We are past suspicion. Our healthy suspicion has helped us pierce the bubble.
Once the bubble is pierced it is no longer suspicion.
Truthfully, yes there is a small amount of pride in having overcome the forces that tried to keep you down. Pride is maybe too big a word and smacks too much of as it is used by the Church to keep you in your place. “Don’t think for yourself and cower before the awsome knowledge of your priest!”
This rather sounds like projection. I don’t fear that.
Maybe you are the one with fear that your religion is exactly that; just stories perpetuated only because that is what people grew up with.
Which would rather handsomely explain why religion varies from region to region.
Is this a serious question?
What???
Right, so you don’t wear your seatbelt?
You don’t wear shoes and you don’t work because God will take care of you.
If God didn’t want you to be cold he would not have made winter, so no winter-coat for you.
Or doesn’t it work like that?
Well you see it *does * work like that. That is how we are able to build bridges, television, sky-scrapers, safe cars and cement.
What doesn’t get you far is praying to God for things to happen, because you’ve been a good boy or promise to be one from now on.
Isolation, yes. You can keep yourself isolated in isolated terrain, like the Cajuns, or by (self-)enforced social isolation. Some social elites do this and often immigrant populations.
But all these micro-social ‘eco-systems’ within a country will be washed away if you are conquered and settled by new people. If you live in isolated terrain, you may indeed be able to hide and survive as a distinct culture.
Hatti, the Hittite homeland, is not that isolated, except the city of Hatushash itself.
Plus it’s not just a single invasion that has washed over them.
First their empire was destroyed by marauding Greeks, then there’s the Cimmerians and then Tharcians/Phrygians, then Persians, Romans and finally Turks.
The
Egyptians Book of the dead mentions the commandments in a way, they use the same type of wording to get to the after life, by stating things like: I did not kill etc. and a list of what they didn’t do very much like the 10 commandments. There is no proof that Moses was a real person either, so even if there was it was, a Human who’ said’ God gave him the commandments, and one’s belief is in another human…not a God.
if youre born with an inner knowing, for lack of a word, a connection to something you are sensing and yet, not able to describe adequatley, it may come out as various interpretations of a higher being, well this seems to be found through history as far back as one can dig, a rose by any other name smells as sweet. etc.
For those of us that weren’t born with such an “inner knowing”, how do we differentiate these kinds of assertions from the ramblings of an insane person, or the lies of a deceitful person?
Only a person that is somehow inhibited to wonder about the world around them could be distracted from the inner search for meaning and purpose in their lives. Our curiousity alone makes us seek cause and effect of ourselves and those around us. Who does not wonder about why they are here? St. Augustine had a saying " You made us for yourself, our soul is restless until it rests in Thee." Who has not experienced the feeling of never being completely satisfied? of striving for something only to get it and weary of it and want something else? Perhaps not all people ask themselves why but busy themselves running after new ideas, new toys, until they can not run anymore.
Why am I here? Strictly speaking because my parents had sex at a certain time in a certain position and the sperm cell which held half my DNA got lucky. Any more reason would be extremely egotistical. I’m here in part because my father was away in Europe during WW II which kept my parents from having kids earlier. Should I say WW II happened in part to produce me?
Given that I am here, I can find meaning, which I’ve done pretty well. And not believing in God makes the job easier. I can concentrate on this world. I also don’t have to worry about why evil, both human and natural, happens.
Do you think belief in Jesus is inborn? It isn’t for me. I grew up Jewish, didn’t get indoctrinated in that way, and have no more brief for Jesus than for Baal.
You have to stand back and look at what LIFE is, one continuous string of energy, youre life did not begin with your parents, its been in existance since the beginning of time and no one but the creator knows what that is, infinity, what do you or I know about infinite? We have learned to frame time in a convenient way, such as " OUR OWN LIFE JOURNEY" but that is a delusion of time. Our worldly parents are but conveyers of the life force, co operative partners with the creator. Ah! Life! We are supposed to do the best with what we have at hand on our personal journey.
Heh, heh - cite? My life certainly began with my parents. My life and mind are intimately bound up with my dna, my fetal environment, and how I was raised in some proportion none of us know. You don’t really know what energy is, obviously. It has nothing to do with souls. The universe, by the way, is large but finite.
