The Obvious Question

[Cannon_Fodder]

Oh, jeez. I didn't know what the heck you were talking about for a while, then I remembered the thread subject...( ). Good of ye to come over to the light! May your pasta be delicious and noodley! (BTW: If you want to interrupt and get back to the origianl topic, feel free!)

-(Rev. Brackets)

[ergodic]

My parents are both confirmed catholics. I think they put me through sunday school, until I was confirmed, out of habit - since neither of them really believe in the catholic/christian male, angry,etc version of "God."

In high school I quickly decided I didn't believe it either, gave up all belief in a divine superpower, and started exploring eastern religions to see what other people thought (It was a phase I went through).

The only thing that has stuck with me to this day (I'm 23) is the Tao Te Ching of Lao Tzu (google it, lots of free versions). It is elegant, pithy, and poetic. In a very non religions way, I think it is a great summary of fundamental ethics, morality, and the essense of life. It is a great read and I'd recommend it to anyone (it compliments FSMism in a lot of ways).

Whenever Jehova's Witnesses show up at my door I used to take the offensive and try to introduce them to my pseudo spirituality using the Tao Te Ching. What amazes me is how few of them have ever even heard of it. I can't wait till the next one shows up and I start to tell them about the FSM!

[Alpaca]

It's now possible to order a visit from the Jehova's Witnesses online. I sometimes do it for the benefit of friends with mindsets similar to mine.


Welcome to the fora!

[codemartin]

Im a/were jew. who I might add is not rich or tight with money.

all hail the fsm.

[darren996]

Im a/were jew. who I might add is not rich or tight with money.

all hail the fsm.

You can be whatever you want. All are welcome.

[Lexi6124]

I sorta have one foot in atheism and one foot in agnostic. Being raised a good little Catholic girl, I'm a little chicken to go "all the way." Although, Wiccan seems to be pretty interesting, at least that religion values their females. Sigh, I guess I just haven't gotten the brain-washing out of my system yet. There may come a time when I can comfortably not believe in god, but I'm not there quite yet, but every year I little closer.

Lexi

[Alpaca]

I find that really interesting. If you don't mind telling, when you say you're not yet comfortable with no god, what do you mean? Are you frightened of being wrong, that there might be retribution? Are you hesitant to abandon part of your life?

[Griffin]

My sons are the only Jews in the next generation. But it wont last. 2000 years down the pan.

I was brought up on G&S too - the real McCoy - at the Savoy - Doyle Carte - EVERY year. Snow, hail or ice. I barely survived when the copywrite ran out. Seemed like the End of the World.

Thank goodness I found His Noodliness. I was lost.

Actually I only read this thread to see what would happen when I went from page 6 to page 7.

1, 2, 3 ... 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 Next - disappointing - I wanted to see a 6 and a 7 together on the left hand side.

[Lexi6124]

I am not comfortable giving up the thought only because there still is some beauty in the idea for me. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but if it weren't for organized religion....well, I'd be a staunch believer. I see all the things done by people in the name of their god and I am horrified, including the hypocrisy of saying their god is loving and forgiving and yet YOU will go to hell if you dare to do *insert favorite sin here*. I honestly think organized religion was one of the worst ideas ever, but there is a comfort in thinking that someone is watching over you. But I'm also a big fan of self-judgment and taking responsibility for yourself and what you do and say to people. It's really hard to have faith in god if you have no faith in his supposed story. I don't buy the bible for a second.

Aunt Dee Dee, as a scientist, I've never thought that the two were mutually exclusive either. There are times when you can look at something in nature and almost see the 'hand of god' if you will. But then you look at humanity and it makes it awfully hard to see him at all. All the same, I don't think I'll ever quite make it all the way to atheism. Every year, it seems a little more of my faith has been drained away. So, we'll just see where I end up in a few years and if I die, I'll let you all know how the volcano is.

Lexi

[Sir Francis Drake]

Einstein has been credited with the following quote:
"Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."

[ergodic]

But then you look at humanity and it makes it awfully hard to see him at all.

I'm splitting hairs here by pointing out your choice of pronoun.

Nevertheless, something that guided my transition away from Catholicism was to broaden my definition of God. After pondering whether God would actually be a single sex/gender, I pretty quickly moved away from the whole personification idea, thinking it's selfish of humans to claim that they are the earthly image of the almighty and vice versa. Furthermore, I eventually rejected the notion that a single 'entity' -- no matter how gender,race,species,etc.. neutral -- existed as a true overseer of everything and preferred to believe in an 'essence' or a 'way' that guides all phenomena and permeates everything. Humans can only scratch at the surface of this essence with interpretations and observations, be they verbal, scientific, mathematical, theological, etc.., and the sum of all human experiences from the quantum level to the intergalactic level will certainly never encompass or irreducibly simplify it.

As a disclaimer, my thinking was heavily influenced by the Tao Te Ching. I'm not trying to sell you on my philosophy but I feel like in the not so distant past I was just about where you currently are and as I've described inrelatively few words, this is where I am currently.

[Alpaca]

For a while, I toyed with the idea of Deism. I considered that maybe there was one god who simply snapped his fingers (and the lowercase pronoun was intentioal), and the big bang went "bang." Still, just the idea of a god of any sort is unattractive to me, because a supernatural explanation for anything silences the quest for a natural explanation, since it's already explained.

Also, (breaking out of Pastafarian mode for another little while here), I find the idea of eternal life after death distressing. Eventually, heaven and hell would become the same: just plain boring. Eternity is a really, really long time.

[FlyingSopwithCamel]

I follow the teachings of beings capable of levitation without the use of inertia, which covers many things, people, and inert gases.

Open minded to take all the good bits from everything, and snacks when I can get them.

More bent toward Eastern things as they have more plausible myths and a better code of conduct. Well, many do, and it's the following of them is where it gets in trouble. Already I see scisms here in the land of the noodle. Rice, Formed Pasta, even Spaghetti squash (naturalists) all want in the Canon...

Snoopy is the proponent, of course, of the Dogma of the Joy of Suppertime,
interspersed with mystical journeys to the sky to battle enigmas and makers of cheap pizza.

Which has tomato sauce, which leads us of course back to the noodley.

Ramen.

Or, was this supposed to be serious? More Eastern than say, not Eastern.
But if one is east of Asia, is it Western? Oh, I can't be serious. Really.

Waiting for the time when someone finally knows how the world could be made a good and happy place,
an idea that was right, would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything.

[Tickle]

Open minded to take all the good bits from everything, and snacks when I can get them.

RAmen (especially the bit about snacks)

Welcome to the forum FlyingSopwithCamel.

[DeadPoet]

Welcome, newest of the cameloids! Did you make that picture?? It's a real master-piece!! Please put it in the Art section!!!