Age and Religion

[Tunizcha]

I was raised as a deist, and I simply shifted my views to atheism when I read The Blind Watchmaker 5 years ago.

[Greater Americania]

When you aren't Christian life is..... life is..... WAY BETTER!

At least it is for me. Religion seems to content some and irreligiousness discomfort them likewise, but for others such as myself it is a step into intellectual freedom which is one of the biggest reasons I began to first explore irreligious thought. The Rationalist idea that I can make my own future without some interference from God appeals to me much more than the Christian idea that I was taught when I was younger that 'God has a plan for me' and 'God controls my future'.

[Nercer -]

I myself believe that some sort of god or gods have to exist. But I make most of my guesses about what is most likely real off of real-life happenings. I really doubt that a big benevolent dude in the sky exists. It just ain't rational.

I started to wonder what I believed when 13. At the time, I wasn't really being very mature about it. Eventually, I decided that the Jedeo-Christian God must be the true god. Then at 15 I started to think more rationally about how the world works with the more experience I got. I realized that life sucked too much for there to be a loving and caring god. But, life is too complex to have come out of nothing. Plus, something happened to make us special. Humanity can feel things that most other animals can't (love is a good example), so there has to be a some reason for that, right?

Here are my basic periods of though on the issue:

0-11 - Child; didn't care
12 - Puberty, started to notice the world around me and wondered about it
13 - Questioned greatly what I believe and decided on Judeo-Christianity. Great level of immaturity.
14 - Stuck with Judeo-Christian.
15-present- Great amount of development of philosophical and rational thought. Questioning everything. Gradually deciding against loving Christian God. Basing life and religion of my own experience, making my own morals. Becoming open minded. Great confusion, conflicting emotions (which are what largely affects my beliefs).

I'm just wondering if as I get older, will I look back at now and think that I was immature and didn't understand it? Will my understanding keep changing?

[The Deus Corporation]

I left religion at about 12. I've become incredibly happy about the choices I've made.

[Hebalobia]

I think I first really started to understand around 14 or so. I was a Christian then when I suddenly realized that god incarnating himself as one of his creations so that he could sacrifice himself to himself in order to appease himself and atone for the sins of creatures whose nature he created made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Neither did his appearance as a savior only in a backwater of the Roman Empire while ignoring all of the other peoples of the earth make any sense.

In the end you'll find that it's really quite simple. All religions are total nonsense. But don't take my word for. Study each religion as if you were a member of a different one and you'll soon realize that they are all utterly absurd, Christianity included.

[Dyakovo]

I'm just wondering if as I get older, will I look back at now and think that I was immature and didn't understand it? Will my understanding keep changing?

Possibly...

Can't really say for sure since my crystal ball is only good for spying on MHiJ...

[Greater Americania]

Nercer, it just sounds to me like you're becoming an individual who prefers to think for himself rather than just accept the ideological, theological, and cultural demands of those in the society around you. If anything, this is a step towards maturity and not immaturity.

[Aririn]

I myself believe that some sort of god or gods have to exist. But I make most of my guesses about what is most likely real off of real-life happenings. I really doubt that a big benevolent dude in the sky exists. It just ain't rational.

Agnostic theist.

I started to wonder what I believed when 13. At the time, I wasn't really being very mature about it. Eventually, I decided that the Jedeo-Christian God must be the true god. Then at 15 I started to think more rationally about how the world works with the more experience I got. I realized that life sucked too much for there to be a loving and caring god. But, life is too complex to have come out of nothing. Plus, something happened to make us special. Humanity can feel things that most other animals can't (love is a good example), so there has to be a some reason for that, right?

Animals can feel love. Animals can feel deep emotions, same as humans.

Here are my basic periods of though on the issue:

0-11 - Child; didn't care
12 - Puberty, started to notice the world around me and wondered about it
13 - Questioned greatly what I believe and decided on Judeo-Christianity. Great level of immaturity.
14 - Stuck with Judeo-Christian.
15-present- Great amount of development of philosophical and rational thought. Questioning everything. Gradually deciding against loving Christian God. Basing life and religion of my own experience, making my own morals. Becoming open minded. Great confusion, conflicting emotions (which are what largely affects my beliefs).

