hi,
I was born a Catholic and was a practising Catholic until the age of fifteen, when I just couldn’t believe without any doubts any more. So I stopped going to church but i couldn’t shake off the lingering belief that there might be something to Christianity after all. For years I felt that with all its flaws, Christianity was still better than other religions, most of which sounded barbaric to me.
It’s only been in the last year or so that I have come to realize religion is nonsense, that people who do practise any kind of religion are just following a set of ancient texts and beliefs formulated centuries ago. But I still wonder if there is a God or any kind of superior being that does have a hand in our lives, does control events to some extent.
There is no way anyone could convince me now that religion makes any sense. I know now that all religions are nonsense. I could never believe in any religion again. But I''m still at the point where I''m unsure about that other big question - whether or not to believe there is a God.
I am an Indian and live in India. I have no one in my life with whom I can discuss things like this because all my friends and family are religious. Most people in India are. Atheist is a dirty word here. People look down on anyone who doesn’t believe in God.
I would like the opinion of intelligent people. westerners, since I know most indians, including men of science, just take it for granted there’s a God. All our doctors have idols of Hindu gods in their clinics. do you believe there is any kind of supreme being out there? and why or why not?
Among other things, these are what I’m having trouble with:
the universe is such a vast and spectacular place, I find it incredible it could all have come about by chance or accident. All the millions of planets and galaxies, just like that? A big bang and due to that we have this wonder? Our own planet is filled with such beauty and diversity. I don’t walk around all day marveling at it but when I stop to think of it, it’s pretty amazing, all the variety of life forms we have here and the way everything contributes to our being able to survive here.
On the other hand, the idea that one being created all this is just as unbelievable. How could one being do all this and more to the point, why? If he’s God, he doesn’t need to create humans just to see how they do. Why create us just to test us and see how good we will be? And why create animals too? Presumably they aren’t here to be tested; he isn’t monitoring them to see how good a life they’ve led.
When I look at the world, there is so much random mayhem and suffering that I can discern no logical proof of the existence of any higher being who controls things. it makes no sense to believe in an invisible being who has never shown himself. And yet the one thing that still makes me doubtful is the universe itself. It just seems so incredible to think that the entire universe came into being on its own. All the galaxies - they just formed on their own? Fine, there’s the Big Bang theory but there still had to be something before the Big Bang, matter that was capable of forming into the universe we know today. There was something there to begin with - and it’s so odd to think that something just came into existence on its own. But perhaps it is even more incredible to believe that one being could create all this. How do you explain it?
As far as I can see, there is no believable explanation for the existence of the universe. It makes no sense that something could exist out of nothing, without having been created by someone. But then neither does it make sense that God would wait billions of years to create man, since the universe is billions of years old. When did time even begin?
Up till now I haven’t been too interested in the question of how the universe came into being since I always assumed God created it. If there is no such being, isn’t it an incredible coincidence that intelligent life evolved on its own? Or even unintelligent life. The very existence of the planets is something that has no real explanation. When I did get interested in this question, I read up a bit about theories of how the Universe was formed. Nothing convincingly explains how the planets formed, what was there before all the planets formed that had the potential to become planets, or how one and only one planet could give rise to all the life forms we have on earth.
It almost makes me think the Christian fundamentalists are right when they try to force their Intelligent Design theory on people. Because when you ignore who the theory is coming from and really think about it, isn’t it amazing that everything that exists not only on this earth but in the entire universe, isn’t it amazing to think all this came about by chance or coincidence? Then again…one guy on high creating all this with his bare hands…also unbelievable. It wouldn’t be unbelievable if he ever showed himself but since he never does…how long can I believe in an omnipotent being who controls everything but remains invisible and will never show himself?
When I finally realized I no longer had any faith in any kind of religion, that was very liberating. If there is no God, and there is some convincing proof of that, some logical arguments that could convince me, I''d like to hear them instead of going on believing(doubtfully) in something that doesn’t exist.
If there is a God and you feel there are some good logical arguments in favor of his existence, I''d like to hear those too. I''m willing to believe either way - I just need intelligent arguments, the kind that make sense. After all, one can believe in the existence of God even while knowing religion is nonsense.
These are the other things I''m having a problem with: it’s tough to believe in the existence of a God when there is so much evil and suffering in this world, a world where things like Rwanda and Darfur happen. Where is God when genocide is going on and when people are suffering beyond what the average person is called upon to suffer? The argument some people give against this is, these people may be paying for something they did in a previous life. Not very convincing.
On the other hand, there does seem to be some proof, even if not very convincing proof, of some kind of afterlife. There have been documented cases of people who have recalled who they were in their previous life. I know reincarnation doesn’t really sound like it could exist because where’s the proof, why aren’t we all recalling previous lives? most of us have no recollection of any such thing and it makes sense that if the majority of human beings remember no past life, it’s because there is no such thing. Still, there are those few cases which make one wonder...
And if there is such a thing as an afterlife of any kind, whether reincarnation or anything else, it seems to make sense there must be some kind of spiritual reality beyond what most of us experience in this world.
There have been experiments where scientists have said they’ve proved prayer does work. there have been cases where people have prayed, under controlled scientific conditions, for the health of sick people who have then got better. (I assume the controlled conditions means that the people they prayed for got better while the other lot of sick people they didn’t pray for, the “placebo” group, didn’t get better.) Obviously it’s impossible that everyone could get everything they ever prayed for. But there seems to be some evidence that prayer does work sometimes. I read that doctors say that patients who have some strong religious or spiritual belief tend to heal faster, better. I know, all this could be just coincidence or the power of faith/the mind. Theoretically if you believed in the Abominable Snowman and prayed to him and you convinced your mind he’d answer...chances are, you’d get what you so intensely believed you would. And yes, the most recent studies showed that people who were prayed for actually got worse.
Possibilities that there is some kind of afterlife and possibilities that prayers do get answered, beyond a point where it could be just a coincidence, make me wonder whether there is a God even though common sense and logic would suggest there isn’t. Because if there is one, how come we can’t see him? believing in an invisible God is rather like believing in an invisible dragon somewhere out there...
I feel there are things that happen in this world that can’t be explained by the laws of science. That would seem to indicate some kind of reality beyond the physical reality that is all we can really know for a fact exists. There are people who have claimed they’ve seen ghosts, talked to spirits. Some claim to remember past lives. are all these people lying and is there really nothing beyond the physical reality we all experience? It does seem suspicious that the vast majority of people don’t have these kinds of experiences of the paranormal. Why would only a small percentage have them? I’ve never had any supernatural or mystic experiences and I live in a country where there is great faith in such things.
For years I longed desperately to know for sure whether Jesus was God, whether all the other things christianity said were true. And now finally years later I have reached a resolution on that. I shook off the brainwashing of family and society. But now I need to know whether or not to believe in any kind of supreme being. I''d really like to resolve this without going through all the years of questioning and struggle that I went through while I was struggling with the question of whether or not to believe in christianity. I think religion has caused me enough headache by now and now I need some resolution of the God issue but I can’t get it unless I''m convinced either way. And I really am open to being convinced either way.