Hurt By The Church

[eve1974]

Seeing so many posts about religion gets me wondering:

For those agnostics / atheists ....

can I ask:

are your beliefs because you've been hurt by regions / followers of religion
or
Is it your conclusion based on the academics / science of it
or
is it a combination of both.

Not wanting to stir the pot - just interested.

[Atheist]

eve; I don't think it's academic or scientific with me; it's just obviously wishful thinking. I mean, why should I believe some old book that happens to be the local book? Why not the Koran, or any of the other old books? It's just chance that it happens to be near me. Most of the gods of history are no longer believed in. There seems to be no point in science if you simply say 'god did it.' If god did it, then there's no need to think or to enquire, and I can't accept that - we evolved to have enquiring minds.

[gness]

Oh Atheist! You've reminded me of the little red catechism book I had to learn. Wish I could remember other stuff as well as I can still remember that! :-)

[Atheist]

gness, I can't remember any more at the moment. It was a fun game memorising the stuff to please Mrs Riley; a bit like memorising trigonometry, calculus, Latin, French, the hinterland of Brasil, the tedious History and chemistry. A lot of it meaningless, but all good exercise for a young brain learning to memorise stuff for future reference.

[Atheist]

Tantum ergo sacramentum. Veneremur cernui.....

[gness]

Sadly I remember most of it, Atheist...but then I had to please a nun or get a slap on the legs... :-)

[Atheist]

gness; Unfortunately I didn't have the chance to be slapped by nuns! I got the CB's black stitched whalebone and leather tawse (Which fitted into a tailor-made pocket in their black brotherly robes) only once or twice because I was a clever kid and not a troublemaker.
What's the next bit of the catechism?

[rowanwitch]

Brought up vaguely C of E but by around 10 just couldn't believe the stories, I was really into books about mythology and stories from other cultures and I realised there were so many similar patterns and by 13 I was reading everything I could find on witchcraft and paganism. This was where I realised so much of Christianity was copying or at least using earlier pagan myths. Goddess giving birth to a male child that grows, and sacrificed to be born again etc. I just can't find it in me to believe in deities, or follow a religion as I really believe they are just constructs to control, or explain the at that point in time things that were unknown. By eliminating God, by definition I have to eliminate a Nazarene rebel as the son of God.

[gness]

Would make me cringe to start repeating it all, Atheist....and bring back awful memories of Sister Immaculata.
And I'm working tomorrow so off to bed now with a slightly watered Poitín and a good book....and Dave of course....x

[pastafreak]

I too was brought up as a Catholic...a rather loose version. As a youngster I liked the mystery of the Latin mass. But into my teens I realised I didn't at all care for the church's attitude towards women. This was the mid 60s and when we parted company. A few years later, my elder sister and her husband both converted to the Lutheran church. The family was mystified as to why. I just didn't see what the difference was, so why do it?
I'm open minded in that I believe in letting people get on with whatever their faith is. Just don't try to convince me that yours is RIGHT. It's personal and individual...and sometimes delusional.

[Jackdaw33]

Tantum ergo Sacramentum
Veneremur cernui:
Et antiquum documentum
Novo cedat ritui:
Præstet fides supplementum
Sensuum defectui.
Genitori, Genitoque
Laus et Jubilatio,
Salus, honor, virtus quoque
Sit et benedictio:
Procedenti ab utroque
Compar sit laudatio.
Amen.

[Thisoldbird]

"the Catholic Church is a blight on this world"

Exactly that..
I was hurt by the Catholic church the morning I gave birth to my only child..out of wedlock at the time.
A Canon Wilson paid me a routine hospital visit..ask a few questions..he got to, did I attend church regular..no I didn't. I stopped that when i left school. Did my husband attend church..I'm not married!!

Said Canon steps away from my bedside accusing me of "being with men, many men". The evil old bu*ger left when I gave an answer he didn't want to hear.
Never set foot in a catholic church again.

[gness]

"Being with men, many men"..... probably from his own experience, Thisoldbird....x

[nailit]

//are your beliefs because you've been hurt by regions / followers of religion
or
Is it your conclusion based on the academics / science of it.

After having read the bible, church fathers/doctors, church history, theology, etc...came to the logical conclusion that it was all a mess.
Studied more for years. It was still a mess.
40+ more yrs on....its not just a mess. Its an absolute irreconcilable mess.
A mess of contradictions, theology, ideologies.

And apart from all that, it is a sick doctrine/Idea.
Those, apart from the special few, shall suffer in an eternal torture chamber.
Some of the early church fathers even wrote about how the elect would glorify God or the more by seeing the suffering of the dammed from their privilaged place in heaven

Sickos!
Much like the evangelicals of today.

[naomi24]

Apart from a church leader having me in floods of tears by telling the ten year old me that I was responsible for Jesus’ death and that he went through all that pain and suffering for me, I enjoyed my time with the church. However, years after that ten year old sat guilt-ridden and weeping uncontrollably, questions arose that necessitated, to my mind, further investigation, and so setting the church’s teachings aside I examined the residue - and hence reached what I consider to be an incontrovertible conclusion. If a creator God does exist, it’s not the God of the bible - and for anyone who has the wherewithal to check that out, forget everything you've been taught about religion and really - really - read the bible. All the evidence you want is there - well, that's for those who want the evidence.

Incidentally, grudges are self-destructive - which is why I don’t hold them. The clock can’t be turned back and nothing can be changed. Therefore the sensible thing to do is acknowledge that and move on.

[Theland]

My parents were a mixed marriage in a part of Liverpool much divided along religious grounds.
I could share many horror stories regarding the RC church, to emphasise the posts from Gness.
They are evil.

[naomi24]

The Christian doctrine of sin, punishment, and eternal hell is evil - regardless of its specific source.

[mjwman]

I just spent ages on a rant about the futility of religion and its effects but my finger slipped and I lost it. Hmm divine intervention?

[naomi24]

I type long answers in a Word document and copy and paste them here. Safer that way.

[Bobbisox1]

That’s a fab idea Naomi ; thanks)

Re Church, my Dad would say
“Churches are for sinners”

[andy-hughes]

I find it hard to explain the absence of a belief, it is simply 'not there'.

I find daily evidence for the absence of a loving God - as does everyone, but believers put it down to 'Sin' and 'God's Plan' which is a catch-all get-out-of-jail-free card for any of those thorny questions that arise in the mind of anyone with an intelligence level above an eight-year-old.

But what seals it for me is the horrible patronising "I've got something you need, and that allows me to patronise you from a great height ..." attitude of the fervents on here.

I won't be patronised by anyone for any reason ever, and that certainly applies to those who imagine that their faith gives them a licence to metaphorically tut and sigh at people like me who 'don't understand' like they do.

A plague on on all their houses.