Aetheism, Do You Believe?

[DelBubs]

Maybe you're pregnant?

Why, if I was pregnant, I may have to change my whole belief system

To best sum up my aetheism
The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not.
Eric Hoffer (1902 - 1983)

I would like to respond to one specific thing, I totally agree that people will commit any kind of atrocity and evil deed, then justify it by hiding behind a twisted interpretation of religious text or doctrine.

[kozzi24]

I'm agnostic. I have found athiests--the organized Athiests as annoying as religious people, with Madeline O'Hare trying to make athiesm a form of religion and objecting that an astronaut would dare read a prayer while away from earth on Christmas.

Some people may find my background interesting. I was Christened a Catholic almost immediately after birth, by the adoption agency handling me. Due to a long and twisted story of my birth parents, I was not adopted until I was 2. My parents--adoptive--wanted me Christened into their family protestantism. The priest would not do it because "that child is already catholic." My parents eneded up leaving (or being asked to leave) the church over it. An aunt arranged a family christening in her Episcopalian church.

I also think that the whole Catholic priest & boys thing roots down to closet doors. I know two men who became Catholic priests because the no-marriage doctrine made an automatic cover for homosexual tendencies. They're both older, in an American age where the cover was "needed." In doing so, they entered an atmosphere where ALL sex is "WRONG" a sin, including masturbation. In a way it is sickly natural that some of the extreme no-sex nutcases would seek release with "partners" who would not reveal the "affair." There's no such thing anymore, but back in the day it could be "counted" on that through shame or coersion or "the pact of a promise," kids could be manipulated into not telling. The church looses more priests to marriage, and with less societal "need" for a closet door cover, there's actually becoming a shortage of Catholic priests.

[Powersurge]

I am a Teutonic heathen, believe in many gods and goddesses, and ahve always enjoyed the luxury of standing outside of such paradigm's in which stuff like Religion vs. Science make sense.

The quintessence of Teutonic belief about the deities can be found in the Anglo-Saxon term *weoh* (Old Norse - ve, German - weih). This word forms the root of such others words which mean *altar* and *idol*. It literally means *seperate*(from man's state of being) and carries such connontations as imply *mystery* and *unknowability*.

Thus, when it comes to such questions as whether there are one god or many, gods or goddesses, many pantheons or just one, the ultimate answer is always "we don't know".

We have a sense of something divine, like a scientist has a sense of the prescence of a black hole, but our ideas of it are patently *human* ideas and perceptions. These change and grow and evovle/devolve over time.
No matter that a god said it. What the god said was still filtered through the temporal world and one culture or another of Man. There is NO getting around that fact.


Thus why the rule of precedent has always been central to Teutonic thought and belief and culture.

We judge our attunement to the divine by the fruits of our relationship with it, as denoted in the word *halig*... from whence we get such modern words as holy, healthy, heal, and whole. If we are in tune with *weoh* then *halig* is the natural by-product. If our beliefs begin to fall out of tune with the source, our health and wholeness begin to whither and wane, prompting us to quetion and revise our beliefs.

While I don't care for aetheist that act like the newest form of monotheists, believing that they alone hold the one truth that is the ultimate source of goodness for all Mankind, I certainly have nothing against people speaking from and cleaving to their experience... so long as they are respectful of the experiences of their fellow man.

I'm not so sure that religion makes better people. I find really good people, and really bad people, in all manner of different subcultures, claiming all sort of different beliefs. I try to concern myself more with a persons honour and deeds rather than getting all caught up in ideology or who might be paying lip-service to what.

[Effexxor]

I'm not quite sure whether God is there or if he isn't. I doubt that there is a God somewhere pulling our puppet strings, but there just may be something, somewhere. However, if I live my life to the best of my ability and try to help others, that should be enough to a higher being. SOmething in me just rebels at the thought of having to 'validate' an apparently all powerful God, and the fact that if I don't do that, I will go to hell. That just doesn't seem... fair.

I like the Hindu idea 'All roads lead to God.' Because even atheists have a faith system, just their faith is in something besides a deity.

[SephirothsKiller]

To best sum up my aetheism
The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not.
Eric Hoffer (1902 - 1983)

Boy if this were true. The opposite of the religioius fanatic is the angry aethiest to be sure. If you ever go onto any forums devoted entirely to extended discussions you will see what I mean, people constatnly make threads devoted entirely to posts featuring "I'm a free thinker" or "I'm not a sheep" or people like the guy you quoted earlier saying "Religions do really evil things!!"
Its particularly fun to be Catholic, since we get blamed for pretty much everything in the world, and are generally the most discriminated against by Atheists.
I'm not saying that religions don't have these things but to say aetheists don't isn't true. I could start naming religious atrocities not done in the name of any deity, but I won't.

27% of the aids relief funds in Africa are linked to the Catholic Church.

[Mokole]

There's lots of unknowns. I don't believe at all in String Theory, dark energy seems bogus often (slapped in to make their numbers work), the Big Bang may have happened but it's all guesswork, cosmic background radiaton may be a function of the structure of the universe not a result of a big bang, all physical properties may be tied to the essential structure of the universe that we haven't discerned yet, like with gravity, and I blather on about unknowns. So a mystery God isn't such a problem for me.

