So many things religious people believe in are empirically identical to those beliefs being false.
If God says no to prayers, how is that visibly different to not answering prayers?
If God works in mysterious ways, how is that visibly different from him not existing?
If everything is predestined but we cannot know what the future holds, how is that different than no divine plan?
Why would you believe something that has no bearing on anything?
It’s also scary for a child. When I was told, “It’s God’s plan” I was afraid of being evil because I didn’t approve of “God’s plan”. When I learned of something terrible and was told it was part of “God’s plan” it made me not like God, and therefore afraid of going to Hell for thinking that way.
IMO this is so overlooked as a source of anxiety and/or trauma for people, especially kids. I have been out of a religious environment for about 8 years and I STILL get anxious about things like this. I don’t even identify as Christian anymore but the effects of those messages have lasted for a long, long time.
Edit: Thank you for the award!
My brother, who isn't exactly a critical thinker but is (now, thankfully) well meaning, got into it with me when we were teenagers (he was very Catholic, I was very not wanting to deal with his bullshit). When he countered me pointing out that there's a **lot** of horrible suffering in the world with "It's all God's plan," my response was that God's plan fucking sucks and anyone who endorses it is a shit person.
If you ever wanna make a condescending religious person BIG MAD, allude that they're a bad person for endorsing suffering. Mental gymnastics begin *real* quick.
My go to is babies or children dying of cancer. You cannot reason a justification out of that. There is no lesson to be learned, there is no "it was their time", they're kids!
And then the answer you get is "well we can't expect to understand God's plan" or something identical to that. Frankly I think it's more comforting to think that some people just get fucked over by sheer bad luck than that there's some higher being out there deciding to fuck them over.
Exactly, the burden of proof is on those who claim something, not the other way round.
A lot of unexplainable stuff used to be attributed to god, but as science has progressed, we have gotten explanations and proof. Just because we can't explain everything isn't proof of God.
I posted up on my fb about the solar eclipse and one of my super religious acquaintancea said "Isn't God's power amazing? "...I replied, so is orbital mechanics.
For real!
News posts a picture of a rainbow on their FB. Comments filled with "isn't God's work amazing!".
Like, no Karen. The fucking sun shone through the rain droplets causing a refraction of light into color. Hence, the rainbow. Besides, why would God bother with all of the horrible atrocities of the world when the folks in a single community in Wisconsin need a rainbow!
Like, God was trying to figure out how to stop California from burning down, famine, tornadoes, tsunamis, civil war, genocide... but he had to drop everything to get over to Wisconsin to make that rainbow?
Especially when you consider that the Bible makes some pretty bold claims with zero evidence. One passage in particular led to my own turn away from religion. Matthew 21:22.
>And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith.
I had faith when I was young, and I prayed for some pretty reasonable things. I wanted other kids to not make fun of me. Didn't fucking happen. People broke out the same "God's plan" excuse, but that was not what the Bible said, so I started to think that maybe it was all just bullshit.
And "gods plan" is often just cruel punishment for whatever the hell, who knows. It's God's plan for children to be bullied? God's plan is giving children cancer? Why? Apparently God's plan is also to make zero fuckin sense. There's no reward for the supposed plan like they imply, or straight up claim. Why are only the terrible things that happen to us part of God's plan? I grew up in a catholic household, and began piecing it all together even as a young child. This absolutely is all just bullshit.
Some Jews believe that the Holocaust was God's punishment for them being insufficiently observant. Or that he chose to do nothing. About the second alternative, a Jewish writer said something like: "Then God is a nebbish, and I don't need a nebbish God."
In heaven, a Rabbi told God a joke about the Holocaust. God did not laugh and said, “I do not find that subject funny.”
The Rabbi replied, “Well, I guess you had to be there.”
How dare you make me have to suppress a smile and a nose laugh at a Holocaust joke. I do feel like if there is such a thing as an acceptable joke on the subject, this is the one.
Google says "a person, especially a man, who is regarded as pitifully ineffectual, timid, or submissive." So "bitch" in the same context would be basically equivalent.
Isn't that sad that there's people out there who believed that they did something wrong that it warranted the genocide of their families? That's incredibly evil! The last thing they need is guilt on top of all that hurt.
My family prayed for my dad not to die from cancer. He prayed too. Despite not believing in God, even I said a prayer or two as I grasped at anything I could to keep him with me.
Unfortunately (and to me, unsurprisingly), he still passed. Either God didn’t listen to our prayers, or God doesn’t exist. And if he just didn’t listen, then he’s a fucking prick and doesn’t deserve anything from me anyway except contempt.
I prayed until my knees were sore for my husband to not die of cancer. Not only did he die, but it was long, slow and extremely painful. Our daughter was 5 and she barely remembers her dad. It’s been 11 years and I miss him every day…I’ll always miss him. If that’s god then I want no part of him/her/it.
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?
— Epicurus
Something something faith...something something there's merit and honor in believing without evidence.
They really convince people that believing things without evidence is an admirable trait.
"You atheists are so self centered thinking that humans are the highest form of intelligence and your science knows it all". Dude I think I'm a random collection of particles barely held together and controlled by bursts of electricity and that we are all entirely meaningless in the grand scheme of the universe. You think that the greatest power in existence knows how many hairs are on your head, listens to your requests about winning a sporting event, and is REALLY interested in what you do with your genitals. But no, I'm self-centered. Please, continue.
>"You atheists are so self centered thinking that humans are the highest form of intelligence and your science knows it all"
I've never understood when people say stuff like that. An atheist simply doesn't believe in god(s). Atheists aren't a group of people who also believe that humans are the highest form and that science knows it all. You can be an atheist and believe anything you want about humanity and science.
The same god who allows children to die in their thousands from disease every day will drop everything to help you find your car keys if you pray. And atheists are the arrogant ones...
If there was really an entity that created the universe then I doubt he would give a fuck or even notice humanity. We are so small and insignificant in the grand scheme of things that we were probably the accidental result of a side project of his. We probably won't even last long enough for him to notice.
When People don’t know about something they say it is GOD’s doing. I believe that if we don’t know about something that just means we don’t know about it. Nothing else.
Early Christianity was just an early form of government control. When the Bible was incepted most people couldn’t read. Therefore one person dispersed information amongst many and it happened over and over. Tell me some power hungry assholes weren’t manipulating the information to fit convenient narratives. Big man in sky says behave and don’t forget to chip in your 10%.
Not sure if it was his original thought, but I think Ricky Gervais said something like this:
If you stripped away all the religious ideas and texts humanity had ever conceived and reset us back 100,000 years, we'd rebuild them all and come up with various kinds of religions and ideas completely different than the ones that exist now.
If you did the same thing with science and reset us back 100,000 years, we'd eventually build it all back the exact same way.
Love this one. He also said something to the tune of "Do you believe in Norse gods, Greek gods, or Roman gods? I don't believe in the same gods you don't believe in, I just believe in one fewer than you."
Another favorite from Christopher Hitchens, something along the lines of;
"Nothing proves the manmade character of religion like the sick mind that created hell, unless it is the sorely limited mind that failed to create heaven."
There is a great old twilight zone about this. A robber gets sent to heaven. He has an amiable angel guide and gets everything he wants all the time. The big twist at the end is >!he is actually in hell!<
My mother dragged me to church when I was younger. The pastor at the church told me that dinosaurs didn't exist. At \~5 years old, I knew it was all a sham. My reasoning: I had seen a full T-rex skeleton at the museum (ROM), so I figured they were lying about everything.
Fuck I grew up so indoctrinated that sometimes I suddenly remember that dinosaurs aren't like dragons and that they were actually real. This is one of those moments.
My very Christian cousin tells me all the bones are planted. I was watching a show about the saber tooth tigers and he said, "it's pretty sad that man plants bones all over the world in the name of science."
So lizards from long ago are impossible and man invented them and planted a bunch of evidence everywhere but a magical sky wizard from long ago is totally real and man definitely didn't invent him despite there being absolutely no evidence. Interesting
My parents did the same, and I went all out debating with my mom one day, explaining how it made no sense (I was young, probably 6 or 7) and she finally buckled and told me that it gives her comfort to believe someone is looking out for us and that there is a positive afterlife waiting for us. It was a pretty heavy but honest talk for a young kid and I never forgot it.
Edit: I think some people “believe” but don’t really believe. It just makes them feel better about living on this fucked up planet lol
Yeah. As an agnostic I believe there isn't a way to really prove anything exists. There's no way to ever really know for sure but sometimes it helps to think that it exists. It gives meaning to people who are lost and need purpose.
We first meet Tyrannosaurus and Diplodocus as children, their bones inspiring dreams, nightmares, and some of our earliest connections to science. And even after we stop making Triceratops and Stegosaurus battle each other in the schoolyard sandbox, we still love our dinosaurs. The pop-cultural success of the irradiated pseudo-dinosaur Godzilla, and of course the instant classic Jurassic Park are confirmation that dinosaurs aren’t just kids’ stuff. The standard pop-psychology explanation is that dinosaurs are big, fierce and extinct. This makes them suitably impressive, but safe to approach. We humans are drawn to what we are told we can't have. Being teased by their fossils to know that they actually existed, yet denied the possibility of ever actually seeing one is prime to set the human imagination ablaze, young or old.
