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Author Topic:   People - I /was/ a Christian
arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 4 of 307 (420999)
09-10-2007 4:24 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by crashfrog
09-10-2007 3:34 PM


Re: I know about Faith
People - I was a Christian. A fundamentalist, creationist one. Biblical inerrancy. Redeeming power of Jesus.
what, exactly, caused your change in opinion? if you don't mind me asking?
Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 18 of 307 (421018)
09-10-2007 6:57 PM
Reply to: Message 16 by NosyNed
09-10-2007 6:44 PM


Re: Read more carefully Mike
mikey is carrying out some hostility from another thread, and reacting to crash's generally inflammatory (and sometimes arrogant) attitude.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 28 of 307 (421032)
09-10-2007 8:03 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by crashfrog
09-10-2007 7:54 PM


Re: Sorry to break up the nods
I agree it's pretty boring. All I'm trying to tell you people is that it's not a matter of me not being a Christian yet; I've been there already, and I'm past it.
But it's pretty stupid to try to say who's farther or more mature from that. It's ridiculous. Of course, I don't expect Christians to ever stop.
yes, but is merely telling the same story and making the same points, only in reverse, really the answer?


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 43 of 307 (421079)
09-10-2007 11:02 PM
Reply to: Message 41 by pbee
09-10-2007 10:58 PM


Re: I know about Faith
That makes me laugh.
you don't have to live with her.
it seems that some people are just inclined to fundamentalist thought patterns. even when you get them away from religion, they approach atheism as a fundamentalist would. no real logic to speak of, and reliance of piss-poor sources. my mom happens to be a fan of julian jaynes' "the origin of consciousness in the breakdown of the bichameral mind." which is to psychology what "darwin's black box" is to biochemistry.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 45 of 307 (421081)
09-10-2007 11:22 PM
Reply to: Message 44 by pbee
09-10-2007 11:11 PM


Re: I know about Faith
ideally? reason and honesty.
but that isn't always the case, as the fanatic bug apparently bites them too. like christian evangelism, the militant-recovering-christian fanatacism seems to stem from a desire to help people, often with a "little brother" twist. they see other people making the same mistakes they did, foolishly believing the same lies, and it makes them ashamed. that kind of attitude often leads to emotionally charged outbursts, and the kind of anger we often associate with the christian fundamentalists around here who simply cannot follow the rules and are quick to ad-hominems.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 74 of 307 (421117)
09-11-2007 2:11 AM
Reply to: Message 47 by crashfrog
09-10-2007 11:45 PM


Re: I know about Faith
Since the knowledge of God is to attain eternal life, what do atheists offer?
The truth.
well, the fundamentalists are trying to sell me that too. only they're willing to pitch in the way and the life as well, for no extra charge (just shipping and handling).
But the way you frame it - as though atheists are just one stall at a bazaar of religions, where people pick and choose at their whim based on what's for sale - really proves my point, doesn't it?
well, no. there are people say atheism is not just another religion, and then still treat it as such. i think its on the shoulders of the atheists to not act like the religious nuts. wouldn't you say?
Atheism offers little solace, little comfort, and certainly little to no hope in "life everlasting".
crash, i tell you in all hopes that you will understand and knowing full well that you probably wont -- religion isn't easy either. fundamentalism tries to make it seem that way, and the fact that it's not, that so much of it fails to make sense, is what tends to drive people away from it.
if one truly believes what the bible says, and not just what they wish it said, there's little comfort there, either. a god who sends his chosen people into exile after exile, just to prove a point. a god who has been known to lie, and destroy all of humanity on a whim. a god who punishes the just and rewards the wicked. that "god loves you" stuff is groovy and all, but some books don't even seem to point to an afterlife at all.
frankly, i feel a lot better knowing exactly how little of it is true. and i'm betting that you do too. fundamentalism simplifies things into black and white. it's what it does. don't mistake that for a second with the full spectrum of religious thought, that it's all happy go-lucky and flowers and shit.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 75 of 307 (421118)
09-11-2007 2:13 AM
Reply to: Message 49 by Taz
09-11-2007 12:01 AM


