Am I missing something? Religion.

[ButterflyTable]

I will caveat this by saying there was a point in my life when I was religious. However I now just feel religion is created by men; about men for men.

I look at women around me who are friends and religious, and their religion oppresses them. Much more than men.

I want to believe in God, or a higher power. But nothing in this world leads me to think there is a God as such. Granted I think there is energy, something out there perhaps connected to our ancestors or the Earth.

Religion to me seems about control, rituals, even having spent time around people of multiple faiths, in their holy buildings - I feel something, I hear a hymn, a call to prayer, I’ve sang I a church congregation. I’ve sat in Temples, I’ve been in Muslim countries and heard the prayers, I’ve experienced and read about a number of faiths. To the extent they all say pretty much the same thing, but I cannot believe in God.

I also feel faith holds people back. I’ve seen a lot wrong done by very religious people.

This is why I enjoy Paganism, specifically witchcraft. Mostly Goddess and nature orientated.

yep. I also face this attitude in real life. it is exhausting.

your degree sounds really interesting. did you focus on abrahamic religions/Christianity or also explore nordic religions? I find the overlapping of beliefs/mythology/history absolutely fascinating...

Posters were making general comments about their views on religion and belief in god only to be told by you that their general comments were not respectful enough. That's pretty presumptuous.

They were not (as far as I saw) being directly rude to other individuals but that was still not good enough for you.

Agreed - it’s very hard to have a proper discussion. I also studied/trained for ministry for 5 years, have a very high IQ. But most posters on here who are atheist straight away default to name calling rather than proper intellectual discussion.

Everyone blithely asserting their moral code is their own not shaped by religion (Christianity) is overlooking the fact that these values are not developed in isolation - you, and your values, are a product of your upbringing, your culture and the society into which you were born.

You have been born into a country (assuming the UK) which has been so shaped by Christianity and Christian values that you take its central claims and moral guidance for granted seeing them as universal. But they are not they are the result of the ‘Christian Revolution’.

Tom Holland’s Dominion - is very, very good at demonstrating Christianity’s transformative impact on our value system. It is eye opening and fascinating.

Fundamentally, what proper discussion do you expect?

Belief in God is faith based. Despite what people will argue it certainly isn't logic or evidence based. People who don't believe aren't going to suddenly be convinced by arguments which are only ever based on faith, no matter how intelligently argued.

I am never, ever going to believe in God because, to my mind, the idea of God as presented by every religion ever invented is very clearly man-made.

If God, or Gods want me to acknowledge their existance they need to put a bit of effort in and reveal themselves, and perhaps help out a bit around the place.

Not much to ask, really, for supposedly all powerful, loving beings.

I have a relationship with our Heavenly Father but I am non denominational and I am a whole bible believer, Saturday sabbath, 10 commandments, biblical feast days.

Where is easter in bible for example? Where is christmas too? santa etc? pagan traditions (yes the resurrection and birth is in the bible but the rest is actually from pagan practices, look this up)

Just pray for truth and pray to Heavenly Father In Jesus' (I also call him by the hebrew name Yahusha') name. You will find him when you seek him with all your heart! I will pray for you (Hugs)

Religion oppresses everyone and causes most of the world problems

Also I want to add that God created everything and everyone and there is no way to disprove that (when atheists say they cant prove there is a God then I can say the same thing and not being able to disprove him ) But basically its faith in the scriptures he gave to us as a way to understand the world ( what is left of them anyway) and when you don't reject God you see him... its just the way it is. its a relationship rather than a religion.

We were literally created to have a relationship with our creator and then the whole adam and eve thing ( because of satan and because of weak humans wanting to know something they didn't need to) Then we now live in a fallen sinful world. Can not deny that. and Jesus is the only way to the Father in Heaven. according to scripture. And its all for a very good reason. Why else are we here? higher up than the animals ? He made us that way to communicate with him. Its literally a world of good v evil like a game, the game of life.

I don't know why it has become so. Respect for each is so little these days. And yes it is exhausting.

