What do you get from it?

[Vision25]

I think it may be beneficial if we approach the question from another direction.

What do believers and atheists get from their position?

How do you gain, is this connected to your upbringing, what about your social network etc?

[redsturgeon]

I am not a believer. I can't think of anything that I get from this, except perhaps freedom from having to attend a church or perform certain rituals that I see no reason for.

My parents were not religious and I have few/no religious friends.

John

[Clariman]

Like John, I am not a believer and neither were my parents (although both brought up Christian). My difference from John is that I have many Christian friends and some Christian family.

What do I get out of being a non-believer? To be honest I think life is simpler without the notion of a God. I could elaborate but I'll let others talk. I was brought up to be questioning and to look for evidence, so it is a fundamental part of who I am.

[Sussexlad]

My family were quite religious with the exception of my dad, although I sensed he may have had a faith but it didn't revolve around the church. I went to Sunday school and the early service on a Sunday and attended the attached youth groups like Lifeboys and the BB. However, I was never tempted to buy into the faith part and on reflection, I think the bottom line was the message, 'Seek and ye shall find.' Rather than attracting me to believe, my innate reaction was always, ' Well that's b****y obvious!' and I was always going to need some hard evidence that there was some over-arching power for good before I committed myself to the cause and that has simply never been forthcoming. I simply think that you have see the world through extremely rose-tinted spectacles to think that could possibly be the case and put simplistically, that boils down to thanking God for the good bits but conveniently overlooking the bad.

[beeswax]

When I was a Christian I got very little out of being one. I didn't obey most of their rules anyway and the ones I did know were miserable and showed little charity either. I suspect they felt as though they were missing out on worldly pursuits! I'm a Deist and so do believe in a Creator/God who from all the evidence we humans have is that he doesn't involve himself in the world and nobody has seen this God and so its all based on faith.

I think today we are privileged where we in Secular Countries are not compelled to believe in any religion when at one time you could be killed or ostracised for not doing so..The power of the church was unbelievable and it has caused so much misery and death that Jesus at least would be appalled at what its done in his name. I'm surprised that Theocracies have lasted so long?

My former Christian friends used to send us Christmas Cards but that only lasted as long as went along with them and went to their place of worship. I'm sorry to say that I have no time for any organised religion and feel much better than when I did...I didn't think I would ever say this but the world would be a far better and peaceful world without them.

Fortunately I was never indoctrinated into religion as a child like most are and why they can't let it go..My wife is still one only because she was...

[RowdyReptile]

I don't make my associations, either with individuals or groups, hoping I might "get" something. There could be some nice fallout, but that should not be the goal when associating with ..."something".

Then again, I suppose you "get" what you put into that particular something.

I am a big American college football fan, so I got to talk with the Head Coach of BYU one on one recently. He married someone from our local church. That was kind of cool.

RR

[redsturgeon]

When I was a Christian I got very little out of being one. I didn't obey most of their rules anyway and the ones I did know were miserable and showed little charity either. I suspect they felt as though they were missing out on worldly pursuits! I'm a Deist and so do believe in a Creator/God who from all the evidence we humans have is that he doesn't involve himself in the world and nobody has seen this God and so its all based on faith.

You have given a pretty full account of why you have moved away from organised religions but I'd be interested to know why you have kept your belief in a god at all rather than going all the way towards atheism or at least agnosticism?

What evidence do you have for the existence of a creator god?

John

[beeswax]

When I was a Christian I got very little out of being one. I didn't obey most of their rules anyway and the ones I did know were miserable and showed little charity either. I suspect they felt as though they were missing out on worldly pursuits! I'm a Deist and so do believe in a Creator/God who from all the evidence we humans have is that he doesn't involve himself in the world and nobody has seen this God and so its all based on faith.

You have given a pretty full account of why you have moved away from organised religions but I'd be interested to know why you have kept your belief in a god at all rather than going all the way towards atheism or at least agnosticism?

What evidence do you have for the existence of a creator god?

John

That's a fair question John...in fact very fair as most people that give up their faith do become atheists or at least agnostic and so why me with Deism? Three reasons really. One is that although I have no evidence for God directly, I have had some unusual experiences that have little or no explanation and believe there is some kind of spiritual dimension to the universe that can be tapped into..Especially one remarkable event that I don't want to discuss here....YET? maybe at some time?

Second, its highly possible that I am clinging to my belief in God because of 50 years within the Christian believing faith. Ie like someone on a life raft that tries to save himself from drowning so to speak. But as lots of believers do cling to that in the hope of heaven after death, that's never been my concern because I don't believe in hell or in any bogie man Satan then maybe Heaven doesn't exist either? Ignorant believers thought that was a place just above the clouds in the past and where God resided. I wonder where they think God and heaven is now?

