" and none of us can ever achieve the same state as him (except perhaps through divine grace and all that guilt crapola from the Old Testament). This is just nutty and does not follow from the texts IMO. If you read closely you see over and over again references to how he wants his followers to basicaly "do as he does" not kiss his feet and stare off into space.

But then if you *really* solidly believe that a few fish can feed a few thousand people, you have a serious reality detection problem already.

Well since you asked....

I have no idea whether there is or is not a God/Goddess/Gods, I've seen no "proof" that I find convincing. That being said, I have no proof either that no sort of higher being exists in some or fashion. As such the case I guess I fall most into the category of an agnostic, but one with strong atheistic leanings.

I believe religion is purely a personal matter of faith. You either choose to believe, choose to give the benefit of the doubt to the existence of a God (to fill in the gap of proof I just mentioned), or you don't.

I believe that what other people believe regarding the existence of a God is totally irrelevent to me, as long they don't force me to change my beliefs. The fact that other people do believe in God, doesn't bother/offened me in the slightest.

I feel no need to proselytize or otherwise try to convert others to my non-belief in God. In fact, I think its just as obonxious a practice for my fellow non-believers to feel its their duty to beat believers over the head until they "see the light of reason" as it is for street preachers and the like trying to convince me that I'm wrong, and doomed to hellfire unless I accept their faith.

I think religion, like most other things, can be a positive or negative thing in people's individual life and society in general. And someone's negative experiences with religion doesn't negate someone elses positive experiences and vice versa.

I think there are useful bits of philosophy and codes or ethics and behavior that can be borrowed from lots of different beliefs. Also having a long interest in comparative mythology and works by people like Joseph Campbell, I find the common stories and ideals that you find among mythologies of different cultures very interesting.


I also like pie, apple mainly, never cherry. Cherry pie is for unclean heathens!

God is dead.

~Ulrika~

No I'm not.

There is another interpretation on the Christian mythos that takes the angle that he said that he, as are all humans, part of the personification of the Deity. Rather "eastern" in that sense, which dovetails into the bit you mention below.

Interesting you bring up agnostic. I always thought it is a better term than atheist. Atheist is one who doesn't have faith in God, rejects the notion of God, and says there is no God with authority. But they can't be sure, so it's kind of a faith to be atheist.

Agnostics on the other hand are honest in the sense they admit there is no way to disprove God.

I think most who claim to be atheist are really agnostic. As Dianne said.. "I believe that there is no god in the Christian sense. " after claiming to be atheist. She is indeed leaving open the possibility of a god of some sort.

It seems terms get in our way too often.

As for me, I believe we are all divine since we were all created by a divine being. Even Jesus says we are gods, who am I to argue with the MAN.

The off topic forum is dead. You've all killed it.

This statement would cause one to assume that God had lived. Isn't that a detractor for an Atheist?

Did not mean to leave that open to question at all. I am not agnostic and don't believe in God.

"God in the Christian sense" was meant to be more like "God in the sense of a higher intelligent being that loves us and we are his children and he actually cares about us." To me that is absolute nonsense. There is no benevolent "father" or alien race that is keeping us like sheep for some higher purpose IMO.

I would say that it's blindingly obvious that there are likely "higher" creatures than us in the cosmos, who might in fact appear "godlike" if we met them, but it is extremely unlikely that these folks would care about us in any way or be connected to us.

If I have a concept of God at all I would say that the entire Universe can be visualised as a single entity. (Notice that I just said "visualised," this may or may not have any truth to it)

Looked at that way we are "all god" or all "part of god," but as deep as many people make this little truism sound, its really just a word substitution for "universe."

I consider myself an individualist and humanist. I believe that life is simple. After food, shelter, and procreation, abolutely everything else is voluntary. Every human construct, civilization, philosophy, culture, activity, amounts to little more than all of us playing make believe by our own arbitrary made-up rules... a way of entertaining ourselves during our brief time between the forceps and the stones.