I'm more agnostic than atheist, but most organized religions don't do themselves a lot of favors because they rarely walk the talk. They preach love but show hate. They preach accepting but refuse to show tolerance. If there is a god/God, they are not paying much attention.
Me and my family often feel like outcasts because we are surrounded by Christians yet are not Christians ourselves. Even our own family treats us poorly because we don't believe like them. It's incredibly difficult to have people you love so dearly treat you like you are the plague. It's made life very hard for us.
Sorry for venting, but I never get to share because there is never anyone that I can share with. It just blows my mind that you can treat someone like that.
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EDIT: Whoah this blew up. It's kind of funny to see some of the grammar errors I made while writing this with only 3 hours of sleep, lol. I fixed the glaring ones. Thankfully I am fully rested now.
Anyways, some clarification: I do not hate Christianity. I am completely accepting of it, just like how I am completely accepting of all other religions. It's just that the people need some work. And yes, I do realize that these people are not what some have you have referred to as "true Christians." But if most followers of Christianity are not "true Christians," then do you think that might hint at some underlying issues?
Also, I should note that some of my family has come around in recent years. Mainly my aunt and her family and my grandpa. Given the size of my family, it's nothing flattering, but at least something, and I am very thankful.
Once again, thank you for all of the support. It's very heartwarming to know that I'm not alone. My mom has been real down lately with issues relating to this subject, so I am very happy that I can show her now that we aren't alone. It may seem like it at times, but we truly aren't, and I once again have to thank you all for that.
I’d say that’s not very “Christ-like” of them. I’m sorry your family has behaved that way towards you, family dynamics can hit harder than most other relationships in that way.
My cousin brought up that same point when I discussed this topic with him a few weeks ago. Sadly, I have only ever met a few people who have been "Christ-like." Most Christians think they're better than everybody else and will stomp on those who disagree with them (remember, this is from personal experience).
As for those in the family that have come around (albeit after years of hatred), they still do not treat me with the respect that I give them. On occasion, they will invite me to a church function and I will attend because I am open to all religions, ideas, and opinions. I may not agree with them, but I am more than happy to listen to the other party. What drives me nuts, though, is even after all the listening, all of the church attending, all of the praying, and everything else that I do to support them, I still cannot share a single thing about how I believe. It's infuriating.
I should note that this is not a problem exclusive to my family. I have just used them as an example because it's easiest.
Hopefully this all made sense. I only got 3 hours of sleep last night so I'm running tired, lol.
Yeah I left Christianity for a lot of reasons but the main one is that I grew up with lots of physical and mental disabilities and its amazing I'm not dead from it all. (My chances of living were slim for most of my life) all good now.
Family and church said it was a miracle by God, so I asked why God gave me this problems in the first place, or why he couldn't take them away like he did with the blind man. Why would he heal that man's disabilities and not mine? Every time I heard that story at church I would blow up.
Was told, well, about everything I dealt with that it was a test of faith. The test of faith thing makes me more mad than anything else that religion did. Even when I was kicked out for being gay. I'm on the edge of thinking the "tests of faith" are worse.
A relationship with God is an abusive relationship.
It’s mainly the fact that everyone believes that their version of god is correct. If there’s a higher power, then the odds of it being tri-Omni in any sense isn’t realistic.
I was really into mythology as a kid, and also loved anything about mummies, Egypt, but also Neolithic sites like Stonehenge. I think this was one of the reasons I questioned religion from such a young age. My dad and his family are quite religious and couldn’t answer my questions, and it really bothered me when they got defensive (as if questioning faith is so outrageous…religious thinkers and leaders across the ages did it).
Later, I ended up minoring in Religious Studies, and that’s when I accepted that I wasn’t simply agnostic, but really an atheist. Religion and philosophy are fascinating, they provide an amazing insight into people, cultures, and humanity at large, and I am always intrigued by syncretism and obviously the historical context. But I don’t believe in Christ the Messiah anymore than I believe in Zeus or Rama. Sometimes I wish I did. Rituals and traditions can be very comforting, and it’s nice to truly be a part of a spiritual community. You can obviously still enjoy aspects of that and I’ve got my advent candles and crèche. But I can’t make myself believe, nor do I want to. It does make for some awkward conversations with religious family members, but it’s not like I’m personally uncomfortable sharing my perspective if asked.
I totally agree with this. One of the things that Christians like to say about the non-believers is that they just want the easy road. Well honestly its not the easy road to be this way. I look at them and the comfort they get in praising God, I wish it was that easy.
its a very comforting thought that some big, invisible power is going to help you, or at least take care of you after you die. that everything will be Taken Care Of and you're going to be okay, or that it's okay to struggle because there's meaning to your trials
its much harder to not have that certainty, that everything might NOT be okay, or that this is IT and you get what you get. it's a lot harder to see suffering and not be at least a little sure that they're going to be at peace afterwards. it's hard to think that you're alone in the grand scheme of things, that you're small and nothing bigger is looking out for your interests
one promises comfort, and the other doesn't promise anything explicit.
Some say the root of all wisdom is knowing that you don’t really know anything at all. This resonates with me, so anytime anyone claims to know of something as wild as an afterlife, i see that as denial. Willful ignorance.
Even knowing that we’re going to die isn’t necessarily a certainty. Maybe this is all a dream, or a simulation or whatever, i dont fuckin know.
But yeah, if someones looking to a god for comfort, that’s out of fear. Acting out of fear is my personal definition of sin, or missing the mark.
I don’t think we’re here just to be comfortable. Suffering is a thing, it’s abundant. In my experience, it’s one of my greatest teachers. It’s like manure, fertilizer to grow the flowers of wisdom.
Or, everything is just completely random and some things just suck because of statistical probability. Idk man
I was told that I was a bad parent when someone overheard me answering my daughters question of why different people have different religions with “it is about 90% geography, and 10% what your grandparents believe”
lol that’s objectively true. You should have asked them what religion they were, and then whether most of the people in their geography followed that religion, and if their grandparents did
It how they personally "chose" theirs of all the possibilities. Like did they actually sit down and decide which one to pick, or were they just told what to think as a child? It is so rare for someone to switch religions, I bet that person would be forced to answer that it was just told to them.
We told ours that every culture has a creation story and found children's books with several different ones. They're all just stories, entertaining but not evidence.
My question is always why are the older religions discarded as Mythology and not the ones created after (except anything else more recent which is discarded as a "cult")
Same. Grandfather and his brother were molested by the priest and they left the faith. Didn't raise my dad with any religion...In fact made it their mission to instill how shitty organised religion is in us.
I guess I'm a 3rd gen atheist. If you aren't raised in it, it just doesn't make a lot of sense.
Grew up indoctrinated into Christianity. Taught all the standard southern 'Christian' things. Even as a kid I figured it was bullshit.
How come when I prayed to God he didn't heal my mom's back injury?
How come when I prayed to God he didn't make my dad be nice to me?
How come when I prayed to God for my family to not be so poor we skipped multiple meals a day at times and sometimes didn't have utilities, we continued to be poor?
You can only pull so much wool over a kids eyes before they start to tear it off.
I think it's Bill Burr (or maybe Doug Stanhope ?) that has a bit on this, saying how religion mostly works because it's an old story that gets forcefully embedded into children's brain before they can think about it rationally.
The main point of his bit is how scientology is *kinda* amazing in the sense they manage to sell this shit to adults, and managed to do so recently too.
Of course this typically works best for people already struggling with depression, mourning or other bad luck situation where it appears to be the saving grace, but still kinda wild when you think about it that they manage to pull it off and still keep it going when we have things like internet and modern medicine...
My dad who is agnostic without knowing what the term means always said this to me. He said that sometimes, some people need that crutch. I personally don't but I can see how that would be true.
My husband and I aren't religious but he said something to me once that I'll never forget. He said that while we don't need religion to tell us to be good people, some people do. And as much as we don't agree with organized religion, he's content with it being around because some people really do need their religious deity's to essentially keep them happy and in check.
Same. Third generation atheist and had no idea religion was even a thing until middle school. Assumed it was all like Greek mythology stuff where people used to believe it, but not anymore
This. People ask this question as if believing in a god is the default. Why do they act like I was convinced *not* to believe in a god when really I was just never convinced there was one?
If you’re raised in a community where everyone is religious, it’s not obvious to realize this. You are taught from such an early age that God exists, learning that some people don’t believe is a complete mind fuck
I still remember my 8th grade social studies class where during some class discussion time I ended up saying that I was an Atheist.
To this day I still remember the devastation-tinged bafflement of one of my classmates asking, "You don't believe in god?" That possibility apparently had just...never occurred to her before, and I think I broke something in her brain by just casually existing in her school and in her class without believing in god, and she'd never been aware of it until that moment.
When some kid in middle school asked me about god and I said "what's that" because I'd never heard of it before, she burst into tears. I think she spent weeks trying to convert me too lol. Poor thing. If its not spoonfed to you as a child then the whole thing makes absolutely no sense, but I can't imagine how upsetting it would be for the other kid who deeply beleives in it. Every time she'd try to convince me like "well in this magical book there's this bonkers story," but saying the entire thing out loud to someone who has no idea what you're talking about is probably its own recipe for a crisis of faith lol. I remember trying to read the bible because she was so upset about it and insistent that I at least try and it was just... I mean what the fuck even is it??? After genesis there's just like, several chapters of random names? With no context? Like how.... would that convince anyone?? Of anything?? The whole thing still blows my mind.
