Dhaeron

I'm no christian, but talking about sides, let's try out the other side of Pascal's Wager.

I assume you're one denomination of christian. So, why aren't you afraid of Allah putting you in hell for believing in a false god? Or of Thor and Odin, cause i bet you've been slacking with your weekly sacrifices? From reading some greek mythology, you can see that that whole pantheon does unpleasant things to humans who don't worship them enough.

If you believe out of fear, you'd better make damn sure you believe in the correct god, or you're pretty much screwed. I don't know of a way to figure out what god that is, tell me if you find one.

DarlingSin

I attempted a rewrite of that speech last year, but instead made it about the culture war between faith and reason:

To lie, or not to lie; that is my dilemma:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to deceive
with lies and sorrows of outrageous beliefs,
Or to take arms against a school of liars,
and by opposing end them? To lie is to sleep
evermore, and by a sleep to say they end.
The head-ache and the thousand natural lies
that mind will cling to, 'tis a consumation
divine that is wished. To lie is to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the crux
Yet in the sleep of life what memes may come,
When we have shuffled off this immortal coil,
must give us pause, when time reflect
that makes calamity of divine life;
For those would bear the whips and scorns of lies,
The decievers tome, his proud irrelevancy,
Defangs our despised truth, his lies relay
the insolence, his malice, and his spurs
the latent demerit of his unworthy fakes
which he himself would quietly make
With nary a grumble he would model there
and grunt and sweat over a complete lie
And that his dread of nothing after death
the undiscoverable country from whose bourn
no traveller returns and puzzles their will
And makes them rather bear those lies they have
Than tell of truths that we know all of
Thus conscience makes not cowards of the truth
And superlative truth our resolution
Is sprinkled o'er with the great mast of thought,
and enterprises of great thought and moment
With this rearguard their deceit dies away
And lose to the name of factual. Truth you know!
The fair Atheist! Wide in thy horizons
in all our memes remember'd

JPD

Or that if somehow God does exist, it bears no relationship whatsoever to the contents of any purported texts/recitations from the mouth/brain of God and we aren't going to know anything about it.

Live your life. Think what you want to think. Feel what you want to feel.
Careful you don't get arrested on the last one!

David Vestal

Here's my advice. It's what got me out of precisely the situation you're in.

Firstly, make a hobby of studying apologetics and counterapologetics. Pick a subject (say, the Resurrection, or Messianic prophecies), and read all arguments for and against their validity you can find. Soon, you'll begin to think it increasingly incredible that people actually believe it. With time, this translates into not just an inability to believe it, but also an inability to fear it.

Secondly, here's an argument for you: the idea of an omnibenevolent, perfectly loving god is completely incompatible with the idea of that god creating a place of infinite torture of the most unimaginably cruel sort. These two ideas simply can't be reconciled; infinite, eternal punishment is so far out of proportion to ANY crime, much less the crime of being some 13-year-old African Pygmy kid who dies of starvation without ever having heard of such nonsense as christianity, that it deserves no thought or fear.

Furthermore, if people go to hell even if their only crime was to not have heard of god (which will happen, according to the bible), then that is not a just god. Again, it's contradictory.

So...don't sweat it. But if you can't help it, make the study of it your hobby for a few months, and it'll clear that fear right up.

gtgauvin

Aside from the issues of justice and philosophy regarding death and judgement and all, if you're a scientifically-minded person, I'd recommend taking some neuroscience books out of your local library. I'd personally recommend V.S. Ramachandran or Antonio Damasio. If you're experiencing anxiety about an afterlife (and I've been there), it's oddly liberating to learn that all that makes us who and what we are occurs in a football-sized lump of grey goo. When you approach the brain sciences with a spirit of intellectual honesty, it's surprising to find how quickly the soul hypothesis and post-mortem consciousness fall to Occam's Razor.

Mace

Thanks... you know I actually never started thinking like this until I came here?

I should eather be really pissed or really thankful at you guys. :Cheeky: I think it's the latter.

Barefoot Bree

I'm glad to hear that. (Put another notch on II's belt, guys!) :devil3:

More terrific books for you - take your pick or read 'em all:

Carl Sagan's The Demon-Haunted World
Michael Shermer's How We Believe
Karen Armstrong's A History of God and The Battle for God

I can't recommend these enough for anyone wishing to take a good hard look at religion, why it exists, and how "God" has changed over the centuries to fit man's changing ideas. They all point out quite clearly how "God" is simply a man-made idea.

Mace

You know I also think I want to read christ-on-a-stick's Journey to Atheism. That sticky up at the top of the page. Might as well read material written in IIDB too. Plus it looks fascinating since I skimmed over some parts.

BadBadBad

Tell me about this fear. When I was about 12, I think I went through this. Is it really fear of hell and what not, or is it fear of people and what they will think about you? I remember both, but somehow the two are linked. Did you believe in God or did you believe in the people that brought him to you? If you're afraid of the unknown, can you make yourself believe in something you don't? Can you believe in invisible green dragons in your backyard?

Spanish_Inquisitor

Coincidentally, I ran across this quote while digging through my desk drawer today:

SI