I'm just wondering if as I get older, will I look back at now and think that I was immature and didn't understand it? Will my understanding keep changing?

We are beings in constant change. That much I can tell you. Will religion comfort or discomfort you? Will finding a set way of beliefs fulfill you, in any way? Who knows.

[Nercer -]

Some of the anceint animistic ones actually make some serious sence.

[Dyakovo]

Some of the anceint animistic ones actually make some serious sence.

You might want to talk to Muravyets then, she's an animist...

[Maurepas]

about 2 years ago, when it dawned on me that Id adopted every facet of non-religion short of calling myself an Atheist, now I am...

I was raised Southern Baptist though, and I think I began to understand it much better around the same time,

[Maurepas]

Some of the anceint animistic ones actually make some serious sence.

It doesnt make any sense to me...giving ever particle its own spirit is just to me,

[Pope Joan]

I think I first really started to understand around 14 or so. I was a Christian then when I suddenly realized that god incarnating himself as one of his creations so that he could sacrifice himself to himself in order to appease himself and atone for the sins of creatures whose nature he created made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Neither did his appearance as a savior only in a backwater of the Roman Empire while ignoring all of the other peoples of the earth make any sense.

In the end you'll find that it's really quite simple. All religions are total nonsense. But don't take my word for. Study each religion as if you were a member of a different one and you'll soon realize that they are all utterly absurd, Christianity included.

I don't buy into substitutionary blood atonement either.

But that was Paul, and Anselm, Jesus never taught that.

Did you know that Mennonites do not usually display the cross at worship?

Instead there is often a picture of Jesus alive.

Because we do not feel helped by legalistic atonement talk.

[The Adrian Empire]

I guess I began to truly understand religion, maybe two years ago, I was 14 then. Before that i was something of a mix, when I was young(er) about 12, for all intensive purposes I was an Atheist, my family was Christian, but I just didn't subscribe to it, actually I shouldn't say atheist I was more of an Aristotelean Deist, I believed in evolution but recognized the mathematical impossibility for a universe without a creator (look I was a smart twelve year-old ), and mostly was against the idea of him being good, there was far too much wrong with the world,

Now for an utter shock to most of you, (who haven't read any of my previous posts ), I am now a Baptist Christian, the real turn of events was while reading a biography on Albert Einstein, I came across the story of how he had answered the existence of evil argument, I'd rather not duplicate it in entirety but in essence, "As cold is merely the absence of heat, dark the mere absence of light, both are abstracts unmeasurable and undefinable, so is evil the absence of Good (or God) where cold does not exist nor darkness, evil is merely the result of people who do not have goodness.
This started the ball rolling my interest in religion which had been waning, (I was always interested in Religions though) re-blossomed, I did elaborate research on different religions, and I read my parent's bible, I read it with an impartial mind, and I converted, I'm no Biblical expert, but I can say I understand the Bible far more than many life-long Christians and I am a avid dispeller of common religious misconceptions

For instance "If God is all-powerful and all-seeing then why did he allow evil to come to be" that one is rather easy, we must realize that God, operates under his own set of morals, he knew the consequence of his actions, but he did not intervene because it was not his decision he abided by his own ethics and allowed man to choose his fate. This does not as some would say make him evil but rather transcendently benevolent, in that he would allow his dear creations to leave him, because he must abide to his own morals, (this also debunk the "what if God made a box he couldn't open" logical conundrum as he couldn't because he made it so that he could not open it although he could open it, he does not because he made it not to be opened by him)

[Conserative Morality]

For instance "If God is all-powerful and all-seeing then why did he allow evil to come to be" that one is rather easy, we must realize that God, operates under his own set of morals, he knew the consequence of his actions, but he did not intervene because it was not his decision he abided by his own ethics and allowed man to choose his fate. This does not as some would say make him evil but rather transcendently benevolent, in that he would allow his dear creations to leave him, because he must abide to his own morals,

He 'allowed' man to choose his fate in the same way a careless parent might 'allow' their child to play in a busy road and get hit by a car. If he exists, he does not care about the fate of mankind, at least according to most moral codes. If his set of morals allows him to sit by and watch us kill each other, and get killed, in his name and in the name of our own stupidity and greed, he does not deserve my worship.