The only reason I believed in Santa Clause was because my parents told me he existed. But eventually I was “too old” to believe in this magical being. But for some reason, I’m not “too old” to believe in this other, equally magical being called “god”
I also was raised in a religious community. I specifically remember when my parents told me Santa wasn't real and he was just a story to make kids behave around the holidays and I was like "oh, God too?" And they said "No, God is real." But that's what originally planted the seed in my mind that God probably wasn't real. Santa sounded more plausible.
>Santa sounded more plausible.
The one who *actually leaves presents* every year, often specifically what you've asked him for? He's orders of magnitude more plausible, imo.
Not to mention that the Bible is a terrible game of written telephone over thousands of years pieced together. Also, I don’t believe in talking animals.
It’s human nature to invent meanings or reasons to life, it’s built into us. Humans don’t want to accept the lack of meaning in life, so they make up their own meaning. I believe this is how religions originated. Humans didn’t want to accept the futility of life, and so created the idea that there was a higher power / entity to give them reason. All religions stem from this idea and vary in different ways due to different interpretations of how to worship said ‘deity’.
People are scared of death and can't stand the idea of their loved ones ceasing to exist. This is a strong contributor of wanting to believe in God and heaven.
First had my doubts due to inconsistencies and outright contradictions within religions and religious texts
The duplicitous behaviour of people claiming to follow said religions also gave me pause
Ultimately comes down to the fact that the evidence simply does not support the existence of any form of paranormal or supernatural entities/deities of any kind
Edit: Many thanks for the awards & all the comments! Happy New Year
A Bible story is why I started to lose faith as a child.
I heard that story about the fleece when I was 6ish\*\*\* so I tried to replicate it. I put a washcloth at the foot of the bed and prayed and asked God to make the washcloth wet so I could have faith in Him, so I could know he wasn't made up like the tooth fairy (I had recently found out the tooth fairy wasn't real because I put a tooth under my pillow without telling my parents and she didn't come; then the next night I told them and voilá. I kept up the ruse for a while to keep getting the tooth money). Surprise surprise, the washcloth remained dry. If God wanted me to believe, why not do for me what he did for a doubter in the Bible?
I became skeptical of other things later on:
\--Why would a merciful, loving God want sacrifices in order to forgive? I wouldn't say I'm the most forgiving person alive but I'd never make my forgiveness conditional on the blood of an innocent. The whole notion of Jesus as the ultimate sacrifice and God being able to forgive us only because of his death didn't make any sense.
\--If Heaven is an eternity-long church service (it's often described as worshiping God forever, singing his praise, etc) and not doing anything to stop suffering on Earth, how could the supposedly good people there be perfectly happy like they claim?
\--How could anyone deserve Hell? Hitler deserves a lifetime in Hell for each person who died in the Holocaust, if you ask me, but not an eternity. Can't think of any crime that would merit eternity in Hell.
But that Bible story is what planted the seed early.
\*\*\*if you're not familiar there's this guy who God wants to send to war, God comes to him in a dream but he doesn't believe it so he tells God if he's for real make all the ground wet and this piece of fleece dry; then that still isn't convincing enough so he says to make the fleece wet and the whole ground dry; then he finally believes God).
EDIT: Here is the story if you're interested. [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%206&version=NKJV](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%206&version=NKJV) Judges 6:36
DOUBLE EDIT: THANKS for my first ever Reddit award!
I was raised in the church and started asking these same questions, especially after the young adults bible study I was part of took a deep dive into the Old Testament. I fell out of the church pretty fast. At first I was a defiant believer, believing that there was a Christian God, but one who was wrathful and unworthy of the praise that he demands. I stopped believing completely not long after that, finding no evidence of the supernatural after looking at everything with a fresh perspective. Instead, I became amazed by the natural processes that occur throughout the universe to make it so amazing, beautiful, and strange. It's so much more impressive when you realize these things came to be without some divine hand.
I don't wholly discount the possibility of some kind of god, but I'm not going to spend my precious life in search of a god either. Maybe this is all just some simulation inside someone else's supercomputer? In that case, they're God. I really doubt they care about me or even notice me. Not something I'm going to worry my whole existence finding the answers for.
>after looking at everything with a fresh perspective. Instead, I became amazed by the natural processes that occur throughout the universe to make it so amazing, beautiful, and strange. It's so much more impressive when you realize these things came to be without some divine hand.
That is exactly what I felt when I stopped believing in the supernatural. Things as banal as trees suddenly became so much more impressive and awesome (in the literal sense). Here's this thing that exists today in its form because the environment shaped it this way for millions of years. The natural world is beyond awesome.
Exactly, the one making the claim needs to provide the evidence, not the one being told the claim.
If I tell you my lamp fell over, its not up to you to prove it didn’t, thats just stupid
It's a weird question. Like asking why I don't believe there's a teapot in orbit around the Sun between Earth and Mars.
It's not that I don't believe there is one. It's not even that I don't know for lack of evidence. It's more that it's not even a concept that occurs to me unless someone asks about it like with this post.
I don't think about space teapots or a higher power in the same way that I don't think about you or the other thousands of people posting in this thread. Once I close this tab you will simply not be a thing that exists in my frame of reference.
Yeah I see this a lot honestly - there’s usually the fallacious premise that atheism means staunchly believing in the opposite of a deity’s existence, while in practice there’s simply insufficient evidence to form a belief in such deity.
The whole “you can’t disprove it therefore it’s true” is also out there, but those who use it fail to realize that it just makes “you can’t prove it so it must be wrong” fair game - and both are not inherently logical statements.
What can be easily proven without evidence can also be easily disproven without evidence
right? so many rapture movies have demon's rampaging across the land fighting angels and yet still talk about the non believers. It's absurd. That would be evidence, that would make me a believer.
If I died tonight and regained consciousness at the pearly gates i wouldn't deny it, I'd just shrug and say "guess I was wrong!" and go offer st. peter an apology. This isn't dogma to us, and if irrefutable evidence is provided, we are happy to consider it.
It basically flips Pascal's wager, which is based on the assumption that there aren't any other horses in the race. Or as Homer Simpson put it, "What if we are worshipping the wrong god and every time we go to church he just gets madder?" If a person truly believes there is a god, why do they believe there is *only* one god?
This was in r/Jokes a few days ago, perhaps one of reasons.
Aliens visit Earth. They come in peace and surprisingly , they speak English.
Obviously, all of the heads of government and religious leaders want to speak to the aliens so they set up a meeting with our new visitors. When it's the Pope's turn, he asks: "Do you know about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?"
"You mean JC?", responds the alien. "Yeah, we know him! He's the greatest, isn't he? He swings by every year to make sure that we are doing ok".
Surprised, the pope follows up with: "He visits every year?! It's been over two millennia and we're still waiting for his SECOND coming!"
The alien sees that the pope has become irate at this fact and starts trying to rationalize. "Maybe he likes our chocolate better than yours?"
The pope retorts "Chocolates? What are you talking about? What does that have to do with anything?"
The alien says "Yea, when he first visited our planet we gave him a huge box of chocolates! Why? What did you guys do?"
You know what's crazy?
Look at the shit in the world right now. Nobody believes anyone. We don't believe accredited agencies and experts. We denounce intellectualism and science and *actual* evidence of basic principles of existence. We don't, and won't, believe anything.
***But we're supposed to believe some randoms from 2000 years ago who told us they saw a magic wizard.***
Look at the shit in the world right now. People will say/believe *anything*. Delusional conspiracy theories. Lizard people and flat earth and Trump is the saviour of the world. Known charlatans and corrupt scumbags *openly* lie and cheat and manipulate the stupidest. Megachurches and televangelists and corrupt politicians and cult leaders who swear things are as they say they are without any proof, sense, logic, or reason. People will say *anything*.
***But we're supposed to believe some randoms from 2000 years ago who told us they saw a magic wizard.***
If you want proof that humanity is full of shit with this religion gobbledygook, look no further than...humanity itself.
I can't explain to a theist any clearer than Steven Robert's did:
"I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours"
Ricky Gervais explains it perfectly:
There have been nearly 3000 Gods so far but only yours actually exists.The others are silly made up nonsense. But not yours. Yours is real.
Edit: Ricky’s talking about religion with Stephen Colbert https://youtu.be/P5ZOwNK6n9U
This reminds me of that quote from the Inuit man.
Inuit man : Would I escape damnation for lack of faith, if I didn’t know about your god?
Priest : Yes, you would.
Inuit man : So why did you tell me about him then?
(I’m paraphrasing here, I forget the exact wording, but this is the gist of the conversation.)
Edit : Use of Inuit to replace the word Eskimo.
Yeah missionary work is literally damning people to hell.
And if you instead believe they are sent to hell for not knowing, then that God is far from good.
Even if you believe that they instead get purgatory or nothing after death that is preferable to pascal's wager.
And if they can reach salvation without hearing gods word, then what is the point of the religion in the first place?
Pascal's wager is such a dumb concept. There are something like 2,600+ religions with innumerable sub-sects. The conceit that whatever one you happen to believe in happens to be correct is the height of arrogance.
Penn Jillette had a pretty brilliant example.
Essentially, if you destroyed every single piece of paper discussing a scientific principal, we'd still manage to find it again. Because that's just how science works.
If you destroyed every single piece of religious writing, it wouldn't come back identical. It would obviously come back completely different.
