Laci

Ignore Pyrrho. He's just a hustler. They're always on the outlook for insecure young people at a time in their lives.

Arken,
How old are you? You sound pretty young. I was born and raised Catholic (Christian). I hated it. I hated the masses (in Latin); I hated going to confession and saying penence; I hated priests.

As an adult I became a "born again" Christian.
It served my needs at the time. And I learned that Jesus loved me and he became my personal saviour. We moved, and I attended no church.

As of this day, in my heart, I'm a Christian more than anything else. And Jesus is my saviour. Other than that, I don't go to church or belong to a prayer group. It's all in my heart. I talk to him personally when I need to.

Can you live with that type of religion? I'm not sure what it's called. But I can sit back and respect all the other religions because they are all there to serve a purpose to some segment of society.

Visit the churches. And decide what's the best one for your needs. And then join. If you become uninterested or bored, try a different one.

Jamie_L

Why not create your own God?

According to L. Ron Hubbard, it can be very profitable. And, the evidence suggests that his assessment was correct. But, unless you are very rich, don't acutally become a scientologist.

Seriously, though, if you still feel pretty religious, there really isn't any reason why you can't come up with your own interpretation from God. If one person's personal revelations are good enough to found a religion, why aren't your personal revelations good enough to create a personal image of God for yourself?

If the world is a creation of God, then examining the world should give you an understanding of God. So look around. Think about what makes sense. More than likely, the deity that you envision will be a lot more internally-consistent and consistent with reality than the strange beings that many religions posit.

It worked for me for a number of years, and made much more sense than "real" religion. Of course, after a while, one thing lead to another and...

BAM. Metaphysical Natrualist. So, be warned, I guess.

Of course, metaphysical naturalism doesn't give any better results than religion, but you don't actually have to waste any time on praying to get those results, and you know what results to expect, so you're not disappointed.

Deism works almost as well in that respect. As does praying to Joe Pesci. (See this link if you don't understand what us George Carlin fans are talking about.)

Jamie

mike_decock

I remember seeing a website which provided you with a different deity to worship every day. For the life of me, I can't find it again .

-Mike...

Pyrrho

Come on, surely the whole thread is a joke. You really don't expect people to "shop" for gods like that, do you? I do not seriously expect anyone to send me an email telling me that they want to worship me. You have a rather silly evaluation of me (which, incidentally, is also a violation of the rules of this site). Anyone who wants to see what I do should read more of my posts; they can use the "search" feature and search for all of my posts.

(I am not saying the thread is pointless when I say it is a joke; a joke may very well convey an important lesson.)



That advice would only be good if at least one church were right. But that has not been shown to be the case at all. It may be much better to give up on Santa Claus altogether rather than try to find a new one.

atheist_in_foxhole

:notworthy :notworthy :notworthy :notworthy

SLD

Well, at least someone reads my posts. Glad you enjoyed AiF.

SLD

Jamie_L

You know, I've been told that God only answers those prayers if you are praying for the right things. That always confused me, and made me wonder what, then, was the purpose of praying. How, pray tell, does one know what are the right things to pray for?

Now, if you were a Volkswagenist, this problem would be resolved. If you pray for your Volkswagen to get you from home to work, that's probably the right prayer, and it will probably get answered. Of course, you have to drive the car, but this is also no different from Christian apologetics. "God helps those who help themselves."

Of course, when your Volkswagen does break down, you have to go pray to your mechanic, and possibly your bank as well.

Jamie

Spaz

Volkswagens do not break down! Atheist lies! The Volkswagen is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the one that was, is, and always shall be, if the Volkswagen broke down, so also would the universe...

Tom Sawyer

I'd like to suggest trying out one of the Aztec gods.

I don't think they'll answer your prayers, but at least you'll get to sacrifice some virgins, which is always a fun way to spend a rainy afternoon.

Gregg

I don't know...I don't fancy having to go out to find sacrificial victims and cut their hearts out. It's a bit too Jeffrey Dahmerish for me. Then I'd have to dispose of the bodies and clean the bathtub.

Gregg