Did you make the choice to be / not be religious?

[the0logical]

Just been reading another thread on here about religion and I always think the theological discussions on here are fascinating.

I'll start - I identify as an athiest, I was brought up in a non-religious family but attended heavily Catholic schools. I didn't like some of the ideologies that became mixed into the religious elements of my schooling (e.g. through correlation or randomness, the most "devout" children were always the most prejudiced) and this pushed me away from entering into any faith. I studied Philosophy & Religion at a higher level and then learned about my perception of fallacies in most major religions, which I couldn't seem to logically support especially when I didn't have any feelings of faith. I've never felt the capacity to let myself be succumbed by a religion, though I have tried - I just don't believe.

So, guess I'm just curious to know some reasons why people are / aren't religious and how much of a "choice" it is. Not a reporter before anyone asks, just a nerd who loves anecdotes especially in a religious debate!

YABU - I made an active choice to become religious, or to become non-religious
YANBU - I didn't make any choice, I have always believed / never believed
(hoping that makes sense!)

My mum became a Pentecostal Christian in my teens. I went to church, wanted to believe, wanted to have faith very much. Just didn't. I just can't. It's not there.

Non believer here, logical choice as it’s all fairy stories that just does not make any sense.

What fascinates me is the way that millions and millions believe in it all. The psychology around this is so so interesting.

I'm a Christian. I didn't choose or not choose. I had a bit of a religious experience when I was around 14 and suddenly knew, with all certainty, that God was real. It's difficult to put into words.

Winter of discontent - I guess it depends what you think about China?

I was brought up "culturally Christian" in thst we celebrated high days and holidays but unless someone hatched/matched/were despatched we didn't go to church. I went to a church school but all the schools in my home district were church schools, there was no choice.

My Gran only used to take communion because she liked the wine and wafer! Honestly, we were a lost cause as a family.

In my teens I considered getting confirmed but a thought pervaded that God might not exist. I decided I was agnostic in my 20s and in my 30s became a Humanist. I would now describe myself as atheist because I'm too selfish to do good without God.

All this came about because I read a lot including the Bible and Richard Dawkins and Yasmin Mohammed. I just couldn't tie up.scientific fact with religious doctrine. It's irrefutable, for example, that evolution exists, because genetics and DNA exist. So God didn't create life, it's organic and much more complicated.

My husband is an atheist and my daughter doesn't believe in God but is still exploring supernatural phenomena. She describes herself as agnostic. I've never indoctrinated her with my view.

@ArtemisiaGentle

It's irrefutable, for example, that evolution exists, because genetics and DNA exist. So God didn't create life, it's organic and much more complicated.

I completely believe this. Evolutionary theory is the best theory we have to explain everything. It’s not at odds with RC or Judaism (to my knowledge).

I'm a cultural Christian.
I was confirmed when at school, more or less everyone was.

If I think hard I don't believe, but I get a lot of 'spiritual' comfort from the old hymns, carol services etc. I have at times sat in our local Abbey for reflection. 'Secular' marriages and funerals seem to be missing something.

So maybe it is comfort in the familiar that I like rather than faith.

[quote LadyfromtheBelleEpoque]@ArtemisiaGentle

It's irrefutable, for example, that evolution exists, because genetics and DNA exist. So God didn't create life, it's organic and much more complicated.

I completely believe this. Evolutionary theory is the best theory we have to explain everything. It’s not at odds with RC or Judaism (to my knowledge).[/quote]
This. I mean, I'm an atheist and perfectly happy about it, these days, but I had a devout Catholic upbringing and was educated from 3 to 18 at convent schools, and there was never the remotest suggestion that evolution was at odds with a Catholic worldview. It took me living in England and DS having to go to a C of E village school because there were no non-C of E schools for about twenty miles around where we lived to encounter an evangelical vicar and youth worker who came into the school for assemblies and were actually biblical literalists. I was completely taken aback. Our nuns were not particularly intellectually sophisticated, but they didn't think, or expect us to think, that Genesis was anything other than a metaphor/creation myth.

I was brought up culturally Christian. Once I was old enough to use critical thinking I immediately saw it was all bollocks and have been an atheist ever since.