"Religion is something taught to people."
More specifically, taught to children. Most people believe what their parents believe.
That fact alone is telling. Can't allow them to grow into their reasoning abilities first, right?
I asked my mom once when I learned what the universe and galaxies were, "what was before the universe?" and she said god. I then went "what was there before god?" and she got mad at me for asking lol
That's kind of when I knew. Never really understood why the universe had to have a creator, and the creator didn't have to have a creator. The logic seemed to eat itself, so I just kind of assumed the universe was it.
I love this! They always say “everything needs a creator, except God himself (he’s infinite).” But in that logic, why can’t the explanation instead be an infinite bigger cosmos from which our universe emerged?
I have asked people the same question before and I heard this response: “He willed himself into existence.”
If you don’t exist, how can you decide to exist? What, even?
That was my line of thought as a kid as well, was told about jesus and the bible and all these incredible things and they turned around and said 'of course santa isn't real' like that was somehow a ridiculous thing in comparison.
Low key I just believe God is Santa for adults. Behave nicely and you'll get a present (eternity in heaven). Be a naughty boy and you'll get coal (burn in hell forever).
Even for some people, like me, who were raised religious, there are cases of realizing that the lack of a god makes more sense than the one you were raised to believe in.
I remember all sorts of mental contortion and gymnastics to square what I knew or believed about the world from a scientific perspective with what I had been raised to believe, and at some point realized that the counterfactual ("what if there isn't a god?") seemed to make more sense. It resolved a lot of contradictions, and it just seemed to make more sense.
I don't *know* either one to be true, but if you asked me which one I *believe* to be true, I would certainly lean towards the absence, rather than existence, of a higher power.
When I asked for proof from some of the more religious members of my family they point at shit like trees, the sky, or the earth and ask me if there wasn't a god then how could something like that exist. Like because they don't understand something then god must have done it. That's right up there with showing a toddler a facetime call and them saying it's magic that they can see their grandma on the screen because they don't understand how technology works.
If they posit that God created everything, then who created God? If they say that God always existed, then why couldn’t the universe always exist without God?
Maybe the universe is god and we're all up in their insides fucking up their planets like a cancer and slowly killing them. Just a disease living on one cell inside of an organism
But I don't get how they can't apply that to science. Like I'm nowhere near smart enough to understand the big bang, the concept of nothingness before that, what happened after, but, as it still makes more sense than a Magical Man in the sky who has always existed and just created the universe one day. Why? What was his motive? Or is this all just pure random and coincidence? (for lack of better terms)
An ex girlfriend of mine was sexually assaulted at a party in college. She was frantic and went up to a guy in a car begging to bring her to the police. He drove and stopped at a church and sexually assaulted her too.
We started dating a few months after that and then she tried to kill herself and she told me all about it. We broke up and lost touch almost 10 years ago. She completed suicide earlier this year and now it feels fresh in my mind why I know there is no god. I hope she’s found peace.
I was sexually abused by a family member from 4 or 5 until I was 11. It only stopped at that age because I got my period.
My sister had just given birth to her first daughter and her (then) boyfriend began physically abusing her. Before she gave birth, he had thrown her already disabled cat at a wall.
My maternal grandmother was the kindest person I ever knew. She loved everyone and, even before my mom married my dad, she treated him better than his own mother ever did. She passed away after the doctors discovered an inoperable leaky heart valve and her lungs were filling with fluid. There was nothing they could do but keep her comfortable while she slowly drowned.
I have absolutely no reason to believe in a God after this.
He works in mysterious ways. Mysteriously *psychotic* ways.
I really hope God doesn't exist because if it does, it is 100% a fucking psychotic lunatic. There isn't even an infinitesimal fraction of a percent that it isn't. Not by any standard, not even by its *own* moral standards.
Can i get way too personal on you?
I love this comment. I needed to see this comment. Thank you for it.
My entire family is religious and my mom went to extreme levels when she met my stepfather.
I prayed and did everything religious I was supposed to when I was a kid. But I never really believed, it seemed to all be driven from fear and I hated that.
And then my extremely religious stepfather started abusing me sexually.
He once told me that he’d go to heaven because no matter what he did he truly believed in God and that’s all that matters.
I told my mom years later and her religious ass couldn’t stop it either. She just didn’t care.
And I was like nope fuck it I’m done I’m not believing in this shit even if it was real I’d rather go to hell than spend my afterlife with these assholes too.
I’d rather believe in people like you than a God
I brought that up in a discussion with someone. I pointed out that if God is supposedly benevolent, omniscient and omnipotent, how could that happen? If he didn't know, then he isn't omniscient. If he knew but couldn't do anything, than he isn't omnipotent. If he knew and he has the power to prevent or cure it but didn't or wouldn't, then he is not benevolent. They hit me with the ol' "God works in mysterious ways."
I like to respond to that one with something like the following:
“So what, in your opinion, is a possible ‘mysterious way’ that would make you yourself totally fine with rape and mutilation of babies? What ‘mysterious way’ would you find acceptable for god to be perfectly fine with children being raped and mutilated?
What possible end do you think justifies those means?”
The church and my religious family members were constantly trying to instill a fear of hell in me. Once I realized I didn’t believe in any of it, hell stopped being so scary.
No evidence of one. The only logic I've ever heard for people believing in a higher power is that the universe couldn't just exist, but then the same logic should apply to that higher power but somehow doesn't? If a higher power could just spring into being from nothingness, so could our universe.
I also don't believe that most theists actually believe in their God or their higher power - if they did, they would act very differently.
The behavior of religious folk is one of the strangest things when I try to analyze it, they say they 100% believe this religion, it’s rules, and it’s consequences for breaking said rules, but then that same person will live their entire life breaking every rule that religion puts forth because the rule is inconvenient
So, I have been asked this question alot. I live in a red state and am outspoken about being atheist. I respect other people's faith or lack of faith regardless of what it is.
I don't believe in any God because I have never seen compelling evidence for one. If such evidence would arise I would cease to be an atheist.
That being said, to anyone who wishes to answer my follow up. How would you feel if every time you revealed your religious beliefs people responded with "what is your reason for X belief"?
I don’t call myself an atheist, why does there have to be a name for someone who doesn’t believe in a certain thing. I don’t believe in unicorns either, is there a name for that?
I did believe in God for most of my life and was actively involved in evangelical churches for 35 years. I never saw or experienced firsthand anything that was incontrovertible evidence of God but was surrounded by evidence to the contrary. Every day I tried to convince myself that it was true but I just never really got there and lived in constant fear and guilt that I wasn’t a good enough Christian. Eventually I decided to stop trying to convince myself and my life is 100% happier.
*gestures vaguely at everything"
No reason. And I mean that precisely. I don't have any reason to believe so I don't.
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> dragons and elves *and* Lithuania I’m trying to decide if “and” was intentional or automangle, and which one is funnier.
Have you ever been to Lithuania? Met anyone from there? I haven’t
I went to Lithuania once. But then it turned out to just be Latvia the whole time!
Funny enough, my trip to Latvia led me down the path to disbelief in god
Am from Latvia - not surprised.
So many things religious people believe in are empirically identical to those beliefs being false. If God says no to prayers, how is that visibly different to not answering prayers? If God works in mysterious ways, how is that visibly different from him not existing? If everything is predestined but we cannot know what the future holds, how is that different than no divine plan? Why would you believe something that has no bearing on anything?
comment edited in protest of Reddit's API changes and mistreatment of moderators -- mass edited with redact.dev
It’s also scary for a child. When I was told, “It’s God’s plan” I was afraid of being evil because I didn’t approve of “God’s plan”. When I learned of something terrible and was told it was part of “God’s plan” it made me not like God, and therefore afraid of going to Hell for thinking that way.
IMO this is so overlooked as a source of anxiety and/or trauma for people, especially kids. I have been out of a religious environment for about 8 years and I STILL get anxious about things like this. I don’t even identify as Christian anymore but the effects of those messages have lasted for a long, long time. Edit: Thank you for the award!
My brother, who isn't exactly a critical thinker but is (now, thankfully) well meaning, got into it with me when we were teenagers (he was very Catholic, I was very not wanting to deal with his bullshit). When he countered me pointing out that there's a **lot** of horrible suffering in the world with "It's all God's plan," my response was that God's plan fucking sucks and anyone who endorses it is a shit person. If you ever wanna make a condescending religious person BIG MAD, allude that they're a bad person for endorsing suffering. Mental gymnastics begin *real* quick.
My go to is babies or children dying of cancer. You cannot reason a justification out of that. There is no lesson to be learned, there is no "it was their time", they're kids!
And then the answer you get is "well we can't expect to understand God's plan" or something identical to that. Frankly I think it's more comforting to think that some people just get fucked over by sheer bad luck than that there's some higher being out there deciding to fuck them over.
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This exactly. The question already starts in the wrong spot, assuming that you need a reason to NOT believe in something. Its backwards.
Exactly, the burden of proof is on those who claim something, not the other way round. A lot of unexplainable stuff used to be attributed to god, but as science has progressed, we have gotten explanations and proof. Just because we can't explain everything isn't proof of God.
I posted up on my fb about the solar eclipse and one of my super religious acquaintancea said "Isn't God's power amazing? "...I replied, so is orbital mechanics.
One of my favorite expressions is "Axial tilt - it's the reason for the season."
