I went to church up until I was about 16 or so. I began to question a lot that didn't quite make sense to me around then and it eventually lead to my leaving the church completely.
I had my "militant atheism" phase since I had a bit of a chip on my shoulder, but that eventually faded and I came to appreciate the value of Christianity while not necessarily subscribing to it personally.
It was less of a decision and more of a realization. I wanted nothing more than to go back to believing, but it was like peeking behind the curtain with no way to turn back.
For what its worth, Jordan Peterson speaks on it in a way I'm on board with. I cant go back to believing in a literal sense, but the idea that there are principles that we can consider to be transcendent (which I guess would be God as far as translation goes) is something I do hold to be true.
It's constantly on my mind. I like to think that I believe "enough" of the spark notes so-to-speak. I live my life as though there is a god, so Hell, maybe I'm more Christian than I realize.
The morality is something I value very much, but the superstition doesn't jive with however my brain works.
So I was raised in a protestant church where we took the word literally. Basically a textualist approach to scripture.
As I got older and learned more about our understanding of reality, the scripture went from being the bona-fide literal truth to seeming more like a story.
Rebel-teen brain kicked in and found everything wrong that it could. Things like the creation story, the floods, etc. made less and less sense to me. Then I became angry with the idea that it was so easy for me to believe because of how easy my life was and how fortunate I was while growing up. I was never starving, I was never in fear of not having clean water, I wasn't born with any disabilities, etc.
I felt like I'd been had, but instead of giving religion the benefit of the doubt, my mind decided to go scorched earth on the idea. I felt that religion was for people who were afraid of death, who wanted to justify wrongs in the world as being "the plan," and wasn't satisfied with the idea of ignoring these thoughts by simply having faith. Evidence to the contrary piled up, but the church said "don't worry your pretty little head, just ignore that."
I don't hold those hostile attitudes any more (especially with Peterson's lectures), but it's hard for me to believe in the God I was taught about. At least as far as his abilities went.
I went to a catholic university and had some really great discussions with my theology professor about my journey. He said that a collegue of his has argued that the Bible may have overstated the power of God. Im gonna butcher it, but it was something akin to:
"Due to the suffering allowed in this world, God cannot be all knowing, all loving, and all powerful. One must give. He either knows and controls all, but is not all loving (or else we would not have childhood cancer), controls and loves all but does not know all (i.e. he isn't aware of childhood cancer), or he knows and loves all, but is not in control (therefore he detests childhood cancer, but cannot prevent it)."
He told me it was a point that caused him to struggle, and that he subscribes to the idea that God knows and loves all, but is no longer in control. He says he can see a reality in which God was in control, but gave up the controls to man in a way that he cannot override them.
I'm just rambling at this point, but basically it doesn't jive with my interpretation of reality. I can see the scripture as a philosophy that still holds value, but the superstition is something I can't bring myself to hold as true without being dishonest with myself.
I'll give my answer to the problem of evil, which will almost certainly be insufficient, but here it is anyway.
What if the things we see as evil aren't actually evil? We are extrapolating from extremely incomplete data. Even materialistic interpretations of the universe acknowledge this.
So, and bear with me here, what if childhood cancer isn't the evil we think it is? (I have children, and Ive suffered personal tragedy before you think me callous) What if the reality we experience is not actually real? Have you ever experienced a dream which changed your life? I have. There was a point in my life where I was starting to get into some gnarly shit, and I had a nightmare about the consequences and turned it around. As horrible as that nightmare was, it wasn't real. But it had real, positive effects. What if this reality is a proofing ground for remedial souls to give us a foretaste of existence outside of God's presence so that we can make a more informed decision about how to spend eternity?
"Why doesn't God just say that, then?" He kinda does if you read the Bible a certain way. But it would also spoil the effect IMO if He was more explicit.
"But there's no proof for this" True. Which is why it's insufficient. Here's the thing, I find that there's plenty of evidence, both material and philosophical, for intelligent design. (Not young Earth creationism, ID) So if there is a God, there's no reason we should expect to understand His mind completely. And there's no reason to assume that we can comprehend the complexity of His actions.
Spez: here's the mindfuck, imo: what if God is all powerful and all evil? What if the good things we experience are designed to make the suffering here and after more intense? Now, I don't believe this but it can be disconcerting in moments of weakness.
You got me thinking theology this morning, so I'm going to lay it all out for you. This is the only analysis of Christianity that makes sense to me...
The creator of this physical world is Satan, and his power is an emulation of God's. It's pretty good but not entirely real because the divine spark of true creation always come from God Himself.
We are partially the creation of Satan's physical world (our bodies) while also being God's children through the divine spark within all of us. This divine spark is often called "soul".
This physical world is kind of like a science experiment. It's Satan's attempt to "out-god God". He wanted to make a perfectly balanced, perfectly consistent, self-sustaining creation. And this world is perfectly balanced. Good equals bad in all things. For example, if you feed a puppy and watch it grow, other animals will need to die in order to provide meat to feed it. If you fall in love with someone, one day either you or your loved one will die, resulting in sorrow. Every birth results in death.
