Jump to content
Goodbye Jesus

Why Do So Few Doubt?


WakingUp

Recommended Posts

:scratch:

I'm feeling sort of down this evening. Why do so few "christians" question this stuff? It took me 40 years to do so but the questions wouldn't stop and here I am. I can't make the scriptures and stories hang together anymore. However, I wonder if there is something wrong with me because there are millions of Christians that have faith and truly believe. There are only a few of us that lost faith and no longer believe. How do we know we are right? What if we have it all wrong? :vent:

My down feeling is probably part of the process but I sure don't like it. I want to KNOW the truth about all this. I prayed for years..."you shall know the truth and the truth will set you free"...for God to help me understand, believe, be a good Christian. I prayed that there was no Hell. I never really got any answers but was it because I lacked faith? I tried as hard as I could to have faith. Am I deceived? I'm just feeling so lonely tonight and wondering how so many smart biblical scholars are satisfied with the Bible answers and have tons of faith...and I don't. So few of us out here in the ex-christian camp. Are we deceived?

 

WakingUp

Link to comment
Share on other sites

there's nothing 'wrong' with you.....I'm sure that a whole lot of chruch going christians are full on doubting ....but whether they have the 'gut's' to speak out about it ..is another story..

 

you are not alone.....besides....how do you really know what all the other people are really thinking?

maybe there is no such thing as a 'true' christian......I know that there is no way I can read someone's mind.

 

Nah...I don't buy it....but of course when it suits the religously inclined ..they will say shit like....they live in a 'secular' society...or alternatively...they have a grip on the 'absolute' truth....moral justice ...and the keys to the universe...

 

up and away......like superman - its all crap - its a show....just take a look at the 'followers'...see what happens in the 'name of gods'....

 

:grin:

 

 

seeya

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The reason so few doubt is because so many are raised in the belief system. Top that off with the fact that it has built-in features (read - fear induction) that keep most people from questioning it even after they get older.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Why do so few "christians" question this stuff?

If they are blissfully happy with there belief they have no reason to question it. When your taught from childhood something is reality then it is real to you. It's not until they self study, or encounter something they feel is wrong will they start to question it. The problem is many rarely do and just listen to there pastors content that they just memorize the few nice passages.

 

However, I wonder if there is something wrong with me because there are millions of Christians that have faith and truly believe.

Have you ever heard of the term 'bandwagon'? It basically means you see everyone else doing something there is a strong need to want to join. We are social creatures and want to be accepted. It's natural to want to conform and feel the need to believe what many others do.

 

There are only a few of us that lost faith and no longer believe. How do we know we are right? What if we have it all wrong? :vent:

Don't you find it strange you don't feel this way about Allah or Islam? You don't say what if we are wrong about islam or fear going to it's hell. Just like you don't worry about Islam then why worry about christianity

 

I want to KNOW the truth about all this.

If you want to KNOW the truth you are going to run into some problems. Humans for years have spent there whole lives desperately trying to find "the truth". Unless you want to spend the rest of your life studying and trying to find the truth (not saying this is wrong) just enjoy life.

 

I prayed that there was no Hell.

Study about hell to lose fear of it. Ask some Rabbi about hell (the originators of this religion) and see what they think. You'll learn that it is just a pagan concept and you have no reason to fear.

 

I never really got any answers but was it because I lacked faith?

Nothing wrong with wanting evidence.

 

I'm just feeling so lonely tonight

This is probably the problem you should be focusing on.

 

how so many smart biblical scholars are satisfied with the Bible answers and have tons of faith...and I don't.

We all just try to find the truth that sits well with us. They have merely done the same

 

So few of us out here in the ex-christian camp. Are we deceived?

There are many few ex-christians but many non-religious christians who would have nothing to do with the bible. They are just happy believing in the chrisitian god they were raised by but not going to church and fornicating. My kinda christians :wicked:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great questions.

 

So few doubt because so few think. The thought of divine vengeance is truly incomprehensible and does not compute. But most people can tolerate it because they never think about it, even though the whole Christian thought system ("atonement mythology," "justification by faith soteriology") is based upon the thought that divine retribution is destructive rather than creative. :eek:

 

The Christian cognitive edifice is bizarre, disgusting, and obscene, but must Christians do not even know what it is. To them, Christianity is just a label: I am white, I am male, I am Christian. They never read the Bible, and they zone out during sermonizing at church. If you ask them to explain the atonement doctrine, they could not put two words together. Their eyes would glaze over if you asked them about the doctrine of "justification." Ex-Christians and non-Christians, by and large, know more about the Christian religion than Christians do. :ugh:

 

And when we turn to PhD trained theologians and Religion professors at universities, almost none of them believe in "the Old Time Religion." They have all, like C.S. Lewis, made the necessary adjustments in the religion in their own minds to remove the nasty bits, like non-corrective hellfire and the Bible's explanation of the meaning of Christ's death. Pure technitions, like scholars of ancient languages and Bible translators may believe it, but that is because their specialized skills distract them from deep thoughts about the implications and possibilities presented by the Christian doctrines. :Hmm:

 

Returning to the average joes: To be anything else but Christian in western society requires being a philosopher instead of a boob sitting in front of the television. How many of your Christian friends are capable of walking away from it? :loser:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To be anything else but Christian in western society requires being a philosopher instead of a boob sitting in front of the television.

