How did you come to your belief system?

Well, kicky. I was raised in the Baptist Church. Even at a young age I questioned things because they seemed contradictory. My Mom and Dad never forced anything on me, but the hell fire and damnation stuff scared me to death. I look back now and realized that I suffered panic attacks as a kid, but, of course, I didn't know that. Today, I am still spiritual, but no longer attend church as I see it as an extension of one's social life.

Trial and error, trial and error.

My parents exposed us to Biblical traditions and the King James Version as literature but left us free to draw our own conclusions.

I was raised in a family that paid no attention to religion whatsoever. I remember being P.O.'d as a second grader having to recite the Lord's Prayer every morning.

Once I had a lovely woman in my world. She was from Tennessee and S Baptist. She tried to convert me to Christianity and I tried , I really tried. I wanted to be in her world so bad...but in the end I just couldn't stomach the dogma and I had to let her go.

A strange thing happened a year ago. My father who was a sort of lapsed Jew wanted me to take him to a synagogue. I think he wanted to make amends for his wandering. We sat through the service and I helped him stand up at various points but I was struck by the thought that all that mumbo-jumbo meant nothing to me. I'm glad that Jews and Christians get sustanance from their religion, I don't.

One of the great things about you Kicky is that you teach us to lay ourselves bare. There are times when your loneliness and fear of the unknown seep through your posts. I respect the way you stop, shrug your shoulders and go on your merry way. You give a lot of people joy. I should be so clever.

My brother-in-law was Catholic and an altar boy. As he was dying, my sister asked if he wanted her to have a priest come and bless the family cemetery. He said simply, "NO!"

My dad, for some reason, wanted a wake. He wasn't religious, but I think he must have been spiritual.

Thanks for the input guys. It's interesting to me to see how people's belief systems evolve, or if they evolve at all.

I would like to amend my original post though. I didn't mean to imply that all religious people are stupid. But whenever I talk about stuff like this, I think of my insane family, and the cult-like mentality that they all seem to have, and it pisses me off to no end. That is where the "stupid" comment came from. I'm not really that angry at religion or god, most of the time.

And Panzade, thank you for your kind words. It's nice to know that my particular brand of insanity is helpful and entertaining to some of you guys.

I have no belief system--the why is no one's business but my own.

When Thomas Jackson died, it is reported that his last words were: "Let us cross over the river and lie down in the shade of the trees." That is how i would like to go, strolling off in my mind to lie down in the shade of the trees.

Falstaff babbled of green fields.

I believe Brer Set was born and raised in the briar patch.

...and doomed to domesticate Tar Babys.

Kicky
Your first paragraph of this thread sounded pretty much like the way I was brought up. 12 years of catholic school, uniforms, Not questioning. Freaked me out a little.

In my world, men did not go to church, women and children did. Men were too busy earning a living. At least that what my mother told me when I asked why dad didn't come to church.

When I was around 15 my mother and I both got really bad colds or flu or something, and didn't go to church for 3 weeks.
I remember the 4th week feeling lots better and expected to go. My mother never made a move to get dressed to go or said anything, so neither did I.
That was the last time I went into a church unless it was for a wedding or funeral or something.
That was so weird - I wondered why all of a sudden it was ok not to go, just because the person who drove the car didn't.
I think I felt a strange type of guilt for a while - between that and going through the other growing up experiences, I thought there was no hope for me.
To be honest, I never enjoyed or looked forward to going to church even once in my entire life - It was just something you had to do. Yet I considered myself religious.
I remember leaving church - you know, the priest saying "go in peace" and never getting as far as the car before my mother was yelling at me or one of my brothers or sisters.
There was just such a disconnect. I never thought for a moment there was anything strange about that, until one day I noticed my mother was the only one yelling at anyone.
My father was strictly a Xmas/Easter man. I did everything I could to try not to be sitting next to him, so I wouldn't have to touch him during that "sign of peace" crap.

For pretty much most of my young adult years I still considered myself catholic - it was just a familiar name to call yourself, because jeez, you had to call yourself Something!
Then it seemed for a while all these born again christians were telling me that "theirs" was the only way.
I hated the pretentiousness of that. Just leave me alone.
It did bring up old fears of going to hell though.
I went through a period where it seemed everyone was saying theirs was the right way - well that's pretty bad odds when you are only supposed to choose one.
Slowly I've come to the sense that God is in everything - and everything is of God.
I see God in a potato or in the act of preparing the potato to eat. Things always seem to taste better.
I'm trying to get to the point of where God will let me see where the meaning is in some of this.
Mostly I know God is not me.

I few years back, my father was dying of cancer - I remember my mom telling me that she was praying to God and "telling" him to do something.
I asked her if she realized that she was thinking she could order the almighty supreme being of the universe around.

I now can see the humor in that, but I'm still appalled.

I have to approach God alone - I can't open up when others are around slapping my back, grabbing me and making me eat cassarole

logic and truth are how i came to my belief system. that is how everyone should come to theirs as well.

Mine is still evolving. I grew up in a Methodist family, but we weren't regular church-goers (just the holidays, it seemed). I pretty much turned into a lazy agnostic through high school, college, post-grad, career and through most of my <so-called> adulthood. About 4 years or so ago, I was going through a lot of hard changes in my life and came to the Peggy Lee song, "Is That All There Is?" I began to read more, particularly C.S. Lewis, who came to a spiritual awakening late in his life. His writings actually began to point the way to the pure logic of believing in some Higher Power. I still struggle with it and like Kicky, was thoroughly indoctrinated by rock and roll, George Carlin and other vehicles of non-belief. At the end of the day, though, I guess I'd rather believe that there is something more than this twirling ball of earth and water. I guess I <we> will all find out sooner or later <as the man said>, eh?

Like Set....I have no belief system.

you can't have no belief system. your belief system could be that you believe in nothing, but you can't have no belief system

Oh really!

Is that written is some book somewhere????


One most assuredly CAN have no belief system....and I am one who does not have a belief system.

Try to deal with that....rather than trying to remake reality.

Okay, so how did you come to your non-belief system then? What were some of the things that made you a non-believer?

then your belief system is that you believe in nothing, which is a belief system.

Often I think: like Elvis, God has left the building.

I was raised in a mixed religious household, but was briefly a Jesus freak as a teenager. Like others mentioned- the more I learned, the more I questioned and the less I realized I knew. I went to a bible study class and thought about all the contradictions, misogyny and downright nastiness portrayed in it's pages and tossed it in a trash can on the way home one night. I thought what a better place the world would be without it. Family values? More like incest, brutality, ignorance and outright hate - and that from the supposedly good people.

I like to think there is a big spiritual world out there with a loving being at the head of it all, but I don't believe anyone is pulling the strings. I think prayer is comforting, but meaningless as to the outcome. I do think if there is a heaven it takes the form of a conscious - you are suddenly given insight into your own actions. You see yourself as others have seen you. You experience yourself as others have experienced you. And you feel both all the pain and joy you have caused in your life. How else can we learn about ourselves?

And if the fundimentalists are right - I take comfort in the saying: "God loves an honest doubter"