And not a single thing I said this post has anything at all to do with my religious believes. I'm a scientist and mathematician and I find fault with so much physics these days (I always found it odd that evangelists took on biology/evolution as a battleground when evolution doesn't contradict anyone's core beliefs anyway, yet don't battle over the origin of the universe which is highly debatable ).

To me, if an idea is beautiful and simple, it's correct. E = mc2. Ek = 1/2 mv2. The modern definition of combustion. Simplicity and beauty, which String Theory, current Big Bang Theory (inflation?!?), and dark energy theory ain't by a long stretch. Some day somone will do what Faraday, Newton, Ohm, Einstein, Boscovitch, Boyle et al did, and find the simple answer.

[Mokole]

Boy if this were true. The opposite of the religioius fanatic is the angry aethiest to be sure. If you ever go onto any forums devoted entirely to extended discussions you will see what I mean, people constatnly make threads devoted entirely to posts featuring "I'm a free thinker" or "I'm not a sheep" or people like the guy you quoted earlier saying "Religions do really evil things!!"
Its particularly fun to be Catholic, since we get blamed for pretty much everything in the world, and are generally the most discriminated against by Atheists.
I'm not saying that religions don't have these things but to say aetheists don't isn't true. I could start naming religious atrocities not done in the name of any deity, but I won't.

27% of the aids relief funds in Africa are linked to the Catholic Church.

Quite true. Our Catholic group does projects like housing in Mexico, food for Palestinians, water in Africa, and more than I can remember. Then our priest gets mad at us for not giving enough!

Being good matters to me, if you're Catholic or not. Like I know what really matters to God.

To add a 'funny' thing, a friend of mine loves to go to atheist forums and Prince Di forums and.... and make fun of them for going over the top about their love of... or hatred of... or attack on... He gets banned a lot.

[DelBubs]

To best sum up my aetheism
The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not.
Eric Hoffer (1902 - 1983)

Boy if this were true. The opposite of the religioius fanatic is the angry aethiest to be sure. If you ever go onto any forums devoted entirely to extended discussions you will see what I mean, people constatnly make threads devoted entirely to posts featuring "I'm a free thinker" or "I'm not a sheep" or people like the guy you quoted earlier saying "Religions do really evil things!!"
Its particularly fun to be Catholic, since we get blamed for pretty much everything in the world, and are generally the most discriminated against by Atheists.
I'm not saying that religions don't have these things but to say aetheists don't isn't true. I could start naming religious atrocities not done in the name of any deity, but I won't.

27% of the aids relief funds in Africa are linked to the Catholic Church.

Ah, but couldn't one argue that a lot pf Africa's problems can be traced to missionaries interfering in the natural order of that continent. Contraception is a no no, so more than your average number of children, more mouths to feed with no real increase of food production from the indigenous peoples usual farming techniques.

I probably do feel most animosity to the Catholic church, but only if pressed on the subject. That is probably influenced by the troubles in Northern Ireland which ran during a greater part of my life. I also have difficulty with a church that will quite happily spend £2,000,000+ on a Cathedral, while people starve elsewhere. I won't even get into the latest Pope and his war record or how the Catholic church could have said something about the Concentration camps, but did nothing.

My aetheism is not something I wear like a badge, I don't often think about religion or what I do and don't believe in. To my mind all people are perfectly entitled to believe in what they want and as long as they don't press it on me, I'm fine.

[Powersurge]

Well, not to pick on Catholics, despite the history of their Church, but alot of the aid given to foreign countries comes with strings attached. It's not a Universal Brotherhood of Man type thing, but a evangelical tactic, along with policies of accomdation, in which indigenous beliefs and worldview are not challenged and conversion amounts to little more than a change in the deity-names one grunts in prayer. Thus why we of NW European heritage had this little event called the Reformation.

Anyway, the so-called gift of love, the "free" gift, is really nothin of the kind, making it somewhat hard to accept as such when it is held over one's head as somekind of pretnetious proof of moral superiority. Of course, when it gts right down to it, we all seem to help, in deed, as selflessly and as selfishly as any other group. For some the price of that help is the soul, for others it's a the mind, for others it is a few dollars and some thanks. And of course, we all have that selfless side that pops up here and there.

[Effexxor]

Personally? I'd far rather be around a catholic than a rabid fundamentalist. Catholics seem to possess the ability to think critically about their religion, or at least more so than fundamentalists who spoon fed their beliefs without taking a minute to really think about it. The countless issues with the church has kind of fostered a skepticism, at least here in Nebraska.

Catholics are pretty with charity also, except with contraception. I volunteer with the Nebraska AIDs project and good lord, the crap we get from catholics. And the pope, telling people in places where AIDs has 20% of the nation that they shouldn't use condoms... There's no excuse for that kind of behavior. But if the catholic church relaxes on that, I'll be happy.

[Powersurge]

Personally? I'd far rather be around a catholic than a rabid fundamentalist. Catholics seem to possess the ability to think critically about their religion, or at least more so than fundamentalists who spoon fed their beliefs without taking a minute to really think about it. The countless issues with the church has kind of fostered a skepticism, at least here in Nebraska.