What made me change my mind? Unlike crashfrog, I actually remember the instance when it hit me. And yet, it was a pretty damn hard hit. It was the realization that I was a sexist, racist, and bigot, and everytime I talked to god he always answered me by telling me I was right to hate.
sometimes i worry that that god is real, and i delude myself into believing in the compassionate one.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 80 of 307 (421124)
09-11-2007 3:11 AM
Reply to: Message 53 by Buzsaw
09-11-2007 12:17 AM


my experience in fundamentalism (tl;dr?)
Multitudes of professing born again folks either lack inspirational and intelligent mentors within the churches or never get grounded in good inspirational fundamentalist churches and so forth.
yes, i agree buzsaw. fundamentalism, in general, has neither intelligent and inspirational mentors, nor good churches. and that's why people drop out of it -- they see through the idiotic crap hurled at them.
let me tell you about my journey through fundamentalism.
i was raised as an atheist, and a militant one at that. my father is (probably) an agnostic (he doesn't talk much about it), and my mother is about as evangelical as atheist can get. both of my parents hold degrees -- my mother has a masters in classical studies (greece and rome) and my father is a ph.d. in mathematics, and is a graph theorist with an erdos number of +2. for non-math-majors, that means he's a big person in his field -- he's co-authored papers with people who have co-authored papers with the biggest name in graph theory.
as a child, i had an interest in the sciences, specifically natural history. dinosaurs. by the age of 10, i understood all about the geologic column, the law of superposition, radiometric dating, etc. i knew a bit about the evolutionary history, in general, of most of the life on this planet. i owned fossils, textbooks, etc.
at 13, i converted to christianity. i listened to the classical music channel/npr a lot, and the local jesus station was stronger than anything else in town. it took over at least 5 whole numbers (not decimal points) on the radio dial, and periodically would seep into the station i listened to as i went to sleep. on night, i decided to see what the mumbling was, and tune in. listened for a week, and converted. it wasn't a story about jesus, either. it was abraham, and god having a plan, and all that.
i started going to church. the first place i went, i didn't really enjoy. it was big, and fake, and everyone had poofed hair. the youth group was learning why not to listen to metallica's black album (omg, it has a snake on the cover, it's totally satanic like whoah). it struck me then -- and i was 13 -- as goofy paranoia, and i didn't even like that kind of music. my only other memorable experience there was them laughing at me.
i drifted around for a bit after that. a friend from middle school invited me to his church, and i went to that. they were a store-front church. real fundy. soon after i joined up going to their youth group, they got a real building. i went there for years -- but i started noticing problems immediately.
for instance, i asked my youth pastor why we were selling things in the lobby. as a 14 year old, that just didn't make sense to me. doesn't jesus frown on that sort of thing? "well," he says, but i interrupt, "no, i pretty distinctly remember him overturning the money changers' tables because they were turning a profit in the house of god." ...no good answer, just some weasling about why it was ok for them to do it.
about this time, i started noticing their utter disdain and fear of the outside world. they told me a story once about having to remove a homeless person -- that just didn't seem right to me. jesus walked around homeless. would they turn away jesus? why is a church refusing to help the very people god said they should?
i had made friends with this girl that went there. she was an atheist; her parents made her go. it quickly became obvious that i was the only person there she actually felt comfortable talking to, because i wasn't spouting "jesus" 24-7. as i got to know her, i became more and more aware of the effects of rabid fundamentalism on a family. constant fights with her parents over stupid stuff. they continually break into her room, and burn anything that wasn't a bible. cds, books, letters, pictures. i watched her find more and more ways to rebel, taking up smoking and drinking, and anything she could do behind her parents' backs. i tried to explain this once to her step-mother, but she just didn't understand: keeping your child locked up isn't love and protection. it makes them want to run as far away as they can, as fast as they can. forcing religion on her was pushing her away.