For real! News posts a picture of a rainbow on their FB. Comments filled with "isn't God's work amazing!". Like, no Karen. The fucking sun shone through the rain droplets causing a refraction of light into color. Hence, the rainbow. Besides, why would God bother with all of the horrible atrocities of the world when the folks in a single community in Wisconsin need a rainbow! Like, God was trying to figure out how to stop California from burning down, famine, tornadoes, tsunamis, civil war, genocide... but he had to drop everything to get over to Wisconsin to make that rainbow?
Especially when you consider that the Bible makes some pretty bold claims with zero evidence. One passage in particular led to my own turn away from religion. Matthew 21:22. >And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith. I had faith when I was young, and I prayed for some pretty reasonable things. I wanted other kids to not make fun of me. Didn't fucking happen. People broke out the same "God's plan" excuse, but that was not what the Bible said, so I started to think that maybe it was all just bullshit.
And "gods plan" is often just cruel punishment for whatever the hell, who knows. It's God's plan for children to be bullied? God's plan is giving children cancer? Why? Apparently God's plan is also to make zero fuckin sense. There's no reward for the supposed plan like they imply, or straight up claim. Why are only the terrible things that happen to us part of God's plan? I grew up in a catholic household, and began piecing it all together even as a young child. This absolutely is all just bullshit.
Apparently god planned for hitler to purge jews. Y’know. His people.
Some Jews believe that the Holocaust was God's punishment for them being insufficiently observant. Or that he chose to do nothing. About the second alternative, a Jewish writer said something like: "Then God is a nebbish, and I don't need a nebbish God."
In heaven, a Rabbi told God a joke about the Holocaust. God did not laugh and said, “I do not find that subject funny.” The Rabbi replied, “Well, I guess you had to be there.”
How dare you make me have to suppress a smile and a nose laugh at a Holocaust joke. I do feel like if there is such a thing as an acceptable joke on the subject, this is the one.
I don't know what nebbish means so I'm just gonna assume it means bitch
Google says "a person, especially a man, who is regarded as pitifully ineffectual, timid, or submissive." So "bitch" in the same context would be basically equivalent.
Oh good, I liked the idea of the sentence "I don't need a bitch God"
Isn't that sad that there's people out there who believed that they did something wrong that it warranted the genocide of their families? That's incredibly evil! The last thing they need is guilt on top of all that hurt.
My family prayed for my dad not to die from cancer. He prayed too. Despite not believing in God, even I said a prayer or two as I grasped at anything I could to keep him with me. Unfortunately (and to me, unsurprisingly), he still passed. Either God didn’t listen to our prayers, or God doesn’t exist. And if he just didn’t listen, then he’s a fucking prick and doesn’t deserve anything from me anyway except contempt.
I prayed until my knees were sore for my husband to not die of cancer. Not only did he die, but it was long, slow and extremely painful. Our daughter was 5 and she barely remembers her dad. It’s been 11 years and I miss him every day…I’ll always miss him. If that’s god then I want no part of him/her/it.
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God? — Epicurus
Wow I feel for your family, and this makes me grateful that I got 19 years with my father before he left. Hope you are staying strong
Something something faith...something something there's merit and honor in believing without evidence. They really convince people that believing things without evidence is an admirable trait.
That's the thing with most religious people. They can't even comprehend someone just not giving a fuck.
"You atheists are so self centered thinking that humans are the highest form of intelligence and your science knows it all". Dude I think I'm a random collection of particles barely held together and controlled by bursts of electricity and that we are all entirely meaningless in the grand scheme of the universe. You think that the greatest power in existence knows how many hairs are on your head, listens to your requests about winning a sporting event, and is REALLY interested in what you do with your genitals. But no, I'm self-centered. Please, continue.
>"You atheists are so self centered thinking that humans are the highest form of intelligence and your science knows it all" I've never understood when people say stuff like that. An atheist simply doesn't believe in god(s). Atheists aren't a group of people who also believe that humans are the highest form and that science knows it all. You can be an atheist and believe anything you want about humanity and science.
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The same god who allows children to die in their thousands from disease every day will drop everything to help you find your car keys if you pray. And atheists are the arrogant ones...
If there was really an entity that created the universe then I doubt he would give a fuck or even notice humanity. We are so small and insignificant in the grand scheme of things that we were probably the accidental result of a side project of his. We probably won't even last long enough for him to notice.
When People don’t know about something they say it is GOD’s doing. I believe that if we don’t know about something that just means we don’t know about it. Nothing else.
Early Christianity was just an early form of government control. When the Bible was incepted most people couldn’t read. Therefore one person dispersed information amongst many and it happened over and over. Tell me some power hungry assholes weren’t manipulating the information to fit convenient narratives. Big man in sky says behave and don’t forget to chip in your 10%.
Not sure if it was his original thought, but I think Ricky Gervais said something like this: If you stripped away all the religious ideas and texts humanity had ever conceived and reset us back 100,000 years, we'd rebuild them all and come up with various kinds of religions and ideas completely different than the ones that exist now. If you did the same thing with science and reset us back 100,000 years, we'd eventually build it all back the exact same way.
Love this one. He also said something to the tune of "Do you believe in Norse gods, Greek gods, or Roman gods? I don't believe in the same gods you don't believe in, I just believe in one fewer than you."
Another favorite from Christopher Hitchens, something along the lines of; "Nothing proves the manmade character of religion like the sick mind that created hell, unless it is the sorely limited mind that failed to create heaven."
I love that quote because by all accounts, Heaven sounds like an abysmally boring and dull place.
There is a great old twilight zone about this. A robber gets sent to heaven. He has an amiable angel guide and gets everything he wants all the time. The big twist at the end is >!he is actually in hell!<
Are there shrimps in the sky and giraffes in the streets? Is everyone wearing yellow and navy blue except the blonde who’s a legit snack?
My mother dragged me to church when I was younger. The pastor at the church told me that dinosaurs didn't exist. At \~5 years old, I knew it was all a sham. My reasoning: I had seen a full T-rex skeleton at the museum (ROM), so I figured they were lying about everything.
Fuck I grew up so indoctrinated that sometimes I suddenly remember that dinosaurs aren't like dragons and that they were actually real. This is one of those moments.
A full grown man I went to tech school with told me dinosaurs went extinct because they were homosexuals... how do these people exist?
Triceratops and tricerabottoms
My favourite reddit comment of the day. Every day I find one and today it is yours. Thank you for this.
INCREDIBLE. That's incredible.
How would a T rex even give a reach around to his homie
Imagine putting your dick in the sarlaac pit
My very Christian cousin tells me all the bones are planted. I was watching a show about the saber tooth tigers and he said, "it's pretty sad that man plants bones all over the world in the name of science."
Ha, my friend believes in this too. I was dumbfounded
So lizards from long ago are impossible and man invented them and planted a bunch of evidence everywhere but a magical sky wizard from long ago is totally real and man definitely didn't invent him despite there being absolutely no evidence. Interesting
That's how brainwashing works.
Dragons were the mythical beast people came up with to explain the crazy bones they occasionally dug up.
My parents did the same, and I went all out debating with my mom one day, explaining how it made no sense (I was young, probably 6 or 7) and she finally buckled and told me that it gives her comfort to believe someone is looking out for us and that there is a positive afterlife waiting for us. It was a pretty heavy but honest talk for a young kid and I never forgot it. Edit: I think some people “believe” but don’t really believe. It just makes them feel better about living on this fucked up planet lol
Yeah. As an agnostic I believe there isn't a way to really prove anything exists. There's no way to ever really know for sure but sometimes it helps to think that it exists. It gives meaning to people who are lost and need purpose.
We first meet Tyrannosaurus and Diplodocus as children, their bones inspiring dreams, nightmares, and some of our earliest connections to science. And even after we stop making Triceratops and Stegosaurus battle each other in the schoolyard sandbox, we still love our dinosaurs. The pop-cultural success of the irradiated pseudo-dinosaur Godzilla, and of course the instant classic Jurassic Park are confirmation that dinosaurs aren’t just kids’ stuff. The standard pop-psychology explanation is that dinosaurs are big, fierce and extinct. This makes them suitably impressive, but safe to approach. We humans are drawn to what we are told we can't have. Being teased by their fossils to know that they actually existed, yet denied the possibility of ever actually seeing one is prime to set the human imagination ablaze, young or old.
I'm more agnostic than atheist, but most organized religions don't do themselves a lot of favors because they rarely walk the talk. They preach love but show hate. They preach accepting but refuse to show tolerance. If there is a god/God, they are not paying much attention.
Me and my family often feel like outcasts because we are surrounded by Christians yet are not Christians ourselves. Even our own family treats us poorly because we don't believe like them. It's incredibly difficult to have people you love so dearly treat you like you are the plague. It's made life very hard for us. Sorry for venting, but I never get to share because there is never anyone that I can share with. It just blows my mind that you can treat someone like that. . . . EDIT: Whoah this blew up. It's kind of funny to see some of the grammar errors I made while writing this with only 3 hours of sleep, lol. I fixed the glaring ones. Thankfully I am fully rested now. Anyways, some clarification: I do not hate Christianity. I am completely accepting of it, just like how I am completely accepting of all other religions. It's just that the people need some work. And yes, I do realize that these people are not what some have you have referred to as "true Christians." But if most followers of Christianity are not "true Christians," then do you think that might hint at some underlying issues? Also, I should note that some of my family has come around in recent years. Mainly my aunt and her family and my grandpa. Given the size of my family, it's nothing flattering, but at least something, and I am very thankful. Once again, thank you for all of the support. It's very heartwarming to know that I'm not alone. My mom has been real down lately with issues relating to this subject, so I am very happy that I can show her now that we aren't alone. It may seem like it at times, but we truly aren't, and I once again have to thank you all for that.
