I Really Wish It Was True.

[SillyString]

 

The life we have right now is special and it's all we know we're getting. Treating it as something to just wipe our feet on as we get ready to journey forth into something infinitely more wonderous is a terrible waste and profoundly unhealthy. Atheism has freed me to appreciate what I have for what it is.

 

I miss Christianity like an ingrown toenail.

 

 

 

This.

 

 

Well said man!

 

 

 

[dichotomy]

Personally, I think it's really healthy that you are reconsidering you and your life on a regular basis. It helps prevent you from making the same mistakes repeatedly, and I think it ultimately leads to a happier life, much like weeding a garden helps the good plants grow better.

 

 

Ah so that's what I'm doing! those pesky weeds have a habit of popping up again when you'd thought you'd got rid of them

[chosendarkness]

It is not the promise of eternal life that makes life important. That only cheapens it because then it is not something rare and precious but something with no ending, something ordinary.

That's pretty profound. I would even go so far as to say, without death there is no life.

 

As far as wishing Christianity were true, I don't because there's no point wishing for something that will never happen. Plus I don't get excited about the idea of worshiping a blood thirsty deity for all eternity.

[dichotomy]

It is not the promise of eternal life that makes life important. That only cheapens it because then it is not something rare and precious but something with no ending, something ordinary.

That's pretty profound. I would even go so far as to say, without death there is no life.

 

Yes I think that is a very good way of looking at it.

[R. S. Martin]

I was promised that there was a reason for all my suffering in this life and that this life had some divine importance. That is what I want the most, I want this life to be important but now I know it isn't.

 

Think about this, lostman. Why would the existence of some form of the Christian god make your life important? Is your importance only measured against a divine life or might there not be something even more profound that makes your life important?

 

It is not the promise of eternal life that makes life important. That only cheapens it because then it is not something rare and precious but something with no ending, something ordinary. What makes life important is the fact that it is finite. Have you ever thought about the bible verses that speak of heaven being paved with gold. If you really think about that what it is saying is that gold is so plentiful in heaven that it becomes nothing more than pavement. We value gold because of its rarity. Life in Christianity is like the gold used as pavement in heaven but life outside of Christianity is like gold here on earth - rare and precious.

 

I love that--gold so plentiful it's used as pavement! I'm sure the Christians would have something to say about that, such as it being a metaphor for a wonderful existence or evidence of the most excellent existence possible. But the descriptions of heaven as they appear in Rev. doesn't do it for me, so there! It sounds like a seriously hot summer day in the desert with no green vegetation to cool things off--all gold and other heat-related colour ideation.

 

And given what I know about horses' hooves getting a grip on the shiny polished metal pavement--it doesn't work that way. Heaven with its gold-paved streets is going to be one big calamity. They better have a first-rate emergency ward. Then again, with the Cosmic Miracle Worker in Residence, maybe crushed skulls and broken bones will be healed at a touch and without brain damage or spinal cord injury. But will he be everywhere available at the same time?...Oops, not even the fundamentalist literalists take Rev. this literally.

 

Which leaves us with the intolerable unanswerability of the cosmic questions that Christianity says MUST be answered. I chose what to me appeared the most important of these questions and followed them through to the bitter end. I concluded that if I can't find answers after all this time there probably aren't any and also that there is demonstrably no God.

 

(In the name of honesty, I better add that I insisted on logical consistency in answers and conclusions, i.e. in what I accepted as truth. This had to be consistent with empirical reality because, according to the general understanding of the biblical text, empirical reality was the proof of theological doctrine.)

 

I was somewhat shocked to realize that my conclusions made me atheist. But it was very liberating. Truth made me free--Jesus was right in that one thing at least: Truth does make free.

 

And I had these exC forums. On these forums I found people whom I highly respected, and that proved to me that "atheist" does not equal "evil person." The only thing I've missed from religion was community and music. Admittedly, that's a lot. So I continued going to church for a bit for those items, but soon it felt so empty that I simply stopped.

 

There are communities of common interest outside religion and the same also applies for music. Also, there is no crime in listening to recorded church music if that is one's passion. Classical church music truly is lovely because it was perfected to a high art by the medieval Cathedrals in Europe and elsewhere.