at this point, i started to hear the creation v. evolution debate. my youth leader was a relatively smart guy. repaired computers. "we can't deny that microevolution happens, because they've observed it in a lab. we just don't believe in macroevolution. we believe god created every kind." "oh," i say, not wanting to get into exactly why what he said was wrong -- i was 15, after all. he was, by far, the most reasonable person, scientifically speaking, of the lot. the rest preached about a 6,000 year old earth, and that dinosaur were put there by the devil, and that kind of garbage. i knew even then that this is not the extent of religious belief. my friend's family would sometimes take me to their church, too. my friend's father was a geologist. studying geology and a YEC view are pretty much completely incompatible -- so he'd explained to me his views on things. day-age, and all that. which was how i reconciled what i knew about science with my belief in the bible at that age. but already the wheels of doubt where turning.
i bailed from my youthgroup just before it exploded. the pastor of the church (not my youth leader) got some lady in the congregation pregnant, and ran away with her. people in the youth group started talking about each other behind each other's backs. we started having youth services with more people on stage than in the pews -- everyone wanted to be a star. we had a crazy new member, and in came the laying-of-the-hands. the placebo effect doesn't work on me -- i never fell over, spoke in tongues, etc. people wondered why. my friend from middle school hooked up with this girl in the group, and rumors about their sexual life started flying around. my other friend, the girl from before, somehow got caught up in all this, and got blamed for spreading rumors. she says she didn't do it, and i believe her. she would have told me first, and didn't. anyways. i never went back.
i drifted around aimlessly, from church to church, for another few years. went to another friends church -- they were pentecostals. the kind that clear the church of chairs at the end of the service so nobody gets hurt. they scared me -- i tried not to go there.
in college, i met this girl and fell in love. she was a fundamentalist. i went to church with her, and tried to be the best little christian boy i could be for her. but the doubt wheels, they were still turning. and i had been burned by religion before. not faith, but religion. she fell in love me, too. so she stopped talking to me: i wasn't christian enough for her, and she never got her neon sign from god. this happened two or three times, actually -- always with the interference of her church. a calvary church. i talked to church leaders, but i was always scorned as an outsider, even after going to their church for months, because i dared to think. i would tell them about different interpretations, and what the bible actually said, and how i felt, and that i thought a lot of their isolationist philosophies were dangerous and cult-like. that made me the anti-christ in their eyes, and reaffirmed the notion that i shouldn't be dating one of their flock. (i am truly glad she no longer goes there and that we are still friends)
and i haven't been to a church regularly since. i first noticed in that youth group that church felt dead to me. when they asked us to pray, i started going outside because i couldn't feel god when i was in that building. my (then-girl)friend's church felt the same way. and so has every church after it. it is positively creepy to watch everyone in a church feeling something, and knowing, in your heart, that it's not god. that it's either in their heads, or something far more sinister. she started to tell me once that she felt that too. and it is scary to watch how religion can be used to manipulate people. i knew that my faith in religion was over when i asked her pastor a very legitimate question about the bible... and not only did i stump him in front of a live congregation, but he'd never actually noticed the problem i pointed out. truly the blind leading the blind.
when i see threads like this, i understand. i have been on that path myself. the only thing i fail to understand is why i still have my faith; why i have come out reasonably unscathed. any one of those experiences is enough to make a person lose their faith. and trust me, i am leaving a lot of personal stuff out. i'm leaving out all of the guilt and fear, and the unfulfilled promises. i'm leaving out pain, and frustration, and lots of stuff i just don't feel like sharing. but this should give people an impression.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 53 by Buzsaw, posted 09-11-2007 12:17 AM Buzsaw has not replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 81 of 307 (421125)
09-11-2007 3:13 AM
Reply to: Message 77 by crashfrog
09-11-2007 2:23 AM


Re: I know about Faith
if one truly believes what the bible says, and not just what they wish it said, there's little comfort there, either.
Yeah, but you've described maybe 15% of all Christians with that.
i might say less than that.
For the vast majority of people, it's an exercise in wishful thinking. Grown-up Santa Claus.
Sure, religion can be hard and cruel if you choose to make it that way. Being completely based on lies, you can make your own religion into anything that you care to. Why not just not even bother?
i don't think faith is a choice. not for me, anyways.