 

That's awesome - well said, sirrah! :woohoo:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's as simple as this: More people don't doubt, because they're just too damned lazy and/or stupid.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

alot of people think about religion as more of a social identity than as a set of beliefs. "nominal" christians. they never think about it really because they don't really take it seriously. They call themselves Christian because their parents were Christian or just play along to make their parents happy well into old age.

 

Even though 3 out of 4 Americans identify themselves as "Christians," (more than 250 million), probably only half of those are "evangelical" or "fundamentalist."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

:scratch:

I'm feeling sort of down this evening. Why do so few "christians" question this stuff? It took me 40 years to do so but the questions wouldn't stop and here I am. I can't make the scriptures and stories hang together anymore. However, I wonder if there is something wrong with me because there are millions of Christians that have faith and truly believe.

I used to feel that way also, back in the beginning of deconversion. Over the 23 years I believed, I had periods of great faith, but longer periods of I can't say "nonbelief", more like "don't care." When the end finally came, it was a hard thing to face-the total lack of belief and faith.

There are only a few of us that lost faith and no longer believe. How do we know we are right? What if we have it all wrong? :vent:

I have a friend who was Methodist when I met her. She connected online with some IFB's..and went over the deep end. Then, she met a man who was CoC..and went even further. Her husband was an atheist. They ended up divorced, to her delight. She has since married a CoC. Totally docile and subservient now. She is blinded-not by religion so much, but maintaining a sort of status quo. She has this make believe life now, the faery tale come true. Will she ever doubt? Probably not, but then again, she has changed denoms and beliefs 3 times in three years.

She reads nothing outside of her religion approved material.

 

How do we know we are right? The same way I suppose a xtian knows they are right..with one exception. We have reason and logic on our side.

My down feeling is probably part of the process but I sure don't like it. I want to KNOW the truth about all this. I prayed for years..."you shall know the truth and the truth will set you free"...for God to help me understand, believe, be a good Christian. I prayed that there was no Hell. I never really got any answers but was it because I lacked faith? I tried as hard as I could to have faith. Am I deceived? I'm just feeling so lonely tonight and wondering how so many smart biblical scholars are satisfied with the Bible answers and have tons of faith...and I don't. So few of us out here in the ex-christian camp. Are we deceived?

 

WakingUp

Yes, I would think your down feeling is part of the process..its like a divorce from an abusive spouse. Those on the outside are thinking "this is great! They are breaking away from the abuse!"

But, on the inside, both the deconvertee and those still in, its a hard thing. The deconvert is leaving behind a life, moving on and that change can be both frightening and freeing. Those on the inside have a fear attached also. Its multilayered. If one can lose faith and leave, perhaps they may also. They also see it as an attack of satan or an abandonment of god.

 

No, we are not deceived. We have truly woke up from that dreamworld. It does get better. I found many other interests outside of religion to persue..

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Llwellyn, my cat is very envious of the cat in your avatar!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I want to KNOW the truth about all this.

 

If you want to KNOW the truth you are going to run into some problems. Humans for years have spent there whole lives desperately trying to find "the truth". Unless you want to spend the rest of your life studying and trying to find the truth (not saying this is wrong) just enjoy life.

 

Several years ago, I realized that Truth was the only God it made sense to follow. And this isn't just for the scientist/philosopher types. After all, love, and justice and beauty are aspects of Truth as well. The dirty little secret is pursuing the Truth is to follow the path of things you like and are good at, which makes it even more fulfilling than just enjoyment. And the pursuit of Truth works for atheists as well.

 

I could make a long list of the reasons Christians or members of any revealed religions don't see the light, most of which have been pointed out already, but mostly you're just down because you feel left out, which I think is generally harder for women to deal with.

 

While I think most of us go through what you're going through for a time, you will get through it. You, after all, are the one that's saved, not them, and you did it in spite of them.