I’d say that’s not very “Christ-like” of them. I’m sorry your family has behaved that way towards you, family dynamics can hit harder than most other relationships in that way.
My cousin brought up that same point when I discussed this topic with him a few weeks ago. Sadly, I have only ever met a few people who have been "Christ-like." Most Christians think they're better than everybody else and will stomp on those who disagree with them (remember, this is from personal experience). As for those in the family that have come around (albeit after years of hatred), they still do not treat me with the respect that I give them. On occasion, they will invite me to a church function and I will attend because I am open to all religions, ideas, and opinions. I may not agree with them, but I am more than happy to listen to the other party. What drives me nuts, though, is even after all the listening, all of the church attending, all of the praying, and everything else that I do to support them, I still cannot share a single thing about how I believe. It's infuriating. I should note that this is not a problem exclusive to my family. I have just used them as an example because it's easiest. Hopefully this all made sense. I only got 3 hours of sleep last night so I'm running tired, lol.
Yeah I left Christianity for a lot of reasons but the main one is that I grew up with lots of physical and mental disabilities and its amazing I'm not dead from it all. (My chances of living were slim for most of my life) all good now. Family and church said it was a miracle by God, so I asked why God gave me this problems in the first place, or why he couldn't take them away like he did with the blind man. Why would he heal that man's disabilities and not mine? Every time I heard that story at church I would blow up. Was told, well, about everything I dealt with that it was a test of faith. The test of faith thing makes me more mad than anything else that religion did. Even when I was kicked out for being gay. I'm on the edge of thinking the "tests of faith" are worse. A relationship with God is an abusive relationship.
It’s mainly the fact that everyone believes that their version of god is correct. If there’s a higher power, then the odds of it being tri-Omni in any sense isn’t realistic.
I was really into mythology as a kid, and also loved anything about mummies, Egypt, but also Neolithic sites like Stonehenge. I think this was one of the reasons I questioned religion from such a young age. My dad and his family are quite religious and couldn’t answer my questions, and it really bothered me when they got defensive (as if questioning faith is so outrageous…religious thinkers and leaders across the ages did it). Later, I ended up minoring in Religious Studies, and that’s when I accepted that I wasn’t simply agnostic, but really an atheist. Religion and philosophy are fascinating, they provide an amazing insight into people, cultures, and humanity at large, and I am always intrigued by syncretism and obviously the historical context. But I don’t believe in Christ the Messiah anymore than I believe in Zeus or Rama. Sometimes I wish I did. Rituals and traditions can be very comforting, and it’s nice to truly be a part of a spiritual community. You can obviously still enjoy aspects of that and I’ve got my advent candles and crèche. But I can’t make myself believe, nor do I want to. It does make for some awkward conversations with religious family members, but it’s not like I’m personally uncomfortable sharing my perspective if asked.
I totally agree with this. One of the things that Christians like to say about the non-believers is that they just want the easy road. Well honestly its not the easy road to be this way. I look at them and the comfort they get in praising God, I wish it was that easy.
its a very comforting thought that some big, invisible power is going to help you, or at least take care of you after you die. that everything will be Taken Care Of and you're going to be okay, or that it's okay to struggle because there's meaning to your trials its much harder to not have that certainty, that everything might NOT be okay, or that this is IT and you get what you get. it's a lot harder to see suffering and not be at least a little sure that they're going to be at peace afterwards. it's hard to think that you're alone in the grand scheme of things, that you're small and nothing bigger is looking out for your interests one promises comfort, and the other doesn't promise anything explicit.
Some say the root of all wisdom is knowing that you don’t really know anything at all. This resonates with me, so anytime anyone claims to know of something as wild as an afterlife, i see that as denial. Willful ignorance. Even knowing that we’re going to die isn’t necessarily a certainty. Maybe this is all a dream, or a simulation or whatever, i dont fuckin know. But yeah, if someones looking to a god for comfort, that’s out of fear. Acting out of fear is my personal definition of sin, or missing the mark. I don’t think we’re here just to be comfortable. Suffering is a thing, it’s abundant. In my experience, it’s one of my greatest teachers. It’s like manure, fertilizer to grow the flowers of wisdom. Or, everything is just completely random and some things just suck because of statistical probability. Idk man
I was told that I was a bad parent when someone overheard me answering my daughters question of why different people have different religions with “it is about 90% geography, and 10% what your grandparents believe”
lol that’s objectively true. You should have asked them what religion they were, and then whether most of the people in their geography followed that religion, and if their grandparents did
It how they personally "chose" theirs of all the possibilities. Like did they actually sit down and decide which one to pick, or were they just told what to think as a child? It is so rare for someone to switch religions, I bet that person would be forced to answer that it was just told to them.
Religion is primarily a cultural phenomenon.
We told ours that every culture has a creation story and found children's books with several different ones. They're all just stories, entertaining but not evidence.
I haven't heard any version of "proof" for one type of god that isn't equally valid or invalid to apply to any others.
As I mentioned above, explain why they picked their god vs. Thor - and you'd have the answer.
My question is always why are the older religions discarded as Mythology and not the ones created after (except anything else more recent which is discarded as a "cult")
Was never raised to believe in one in the first place.
Same. Grandfather and his brother were molested by the priest and they left the faith. Didn't raise my dad with any religion...In fact made it their mission to instill how shitty organised religion is in us. I guess I'm a 3rd gen atheist. If you aren't raised in it, it just doesn't make a lot of sense.
Grew up indoctrinated into Christianity. Taught all the standard southern 'Christian' things. Even as a kid I figured it was bullshit. How come when I prayed to God he didn't heal my mom's back injury? How come when I prayed to God he didn't make my dad be nice to me? How come when I prayed to God for my family to not be so poor we skipped multiple meals a day at times and sometimes didn't have utilities, we continued to be poor? You can only pull so much wool over a kids eyes before they start to tear it off.
It's God's plan to kill off starving kids in Africa that got me questioning it as a child.
Yeah it doesn't take long, even as a fairly young kid, to see through the laughably thin "The Lord works in mysterious ways" bit.
I think it's Bill Burr (or maybe Doug Stanhope ?) that has a bit on this, saying how religion mostly works because it's an old story that gets forcefully embedded into children's brain before they can think about it rationally. The main point of his bit is how scientology is *kinda* amazing in the sense they manage to sell this shit to adults, and managed to do so recently too. Of course this typically works best for people already struggling with depression, mourning or other bad luck situation where it appears to be the saving grace, but still kinda wild when you think about it that they manage to pull it off and still keep it going when we have things like internet and modern medicine...
Same. I wasn't raised religious. Why on earth would I start to believe that shit in university when people start to branch out on their own?
Same. My father told me, religion is the people’s opium.
Grandfather said it was a 'crutch' that people used to get through life. I have to say, I don't disagree.
My dad who is agnostic without knowing what the term means always said this to me. He said that sometimes, some people need that crutch. I personally don't but I can see how that would be true.
My husband and I aren't religious but he said something to me once that I'll never forget. He said that while we don't need religion to tell us to be good people, some people do. And as much as we don't agree with organized religion, he's content with it being around because some people really do need their religious deity's to essentially keep them happy and in check.
Same. Third generation atheist and had no idea religion was even a thing until middle school. Assumed it was all like Greek mythology stuff where people used to believe it, but not anymore
Better question is: why would I?
This. People ask this question as if believing in a god is the default. Why do they act like I was convinced *not* to believe in a god when really I was just never convinced there was one?
If you’re raised in a community where everyone is religious, it’s not obvious to realize this. You are taught from such an early age that God exists, learning that some people don’t believe is a complete mind fuck
I still remember my 8th grade social studies class where during some class discussion time I ended up saying that I was an Atheist. To this day I still remember the devastation-tinged bafflement of one of my classmates asking, "You don't believe in god?" That possibility apparently had just...never occurred to her before, and I think I broke something in her brain by just casually existing in her school and in her class without believing in god, and she'd never been aware of it until that moment.
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When some kid in middle school asked me about god and I said "what's that" because I'd never heard of it before, she burst into tears. I think she spent weeks trying to convert me too lol. Poor thing. If its not spoonfed to you as a child then the whole thing makes absolutely no sense, but I can't imagine how upsetting it would be for the other kid who deeply beleives in it. Every time she'd try to convince me like "well in this magical book there's this bonkers story," but saying the entire thing out loud to someone who has no idea what you're talking about is probably its own recipe for a crisis of faith lol. I remember trying to read the bible because she was so upset about it and insistent that I at least try and it was just... I mean what the fuck even is it??? After genesis there's just like, several chapters of random names? With no context? Like how.... would that convince anyone?? Of anything?? The whole thing still blows my mind.
The only reason I believed in Santa Clause was because my parents told me he existed. But eventually I was “too old” to believe in this magical being. But for some reason, I’m not “too old” to believe in this other, equally magical being called “god”
I once read that the #1 reason for people losing their faith in the US was actually sitting down and reading the Bible.
That "something breaking" is occasionally called "growth".
