Reasons I Won't Believe in Christianity.

[Firebird]

1. Using FEAR to control, how unethical is that?

I think such people are fearful of abandoning Christianity because of long ingrained mental conditioning by parent, church, school, peer and government.

and hence the nail on the head.

bb, FF

[Lord_of_Nightmares]

Any religion that is not based on love and is instead based in fear, is something that I think should be entirely avoided.

[SpiritTalker]

I agree that people who use fear tactics should be avoided.

I came to this life to learn oneness and so I focus on that. I wasn't raised in a X'n active home, nor ever was I threatened that my spiritual beliefs were punishable. I sought the X'n experience &'got it. You can blame me that I'm not a perfect vessel. When I consider Inanna was hung on a pike & re-vivified, and Osiris was dismembered and reassembled, and Jesus was crucified and resurrected etc, I just don't see much difference between pagan & X'n in their final outcome. Each culture put it's own narrative on the same theme. Something spiritual is happening to the followers of these narratives in response to the theme. That's worth a 2nd look. What does the land's seasonal renewal and death-rebirth theme represent in man himself?

Something is experienced in pagan & X'n rites just as in traditional witchcraft rites. There's something transformative going on that isn't about logic, but is about who & what we are as human beings. People from any walk in life can intuit & practice trad-witchcraft ceremonies that raise energy & open the door to this experience. I don't know if it's a geo-electro-chemical stimulation of DNA or crystalline resonance in the blood, or what, but when we resonate to the transformation of power it's like an on-switch. Pagans do it, Christians do it. Hermetic alchemists do it, etc. It's not confined to any one religious expression, but it surely is a "religious" experience.

It doesn't recognize differences, only commonality. Has anyone figured out what we're all doing in common? (besides MK Ultra?) Who's got time to nit-pik? There's more important & far more interesting things to know about what's really going on. While it's important to sort out what we believe, it often changes as we learn more. It doesn't seem to matter what we believe only that we are open To believe in something greater. I've had transformative experiences in both X'n & pagan settings as orchestrated by that-which-is-greater (no mushrooms) &' it can't be confined to description except by using paradoxes. I don't mind what anyone wants to call it. I see it as being all-one. It's a locked-in, intuitive recognition of spiritual perception, not logic. So that's how i can be X'n & practice witchcraft. Simple really. And it's ok if someone doesnt "get" my comments. We can go our own way to center where all paths lead anyhow.

(skip the next paragraphs If you're not up to personal catharsis sagas)

Edit: This entire thread is incredibly interesting to me because I've been "god-hunting" since I was 4 & pinned my mom down to explain god to me, as seen on TV. She & dad were (post-WWII) non-practicing, former X'ns for their own reasons. If it wasn't for the Gideon's free Bible handouts when I was in 3rd grade I'd never have owned one & commenced to read it. Freaky, but I wanted more & wasnt taken seriously. I was a kid starving for the hunger & finding insufficient sustenance in the kid's versions i was offered. In my late teens i still kept being fobbed-off to youth groups. Grr. So life intervened & I joined a variety of parapsychology and Bible study groups here & there. In that time period i got a handle on the psychic visions & psi-traveling I dealt with.

I took up the hunt again in my 30's, jumped through all their hoops, was confirmed RC & entered a cloistered convent. It was intense & everything I'd sought but sudden memories of alien abduction scenarios derailed me. Gah! For cryin' out loud. Life is like bumper cars. None the less pieces fell into place &' i declined vows & went home. 30+ & living with Dad again - It humbles ya. I'd never felt so knocked cockeyed, but hey, everybody goes thru something. But the pump was primed. The 1st Halloween season (2weeks after convent) out of the blue while walking the dog & as id watched geese in flight, I'd felt the earth energy move under my feet, got telluricly zapped foot-to-head & catapulted out of body. (Lots of pagan symbolism were recognized in hindsight when i connected the dots later.) At the time I was licking my ex-nun's wounds & I was not interested in witchcraft & did not even believe in witches. Hahaha. God's laughing. Just like following a trail of Q-bread crumbs my hunt &'investigations, and my Little Voice guidance led me to God/dess with a face lift in the Craft. I have no need to denounce his other faces. It's all one connected path. So far it's stuck, over 30'years. All the twists & turns of the 1st 30 years had a reason & each step led to the next 30 years as I'm 65 now & Cueing up for round three.

Sorry to carry on so long.

[L.J.Hex]

I didn't read the whole thread and I'm sure every reason I'm going to list are already mentioned in a way or another.

There's a lot of reasons why I don't believe it. To be honest, I'm not sure if I ever did much. I was raised lutheran christian as its a custom here and my mother has her faith, quite free actually, religion was never pushed on me in any kind of way. It was a part of the holidays, I remember thinking about christmas when I was kid that the Jesus thing wasn't even the top priority in that, but the Finnish traditions were. It was as if we were celebrating just mid winter and jesus christ, it was just a christian overtone and everything else felt more meaningful.

I kept my childs faith until I was about fifteen years old, around that time I started to feel that the whole thing is an empty shell of spirituality, filled with empty words and thinly veiled threats of you either open wide and take jesus in or you'll head for eternal damnation. It also started to look extremely naive, everything, the story book, the stuff they preached, things they talked about. Naive. Empty. Meaningless.

I found more insight from heavy metal lyrics than the bible, oh yea, I read it. The old testament is the most vile, disgusting piece of horror I've ever read. A lot of it could be used as Cannibal Corpse lyrics and it would fit without a problem. I never understood how such a almighty, loving god would do such horrible things and allow so much suffering to happen. If the god truly was loving and almighty, I guess we would be living in a paradise. Yet that sadistic disgusting [censored] made people suffer in countless of way and I was supposed believe that this sadist god loved me enough to send down his only (Aren't we all gods chidlren??) son to die for all of us so we could be saved. Saved exactly from what? Lutherans don't have the ideology of original sin, so what the heck am I supposed to be saved from? The damnation? Hell in which I will burn for eternity unless I believe in the son of the most sadistic god in existence?