My eldest daughter is a ton like me in many ways, including appearance. (Except on her it looks good.) My younger daughter is a lot like my wife. Did this infinite life force know about us ahead of time? If the phone had rang at the wrong time would another life force barge in?
Here is an honest question: where do you get this stuff? It really sounds like something someone who lived 1,000 years ago might have believed. They didn’t have the benefit of Watson and Crick or biology texts.
Religion is made up by men and therefor could be wrong. But evidence of God comes when you least expect it. Not from faith but from experience that lasts forever. No one needs to describe it only to live it. Love
My apologies for the long answers. Y’all just ask a lot of questions.
That sounds ideal from my viewpoint. Some Christians see neutrality as a bad thing, sadly, as do some parts of other religions.
Yes.
If by the universe, you mean this cosmos and any other, then yes.
Sometimes.
Oh, I think there are many others on the planet of many faiths that are aware of the God I believe in. We may not have exactly the same beliefs. It would be futile to try to explain to anyone who has not had the experience exactly what it is like. There are many believers who have these experiences in the most unusual places. My father experienced it when he was having a pacemaker put in. I was not told about it until after his death. But Mother said that he was never afraid of death again after his experience.
You want me to give it a name? No. I will leave that to scientists. I’m assuming that you have this sense, but haven’t used it. My experience with it is very limited but overwhelming. There are people who have these experiences much more frequently. I envy them. But it wasn’t a “god creature” that I experienced. I have said repeatedly that I did not see God or the Christ.
If you are really curious, you might want to read about the experiments of a Canadian scientist, Dr. Persinger. The experiences are different, but I think maybe from the same source. His experiments have rather interesting consequences. I first saw him on Sixty Minutes a few years ago. He doesn’t make any particular claims about the reason that often certain things happen during his experiments. He remains fairly neutral. But in my thinking, there is another sense at work here that is both natural and largely untapped.
Yes, I believe in God. I have evidence that can only be understood by those who have experienced something like it. It applies to everyone, I think.
I haven’t offered any evidence.
I have what I think is an extra sense – a mostly unused portion of my brain – that allowed me to have the experience which I perceive as evidence, not proof, to myself.
I understand that you are trying to communicate too much in just one sentence the one above). Nevertheless, I repeat that God did not appear to me nor speak to me. I didn’t even tie the experience in with my beliefs about God until much later. (This is a recording.)
I think the experience I had would have sent me to search for understanding --and it did. It was mostly through a little knowledge of Eastern religions that I began to tie it in with some of my own religious beliefs which had become kind of flat since I didn’t believe many parts of the Bible. That insight was a long time in coming.
I do not feel that it is illogical to believe that we have parts of our brains that we haven’t used or been aware of. I think this is true for everyone. I have never claimed that my beliefs are logical. Please stop twisting my words. You are confusing illogical beliefs with logical thinking processes. I say that my beliefs are illogical because I can understand why they would seem to be to rational people. But my thinking has been fairly sound and logical.
The comments you have made lead me to believe that you missed a lot.
I doubt that anyone would call my beliefs the “default human position.” You are very wrong to accuse my father of child abuse. He was the kindest and most generous person I have ever known – a teacher and a philosopher. Anyone would be lucky to have a father as patient and open as he was. My mother was abusive, but one of the best things that she provided me with was religious learning. I have forgiven her the abuse, finally. It is required of us to forgive.
Now that is funny. In my early twenties I had a friend from Switzerland who thought she would find people on horseback in Nashville. Maybe those people around your house were richer than you. I wouldn’t say smarter. We have something in common: Earle Palmer Halliburton was my cousin. He was born not far away from my place of birth, but I didn’t meet him. I guess we weren’t close enough kin and there was a huge age difference. He also invented those Halliburton cases that cradle photographic equipment and other sensitive mechanisms. Ah! So near and yet so far! But I am content.
Hey, I make shit up! But I call it poetic license. My posts here have nothing to do with that. I don’t make up stuff here.
Insane is actually a legal term used to describe a defendent who doesn’t know right from wrong (so I’ve been told). Personally, I dislike liars about as much as I dislike any personality type. But you would have no trouble thinking that I am crazy and who knows? You may be right. I realize that your question was for someone else; excuse me for intruding.
Then, personally, I would think you are very grounded and thats good.