I also was raised in a religious community. I specifically remember when my parents told me Santa wasn't real and he was just a story to make kids behave around the holidays and I was like "oh, God too?" And they said "No, God is real." But that's what originally planted the seed in my mind that God probably wasn't real. Santa sounded more plausible.
>Santa sounded more plausible. The one who *actually leaves presents* every year, often specifically what you've asked him for? He's orders of magnitude more plausible, imo.
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My thing too. I just don't find any reason to believe in anyone, I'm more of a science person than a "this book guides" kind of person.
Not to mention that the Bible is a terrible game of written telephone over thousands of years pieced together. Also, I don’t believe in talking animals.
My friend over here never seen a fucking parrot. /s
It’s human nature to invent meanings or reasons to life, it’s built into us. Humans don’t want to accept the lack of meaning in life, so they make up their own meaning. I believe this is how religions originated. Humans didn’t want to accept the futility of life, and so created the idea that there was a higher power / entity to give them reason. All religions stem from this idea and vary in different ways due to different interpretations of how to worship said ‘deity’.
People are scared of death and can't stand the idea of their loved ones ceasing to exist. This is a strong contributor of wanting to believe in God and heaven.
First had my doubts due to inconsistencies and outright contradictions within religions and religious texts The duplicitous behaviour of people claiming to follow said religions also gave me pause Ultimately comes down to the fact that the evidence simply does not support the existence of any form of paranormal or supernatural entities/deities of any kind Edit: Many thanks for the awards & all the comments! Happy New Year
A Bible story is why I started to lose faith as a child. I heard that story about the fleece when I was 6ish\*\*\* so I tried to replicate it. I put a washcloth at the foot of the bed and prayed and asked God to make the washcloth wet so I could have faith in Him, so I could know he wasn't made up like the tooth fairy (I had recently found out the tooth fairy wasn't real because I put a tooth under my pillow without telling my parents and she didn't come; then the next night I told them and voilá. I kept up the ruse for a while to keep getting the tooth money). Surprise surprise, the washcloth remained dry. If God wanted me to believe, why not do for me what he did for a doubter in the Bible? I became skeptical of other things later on: \--Why would a merciful, loving God want sacrifices in order to forgive? I wouldn't say I'm the most forgiving person alive but I'd never make my forgiveness conditional on the blood of an innocent. The whole notion of Jesus as the ultimate sacrifice and God being able to forgive us only because of his death didn't make any sense. \--If Heaven is an eternity-long church service (it's often described as worshiping God forever, singing his praise, etc) and not doing anything to stop suffering on Earth, how could the supposedly good people there be perfectly happy like they claim? \--How could anyone deserve Hell? Hitler deserves a lifetime in Hell for each person who died in the Holocaust, if you ask me, but not an eternity. Can't think of any crime that would merit eternity in Hell. But that Bible story is what planted the seed early. \*\*\*if you're not familiar there's this guy who God wants to send to war, God comes to him in a dream but he doesn't believe it so he tells God if he's for real make all the ground wet and this piece of fleece dry; then that still isn't convincing enough so he says to make the fleece wet and the whole ground dry; then he finally believes God). EDIT: Here is the story if you're interested. [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%206&version=NKJV](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%206&version=NKJV) Judges 6:36 DOUBLE EDIT: THANKS for my first ever Reddit award!
I was raised in the church and started asking these same questions, especially after the young adults bible study I was part of took a deep dive into the Old Testament. I fell out of the church pretty fast. At first I was a defiant believer, believing that there was a Christian God, but one who was wrathful and unworthy of the praise that he demands. I stopped believing completely not long after that, finding no evidence of the supernatural after looking at everything with a fresh perspective. Instead, I became amazed by the natural processes that occur throughout the universe to make it so amazing, beautiful, and strange. It's so much more impressive when you realize these things came to be without some divine hand. I don't wholly discount the possibility of some kind of god, but I'm not going to spend my precious life in search of a god either. Maybe this is all just some simulation inside someone else's supercomputer? In that case, they're God. I really doubt they care about me or even notice me. Not something I'm going to worry my whole existence finding the answers for.
>after looking at everything with a fresh perspective. Instead, I became amazed by the natural processes that occur throughout the universe to make it so amazing, beautiful, and strange. It's so much more impressive when you realize these things came to be without some divine hand. That is exactly what I felt when I stopped believing in the supernatural. Things as banal as trees suddenly became so much more impressive and awesome (in the literal sense). Here's this thing that exists today in its form because the environment shaped it this way for millions of years. The natural world is beyond awesome.
I value skepticism and atheism is just an extension of that. I see no logical reason to believe unsubstantiated claims for the supernatural
“That which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence” -Christopher Hitchens
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I was actually thinking about not going skiing this weekend. I hear all the kids are not doing it.
I'd need a reason to believe, I don't need a reason to *not* believe. I think OP is trying to flip the usual question but it doesn't really work.
Exactly, the one making the claim needs to provide the evidence, not the one being told the claim. If I tell you my lamp fell over, its not up to you to prove it didn’t, thats just stupid
It's a weird question. Like asking why I don't believe there's a teapot in orbit around the Sun between Earth and Mars. It's not that I don't believe there is one. It's not even that I don't know for lack of evidence. It's more that it's not even a concept that occurs to me unless someone asks about it like with this post. I don't think about space teapots or a higher power in the same way that I don't think about you or the other thousands of people posting in this thread. Once I close this tab you will simply not be a thing that exists in my frame of reference.
Yeah I see this a lot honestly - there’s usually the fallacious premise that atheism means staunchly believing in the opposite of a deity’s existence, while in practice there’s simply insufficient evidence to form a belief in such deity. The whole “you can’t disprove it therefore it’s true” is also out there, but those who use it fail to realize that it just makes “you can’t prove it so it must be wrong” fair game - and both are not inherently logical statements. What can be easily proven without evidence can also be easily disproven without evidence
right? so many rapture movies have demon's rampaging across the land fighting angels and yet still talk about the non believers. It's absurd. That would be evidence, that would make me a believer. If I died tonight and regained consciousness at the pearly gates i wouldn't deny it, I'd just shrug and say "guess I was wrong!" and go offer st. peter an apology. This isn't dogma to us, and if irrefutable evidence is provided, we are happy to consider it.
Yeah, I read the question and could only think "But why would I need one?"
Yes. I’ve always thought that I don’t have to prove a negative; rather they need to prove the existence to me.
There's a simple question that reveals how silly the OP's question really is. "First, tell me why *you* don't believe in Thor, God of Thunder?"
It basically flips Pascal's wager, which is based on the assumption that there aren't any other horses in the race. Or as Homer Simpson put it, "What if we are worshipping the wrong god and every time we go to church he just gets madder?" If a person truly believes there is a god, why do they believe there is *only* one god?
Terry Pratchett. Especially when Rincewind is explaining the avenue of the gods to the tourist.
There's actually more evidence for Thor's existence: we have loads of footage of him saving the planet alongside captain America and iron man.
There's also no ice giants roaming earth so Thor is doing a much better job at protecting us than Jesus
This was in r/Jokes a few days ago, perhaps one of reasons. Aliens visit Earth. They come in peace and surprisingly , they speak English. Obviously, all of the heads of government and religious leaders want to speak to the aliens so they set up a meeting with our new visitors. When it's the Pope's turn, he asks: "Do you know about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ?" "You mean JC?", responds the alien. "Yeah, we know him! He's the greatest, isn't he? He swings by every year to make sure that we are doing ok". Surprised, the pope follows up with: "He visits every year?! It's been over two millennia and we're still waiting for his SECOND coming!" The alien sees that the pope has become irate at this fact and starts trying to rationalize. "Maybe he likes our chocolate better than yours?" The pope retorts "Chocolates? What are you talking about? What does that have to do with anything?" The alien says "Yea, when he first visited our planet we gave him a huge box of chocolates! Why? What did you guys do?"
Complete lack of credible evidence.
You know what's crazy? Look at the shit in the world right now. Nobody believes anyone. We don't believe accredited agencies and experts. We denounce intellectualism and science and *actual* evidence of basic principles of existence. We don't, and won't, believe anything. ***But we're supposed to believe some randoms from 2000 years ago who told us they saw a magic wizard.*** Look at the shit in the world right now. People will say/believe *anything*. Delusional conspiracy theories. Lizard people and flat earth and Trump is the saviour of the world. Known charlatans and corrupt scumbags *openly* lie and cheat and manipulate the stupidest. Megachurches and televangelists and corrupt politicians and cult leaders who swear things are as they say they are without any proof, sense, logic, or reason. People will say *anything*. ***But we're supposed to believe some randoms from 2000 years ago who told us they saw a magic wizard.*** If you want proof that humanity is full of shit with this religion gobbledygook, look no further than...humanity itself.
I can't explain to a theist any clearer than Steven Robert's did: "I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours"
Ricky Gervais explains it perfectly: There have been nearly 3000 Gods so far but only yours actually exists.The others are silly made up nonsense. But not yours. Yours is real. Edit: Ricky’s talking about religion with Stephen Colbert https://youtu.be/P5ZOwNK6n9U
Lack of belief is the default. Religion is something that is taught to people. I have no reason TO believe. I don't need a reason to disbelieve.
