re: For the ppl who believed in God but dont anymore or whose pa

Quoting Wallah:“ Yeah talk about having a hard time! But all the prophets suffered loss, bad things happen to good people too.”

Yeah Job's was the worst IMO and that's why it comes to mind every time something bad happens to me. I mean he was a good Christian, he didn't sin. Yet God allowed all that to happen to him. God Himself didn't do it, he LET it happen. The thing I love about the story is that he NEVER in all this lost his faith, even when his own wife kept telling him to damn God.

i can tell you many times I have been tested with my faith. I question all the time why does bad things happen to good people. One thing I've come to realize threw all the bad things I've been going threw is, that in those times when I feel like my world is falling apart, I find myself being drawn to God. I'm not sure if before the bad things were happening I was going a stray, but with what I'm going threw with my dog, I know that God is with me. And though I pray that Dylan will be ok, I have to remember that sometimes the answers to my prayer, is going to be "no". It's not always going to go my way, but it's going God's way. I believe everything happens for a reason. Good, bad and ugly. Alot of it doesn't make sense at the time, but I've seen many ugly things play out for the better in the long run. All of this is just my opinion, it's how I deal with the things I've been threw in life. It's easy to blame God and to think he is horriable for allowing bad things to happen. But when we lose someone we love, and we cry about it. We are just crying for ourselves, if we believe they are in heaven, why would we want to keep them on this earth that is full of sin and where bad things happen. We will be reunited with our loved one and God is with us until that day.

Quoting Ari&J'sMommy:“ What made you quit believing or never believe even though your parents did?”

I grew up Catholic. I can say that at best, my belief in God was always tenuous, because the concept just never made much sense to me. I wanted to believe, but I never could, not fully. I questioned for a long time, even after I'd stopped considering myself Catholic, but I could never get it to make sense, and eventually I went looking for other religions that might make sense, and none of them did, either. I have to imagine it's partially the way my brain is wired, and it's not even so much that I need answers and that religion/God doesn't provide them, because I don't believe we can ever know anything, in a manner of speaking, but when I observe the universe with my senses, the scientific view of the universe is the one my brain can comprehend the best.

C.

I feel like there have been several times that I have doubted the existence of God but for me, it would always come to a point where I had to either believe or throw it all out the window and I just couldn't help but believe. I used to think that God somehow controlled everything that happens in the world but I feel like my faith has matured a lot in the last few years or so and I don't see God like that anymore. I don't know how involved he is in our daily lives, I think he cares about what we do and I definitely think he grieves with us when tragedy hits but I don't think he sits on some throne and decides that I need to learn some grand lesson so it's time to give me a baby that won't survive after she is born. I think tragedy is just a part of this life, everyone experiences it at some point or another. To me, the involvement of God in tragedy is kind of dependent on us. We can either cling to him or run from him.

Wow, everyone has a lot to say on the subject. I can sum up my reasons for no longer believing in God in one word.

Education.

I hope no one is offended by this! Its not meant to be a general statement, just my experience.

Quoting HippieMommieArmyWife:“ Wow, everyone has a lot to say on the subject. I can sum up my reasons for no longer believing in God ... [snip!] ... God in one word. Education. I hope no one is offended by this! Its not meant to be a general statement, just my experience.”

That is why this is in D&D, to hear every side.

Quoting HippieMommieArmyWife:“ Wow, everyone has a lot to say on the subject. I can sum up my reasons for no longer believing in God ... [snip!] ... God in one word. Education. I hope no one is offended by this! Its not meant to be a general statement, just my experience.”

Education? So those of us that believe in God are uneducated?

I do not believe that is what she means. I believe she means that education she received is what led her not to believe. That doesn't mean you're uneducated, but you've either received a different education, or you've interpreted the education you received differently.

I do however realize I could be mistaken.

C.

Quoting Ari&J'sMommy:“ What made you quit believing or never believe even though your parents did?”

No one could answer my questions as to why things where the way that they where. I hate being told because that is the way things are/where. I also hated the fact that there was no proof to back up God and there was all this proof to back up other theories.

for me, it was after an extensive study of the bible itself.

Nothing made sense to me. There were too many things that didn't fit.

Quoting Ari&J'sMommy:“ What made you quit believing or never believe even though your parents did?”

it was an evolving process that started around the age of ten.

i grew up w/out a father around-- and so i was quite happy to replace him w/ god as child, but as i became more aware of how the world works and christianity itself, i started to see things i just couldn't deny.

if god loves everyone as they claim, then why is he willing to send everyone to hell forever? i mean, that's insane! any clear thinking lawyer would tell you that the "crime"of disbelief in an invisible being is not matched to the punishment of eternal damnation.

i never felt like a sinner, never felt guilty, despite being continually told that i was one, that i should be repenting... it just never stuck, even as a child, i never felt the guilt that i was supposed to be feeling. .. and i suppose a part of me just never really believed in an invisible judge in the first place.

by the time i got to college and was finally able to analyze the claims of the bible through a scientific lens-- using actual research and verifiable data, the rest just disintegrated-- any remnant hope that there was some supernatural all-powerful god interested in me and my daily struggles went *poof!* the actual facts are really stacked against the bible

and when you sit down and analyze it from a real-world standpoint, it all becomes as ludicrous as believing in santa.

there's an invisible being who will never speak to you directly, will never manifest himself in any verifiable way-- yet you're supposed to worship him and let him dictate your day-to-day life?

and his guidebook-- the bible?

it's a bazillion years old, written by hundreds of crusty crazy old men, translated six thousand gazillion (yes, that's the official number) times, completely outdated and irrelevant in many of its laws, and totally offensive to women, homosexuals, children, and anyone who has a modicum of self-respect or a humane view of justice and society.

I have always been unsure. In fact, I cannot recall a time where I ever believed. I just don't know. I can't say for sure that there is no higher power or some kind because things have happened that have made me want to believe. I have gone (of my own accord) to many different churches, bible studies and read the bible and there've been too many questions unanswerable for me.

Why do you guys stop at the Bible? Sure the Bible never made any sense to me for the same reasons many of you have stated, but did you try to learn about other religions?

Quoting Wallah:“ Why do you guys stop at the Bible? Sure the Bible never made any sense to me for the same reasons many of you have stated, but did you try to learn about other religions?”

i'm highly critical of the religion i was raised in-- and once i debunked that, i never really felt compelled to replace it.

i've looked into other religions but not w/ the intent of finding greater meaning as they're largely all the same in that it they require some measure of faith in a variety of unbelievable things (mostly invisible supernatural powers/tales/nonsense).

i feel no need to rely on mystical magical explanations to explain my place in the world, much less be the basis of my morality and ethics.

as a general rule, i don't trust principles and ideas that require faith b/c they can't be verified in the real world and are consequently too easy to manipulate according to personal needs/wants and thus, make for a lousy base by which one may derive meaning, morality, and ethics.

I'm pretty late on this buuut, I grew up a Christian on my own. I was the only one out of my family who went to church and I was extremely involved in it. God was my entire life, and I was convinced that I was "called" to the youth ministry. Around 17 I started questioning Christianity as a whole. There's so many questions that are left unanswered and the only answers I would get from Christians were "Have faith" or "I'm praying for you". I couldn't stand the politics of it and I couldn't handle all of the hypocrisy I saw. It was unacceptable to me, but I was apparently the only one who felt that way.

Maybe there is a god, but there are too many flaws in Christianity that no one can answer for me. I don't understand why God would allow me to literally NOT be able to understand him or his religion (if it is true) especially when I asked for understanding. Idk, that's just my take on it though.