I just mean that we are tiny and unsophisticated and that probably we are incapable of reaching any meaningful understanding about the deeper truths of life/the universe. The more I learn about space the more I feel that’s true.
So, what would I tell a creature even less significant than myself who was worried about these types of things? Isn’t that probably what a wiser creature would tell me?
I just try to focus on cultivating a practice that actively makes me what I believe is a better person. I’m very serious about it too, like it isn’t a small thing, it’s literally the most important part of my life. I have done some seriously unpleasant work on myself because of my whole philosophy, lol, and it’s been so hard but crazy rewarding.
I feel like ultimately, fixing myself and continually working to be more forgiving, more loving, more compassionate, more charitable, and more in the present will not only be the biggest benefit to me but also to everyone around me. I don’t need anything bigger than that, like I can and do entertain what-ifs (including a matrix like scenario) but really I think that’s kind of irrelevant to what I am.
I don’t feel anything either in any workings that call on deity. Something in me kind of shudders back and says nonononono and I fall out of any sort of ceremonial mindset.
I do feel things in ritual workings that call on the fog, or the sun or the redwoods or other natural entities. And hellll yes to gardens as spiritual and sacred spaces. I’ve joked here about “I don’t know, I’ll go sit with a tree about it” but really - sitting with a tree about it helps!
I don’t have much to add to the conversation. I did appreciate using a physical item as a method of giving me something to focus my pondering on when I was younger, such as rune stones or pretty coloured rocks.
I picked this up and gave it to a younger self and it was very gratefully received, thank you.
I understand where you’re coming from, but I don’t think you’re really going to be able to understand unless you stop thinking of Christianity as the default experience. There are plenty of folks in my life who either grew up with a different religion or no religion at all.
For some folks paganism is their religion, or Wicca their way of life, tarot their routine. They didn’t necessarily walk away from something else to find themselves there. The same with Islam, and Judaism.
If you want to understand and learn about other’s experiences, stop assuming they could have a better experience with your religion.
But I’m not thinking that at all. As I said, the reason I found the contrast interesting is in terms of my own processing of my relationship to Christianity.
Just wanted to say thank you to everyone for such in depth and thoughtful explanations.
Like a few others here, I have a distinctive repulsion towards anything that purports itself to be both “true” and also something fundamentally supernatural. I find it really helpful to see how (for some people) there are useful aspects that can be taken from spiritual practices rather than having to create it all from scratch.
So thank you. Also, man, these conversations are hard. I feel like every time I try to have something approaching this with my housemate (who is Christian), we misunderstand each other.
If this helps at all, the vast majority of Christians believe what they believe is true, and they worry that those who don’t believe will be punished for it. (Some say belief is enough, other traditions say anyone of good will can be saved, but almost all think some/most people will face eternal damnation and/or destruction in the afterlife.) So even if it feels frustrating, think of them at least meaning well maybe?
My interpretation of Christianity is quite different on that regard, but that is what most believe.
It doesn’t help if I’m honest - I feel like it just shuts down the conversation about how we can build knowledge which will actually allow us to create a good world.
But this isn’t the place for this that discussion I don’t think
Edit to add: It’s hard to discuss with someone who thinks they have THE truth. I have a hard time even talking with most Christians because while I (obviously) believe in objective truth (i.e. a transcendent God who is outside space and time, and underpins reality itself) I don’t think it’s possible for any human belief system to fully capture the objective truth that is out there. Christianity seems to be my path in striving for that truth but there are many paths. If there is indeed an afterlife, I think it’s only there that maybe we’ll find out the truth, but even there I doubt it because finite minds will all experience the infinite differently.
I also dwell almost never on salvation or the afterlife, because I believe that we all get there in the end (if it’s actually there). So, kind of like @AllHat said, I return my gaze to the earth and this life and focus on how I can become a better person and make the world around me a better place.
But because I’m reevaluating my approach to Christianity, I thought understanding the way ex-Christians were approaching other, new paths might help me understand reframing my own path.
No idea if that makes sense.
If this diverges too far from the original thread’s purpose I’ll delete it.
I think for me though…it’s not just not thinking about afterlife, it’s letting go of alllllll the trappings of religion. Church was hard for me to let go of, because of the community aspect and the way it makes you so much more normal in the world if you do go to some type of religious service. I was deeply entrenched in church too, I was an acolyte, in choir, and did youth group (young life too!) and did bible studies. I not only got lots of community but massive praise for being a good christian, and also I made sense to the world around me. I even liked christian rock, lol, like I was in deep.
But my ultimate problem wasn’t just the lack of belief in a deity on my part… it was that doctrine and teachings and translations and history and ceremony and different readings of the same thing in the bible and allllllllll that stuff takes a ton of time and energy away from actually living your life well. The whole point of christianity is to live more like jesus, and I don’t think that requires like 99% of the stuff that church or religion is to achieve. I get christians wanting to gather and talk and prey together, but religion is not that. Religion is so much bigger than that.