[Mad hatters in jeans]

i was about 13 when i realised that there is no big dude in the sky with a beard ready to solve my problems by wishing them away, lost faith in that, turned atheist for a while. recently shifting toward the i don't give a damn anymore approach, being 21 now so eh, i have enough troubles without adding existentialist angst to them thanks all the same.
I was brought up to make fun of christianity, viewing it the same way i see the royal family. Sure it's important for some people and tourists but it doesn't actually make much difference to you if you think about it one way or the other.

[Dyakovo]

i was about 13 when i realised that there is no big dude in the sky with a beard.

Well, duh...
I'm not in the sky...

[The Beautiful Darkness]

I don't think I was ever faithful of any kind of god, although I spent a couple of years when I was about ten telling myself that I was a good Christian girl. When I was 14, I began to consider things a little more, and in a moment of clarity I realised I did not, nor had I ever had faith in any god. Since then, I have referred to myself as an atheist.

[The Blaatschapen]

Somewhere in my teens at about 16 I guess I started to think of that stuff. And I lost the last shred of religion I had. And now I'm still trying to cope with the idea that there is no absolute truth to life and that life is what you make of it, it simply is. And that those ideas give you such an amount of freedom that it is so hard for me to get any direction in where my life should be going But I wouldn't want to trade it for anything, since the freedom is also very empowering

[Cabra West]

I'm 16 and am greatly confussed (and fascinated at the same time) on religion, spirituality, the meaning of life, etc. I wasn't raised in any religion. I have mostly based most of my believes off of my experiances with life (of which obviously there aren't very many of due to my age) and the experiances of others (but mostly the first). Most people look to religion for morality or reason (I don't, I make my own morals, which I think makes me stronger), I seek only to understand. So I'm wondering, how old were you when you first started to understand your own religious beliefs?

About 14 I think. That's when I started turning atheist.

[Tubbsalot]

I was never very credulous of stories like that, and I wasn't raised in a religious environment. I was shattering kids' beliefs in Santa before I was four (presumably because I was an asshole).

[Risottia]

I'm 16 and am greatly confussed (and fascinated at the same time) on religion, spirituality, the meaning of life, etc. I wasn't raised in any religion. I have mostly based most of my believes off of my experiances with life (of which obviously there aren't very many of due to my age) and the experiances of others (but mostly the first). Most people look to religion for morality or reason (I don't, I make my own morals, which I think makes me stronger), I seek only to understand. So I'm wondering, how old were you when you first started to understand your own religious beliefs?

I was 4. About the age when you can tell the difference between reality and fantasy.

Btw, the answer is 42.

[Allbeama]

I'm 16 and am greatly confussed (and fascinated at the same time) on religion, spirituality, the meaning of life, etc. I wasn't raised in any religion. I have mostly based most of my believes off of my experiances with life (of which obviously there aren't very many of due to my age) and the experiances of others (but mostly the first). Most people look to religion for morality or reason (I don't, I make my own morals, which I think makes me stronger), I seek only to understand. So I'm wondering, how old were you when you first started to understand your own religious beliefs?

A tip I would give you: Religion by itself is a bad way to go about understanding anything in this world. There are better ways to go about gaining knowledge and understanding than to follow what some priest or what have you says is the "Truth". Try looking into many religions, philosophies, and also become versed in the sciences, at least to a passable extent. That is what I have done up until this point.

[Augustenborgh]

I was raised "sort of" christian, but i rejected all religious and moral standards when I was around 15 and became interested in philosophy. I live a true hedonist lifestyle, using my senses and finding pleasure in material and aesthetic things, in a moderate and civilized way. I'm 20 now, and I don't feel like i need a "spiritual" element in my life. Some say that that need will emerge later on, I don't know. For now, my life is about good friends, good food, art, music and love.

[Bormanico]

I'm 25 and i was never religious or spiritual. Ever. My mother raised me well on this issue i think... Everytime i asked her about Jesus or God she would never gave me a definite answer (She is a struggling agnostic/raised catholic). She would answer "Well son, some people believe...". So withouth the indocrination the road was clear for me to become more rational, earlier.