What religion or life philosophy were you taught as a child? Have your beliefs changed over time?
Yes they have changed. My father is a militant atheist and my mother a born again Christian. As a small child, i was an atheist. By the time i was about four, i began to believe in a protective supreme being. At nine, i became convinced that the teachings of Jesus and the Torah were right, but didn't know about the evangelical world view. This was partly influenced by going to a Christian school. When i was about ten, a friend of my mother explained the doctrine of salvation by grace and it seemed so obviously incorrect that it destroyed any kind of faith i had in Christianity. At thirteen, i read a pamphlet by the London Healing Mission which condemned Yoga and i decided the only explanation for that was that what seemed to be Christianity must be controlled by Satan. I proceeded to believe in a Hindu-style spirituality.
At the age of eighteen, i committed to Christ on the understanding that i would be able to continue questioning afterwards. I found that in fact this was not so and i was simply expected to conform to homophobia, contempt for animal welfare and so forth, and i proceeded to apostasise after about a year. During the next twelve years, my beliefs were probably closest to Daoism and Buddhism.
In 1997, i raised the kundalini and found i had a strong urge to follow up and honour my commitment to Christ as a result, so i became an active member of my local church. I continued in this vein for ten years, but was eventually put off by the materialism and hypocrisy of some of the people in that church. I then went to a Unitarian church for a while, but found it most unsatisfactory, mainly due to a lack of passion and a willingness to accept metaphysical naturalism in the face of the clear evidence in favour of the power of prayer and the reality of miracles. I therefore went back to a church i was involved with about 24 years ago which is more evangelical and possibly fundamentalist in outlook.
What religion or life philosophy were you taught as a child? Have your beliefs changed over time?
As long as I lived with my parents I was afraid of disappointing them far more than God.
After I moved out I just lived my life the way I wanted.
I was taught from a very young age that you should treat others the way you wish to be treated and that you should treat mother earth with all the respect you can muster for what has been given to you can be taken away just as quickly. I was brought up by two non practising Catholics who came from a long line of French Canadian Catholics but they decided to not baptise me and let me decide for myself what faith I would follow. At the age of 25 I was able to finally put a name to what I had believed for the first 25 years of my life and now I have been a practising solitary witch for ten years.
I wasn't really taught any religion from my parents, but at a young age I wanted to go to church. So my mom took me to church where I learned about god.
I am now an Atheist...
I got to be 76 and did some reading - now, a born-again atheist. And proud of it. Very satisfying.
1) I was raised to believe in God.
2) When I traded in the Bible for a science text book.
I was brought up as a Christian, but came to my senses and left religion.
Religion only serves itself. No God would want us to follow a belief in which conditions are set upon people to go to some place called Heaven. There is no love there.
those of you who says God is in your hearts; you are right. That is where He/She is so you need no religion. Set yourselves free.
I would say I grew up with what I would call a loosely Pagan/New age philosophy. I decided to learn about Judaism in my early 20's just to get a better understanding of my family history/heritage. I am now a liberal Jew and attend a Reform Synagogue.
I was brought up as a Catholic. There was no one moment that altered my perception of the church or that convinced me that organised religion had no attraction for me. As I grew up my increasing awareness of the role the Catholic Church in particular and organised religion in general plays in propagating misery, misinformation, hate and anger grew, becoming impossible to ignore. So here I am.
i was not raised up really anything
and now i am a saved, Sanctified , filled with holy ghost (praise god) saint of god
I like this site for the question and answer format, but when I'm presented with the same questions again and again I wish that the site was set up with different forums that way I don't have to repeat myself.
To repeat myself once again: I was born a Christian, realized the religion was fiction, became an atheist, realized that just because the world religions are false doesn't rule out the possibility of a god, became an agnostic, thought about the world, realized I was a %26quot;hard determinist,%26quot; became an agnostic theist. Here I am today.
i was born and raised a Jehovah's Witness. i saw the road my friends led was destructive and they were not JWs. i saw it was a protective guide that was beneficial for my life and happiness. i stayed with it and is loving it.