I mean, THE truth thing…I believe isn’t just tied to belief, it’s usually also tied to a specific religion and I think some people truly and genuinely love religion itself. I think when someone has both traits, the belief that their religion is THE truth and a deep deep love for religion itself…everything is already seen through a very specific framework and there is no taking off the hat and looking at other perspectives entirely. I’m actually surprised to hear you don’t feel your way is THE truth! I’d be interested to learn more about that!
I just feel that in discussions of religion with highly educated christians, it often becomes a religion discussion and not a real discussion on living…it becomes about how so and so translates this versus this person who doesn’t really get it and therefore it’s not as offensive as it seems. Or it’s about how this council was wrong to include this at all because it technically wasn’t the original teaching. Or how this passage really means xyz because of the historical facts of the time. Or how x symbol really isn’t adequate to describe y concept. It’s just…all about religion.
It’s almost never about say…how they used a reminder of a commandment to be kind to someone who was rude, or how they used a teaching to forgive someone, it’s not action oriented generally unless it’s in protest of someone else’s perceived sin (abortion, gays, etc.). I can say this with a pretty high level of confidence having been to many churches over the years and having been very deeply involved with them. Most bible studies are like, a close reading book club, which is fine but…what happens when you leave the bible study? Do you slam on the horn the second someone is slow to cross the street? Because if so…it’s not working.
I don’t believe in an objective truth. I mean, my actual guess is that this is all kind of made up, I think if there is another life it will be massively disorienting and hard to explain because I think we won’t experience time the way we do now. But that aside, all I feel like I can go on is the results different things yield in this reality I perceive now. When I was christian I had plenty of positive experiences and negative experiences. I had tons of fun at youth groups, I enjoyed a lot of the fancy ceremony stuff, it’s not like I hated it all or anything! But…I did not see people around me getting more peace, or grace, or forgiveness, and I also did not see that happening in myself. I heard a message that I was a sinner, always, no matter what, I heard a message mostly of “do this or else!” and I saw a great deal of intellectualizing and dramatizing grand ideas inside the church walls, only to walk out to the parking lot and see people frustrated with their kids, spouses, and each other. To me…it does not look like most large religions work very well, and I think it’s the actual structure of religion that’s partly to blame.
I fully believe that if stoicism became widely practiced it would start as small groups gathering to discuss theory and real life situations, just like how christianity started. Those would probably be really great, valuable, and places for genuine growth. Then it would get bigger, there would need to be some kind of structure just to stay organized and get things done, and I think if you fast forwarded enough you’d start hearing about sex scandals in the temple of stoicism.
I think when you build a seat of power, or several seats of power (which is what organized religion does by default), you should not be surprised when people who are intently seeking power show up.
One thing I’ve been thinking about with the phrasing of the original question is what the appeal of any belief system in particular is. The way I grew up, there wasn’t an appeal to Christianity, and if I grew up outside of it I feel the only appeal with how it was presented to me would be not going to hell.
With my default as a system of strict rules and dire consequences (again, as presented in my culture), the alternate Wiccan rule set of “do as you will if it harm none” was very appealing. It didn’t posit that I would be eternally punished for wanting sex, or wanting sex with women, or not being constantly attentive to my religious studies. My teens and a decent portion of my childhood were filled with shame and turning to something that still had a moral code but not one with rules I didn’t understand and couldn’t possibly follow was freeing and allowed me to actually live.
Had Christianity been put to me in a way of like “hey, this God loves you unconditionally and will help you out in your life” rather than “be chaste and go to church or go to hell” it might have been a different story.
Oh, yeah, I get that you and I are different there. I just thought it was similar enough to make the analogy
I’d be happy to talk about it, either on my journal, or maybe I can start a new thread, like a “AMA about my zany take on Christianity” lol. Tackling it here might be too divergent from original purpose.
Again this would take us maybe too far from the thread, but I think we need some objective ground in order to universally denounce evil. Otherwise if it is all just relative, it becomes a dialectic of cultural power, which is inherently violent, and thus the victors will write the rules. An ethic of peace requires, in my book, a universal standard to appeal to.
That is more or less my take on Christianity. Without actually pulling my Bible out, the central teaching of Jesus is the golden rule. More than that, he not only say “do unto others as you would have yourself be treated” he says that whatever we do to anyone, the way we treat anyone is something we do to him. Harm someone, you’re harming Jesus. Love someone, you are loving Jesus. He constantly points out marginalized members of the society of his day and says that if we love him, we must love them and treat them with all the dignity we can. The least shall be the greatest. Whoever wants to be greatest must make themselves like a servant, and serve others.
Worship is meaningless if we don’t do that. Mercy is what God wants, not worship. (Hosea 6:6, quoted by Jesus).
Ah yes, I guess that’s just a difference in beliefs. I believe good actions will naturally come when people live with love and acceptance at the forefront, and have inner peace. I don’t really believe in evil. I think “evil” is what we name the actions of deeply wounded and lost and damaged people.