Despite the historical friction with the Church, I also like Catholics... often even more-so than my fellow Teutonics. They celebrate more or less the same holidays that we do, have some common core value, muchly thanks to that elder policy of accomodation, and they have a proper reverence for the divine that I find lacking in (alot of) modern day heathenisms; which seem to be reactionary in their stance/s, ie. Christianity is this way, so we must be the opposite.

Heck, I even recall a hearing a decade or so ago that the Pope declared that doctrine is a growing evolving thing, not necesarily a perfecrted product.

In contrast, Protestantism, for all that it might have the (Biblical) truth, doesn't seem to really want what they have. And needless to say perhaps, fundie-ism is just too whacko.

[Snowsquatch]

I'm an atheist. I'm quite certain that God doesn't exist.

Religion corrupts everything it touches. The influence of religion on politics, on science, on sexuality, on history - is always negative.

I don't mind believers. I tend to view them as harmless cranks, unless they advocate a religious influence over politics. That gets my back up.

I'm not a "fanatical atheist," but I am an stubborn secularist.

[Ben]

In the beginning Man created God;
and in the image of Man
created he him.

2 And Man gave unto God a multitude of
names,that he might be Lord of all
the earth when it was suited to Man

3 And on the seven millionth
day Man rested and did lean
heavily on his God and saw that
it was good.

4 And Man formed Aqualung of
the dust of the ground, and a
host of others likened unto his kind.

5 And these lesser men were cast into the
void; And some were burned, and some were
put apart from their kind.

6 And Man became the God that he had
created and with his miracles did
rule over all the earth.

7 But as all these things
came to pass, the Spirit that did
cause man to create his God
lived on within all men: even
within Aqualung.

8 And man saw it not.

9 But for Christ's sake he'd
better start looking.

[Barnacle13]

This is definitely a topic folks can and will get involved in. Religious discussions always do that for some reason.

My family was brought up very Catholic. Primarily because my paternal grandmother demanded as much out of her children. My father and all of his siblings followed this doctirine until such time as it was no longer convenient for them to do so (coincided with the passing of my grandmother incidentally). Few if any of them are what I'd refer to as devout Catholics. Some still practice the faith, including my own family, but few hold all of the tenets to be absolute. Birth control has long been used in my family. For this I guess we'll burn in hell. Uncles, aunts, and cousins have all taken the Lord's name in vain. Again I suppose we'll burn. Along the way several have I'm sure shoplifted candy or comic books. BURN! If I hold all of these to be absolute, and add to it the fact that my grandmother condemned me to hell for watching Porky's Revenge and Cheech & Chong's Nice Dreams at age 13, then I'm pretty much toast. I prefer to look at it differently though. If they expected me to be perfect they wouldn't call me a "practicing Catholic".

Faith I think is a good thing. Whether that faith be in God, Allah, Buddah, the Fates, destiny, blind luck, etc. who cares! It drives us to be better people in general. Sure there are many who "use religion" to proclaim themselves superior or worse. In the end I like to believe they'll receive what is coming to them, just as all of us who are good will receive whatever reward awaits us. If I'm wrong and 40 virgins are waiting for me in heaven I won't be disappointed. I'll just accept it as another one of my many mistakes and move on to the good stuff!

Basically what I hear most folks saying here is the same thing. We are turned off by those who are overzealous about their religion of lack thereof. Hell, I don't particularly care for zealous Catholics. In fact they bother me probably more that aethiests. I prefer to surround myself and my family with people who are good to other people regardless of their race, religion, sexual orientation, social status, etc. I'm also pretty sure that no one can talk me out of living in this manner. Let em try!

Tom

[Effexxor]

Faith I think is a good thing. Whether that faith be in God, Allah, Buddah, the Fates, destiny, blind luck, etc. who cares! It drives us to be better people in general. Sure there are many who "use religion" to proclaim themselves superior or worse. In the end I like to believe they'll receive what is coming to them, just as all of us who are good will receive whatever reward awaits us. If I'm wrong and 40 virgins are waiting for me in heaven I won't be disappointed. I'll just accept it as another one of my many mistakes and move on to the good stuff!

Basically what I hear most folks saying here is the same thing. We are turned off by those who are overzealous about their religion of lack thereof. Hell, I don't particularly care for zealous Catholics. In fact they bother me probably more that aethiests. I prefer to surround myself and my family with people who are good to other people regardless of their race, religion, sexual orientation, social status, etc. I'm also pretty sure that no one can talk me out of living in this manner. Let em try!

Amen Brotha. Faith is a natural human trait. We all need it, to a certain degree. I know that I, on the night of September 11, prayed to somebody for peace. We need to feel like there's more to this world than all the hatred and bigotry, though some put more of an emphasis on seeing good in the world today and others are thinking more of the good in an afterlife. But I agree that no matter the religious stance, if faith makes someone's life happy and fufilled, then I can't find fault with them. As long as they don't harm anyone mentally or physically by doing so, at least.