This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 124 of 307 (421315)
09-12-2007 12:39 AM
Reply to: Message 123 by crashfrog
09-12-2007 12:22 AM


Re: I know about Faith
And quite frankly, Ray, you can take your ad hominem and cram it up your ass.
oh shit! calling all bets, folks!
You did not have an experience with the "redeeming power of Jesus" because if you did then you would be a Christian.
Learn to read, Ray. I was a Christian, as were many others. Christians identical to yourself. The only difference is, you haven't left the faith yet. But you will, if you live long enough.
ah, this is apparently something you didn't quite experience about fundamentalism, and that most people never do until they're out of it. you see, if you can leave, well, evidently you weren't serious in the first place. yeah, you were never really a christian.
similar to "you can't quit! you're fired!"


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 125 of 307 (421316)
09-12-2007 12:43 AM
Reply to: Message 118 by crashfrog
09-11-2007 8:11 PM


Re: I know about Faith
i don't think faith is a choice.
It isn't until you make it one.
you make it sound like a bad habit. think of it more like a mental disorder.
i realize that analogy doesn't help my case, and i'm well aware that you're more than willing to run with it. but the man who says he never does anything the least bit irrational is either a liar, or delusional.


This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 127 by crashfrog, posted 09-12-2007 1:15 AM arachnophilia has replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 137 of 307 (421394)
09-12-2007 2:02 PM
Reply to: Message 134 by Taz
09-12-2007 12:53 PM


Re: I know about Faith
I think we all have that voice deep down that tell us we like having some kind of supernatural protector watching over us at times.
i think that to some extent it's hard wired into the human neurochemistry. not to the jaynes extent, but i think it's fairly obvious that the human brain works in ways that often defy logic and rationality. especially when we start throwing emotions into the mix.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 138 of 307 (421395)
09-12-2007 2:05 PM
Reply to: Message 127 by crashfrog
09-12-2007 1:15 AM


Re: I know about Faith
you make it sound like a bad habit.
It is, but it's one you can break with practice.
that's like "falling in love is a bad habit." yeah, you could probably break it if you tried.
Well, I agree, but that doesn't mean we have to go around consciously accepting propositions on the basis of no good evidence.
that's just my point -- it's not a conscious decision. people don't rationally accept the irrational. creationsim tries to make it sound that way, but they're liars about everything else too.


This message is a reply to:
 Message 127 by crashfrog, posted 09-12-2007 1:15 AM crashfrog has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 150 by crashfrog, posted 09-12-2007 6:24 PM arachnophilia has replied

arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 139 of 307 (421396)
09-12-2007 2:13 PM
Reply to: Message 128 by iceage
09-12-2007 1:38 AM


Re: I know about Faith
I can relate to Arach.
As a result of some experiences (which I don't want to go into) in my formative years I find I still have some nagging sense of, or tendency to rely on "faith" or believing in a patriarchal anthropomorphic personal God. Silly as I know it is from all the research, reasoning and ceiling gazing that I have done. Maybe it is PTSD or imprinting I am not sure.
it's hard to get rid of, yes, when it's a certain kind of faith.
Or maybe it is because I am a skeptic's skeptic and I find myself being skeptical of being skeptical.
there is line between skepticism and activism. the skeptic looks at all the "evidence" and says "the ecosystem of loch ness does not appear to be able to support a large marine reptile, and all of the photos and videos are adequately explained by trickery or natural phenomenon, therefor there probably is not a large scientifically undiscovered animal in the lake." the advocate says "the witnesses are liars. there never was and never will be a 'nessie' and you're an idiot if you think it might be a possibility"
those are two very different statements. one can phrase and logically argue that the abscence of evidence helps argue for evidence of abscence in a way that remains open to new evidence. or one can go straight for the throat, make definitive statements, and not provide any real argument or justification.
one is skepticism. the other might as well be faith.
Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.