Brought up Christian and had a crisis of faith, BUT I decided that a life spent with God was better for me than a life spent without God so I choose to believe. I don't believe the Bible is the exact word of God, it was written by humans who put their own interpretation on things, you only have to look at witness statements to see how widely different people can remember things but as I said I feel happier with God than rejecting the divine, I don't understand why people have to be so disrespectful of others beliefs, they just come across as angry whether they are militant zealots or atheists.

Icecreamsoda99 the reason some non-believers are disrespectful of the beliefs of others is that we get disrespected all the time by believers. Even on this thread we've seen the usual disrespectful comment stating that non-believers are incapable of having a moral compass because you need faith in a deity to do that. It's relentless, and it's very hard to remain polite in the face of that sort of thing.

My DDs both went to a faith primary, because it was the school best suited to their academic potential. We were honest about our lack of belief on our application, by the way. So because we wanted to participate in school life, we did attend some events. And without fail, in every single sermon or address, there would be something about how we should pity the poor unbelievers because they must be so miserable and so on. Incredibly offensive and patronising. The same thing happened in the church attended by my in laws.

When you're constantly told you're incapable of morality and to be pitied because of your lack of belief, it's a strain. I do not understand why believers can't just have their gatherings without this need to put down those who do not share their faith.

I will never mock people for their faith or talk about sky fairies and the like. To me, being an atheist means respecting all faiths and none and agreeing to disagree. I'd just like to see the same basic courtesy towards me from the faith community. Is that so much to ask?

@pointythings

Never, ever have I encountered this amongst my non believing friends. It is always the other way around and the attacks verbally and emotionally on those who are connected some way to organised religion have been vicious in the last twenty years.

I honestly don’t know what circles you move in but I would leave as they sound weird.

Was brought up in a religious family.
I dumped it all by the time I was 14 because I think it's all a load of shit.

I read an interesting book that touched on this. It was a while ago so the details are fuzzy, but the author made the point that long ago (including pre-Christianity), faith was experiential, not theoretical. People created and renewed it by participating in rituals etc. Even the word "belief" originally had connotations of pledging loyalty, rather than the modern meaning of assenting to a fact. It was just a whole other way of understanding it. Much less literal.

That helped me start to clarify and develop my relationship to religion. I no longer see it as a question of "do I think this is correct and/or actually happened". I've stepped back from that tension and made the conscious decision to practice it and see what that brings forth.

It's a bit like the idea that it's better to press on and do something, than be paralysed by indecision at the crossroads. While my DC obviously can and will make their own decisions about religion when they are older, I am very happy to bring up DC in my religion as I believe that opens up a certain perspective that they wouldn't otherwise have, and which puts one in a better position to understand other faiths. (I definitely find it's instinctively easier for me to understand why people of other faiths do or believe certain things, when friends who were brought up with no religion are baffled.)

@bourbonne

That sounds like Catholicism to me.
It is about action and how you choose to participate in life - from a position of love and plenty or not. The difference it makes to your actions and thoughts is huge as your intent is different. I think it has been hijacked by the manifesting crowd which is why I think religion works as it has a point of consequence and responsibility (and certainly doesn’t subscribe to the idea that you brought illness on yourself in the way The Secret, etc suggests).

However, I keep forgetting that I am speaking to people with different experiences and beliefs that all get put under the umbrella of religion when there is a huge difference between my understanding of it and the literalists or pedants. It is a perspective that adds to my life and makes me a bigger, better person and if you were to deconstruct it in contemporary terms it would be identical to the golden rules/good behaviour subscribed to my atheists, etc. Prayer = meditation, mindfulness= retreats, thinking about consequences = time out, etc

I just accept the tradition and rituals that create communion with others, as well.

@LadyfromtheBelleEpoque haha, I'm so transparent! Yes, that is my background. I have just read through your posts on this thread and they really resonate with me. I'm glad this is a reasonably civil and thoughtful thread so far - lots of food for thought. I will say as well as the experiential (and communal) side of faith that I mentioned, I also find it intellectually stimulating, and personally liberating in many ways. Not that I'm a model member all the time... Work in progress!

LadyfromtheBelleEpoque I don't have any weird friends, and we're talking normal C of E churches in my area! It's also a recurring theme in threads like these.

I absolutely disapprove of people attacking others because of their faith. However, I also disapprove of people who condemn and abuse people who are LGBT, so if that happens in my hearing, I will call it out (politely). However, I don't see that as an attack on faith but as a response to unacceptable behaviour.

