What are your thoughts on religion and god

[Jay]

There's simply SO much about this matter that summing up for a post reply is sure to be an over-simplification. The fact is there are the dogmatic, black and white, seemingly simple responses all the way through the spectrum to the overwhelmingly complex and multi-faceted perceptions. For me, in deliberate recovery, studying from one end to the other has grown from a strategic tool to and entertaining pass time and hobby. Your post doesn't get very specific about the "how and the why" of it all, but it does remind me of Father Leo Booth who is "famous" in the recovery world for his lectures and writings about religious abuse and how to heal and grow beyond such. One of his excerpts frames the value of "inquisitiveness" and highlights some of the essence of the subject from a more spiritually inclined side of the spectrum. I think it still applies to the other end of that spectrum as well but that's deep stuff for my time on this post.

When you wrote religion abuse, the first thing that I thought - Hmm, perhaps God/Creator creates all these and say, "Okay, I've done my stuff and you folks can do whatever you want with it." Perhaps there was no actual religion at the beginning and earth was just a white canvas and we, humans created religions for selfish reasons. We abuse the canvas for our own benefit. 

When I was younger, I was taught that prophet Mohammed was able to get water out of his hands, Moses divided the red sea and so on. Their followers believe them until this very day. The thing is if today, I tell you that I'm a prophet, have received message from God to create new religion and can do magical stuff, people would laugh and send me to a mental institute. In my country, few people have claimed they are the new prophets but yet people laughed. However, people have no issue to believe the previous prophets with no evidence whatsoever. 

Sorry Chad, I've gone random a bit.

Appreciate your thoughts on this matter. Thanks!