Do you believe in God?

[Zet]

The more I think about religion, the more I find the question about god, gods or no-gods irrelevant. To me at least, isn't the matter to worship a deity that makes up for a faith, instead it's about the spiritual enlightenment to choose to become a better person and choose to do what is best overall, for the world and humankind, and not what is best for your own selfish desires. That is religion to me, to dedicate you and your life not to harm or abuse anything in anyway, for any reason at all.

[oiramittedeneb]

(Sorry, this wasn´t supposed to be this long, but I had a lot of free time in the office today ._.)

Well, I´m going to get pedantic (or at least that´s the word my brother uses every time I speak of the subject, which I don´t think I am) but yesterday I was too tired to expand the idea. Here is a perspective:

Well, my affirmation of God requires that at the same time I reject its existence. It’s a little complicated to explain, perhaps, but God does not exist and because of this I cannot be an atheist and I live with faith (which is different from certitude, being faith an affirmation of my full and unanswerable doubt about God). I don´t think existence (in a “strong” way) conditions the effects, because of this I can’t deny reality to the effects of the imaginary or ideological (I´ll explain this below). We could say that justice does not exist, yet we try to make laws just. God could be an analogy of this non-existing justice. God does not exist, but behind its inexistence you have a whole story that seems to try to answer/dominate its [effective] inscrutable mystery (or lack of). At the end, the theodicy is trying to comprehend what people try to answer when speaking about God (or god)

We could say in this sense that democracy, to put an example, it’s a human construct, conformed and quasi-consolidated by persons, and in this way we can speak of God. Whatever is said about God is a human construct, and as such is as disposable as any other concept that does not stick to a “strong” reality. However, such conclusion seems to me quite incomplete, since democracy as an ideal or justice in itself is not a vagary, but a search to improve the condition of “something”, of our lives, a perfection of our society or our justice (apply the vocabulary as necessary). I don´t think we can speak of empty constructs that sprung from leisure. There’s something behind all this that motivates us, however I am not trying to say that this impulse is God or that it comes from God (or that justice comes from God). No, I´m just making an example with the concept of justice and how we are motivated to make justice, an inexistent concept that moves us to give justice some form of reality (contingent, since its inexistence weakens and destroys whatever form of reality we give it). In this sense, the idea is trying to comprehend what is the impulse that gives “reality” to the religious through the idea of God; but the same as justice, the religious result is contingent and it’s supported in the inexistence of God. In this sense is that I have faith in God.

Obviously I´m not a great theologian or philosopher, all of the above is of course pretty much influenced by authors I´ve read. But that´s how I´ve synthetize my very questionable view. Also, bear in mind that this is a perception of God/god, I don´t think I´ve given enough to infer conclusions regarding prayer, liturgy, or specificities on religion.

[lovefuku]

I believe in God not Religious , God is like love,you can feel but can't see or maybe can't prove, this feeling is both universal and personal experience.

[Pix]

I believe in God not Religious , God is like love,you can feel but can't see or maybe can't prove, this feeling is both universal and personal experience.

I liked what someone said, that spirituality is personal and individual, as opposed to a cult where a great guru tells you what to think or organized religion where your spiritual beliefs are subject to democracy. That said, perhaps the UUs aren't so easily defined as spiritual or religious...

And I also wanted an excuse to share this again:




Of course the less noble side of me is happy that plenty of fundies had to rend their garments over that scene. :tongue:

[Bowyn Aerrow]

I have no other choice but to now say that no, there is no God/god.

From my own personal experience in life, if there is a God/god they are a cruel, horrible prankster and I doubt I would live in a universe with that sort of deity.

Since I cannot accept (I am unable to accept) the concept of a All Powerful being who knowingly allows such horrors to unfold, such cruel tricks, I can only conclude that God (or gods) cannot and do not exist.

[Genersis]

I have no other choice but to now say that no, there is no God/god.

From my own personal experience in life, if there is a God/god they are a cruel, horrible prankster and I doubt I would live in a universe with that sort of deity.

Since I cannot accept (I am unable to accept) the concept of a All Powerful being who knowingly allows such horrors to unfold, such cruel tricks, I can only conclude that God (or gods) cannot and do not exist.

Well, most ills of the world caused by humans tends to fall under "allowed to happen due to free will", though you probably knew that already.

This seems like something you've probably been struggling with for a while, and while I am no Christian, from what you have said on this site, you were obviously very committed to the idea of God existing at at least one point in your life; I still feel I should say that matters of religion like this shouldn't be rushed, which is my standard answer for issues of faith.

[Kiid]

I believe in a thing called love :3