A few people have mentioned the value of faith in painful situations. This was the case for me. I'd been wrestling with a painful and complicated situation, and one night it came to me - I had to open my heart and embrace love and a sort of invigorating acceptance washed over me (that sounds very cheesy and vague, I know - don't want to get into details of the whole thing). The next day I went to a place of worship, bought books and started practicing again. Now, obviously people might have similar experiences unconnected with religion, I can only describe how it was for me. But that was my moment of choice, I suppose - it wasn't "Aha, I have seen God, I know that he is there". It was "this feeling, this transformative connection - this is what's needed, this is right, and this is how to tap into it". I often put it to one side, find myself blocked or the well dry. But it's something of value that I hope to keep exploring and keep growing. There's a lot of wisdom that has been stored up over history. Modernity is dysfunctional in many ways and I don't want to be blind to that.

My nan forces it down our throats, moans because we aren’t christened, hate shit being forced on me, my parents didn’t force it on me but any weekend we stayed at hers, be dragged to church Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Holy water sprinkled on us, I don’t follow any religion just because I don’t, I don’t force it upon my children because my parents didn’t do it to me, when they are old enough to make their own choices they can and I’ll support them

Same here @pointythings perhaps this is what people say about Catholics behind our backs and I just don’t hear it? I too would and do call out homophobia.

I think there is an idea of what Catholicism, in particular, is that is very different to my experience of it. I think social media got hold of this synthetic idea and people are criticising that but the real stuff - the stuff that gets you up in the morning and helps you find your way through the day - that can be pretty good stuff. The patriarchal set up most of us ignore, the sanctimonious types are challenged and anything literal is scoffed at - it is multi dimensional not so simplistic. But it always, imv, should be centred around love and kindness - a spirit of goodness for people to rest in when they need it, that can restore them for the challenges ahead.

@bourbonne absolutely, I can completely relate to this. An atheist might say that you just connected to a part of yourself that your internal conflict cut you off from perhaps?

There was a story doing the rounds early on in the pandemic someone sent me. It was about two Italian doctors who were working in the early stages of covid at a hospital. They were exhausted and overwhelmed. A priest came in and they knew he was dying. They were desperately trying to help him but knew they couldn’t. He told them to stop trying. I imagine that these doctors were too tired and respectful to argue with the priest but I do think that his presence meant that they could transfer their anxieties and concerns to someone they saw as older and perhaps wiser. The priest knew he was dying and once he said this to the doctors he allowed them to acknowledge that they weren’t actually in control and that was ok. The priest died that night but the doctors said they felt unburdened and their sense of energy and purpose restored after talking to him. He gave them something that at that time they couldn’t give themselves and he did it unconditionally.

I doubt the story is true - I suspect it was made up to give hope to people. But there is something in it, I think that hits at the core of what a lot of us experience - that feeling that we have to have the answers and be in control when another part of us knows quite well that we can never really be in control of ‘life’. I think intellectually religion gave us the space to manage that internal conflict and religious practice and rituals reinforce that abstract space within us - we build those neutral pathways so that in a time of crises our default is to go to a gentler, non judgemental place rather than panic.

Anyway that’s how I see it. No one has the answers so if intellectually it suits you to use the language of science or the language of theology it is all a journey to understanding the world and ourselves in it.

@Thoughtcontagion

See, that’s not religion is it?

I had a fairly standard C of E upbringing - we went to church and I enjoyed it. More fetes and jam than fire and brimstone. I was quite religious as a teenager and took it very seriously.

Unfortunately this was just as the Alpha course became popular, and between that and my university's hyper-evangelical Christian Union, I was completely put off by the time I was 20. I tried really hard not to believe in God for some time, but ultimately I couldn't maintain disbelief, and returned to the church as an adult.

@pointythings the evangelical wing of the C of E that you are describing is what caused my crisis in faith, the literal interpretation of everything and when I tried to leave they weren't happy, as I said in my post I don't understand it from the zealots either. I call them all or nothing Christians, there is no room for interpretation, allegory or even doubt. As I said for me a life lived believing in God brings me comfort and joy, but that is my individual interpretation.

LadyfromtheBelleEpoque and Icesoda99 so you would be the kind of people I could happily be friends with, and I do think it's important to make that distinction. I have a good friend who is a baptist pastor in the US, and we have many differences in what we believe - but we have a common belief in that spirit of goodness. We just differ in where it comes from for us.