 

This inspiring paragraph from The Age of Reason is both profound and uplifting, I think for atheists as well as deists. I hope it helps you through this funk as it has for me on occasion:

 

“It is only in the CREATION that all our ideas and conceptions of a Word of God can unite. The Creation speaketh an universal language.... It is an ever-existing original, which every man can read. It cannot be forged; it cannot be counterfeited; it cannot be lost; it cannot be altered; it cannot be suppressed. It does not depend upon the will of man whether it shall be published or not; it publishes itself from one end of the earth to the other. It preaches to all nations and to all worlds; and this Word of God reveals to man all that is necessary for man to know of God.”

—Thomas Paine

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I feel for ya Wakingup. I still get those feelings. I used to have them so much when i hung around here at the start of my deconversion process. I used to think the reason I was doubting and on this site was because I didnt have anough faith. Then it got to a point where it was like....Fuck......That.......Shit........I coudlnt any longer put myself down. I couldnt any longer even waste my time on a god that would send billions to hell for finite crimes or not loving up to his standards, what have you. That thought process keeps me strong in the deconversion process. Why even think about a god that is SO NOT LOVE. A bucherer. Not worth my time.. MEH.....It helps me in times... Its perfectly normal. I dont know if you were like me, but the fear thing was keeping me in. Fear is a very powerful tool as i was one strongly influenced by it. So you may slowly break free but many times some people dont and get sucked back in because of it. The what ifs.....anyway....this is a good community so just lets your thoughts spill out here in times of need.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest alwayserica

How do we know we are right? What if we have it all wrong?

 

 

Hi, Wakingup!

 

I'm new to this website, but not deconversion. My process started 14 years ago when I was only 18 years old and I was coming from a hard-core Fundamentalist Calvinist family. It was a VERY slow process. But your questions, I think, are right on target. For me, I had to ask those questions, and ask them often. More specifically, I had to find new answers to the old questions, like what happens when we die? Where did we come from? Is there a source of good and evil? Can we ever be EXACTLY right or wrong? And does it matter? Is it answer or the journey that counts? And to whom do we answer at the end of our earthly lives, if anyone? And what then?

 

For me, finding new answers to the old questions (which Christianity had carefully answered for me in great detail and with terrific certainty) was the means by which I was able to let go of the old and step into a spiritual new life. And for me, this new life, which is a journey of seeking and learning, is more invigorating, more satisfying, and more spiritually rewarding than any "spirit of god" I'd ever met before.

 

IMHO, keep asking those questions...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks everyone! I do believe deconversion is a process and your comments help me to accept that. There is no way it's going to be all downhill. I'll keep walking and waking up and I think in time, things won't hurt so much.

 

WakingUp

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The reason so few doubt is because so many are raised in the belief system. Top that off with the fact that it has built-in features (read - fear induction) that keep most people from questioning it even after they get older.

 

So true. Also, few Christians willingly entertain doubts b/c fundamentalists say that doing so is "sinful". They stuff questions down b/c they don't want to be damned, and figure that the doubts are just "satan" trying to deceive them.

 

It really does take courage to deeply and persistently question a system like that. Few people can muster up the strength to do it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think a lot of Christians do doubt, they just don't want to admit it to themselves or anyone else. It takes courage to admit to yourself that you don't believe in things that others do, even when there's no evidence for those things being real. It takes even more courage to be able to admit that to others.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, and it's even harder the more of your life you've invested in it which also leads to more resentment in others like family and friends. Family can get downright mean and then you run into Mabel at the grocery store and she won't speak to you (which is ok by me). You make a lot of them guilty for not doing the same thing.

 

Imagine being a Soutern Baptist, fundamentalist preacher and the seeing the light on day at 60. What do you do? To quote Winston Churchill:

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing has happened."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

alot of people think about religion as more of a social identity than as a set of beliefs. "nominal" christians. they never think about it really because they don't really take it seriously. They call themselves Christian because their parents were Christian or just play along to make their parents happy well into old age.

 

Even though 3 out of 4 Americans identify themselves as "Christians," (more than 250 million), probably only half of those are "evangelical" or "fundamentalist."

 

Probably actually less than one-third. I read about a recent poll that put the number who believe the bible is the "inerrant word of god" at just under 29 percent (but, of course, now I can't find the citation :scratch: )

 

Any how, I agree that a lot of people, including many of those who never set foot in a church unless they're attending a wedding or funeral, call themselves "christian" just because someone way back in their family did -- i.e., a social identifier only.

 

Perhaps WakingUp and many other recent deconverts feel that everyone else has faith because of the culture they come from -- a fundamentalistic church in the biblebelt where one had better profess faith or else face some social isolation (or worse). But, in my environment (solidly liberal, urbanized, upper-class Montgomery County, Maryland, bordering Washington, D.C.) faith rarely comes up as a topic of conversation outside of a church setting, and it's the evangelicals and fundies who are thought of as the weird ones.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.