The thing is that I also experienced what SpiritTalker said about "religious" experience, I have had it also in a christian setting and pagan setting. I don't think that has to do with the titles, that is something universal about human existence that we can experience it and actively look for it too. But christianity just didn't do it for me, I'm far too sceptical, I question things, I am a rebel. Heck, in one point of view I identified more with Satan than God. Although, I think Jesus is rather interesting character, he was a rebel too. I hold new testament in hundred times more higher regard than the story book about the sadist god that is the old testament.

Then bit later on I naturally grew interested about age old Finnish beliefs and folklore. That made it rather clear that Christianity is a mess of traditions of those people who it conquered, the original stuff, what is it anyway? They always blab on about Israel and middle eastern stuff? What place does that have in the north anyway? We have such rich tradition and folklore with multitude of deities, none of which is like the sadist tormentor of his own creation like the old testament god is. My faith changed into Finnish pagan / agnostic type of thing, although I didn't practice it in any physical real world way.

The people who are into it... Holy crap what a bunch of losers! The worst possible people I've ever been in touch with are certain kind of almost fundamentalist christian types. I know, its not all of them, I know smart and super nice christians too, don't get me wrong. Just the most naive, obedient, unthinking, authority believers that I've had the questionable pleasure to know, are people of the church.

They ask for unthinking obedience, just believe, believe, don't think. No way that would work for me. Also, they always said, just pray and god will take care of the rest. Nothing good ever happened to me in my life from praying to christian god. Nobody heard me, nothing happened. Everything has happened when I did something myself. Their god never took my illnesses away, god didn't stop those morons who were bullying me, god never made me anything.

I realised I have to be my own god if I want things to happen. God(s) helps those who help themselves.

Ok then comes the BIG one. One life. That is all, only one life and then either heaven or hell. That doesn't make sense as I remember living before this life. Also, where do all the souls come from? God is just creating more and more and more? Doesn't make sense. Its already proven that energy never disappears, what is a soul, what is consciousness? It must be some form of energy, that's the only way it makes sense to me and energy does not disappear. I have never really feared my own death as if I have some subconscious knowledge that death is not an end, and even if it is, then its huge relief, absolute bliss of nothingness, no worries, no pain, no nothing. Even that is better idea than the christian weirdness about afterlife. And I don't believe in that either, I don't think we pop out of nothingness and then just cease to exist. That explanation never ring the bell with me at all and this is a big issue I have about christianity. Also heaven and hell? Eternal damnation or paradise? I don't think life is ever so black and white and so simple... There must be more to it.

Then history, nothing has ever caused so much bloodshed and suffering than big organised religions, nothing comes close. You can count also money and power as one of these major religions if you want. I don't want to have anything to do with an organisation who forced my forebears to their ideas with a sword if nothing else worked. I'm way too virtuous person to subscribe to that, it doesn't matter that the crimes are old already, it wouldn't take much for that kind of thing to star again. (Read = Islam becoming totally medieval.) Our tradition was drowned under christianity, although its stupid to hold any grudge for it, it was criminal and I don't want to keep alive a church who's past is full of darkness and death.

Whereas Finnish witchcraft was exactly what witches were for in the old times when there were no doctors and hospitals around. The most common story about a Finnish witch is that of a village healer or a wise person who knew a lot and could do amazing things to help others. That's something to look up to, something to be proud of and a thing to subscribe to. So there, holy goddess what a long post.

[barker]

Either

you get your knowledge from personal experience and interpersonal truth

Or

you find people that will co-depend in fear with you

But

no-one really cares, because the whole truth is inside of one.

[L.J.Hex]

Either

you get your knowledge from personal experience and interpersonal truth

Or

you find people that will co-depend in fear with you

But

no-one really cares, because the whole truth is inside of one.

Very insightful post, but you tend to some times speak in mysteries. Food for thought. :wink2:

[barker]

It would be an interesting conundrum would it not, to either source truth in love or fear, but thankfully there exists a thing called self. And the rest is history. (This is actually what I think of the Bible).

[SCAPEGOAT]

Ummm...obviously. If you say you’re a “Christian,” you clearly don’t get the point.
Christ was the ultimate rebel/heretic, period. He said all of that view of “God” was wrong. What did he tell the woman at the well??? Christ could be Azazel, under such a view, could he not? As above, so below...light side, dark side, etc.? Dude never wanted to be “King.” I believe Christ would burn every church and smash those wooden “t” things everyone wears. Christ taught a lot, but one main thing...LOVE OVER WILL...once in a while...he went extreme, but I think he just happened to be an extreme kinda guy. If you believe him...you realize the Old Testament is a bunch of power-worshiping bunk.

[L.J.Hex]

^And that's the reason why I say I like the character of Jesus.^

Its ironic that the people who are most messed up with it call it Christianity and yet they preach the fire and brimstone stuff of old testament or the coming inevitable armageddon of revelations. If Christianity would be as it is in the name, in that case they should scrap the old testament sadist abomination of a god, have Jesus Christ as the highest of spiritual authority... That would be heck of a game changer as Jesus' words were never (?) about the lake of fire and eternal torment of hell unless you hand out your free will and money to the church.

One more on my list, they say there's no "salvation" outside of the church and behave as in you're lost if you get rid of the church. Yet these people preach and faith. Who the heck needs a church to provide faith? Faith comes from the inside. Yet another box ticked for modern day witchcraft, nobody is forcing me to be a member in a coven or preach about needing salvation from anything, nor does anybody say that being in a coven is the only way to be.