Theology studies at Danish universities are solely focused on Judaism and Christianity (but not on one denomination).

The study is divided into dogmatics (including ethics and philosophy), the study of the New Testament and Old Testament (in the original languages) and of church history.
in addition there are aspects of Middle Easth studies, world history m, of holocoust, of music, of politics, of films, of law, of diverse cultures, of literature, ecumenical relations and much more.

And of course classes of Ancient Greek, Classical and Medieval Latin and Hebrew. Greek and Latin are taught after classical philology standard and the disciplines within subjecs.
Furthermore the study is only dissemination of research and knowledge. Personal belief is not part of the study which is to me definitely an advantage from an academic point of view.

You train at a religious seminar after the degree if you want to serve as a vicar in Church of Denmark.

Most Scandinavians are very well educated in Norse mythology and beliefs - it's a big part of history and religious education in schools - primary/secondary and highschools. And of the Scandic understanding of it's culture even today.

But a relationship with our creator does not do that. How does it? God asks us to worship him alone because he knows he created us and what is good for us. Satan gets in otherwise and evil abounds.

I find many religions sexist. I think some can be controlling too. Some are obsessed with their image so when things go wrong like DV, paedophilia or financial abuse the elders or senior members deny, cover up, or just lie. Also, some religions control women to the nth degree, up to what they wear, if they have a job, if they use contraception or not, and how they interact with their husbands.

In most religions there is a liberal, moderate or orthodox version.

I grew up loosely CofE but quit all of it before getting confirmed. As I became aware of Women's Rights and and scientific advances in my youth in the late 90s & found that I couldn't believe one thing in religion and something contradictory in science and society. So I went with what I could see or prove to myself.

If everyone held the same beliefs then it may just work. But they don’t. I see oppression everywhere.
Religious people are not necessarily good people.

I don’t believe in any god or satan.

Theologians are very well educated - but sadly few people know. MN is no different than the world.

@Dogdilemma2000 but why not try then, as you have a high IQ and have studied theology. What are we missing?

@MumChp Richard Dawkins

The achievements of theologians don't do anything, don't affect anything, don't achieve anything, don't even mean anything. What makes you think that 'theology' is a subject at all?

How come God kills so many people in the bible then? That doesn't sound very good for us. I don't think Satan kills anyone does he? What did he do? Offer a women some knowledge? How come he gets to be the bad guy, and God, who flooded the world and killed loads of people gets to be the good guy?

To be fair, theology is interesting and relevant from a historical and social history viewpoint. It's not possible to deny that religion is a part of human culture and I can see the relevance of studying that in order to understand historical context, current social context and so on.

@Veggielove84

‘Satan gets in’
How does that work then?

Not being religious doesn’t mean that the devil gets in. I don’t believe in him either

Absolutely no way am I going to respect everybody's belief in whatever nonsense they believe in. Some beliefs are provable rubbish- like flat earth. Respect the person, yes, respect the beliefs, no.

@ButterflyTable you sound like you’ve been all over and now made your decision to not have a faith/religion. Are you not satisfied with your decision?

In the nicest possible way, shouldn't God have really had a good idea of what humans were capable of before populating the earth at all? Either he was a bit careless and didn't really think things through before hitting 'Enter', or he already knew how fucked up humans would be and went ahead and created them anyway, which is a bit twisted, to put it mildly.

Discussion just like you said is fine - mutually respectful discourse. the usual response is much less coherent and resorts to using phrases such “fairy in the sky” and mockingly pretending to believe in the Easter bunny.

I never attempt to convince anyone to join my belief system, I feel grown mature adults should be able to respect that not everyone believes the same thing as them.

If you truly are interested in the answer to this then I invite you to research it. I know better than to get involved in these types of conversations as I don't have the time to respond to it all. I just wanted to share my thoughts and faith.

@SaySomethingMan I have now been spending some time looking into ‘Ancient’ religions or beliefs connected to Shamanism. Not just Native American. But also trying to understand other Nations around the world and reading about pre ‘modern’ religion.