I believe that anyone who self-appointedly tries to dictate what I should think, do, or believe has an ego problem and an exaggerated sense of self-importance.

I believe the golden rule is the only one anyone truly needs, and that it's such blatantly obvious common sense that anyone who thinks it took a supreme being to come up with it must have a terrible hatred of humanity to so underestimate its intelligence. I believe this is why so many fundamentalists use the word "humanist" as an insult. There is a word for people who oppose humanism. That word is "inhumane." I believe that the golden rule dictates that it is every person's sole moral imperative to become as self-reliant as possible and not be dependant on others for a sense of purpose or self-worth. Only then can we find common ground not based on selfish manipulation.

I believe that science and the incredible complexity and immensity of the universe can inspire more awe, humility, and wonder than all the religious texts that have ever been written.

I believe that religion will never answer a single question about the meaning of life or our purpose, and to illustrate it I like to imagine the following scenario... Two people have been chosen to summarize the progress, discoveries, and answers provided in the last two thousand years of history - one person to speak on behalf of science and the other on behalf of religion. The science person speaks first and the presentation lasts several years and still doesn't cover all that science has learned. Finally the person speaking on behalf of religion is asked to summarize how religion has advanced and what new discoveries it has made and answers it has provided over the past two millenia. He walks up to the podium and says, "Did I tell you the one about Jesus?"

I believe that life should be a quest for knowledge, truth, understanding, and individual self-expression.

I believe that conformity is the enemy of creativity.

I believe that nothing is sacred and that labelling something as such is only a means to discourage critical thinking. I believe that every human notion is open to equal scrutiny. I also believe that the socially conditioned taboo against critical dialogue about religion is an afront to human growth and progress.

I believe the only way to truly appreciate how meaningful, beautiful, and valuable life is is to accept that we only get one, and that it's brief.

The funny thing, Dianne, is we are very close and very far in our beliefs. I say very close because your understanding of the nature of God is very similar to mine, in that I believe God is everything. When I see a rock or a tree or even my worst enemy, I see God. Of course, this is a limited view, as we are limited in what we can see.

We already know there are things we can't see that has great power. A few examples would be electricity running through an exposed wire, microwaves cooking our food, radio and tv waves flying through the air, etc. Also our eyes are limited to a certain range of the light spectrum.

The difference we have is I believe there is conscience to God in the spiritual sense, and my evidence is "I think", we all are conscience, we are more than a bunch of living cells. This is my opinion based on the evidence I see and feel with my limited senses.

Either way, I do believe the God I imagine will not abandon those consciences who want to be on the main grid(with God).

Thanks for the civil discussion

I believe you should treat everybody the way you would want to be treated. If everybody did that every day, don't you think this world would be a better place?

Not if the masochists played along too?

I believe people need to get outside more.

Shoot, i can't play too? *pouts*

angel

Not only that, I'm not even interested in trying one way or the other. In theory I'll know soon enough or I'll not have a consciousness to worry about it. The God stuff will sort itself out, in the mean time I've got bills to pay!

You get to suffer about not getting to play, so it works out.

Never let that stand in the way of a pithy cliche.

I believe that there is a God but don't like people saying how to worship and that evolution is "Intelligent Design"

Funnily enough the Golden Rule even works for masochists.

If anyone is interested on what might happen if aliens came to earth and decided to enforce this rule, read "Rule Golden" by Damon Knight. A classic sic-fi novel(ette?) based on this deceptively simple idea.

yes! all of us deserve to be treated with respect. I wish religions didn't exclude so many people and advocate so much hate.

here's what I believe, we are immortal souls who have chosen temporary amnesia so we can experience finite love as it is more precious, since it will end, than infinite love. Love while you can and love strongly!

I have my personal spiritual beliefs. but I learned this nifty trick of not trying to either a)Impose them on other people. Or b)Tell other people they were wrong for having different beliefs to mine.

One of my favourite patimes on threads like these is seing just how simillar the religious and the athiest people are. Perfect faith on both sides. Beautiful.