Thirdly, I believe nothing comes from nothing and that the universe was the result of creative action and thought by a sentient being and of course we have no evidence of that, we have the universe and us to prove we are real....At least I think we are?

So its quite easy for me to be a Deist and especially my own experiences as mentioned in the first paragraph.

I would agree that when any evidence comes to light that I am wrong, I will change my mind, which most religious people will never do not because they think these things out as I try to do BUT purely because its in their holy text and God was the author and so cannot be disbelieved or changed in any way whatever. That is up to them of course. But its really quite easy to see what these holy texts say and thus measure what we NOW know against the claims made. Creation and Evolution which is so fundamental to these doctrines and beliefs is the easy bits to disprove. Any reasonably thinking person should be able to do the same but won't but then I didn't did I! But maybe as I said, I was never really one of them...not really! I'm too rebellious by nature!

Mike

[beeswax]

Just to add that I do struggle with the idea that God has intervened in the world when he or it wants too but the question then becomes WHY in a 'personal' way when people make these claims as I do and indeed many have over the centuries? Are some us so special or something? God I hope not!

God didn't intervene in the Holocaust or Tsunamies or when 50 kids are slaughtered by a lone gunman and so WHY at any other time and not then? Then why do billions of believers pray every single day to their God and yet get no answers. What exactly are they praying for? The Queen gets over the flu? God is Great? Who knows but it seems an awful waste of time! Popes and Priests do it the whole time too and wonder what they think when they do that and don't get any answer?

So Deism is a good safe bet! Sorry but I couldn't resist the smily!

[redsturgeon]

I can certainly understand Deists more easily that Theists that's for sure. I am always fascinated however by the argument for a creator being that "nothing comes from nothing". I assume you mean nothing except your creator being?

John

[beeswax]

I can certainly understand Deists more easily that Theists that's for sure. I am always fascinated however by the argument for a creator being that "nothing comes from nothing". I assume you mean nothing except your creator being?

John

Its a difficult one that's for sure but who created the Creator (infinite regression) will never be answered ever imo and and we are the only evidence we have that someone or something created us 13bn years ago. I can only think that THE Creator has always existed and that ALL things flow from that source. However us humans can't grasp that concept very easily, if at all. I say IF there was 'nothing' to start with ie zilch, then the universe wouldn't exist and neither would we...I don't think its a question of IF but what or whom?

Hitchens always respected Deists and had no time for organised religion but he argued quite rightly that even Deists have all their work ahead of them.

[Clariman]

If God can exist without something that created Him/Her/It then surely you can accept the notion that something in the universe could have existed without a creator. It is the same thing.

[redsturgeon]

If God can exist without something that created Him/Her/It then surely you can accept the notion that something in the universe could have existed without a creator. It is the same thing.

You would think so wouldn't you but I never failed to be surprised by those who do not see the logical inconsistency inherent here.

John

[beeswax]

If God can exist without something that created Him/Her/It then surely you can accept the notion that something in the universe could have existed without a creator. It is the same thing.

Sorry, no I can't grasp that notion at all. The big bang could not have happened without some 'external' influence which assumes something or someone was present one second before that event. The fact that I don't know who or what or when IF ever the Creator was 'created' doesn't mean that I can assume other events happened without cause. Ie one question doesn't lead to any specific conclusion other than what we do know and that is the universe exists as we do..The question may always remain, how and why?

[beeswax]

If God can exist without something that created Him/Her/It then surely you can accept the notion that something in the universe could have existed without a creator. It is the same thing.

You would think so wouldn't you but I never failed to be surprised by those who do not see the logical inconsistency inherent here.

John

its only inconsistent because humans can't grasp the Creator may always have existed,in fact that is the ONLY explanation and so actually very consistent imo. Most people can't grasp any spiritual dimension in the universe that would absolutely PROVE the existence of a sentient being. Who created the Creator is about the most interesting question of all but ends the discussion doesn't it?

[jackdaww]

is it so difficult to accept that we humanoids have a problem with the concepts of matter and time either being in existence for ever , or emerging from nothing?

maybe we just dont have the intellect , any more than a bug in the soil could conceive of pythagorus .

its possible we would understand eventually if we could survive long enough - very unlikely IMHO.

.

[Clariman]

its only inconsistent because humans can't grasp the Creator may always have existed,in fact that is the ONLY explanation and so actually very consistent imo. Most people can't grasp any spiritual dimension in the universe that would absolutely PROVE the existence of a sentient being. Who created the Creator is about the most interesting question of all but ends the discussion doesn't it?

It's only inconsistent because you can't grasp the Universe may have always existed ....