 

As for missing "God." I think "God" is simply an emotional feeling that is natural to the human psyche. It is another part of the human being. In my opinion, it is quite okay to continue having conversations in one's head, one part of one's head talking with another part of one's head. It allows one to work through one's thoughts and problems and feelings. In my opinion, other than ritual, that is what prayer is.

 

One purpose of ritual, so far as I understand it, is to help the human psyche mark time--whether in the short term on a daily basis such as mealtime (humans could just nibble all day like animals on pasture instead of setting aside special eating times each day) or over the long term of a human's or community's lifetime with birthdays and other landmark celebrations annually or every so many years. Often, deep meaning is attached to ritual. Prayer is used as ritual in some forms of Christianity.

 

Lostman, and others, if you are like me, finding what causes these feelings may help you find relief and resolution. There are many studies on the psychology of religion, from a variety of religions but I got the impression that this is especially a Buddhist domain though the Christians and Western academia in general have done much work in the field, too. Literature should be easily available on topics like the psychology of prayer, spirituality, etc.

[Vigile]

It is not the promise of eternal life that makes life important. That only cheapens it because then it is not something rare and precious but something with no ending, something ordinary.

That's pretty profound. I would even go so far as to say, without death there is no life.

 

Yes I think that is a very good way of looking at it.

 

 

I don't get it.

[DesertBob]

It is not the promise of eternal life that makes life important. That only cheapens it because then it is not something rare and precious but something with no ending, something ordinary.

That's pretty profound. I would even go so far as to say, without death there is no life.

 

Yes I think that is a very good way of looking at it.

 

 

I don't get it.

I think what he's saying is that if life is plentiful, it's cheap. If it extends into eternity, then you can be rather sanguine about all the injustice and stuff you don't understand, because God will sort it all out for you in the hereafter.

 

Whereas, if This Is All There Is, then it's mighty darned important and you'll take good care of it and make good use of it.

 

I don't think it's always that simple, but it's not untrue on the face of it.

 

I think we see this principle in a general way when people age. As we get older, death becomes more and more real, and even Christians will start to become rather ruthless about the things that they feel must be done in this life and can't be deferred to the hereafter. Your priorities shift.

 

If you accept that you are truly a mortal being, I think you have more respect for life and value it more, even if you happen to be young yet. In general it's not a case of "eat drink and be merry, for tommorow we die". That is how unbelief was always portrayed to me when I was a Christian -- without hope of a hereafter everyone loses hope and gets falling down drunk all the time, indulges in every sort of debauchery, etc.

[chosendarkness]

It is not the promise of eternal life that makes life important. That only cheapens it because then it is not something rare and precious but something with no ending, something ordinary.

That's pretty profound. I would even go so far as to say, without death there is no life.

 

Yes I think that is a very good way of looking at it.

 

 

I don't get it.

I think what he's saying is that if life is plentiful, it's cheap. If it extends into eternity, then you can be rather sanguine about all the injustice and stuff you don't understand, because God will sort it all out for you in the hereafter.

 

Exactly. Why care about the earth if God is just going to burn it with fire? Why care about this life so much when such a better one awaits later? Save the souls of the suffering and they'll be happy after they die.

 

To me this kind of thinking is based on the fear of life. They talk about fearing death, but I think they really fear life. They don't want to take any responsibility. Let God sort it all out. It really is demeaning and is a sad way to live. I know because I used to think that way and it caused me to miss out on so much of life.

[OnceConvinced]

Yep, always wished it was true. Still wish it was true. I wasted over 30 years of my life on it. Not a nice feeling. It would be great to believe that there is a loving God interested in me and he has everything under control, it would be great if I could lay all my burdens upon him and that one day I'll go to Heaven, rather than rot in a grave. I'd also love there to be wardrobes that lead to mysterious worlds and that somewhere in the world there is an amazing chocolate factory where amazing candies are being made and it's run by Oompa Loompas, but nope. Just can't believe that either. Yep, there is a sense of loss, but then again it was all just fantasy. You can't go back to believe in fantasy.