Keeping all this in mind, we can answer why God does not intervene. And the answer is free will. Satan, as a divine being, has the gift of free will from God, just as Man -- a partially divine being -- also has free will.
God cannot intervene with our affairs because He would then be stepping into the science experiment that Satan has set up. And if He took away that free will from Satan, God would be denying the nature of his own creation.
But how could God leave us to suffer, you may ask? God has not left us abandoned. We also have free will, thus God can only show us the way. He cannot force us into it. God speaks to us constantly if we listen, and He even sent Christ to be a little more obvious about the message.
Because we are an inherent part of Satan's experiment, we are the ones who can change things within it without violating the rules that Satan himself has set up. And we are the ones who can choose God if we wish. Of course, this infuriates Satan because it proves that despite all of his perfect and beautiful illusion, the truth of God still wins out in the end.
God is in control. But that control also means that free will must play out...and in the end the choices we freely make may be the most important aspect of our existence.
I had much the same journey; I have a lot of trouble saying I believe in God, but symbolically, in my mind, when I think in those terms - well, it seems to have an effect on my mitochondria. I feel a sense of energy..
..and maybe that is enough to make it true (or I'm just mad lol).
Do you believe in your own spirit? Is there something to your experience here that is more than the sum of the flesh parts? Why should we even be aware at all when our mechanisms could simply function without a consciousness as any machine does?
If you bodies have some strange spirit moving within them, what about the body of the universe?
In terms of spirit and consciousness.. I can think of biological mechanisms that explain them away. A sense of soul or spirit may just be a conditioned response based on my Catholic upbringing; and consciousness, it's a competative advantage and I can imagine circumstances that may favour it's evolution.
However, I certainly have trouble rationalising away the 'something from nothing' problem. Kraussians would say that the question doesn't make sense.. something to the effect that something can be derived mathematically from nothing - but then, where did mathematics come from? Or perhaps the argument was that 'nothing' is not a valid state of the universe.. In any case it is unedifying.
I understand where your line of questioning is leading.. it's basically what I would like to believe; but believing what you want to believe can be a dangerous thing right? You have inspired me to meditate on it some more, which I appreciate!
never too late . . . Christ would for you to join Him
I appreciate it, friend.
I went to church up until I was about 16 or so. I began to question a lot that didn't quite make sense to me around then and it eventually lead to my leaving the church completely.
I had my "militant atheism" phase since I had a bit of a chip on my shoulder, but that eventually faded and I came to appreciate the value of Christianity while not necessarily subscribing to it personally.
It was less of a decision and more of a realization. I wanted nothing more than to go back to believing, but it was like peeking behind the curtain with no way to turn back.
For what its worth, Jordan Peterson speaks on it in a way I'm on board with. I cant go back to believing in a literal sense, but the idea that there are principles that we can consider to be transcendent (which I guess would be God as far as translation goes) is something I do hold to be true.
It's constantly on my mind. I like to think that I believe "enough" of the spark notes so-to-speak. I live my life as though there is a god, so Hell, maybe I'm more Christian than I realize.
The morality is something I value very much, but the superstition doesn't jive with however my brain works.
What is it that makes you unable to believe? I guess, I'm asking what was behind the curtain that you saw?
So I was raised in a protestant church where we took the word literally. Basically a textualist approach to scripture.
As I got older and learned more about our understanding of reality, the scripture went from being the bona-fide literal truth to seeming more like a story.
Rebel-teen brain kicked in and found everything wrong that it could. Things like the creation story, the floods, etc. made less and less sense to me. Then I became angry with the idea that it was so easy for me to believe because of how easy my life was and how fortunate I was while growing up. I was never starving, I was never in fear of not having clean water, I wasn't born with any disabilities, etc.
I felt like I'd been had, but instead of giving religion the benefit of the doubt, my mind decided to go scorched earth on the idea. I felt that religion was for people who were afraid of death, who wanted to justify wrongs in the world as being "the plan," and wasn't satisfied with the idea of ignoring these thoughts by simply having faith. Evidence to the contrary piled up, but the church said "don't worry your pretty little head, just ignore that."
I don't hold those hostile attitudes any more (especially with Peterson's lectures), but it's hard for me to believe in the God I was taught about. At least as far as his abilities went.
I went to a catholic university and had some really great discussions with my theology professor about my journey. He said that a collegue of his has argued that the Bible may have overstated the power of God. Im gonna butcher it, but it was something akin to:
"Due to the suffering allowed in this world, God cannot be all knowing, all loving, and all powerful. One must give. He either knows and controls all, but is not all loving (or else we would not have childhood cancer), controls and loves all but does not know all (i.e. he isn't aware of childhood cancer), or he knows and loves all, but is not in control (therefore he detests childhood cancer, but cannot prevent it)."
