My Crisis: Is my God really not real?

[PortraitOfSanity]

Originally Posted by vja110570

I'm not sure I quite follow what you meant by "another bullshit religion meant to make money for someone". Would you care to elaborate please?

Wicca. The religion's purpose was for a guy to sell books

[vja110570]

Originally Posted by PortraitOfSanity

Wicca. The religion's purpose was for a guy to sell books

Ah, I see what you mean. I don't follow along with how Gerald Gardner did it. I am very much a solitary practitioner. Thank you for clarifying!

[PortraitOfSanity]

That's like saying you're a Catholic, but then saying you don't follow what the Pope does...

[JCC]

Originally Posted by PortraitOfSanity

That's like saying you're a Catholic, but then saying you don't follow what the Pope does...

Actually, it's more like saying you're a Christian, but you don't believe in any of that weird Jesus stuff.

[Godslayer Jillian]

I don't like when people say they dislike THE CHURCH, but not THE RELIGON.
Why?
Religion is inherently hierarchical and authoritarian. It's almost a contradiction to keep saying the religion is true but not the institution.

[mindless1]

Originally Posted by vja110570

Ah, I see what you mean. I don't follow along with how Gerald Gardner did it. I am very much a solitary practitioner. Thank you for clarifying!

I think he invented it based upon Aleister Crowley; his original draft of his 'book of shadows' was based upon Aleister Crowley, some of the rites were. The idea of each 'witch' carrying a book of shadows and keeping it a secret was a way of propogating his cult, he told his members of the witch cult to write down his book word for word as to trick people to believing that these books were the real deal. Wicca is a religion based off a cult. Wiccans believe that Witches are Wiccans, when Wicca in fact is just so different.

Witchcraft predates Christianity but is not isolated to one culture.

[gothicusmaximus]

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

Religion is inherently hierarchical and authoritarian. It's almost a contradiction to keep saying the religion is true but not the institution.

While most major world religions do incorporate some element of fealty to a higher power, I can easily conceive of a religion that didn't encourage its followers to acknowledge or operate within a hierarchy.

[mindless1]

Not many. Not even Unitarian Universalists....

[gothicusmaximus]

I don't know of any, probably because the escapist impulse that spawns religions often manifests as a desire for some spectral nanny to protect one and make one's decisions, but I can imagine one, and I'm sure one exists somewhere.
I'm just saying its not impossible to reconcile spirituality with independence from hierarchy.

[mindless1]

You made a point but can you name at least one?

[Magila]

Originally Posted by Drake Dun

Well, I think there are problems with (1) and (2), but let me just concede both of those for the sake of argument. So we'll assume (3), that the universe had a beginning.

I'm still not seeing how you go from (3) to (4). It looks like several steps are missing in between. Would you care to fill them in for me?

Sovetcke @ hotmail dot com

let's talk there.

[gothicusmaximus]

Originally Posted by mindless1

You made a point but can you name at least one?

As I said, I don't know of any, primarily because such a belief system would, by nature, be confined to a small group, as dissemination of the faith in the absence of an establishment to issue official decrees and such is difficult. However, consider a group that worships an aspected deity, an equal part of which divinity's consciousness dwells in the soul of every person, or an animistic faith that holds no shaman or sorcerer to have a greater capacity for spiritual communion than anyone else. It's not too difficult to imagine.

[Godslayer Jillian]

It's actually quite beautiful to imagine. Why can't people believe that, instead of that women are a fucking rib tumor?

[LaBelleDameSansMerci]

Originally Posted by Godslayer Jillian

Religion is inherently hierarchical and authoritarian. It's almost a contradiction to keep saying the religion is true but not the institution.

I think it's people who are inherently hierarchical, and they create religions based on that. There's nothing saying that there could be a divine being that is equal to everyone else. Th...
Wait. Never mind. I think you're right, Jillian. People needed creator figures, so they created things with superpowers (though not necessarily supermorality). A deity without superpowers is an imaginary human/animal.

Also, most religions I think have been corrupted from what they originally were. They lose their point after a while. People start seeking power and twisting things to their advantage and creating hierarchies.

[Saya]

Even the religions that emphasizes individual effort (like Buddhism and Taoism) have a sort of hierarchy, a student-teacher relationship. And whats weird about that is even though you're not supposed to take the words of your teacher as holy undisputable truth, some people do say "Well MY teacher said......" and won't question them. I can't really think of any religion that doesn't even have teachers :/

[LaBelleDameSansMerci]

Even religions that wouldn't have a teacher-student hierarchy would probably have a deity-human hierarchy.

[mindless1]

That's because humans are morons. And no one is independent.

[MiaMore]

You acknowledge there is a God... therefore, you have faith.

Your title seems a bit redundant. I'm guessing you are young.

It's good to question things, especially when it comes to your belief system.

I hope you find the answer you are searching for.

{I didn't quote here because it seems a bit silly to have your initial post all over this thread}

[Drake Dun]

Originally Posted by vja110570

I must interject here. I think that people on here are content to think that Christianity is an evil religion... The original ideas were to value others above yourself and to lead a cheerfully fulfulling life. The confusion comes in when people associate the essence of the religion with the church heirarchy...

If you define the religion on the basis of the collective beliefs of people who currently adopt the label, that's wrong. If you define it on the basis of what's written in its holy text... that's still wrong, because that holy text is the process of an editorial process carried out by a power structure of exactly the sort you're talking about. If you go back even further and define it on the basis of what was said by its seminal figures and by early believers... you're right, and wrong, and both and neither, since there is no consistency at that stage. So in any case we have no position to stand in and say that the "real" Christianity is good and all the bad stuff is the fault of the church.

If you have a particular interpretation of Christian ideas which renders it harmless, more power to you. Just don't go pretending that it's representative of something that it isn't.

[Drake Dun]

Originally Posted by mindless1

You made a point but can you name at least one?

You have to go to crank.net for stuff like that. The big, visible religions are all the vicious hierarchical ones, presumably because being vicious and hierarchical is a good way to become big and visible. Check out crank.net and you'll find no end of cool whacky belief systems. I can read that stuff for hours. And yes, some of them are touching and beautiful. Others... not so much, lol

[Saya]

Do Jainists have a hierarchy?

[Drake Dun]

Interesting question. I don't know anything about them other than what I read today on Wikipedia. They sound like a good bunch, assuming the article is fair.

[PortraitOfSanity]

Originally Posted by mindless1

I think he invented it based upon Aleister Crowley

*palmface*

[vja110570]

Originally Posted by Drake Dun

If you define the religion on the basis of the collective beliefs of people who currently adopt the label, that's wrong. If you define it on the basis of what's written in its holy text... that's still wrong, because that holy text is the process of an editorial process carried out by a power structure of exactly the sort you're talking about. If you go back even further and define it on the basis of what was said by its seminal figures and by early believers... you're right, and wrong, and both and neither, since there is no consistency at that stage. So in any case we have no position to stand in and say that the "real" Christianity is good and all the bad stuff is the fault of the church.

If you have a particular interpretation of Christian ideas which renders it harmless, more power to you. Just don't go pretending that it's representative of something that it isn't.

I see. Well, I never was an expert in Christianity, so I apologize for the mistake.

[Drake Dun]

No worries. You're definitely right that the Catholic church has been responsible from some pretty screwed up stuff, anyway.