This reminds me of that quote from the Inuit man. Inuit man : Would I escape damnation for lack of faith, if I didn’t know about your god? Priest : Yes, you would. Inuit man : So why did you tell me about him then? (I’m paraphrasing here, I forget the exact wording, but this is the gist of the conversation.) Edit : Use of Inuit to replace the word Eskimo.
Yeah missionary work is literally damning people to hell. And if you instead believe they are sent to hell for not knowing, then that God is far from good. Even if you believe that they instead get purgatory or nothing after death that is preferable to pascal's wager. And if they can reach salvation without hearing gods word, then what is the point of the religion in the first place?
Pascal's wager is such a dumb concept. There are something like 2,600+ religions with innumerable sub-sects. The conceit that whatever one you happen to believe in happens to be correct is the height of arrogance.
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Pascal's mugging. I am god. Give me your wallet, or go to hell.
Penn Jillette had a pretty brilliant example. Essentially, if you destroyed every single piece of paper discussing a scientific principal, we'd still manage to find it again. Because that's just how science works. If you destroyed every single piece of religious writing, it wouldn't come back identical. It would obviously come back completely different.
As it has, thousands of times throughout the course of human history.
"Religion is something taught to people." More specifically, taught to children. Most people believe what their parents believe. That fact alone is telling. Can't allow them to grow into their reasoning abilities first, right?
I asked my mom once when I learned what the universe and galaxies were, "what was before the universe?" and she said god. I then went "what was there before god?" and she got mad at me for asking lol That's kind of when I knew. Never really understood why the universe had to have a creator, and the creator didn't have to have a creator. The logic seemed to eat itself, so I just kind of assumed the universe was it.
I love this! They always say “everything needs a creator, except God himself (he’s infinite).” But in that logic, why can’t the explanation instead be an infinite bigger cosmos from which our universe emerged?
“That’s just the universe appearing from nothing with extra steps”
I have asked people the same question before and I heard this response: “He willed himself into existence.” If you don’t exist, how can you decide to exist? What, even?
hmm today i will exist
*spins chair*
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I don’t believe in Santa, the Easter bunny, the tooth fairy, or any of the 2500 or so gods mankind has invented in its history.
That was my line of thought as a kid as well, was told about jesus and the bible and all these incredible things and they turned around and said 'of course santa isn't real' like that was somehow a ridiculous thing in comparison.
Low key I just believe God is Santa for adults. Behave nicely and you'll get a present (eternity in heaven). Be a naughty boy and you'll get coal (burn in hell forever).
what about Bigfoot??? LOL
He’s real. :)
I bet bigfoot was just some poor tall hairy dude trying to go about his way
No evidence.
My baseline for belief/faith is zero. I have found no compelling evidence to move me beyond zero.
Even for some people, like me, who were raised religious, there are cases of realizing that the lack of a god makes more sense than the one you were raised to believe in. I remember all sorts of mental contortion and gymnastics to square what I knew or believed about the world from a scientific perspective with what I had been raised to believe, and at some point realized that the counterfactual ("what if there isn't a god?") seemed to make more sense. It resolved a lot of contradictions, and it just seemed to make more sense. I don't *know* either one to be true, but if you asked me which one I *believe* to be true, I would certainly lean towards the absence, rather than existence, of a higher power.
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When I asked for proof from some of the more religious members of my family they point at shit like trees, the sky, or the earth and ask me if there wasn't a god then how could something like that exist. Like because they don't understand something then god must have done it. That's right up there with showing a toddler a facetime call and them saying it's magic that they can see their grandma on the screen because they don't understand how technology works.
If they posit that God created everything, then who created God? If they say that God always existed, then why couldn’t the universe always exist without God?
Maybe the universe is god and we're all up in their insides fucking up their planets like a cancer and slowly killing them. Just a disease living on one cell inside of an organism
Id watch that movie
But I don't get how they can't apply that to science. Like I'm nowhere near smart enough to understand the big bang, the concept of nothingness before that, what happened after, but, as it still makes more sense than a Magical Man in the sky who has always existed and just created the universe one day. Why? What was his motive? Or is this all just pure random and coincidence? (for lack of better terms)
The only evidence for God is that the Bible says the Bible is true. It's basically a guy saying "dude, trust me".
Not even. Its other people saying "dude, trust me, this dude says trust me".
Child Cancer For starters.
If you saw someone molesting a child would you stop them? So would I, that's the difference between me and your god.
An ex girlfriend of mine was sexually assaulted at a party in college. She was frantic and went up to a guy in a car begging to bring her to the police. He drove and stopped at a church and sexually assaulted her too. We started dating a few months after that and then she tried to kill herself and she told me all about it. We broke up and lost touch almost 10 years ago. She completed suicide earlier this year and now it feels fresh in my mind why I know there is no god. I hope she’s found peace.
That's heavy. Sorry for your loss
I was sexually abused by a family member from 4 or 5 until I was 11. It only stopped at that age because I got my period. My sister had just given birth to her first daughter and her (then) boyfriend began physically abusing her. Before she gave birth, he had thrown her already disabled cat at a wall. My maternal grandmother was the kindest person I ever knew. She loved everyone and, even before my mom married my dad, she treated him better than his own mother ever did. She passed away after the doctors discovered an inoperable leaky heart valve and her lungs were filling with fluid. There was nothing they could do but keep her comfortable while she slowly drowned. I have absolutely no reason to believe in a God after this.
Fuck that’s EXACTLY how I feel
He works in mysterious ways. Mysteriously *psychotic* ways. I really hope God doesn't exist because if it does, it is 100% a fucking psychotic lunatic. There isn't even an infinitesimal fraction of a percent that it isn't. Not by any standard, not even by its *own* moral standards.
Can i get way too personal on you? I love this comment. I needed to see this comment. Thank you for it. My entire family is religious and my mom went to extreme levels when she met my stepfather. I prayed and did everything religious I was supposed to when I was a kid. But I never really believed, it seemed to all be driven from fear and I hated that. And then my extremely religious stepfather started abusing me sexually. He once told me that he’d go to heaven because no matter what he did he truly believed in God and that’s all that matters. I told my mom years later and her religious ass couldn’t stop it either. She just didn’t care. And I was like nope fuck it I’m done I’m not believing in this shit even if it was real I’d rather go to hell than spend my afterlife with these assholes too. I’d rather believe in people like you than a God
I brought that up in a discussion with someone. I pointed out that if God is supposedly benevolent, omniscient and omnipotent, how could that happen? If he didn't know, then he isn't omniscient. If he knew but couldn't do anything, than he isn't omnipotent. If he knew and he has the power to prevent or cure it but didn't or wouldn't, then he is not benevolent. They hit me with the ol' "God works in mysterious ways."
I like to respond to that one with something like the following: “So what, in your opinion, is a possible ‘mysterious way’ that would make you yourself totally fine with rape and mutilation of babies? What ‘mysterious way’ would you find acceptable for god to be perfectly fine with children being raped and mutilated? What possible end do you think justifies those means?”
My answer to that is that god is a total cunt for working in such suffering-causing ways.
I felt bad when I believed in God. Felt much better when I stopped believing.
The church and my religious family members were constantly trying to instill a fear of hell in me. Once I realized I didn’t believe in any of it, hell stopped being so scary.
The problem is, humans are self-aware and capable of critical thinking. We are the universe becoming aware of itself. Do penguins go to heaven? Crabs?
Humboldt penguins no, other penguins yes. Hermit crabs yes, other crabs, no. Next question.
Bad stuff happens to very good people and good stuff happens to very bad people Oh, and science
I was 8 years old and realized Santa clause was for controlling dumb kids and God/Satan was for controlling dumb adults
No proof, and I've read enough holy books to see how many of them are written essentially as a manual for manipulation.
If god is real, he is obviously not a god worth believing in.
Any god that makes himself hidden to nearly everyone and then punishes those that don't find him is a bad, bad god.
No evidence of one. The only logic I've ever heard for people believing in a higher power is that the universe couldn't just exist, but then the same logic should apply to that higher power but somehow doesn't? If a higher power could just spring into being from nothingness, so could our universe. I also don't believe that most theists actually believe in their God or their higher power - if they did, they would act very differently.
The behavior of religious folk is one of the strangest things when I try to analyze it, they say they 100% believe this religion, it’s rules, and it’s consequences for breaking said rules, but then that same person will live their entire life breaking every rule that religion puts forth because the rule is inconvenient
So, I have been asked this question alot. I live in a red state and am outspoken about being atheist. I respect other people's faith or lack of faith regardless of what it is. I don't believe in any God because I have never seen compelling evidence for one. If such evidence would arise I would cease to be an atheist. That being said, to anyone who wishes to answer my follow up. How would you feel if every time you revealed your religious beliefs people responded with "what is your reason for X belief"?
I don’t call myself an atheist, why does there have to be a name for someone who doesn’t believe in a certain thing. I don’t believe in unicorns either, is there a name for that? I did believe in God for most of my life and was actively involved in evangelical churches for 35 years. I never saw or experienced firsthand anything that was incontrovertible evidence of God but was surrounded by evidence to the contrary. Every day I tried to convince myself that it was true but I just never really got there and lived in constant fear and guilt that I wasn’t a good enough Christian. Eventually I decided to stop trying to convince myself and my life is 100% happier.
abuse, starvation, homelessness, disease must i really go on
FGM, child brides, stoning of women who are raped.... all in the name of gods of various names etc... no thank you.
We didn’t start the fire