He told me it was a point that caused him to struggle, and that he subscribes to the idea that God knows and loves all, but is no longer in control. He says he can see a reality in which God was in control, but gave up the controls to man in a way that he cannot override them.
I'm just rambling at this point, but basically it doesn't jive with my interpretation of reality. I can see the scripture as a philosophy that still holds value, but the superstition is something I can't bring myself to hold as true without being dishonest with myself.
I'll give my answer to the problem of evil, which will almost certainly be insufficient, but here it is anyway.
What if the things we see as evil aren't actually evil? We are extrapolating from extremely incomplete data. Even materialistic interpretations of the universe acknowledge this.
So, and bear with me here, what if childhood cancer isn't the evil we think it is? (I have children, and Ive suffered personal tragedy before you think me callous) What if the reality we experience is not actually real? Have you ever experienced a dream which changed your life? I have. There was a point in my life where I was starting to get into some gnarly shit, and I had a nightmare about the consequences and turned it around. As horrible as that nightmare was, it wasn't real. But it had real, positive effects. What if this reality is a proofing ground for remedial souls to give us a foretaste of existence outside of God's presence so that we can make a more informed decision about how to spend eternity?
"Why doesn't God just say that, then?" He kinda does if you read the Bible a certain way. But it would also spoil the effect IMO if He was more explicit.
"But there's no proof for this" True. Which is why it's insufficient. Here's the thing, I find that there's plenty of evidence, both material and philosophical, for intelligent design. (Not young Earth creationism, ID) So if there is a God, there's no reason we should expect to understand His mind completely. And there's no reason to assume that we can comprehend the complexity of His actions.
Spez: here's the mindfuck, imo: what if God is all powerful and all evil? What if the good things we experience are designed to make the suffering here and after more intense? Now, I don't believe this but it can be disconcerting in moments of weakness.
You got me thinking theology this morning, so I'm going to lay it all out for you. This is the only analysis of Christianity that makes sense to me...
The creator of this physical world is Satan, and his power is an emulation of God's. It's pretty good but not entirely real because the divine spark of true creation always come from God Himself.
We are partially the creation of Satan's physical world (our bodies) while also being God's children through the divine spark within all of us. This divine spark is often called "soul".
This physical world is kind of like a science experiment. It's Satan's attempt to "out-god God". He wanted to make a perfectly balanced, perfectly consistent, self-sustaining creation. And this world is perfectly balanced. Good equals bad in all things. For example, if you feed a puppy and watch it grow, other animals will need to die in order to provide meat to feed it. If you fall in love with someone, one day either you or your loved one will die, resulting in sorrow. Every birth results in death.
Keeping all this in mind, we can answer why God does not intervene. And the answer is free will. Satan, as a divine being, has the gift of free will from God, just as Man -- a partially divine being -- also has free will.
God cannot intervene with our affairs because He would then be stepping into the science experiment that Satan has set up. And if He took away that free will from Satan, God would be denying the nature of his own creation.
But how could God leave us to suffer, you may ask? God has not left us abandoned. We also have free will, thus God can only show us the way. He cannot force us into it. God speaks to us constantly if we listen, and He even sent Christ to be a little more obvious about the message.
Because we are an inherent part of Satan's experiment, we are the ones who can change things within it without violating the rules that Satan himself has set up. And we are the ones who can choose God if we wish. Of course, this infuriates Satan because it proves that despite all of his perfect and beautiful illusion, the truth of God still wins out in the end.
God is in control. But that control also means that free will must play out...and in the end the choices we freely make may be the most important aspect of our existence.
I had much the same journey; I have a lot of trouble saying I believe in God, but symbolically, in my mind, when I think in those terms - well, it seems to have an effect on my mitochondria. I feel a sense of energy..
..and maybe that is enough to make it true (or I'm just mad lol).
Some questions to consider...
Do you believe in your own spirit? Is there something to your experience here that is more than the sum of the flesh parts? Why should we even be aware at all when our mechanisms could simply function without a consciousness as any machine does?
If you bodies have some strange spirit moving within them, what about the body of the universe?
In terms of spirit and consciousness.. I can think of biological mechanisms that explain them away. A sense of soul or spirit may just be a conditioned response based on my Catholic upbringing; and consciousness, it's a competative advantage and I can imagine circumstances that may favour it's evolution.
However, I certainly have trouble rationalising away the 'something from nothing' problem. Kraussians would say that the question doesn't make sense.. something to the effect that something can be derived mathematically from nothing - but then, where did mathematics come from? Or perhaps the argument was that 'nothing' is not a valid state of the universe.. In any case it is unedifying.
I understand where your line of questioning is leading.. it's basically what I would like to believe; but believing what you want to believe can be a dangerous thing right? You have inspired me to meditate on it some more, which I appreciate!
Have you heard the saying "As above so below"? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97V8jw7rc9I
I quit going as a 'rebel teen' as well.
I came back in 2015 by believing Donald Trump would be President.