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arachnophilia
Member (Idle past 1344 days)
Posts: 9069
From: god's waiting room
Joined: 05-21-2004


Message 154 of 307 (421482)
09-12-2007 8:50 PM
Reply to: Message 150 by crashfrog
09-12-2007 6:24 PM


Re: I know about Faith
It is once you know you're doing it, Arach. I realize that's the sticking point - becoming aware of your own bad assumptions - but you seem like you're past that point.
so tell me then, crash, once we're aware that we're irrational, and we fail to stop being irrational... what then? you make it sound like the switch from religion to atheism is like changing hats. "i think today i'll wear this one." it's not like that for most people, and you know it. most people have a harder time trying to quit smoking than the way you portray this.
but see maybe that's the problem. maybe it is just switching hats for you. leaving fundamentalism, and i mean really leaving fundamentalism is like coming down off heroin. it's long, and painful, and it tears most people apart from the inside out. no, the only quick seemingly rational decision is just switching hats, without actually changing. your new hat may say exactly the opposite of your old hat, but until your attitude really changes, it's just a new reactionary expression of the very same flaw. the fact that you downplay something like this tells me that you've never really gone through it. you just converted; transferred laterally. you gave up the heroin in favor of abusing methadone. and then you sell try to sell us on it by acting like an addict. the real path involves the gradual withering of fanaticism. maybe, for some, fanatical atheism (like methadone) is easier to be weened off of -- but that's still the gradual process that does it, not the switch itself. and the new drug can be abused just as easily as the old one.
crash, you act irrationally. you argue your points irrationally. you stick to and repeat refuted arguments, and claim they're "logic." you word it more coherently than ray does, but the both of you seem to think that by putting the word "logically" in a post, it will make it so. you once called me -- me! with the hebrew signature! -- an antisemite. sometimes, it's like you live in opposite world right along with the bushites and the fundies. you rarely ever even hint that you could be wrong, and frequently insert your ideology into fields you know little about. you tend to paint things as completely black or completely white, never nuanced. your first reaction is to insult and flame, and arrogantly condescend. you can be every bit as mean, or meaner than someone like faith ever was, and just as selective in what you want to hear. and then you want to tell us that this is the high ground in the debate? i don't say this to be mean myself. i say this because in this thread you hold yourself up as an example: someone that was a christian, and then got better. but i don't see the improvement, and i know i'm not alone here. for the way you act sometimes, you might as well still be a fundamentalist.
i realize that, with your history, it is very hard not to have a spiteful attitude towards religion. remember that i have had the same (or worse) experiences as you had. i've seen the destructive power of fundamentalist christianity firsthand, as have you. but behaving just like them is not the answer. anger and spite is not the answer. reactionary drivel is not the answer. logic would dictate that if you were a victim, they probably are too. the answer is the compassion they should have -- the real "moral" high ground. and answer is cool and calm discussion, and often years of study and hard work on their parts. you cannot simply force your beliefs or lack thereof on people. not anymore than a creationist who comes here, asserting that god made the world, and then cursing at anyone who disagrees. you do as much harm to rational thought as that christian does for his case.
i also realize that this post will probably get me suspended, as it constitutes a personal attack. i do not mean it as such; merely a critique. you are intelligent and well spoken, but you collect very little respect or credulity for your position because your behaviour or your condescending attitude often gets in the way. you make "rational atheism" seem like just another religion, which is not your intent. you have only given up christianity, but have failed to let go of your fundamentalist ways.
Faith is conscious, though, because "faith" is the rationale people use to defend those assumptions when they are challenged.
no. faith is subconscious. belief is conscious. and they are two very different things. even religious people may confuse the two, but they are not the same. belief is something that changes easily in comparison.
What's stopping you?
i think the more important question is about what's stopping you. i know what road i'm on, and i know where it leads.
Edited by arachnophilia, : editted to add "black and white"


This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
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