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thats fair enough jen.
@jen_jen wrote:
I guess it isn’t the right place for me as my beliefs are based on personal experience that I wouldn’t be comfortable sharing on a forum like JC.
that’s a real shame, Jen. I have a lot of respect for you and your posts, and would have gained a lot from hearing what you think.
But I do understand your discomfort. Personal experiences posted here can be and are taken up in a horrible way.
I believe in a man-made heaven and a man-made hell, that’s for sure. But there’s more than that involved.
I am genuinely perplexed about Christianity (whatever that actually means!), though moving in that direction. There are certain phrases which touch – on Heaven, I’m impressed not by the comment of Jesus that his father’s house has many rooms, as much as by what he says afterwards – if it were not so, I would not tell you it’s so. Either that guy is the biggest shyster ever, or it gives grounds for caution.
– on Hell, it always made sense to me that ‘the world’ of men and women is ruled by the Devil. It’s a hurtful and nasty society we live in – quite ruthless. But there are other aspects too, and again at ther isk of being tagged a bible-thumper (and I’m not), I found the most touching and helpful phrase to me personally was the comment of the shyster above mentioned that the world would hurt and persecute, but to ‘be of good cheer, I have overcome the world’. That phrase came into my mind once during a really nasty time.
all right, mockers, shut up lol amen
I really don’t know what I believe in – I am not religious in the slightest, however, respect those that are, and I love the peace in a church should I venture into one.
I suppose what I am going to type in a very non-commital way ie. no names or relationships mentioned is probably what Jen is saying I dunno, but………….I do believe that those who are ‘gone’, who loved and cared for me, are around me when I am in need of comfort – strange. I suppose it is the ‘soul’ I believe in, not heaven, hell, God or Jesus.
@anc wrote:
I really don’t know what I believe in – I am not religious in the slightest, however, respect those that are, and I love the peace in a church should I venture into one.
I suppose what I am going to type in a very non-commital way ie. no names or relationships mentioned is probably what Jen is saying I dunno, but………….I do believe that those who are ‘gone’, who loved and cared for me, are around me when I am in need of comfort – strange. I suppose it is the ‘soul’ I believe in, not heaven, hell, God or Jesus.
I like that, anc. I feel that about my mother, that she’s with me. I’ve heard of women who say that their babies are smiling down at them from Heaven all the time; met women who mourn over their lost children in a profoundly ‘spiritual’ manner without that consolation..
A psychological explanation can be given, but really that could be as illusory as a religious explanation.
The way I’m thinkig at the moment is developing – but we can never actually know in rational terms. The cosmos could have been created from Love (of whihc Jesus gives us some sort of understanding?), or it could be just a cold dead place without any meaning whatsoever. There is evidence for both points of view, but no rational proof for either(Stephen Hawking has been bouncing back and forth like a yoyo about atheism, but in the end it’s just his mind-games, as he can’t actually prove anything – science is an attempt to explain the physical universe, and can’t do much else).
There’s more to life than human reason can take in, though…so rationality has to be left behind at some point, as long as rational doubt is retained to stop you going off the deep end like some American right-wing evangelical nutters.
I have what you might call a new age gift shop…to the local Christian community, who seem to think they have a god-given right to sit in judgement of me, that means that I must be Wiccan, Pagan or a Heathen. I have actually had printers refuse to do my printing “because of what you represent”. On Saturday just gone I had a local Christian actually leave his toddler in a buggy outside my shop (it’s a main thoroughfare) to come in and tell me about how Christ was the only way to heaven and all that I believed in and represented was just smoke and mirrors, an illusion that would stop me passing through the gates of heaven. He ranted for 10 minutes with his back to the shop window and oblivious to his child sitting outside. He only stopped when I asked him where he worked.
“Why do you want to know?” he asked.
“So I can come to see you at your workplace on my day off and tell you all about my religious beliefs” I replied.
“I don’t need to know about the devil, I see him every day” he replied and walked out.I only talk about my faith and beliefs with people who ask and are genuinely interested, yet I am constantly judged and condemned by Christians, Jehovah s Witnesses, Mormons and more recently the Scientologists that set up their stall in town…hiding their identity but everyone knew who they were.
According to all these people, the only way to heaven is through their faith, their chosen prophet or figurehead, and that seems to give them the right to judge others. They seem flummoxed when I ask whether Mahatma Gandhi went to heaven or hell, or where they think the Dalai Lama will go and so on. My final answer is “there is only one that can judge me and I will happily answer to the One when the time comes.”
There are many roads to the same destination, your road is right for you, my road is right for me but as long as we travel our roads with love and compassion for our fellow man, help each other where we can and do no harm, then we will have lived a good life and be prepared for whatever we each believe comes afterwards or if we believe there is nothing, then with the knowledge that we lived the best life we could.
2 quotes that I like from Mahatma Gandhi:
“God has no religion”
“For me, the different religions are beautiful flowers from the same garden, or they are branches of the same majestic tree. Therefore they are equally true, though being received and interpreted through human instruments equally imperfect.”
I’m sorry, but Scep did make me chuckle: as long as rational doubt is retained to stop you going off the deep end like some American right-wing evangelical nutters
@jen_jen wrote:
I have what you might call a new age gift shop…to the local Christian community, who seem to think they have a god-given right to sit in judgement of me, that means that I must be Wiccan, Pagan or a Heathen. I have actually had printers refuse to do my printing “because of what you represent”. On Saturday just gone I had a local Christian actually leave his toddler in a buggy outside my shop (it’s a main thoroughfare) to come in and tell me about how Christ was the only way to heaven and all that I believed in and represented was just smoke and mirrors, an illusion that would stop me passing through the gates of heaven. He ranted for 10 minutes with his back to the shop window and oblivious to his child sitting outside. He only stopped when I asked him where he worked.
“Why do you want to know?” he asked.
“So I can come to see you at your workplace on my day off and tell you all about my religious beliefs” I replied.
“I don’t need to know about the devil, I see him every day” he replied and walked out.I only talk about my faith and beliefs with people who ask and are genuinely interested, yet I am constantly judged and condemned by Christians, Jehovah s Witnesses, Mormons and more recently the Scientologists that set up their stall in town…hiding their identity but everyone knew who they were.
According to all these people, the only way to heaven is through their faith, their chosen prophet or figurehead, and that seems to give them the right to judge others. They seem flummoxed when I ask whether Mahatma Gandhi went to heaven or hell, or where they think the Dalai Lama will go and so on. My final answer is “there is only one that can judge me and I will happily answer to the One when the time comes.”
There are many roads to the same destination, your road is right for you, my road is right for me but as long as we travel our roads with love and compassion for our fellow man, help each other where we can and do no harm, then we will have lived a good life and be prepared for whatever we each believe comes afterwards or if we believe there is nothing, then with the knowledge that we lived the best life we could.
2 quotes that I like from Mahatma Gandhi:
“God has no religion”
“For me, the different religions are beautiful flowers from the same garden, or they are branches of the same majestic tree. Therefore they are equally true, though being received and interpreted through human instruments equally imperfect.”
I agree with you entirely jen…. it would be simple if everyone felt the same but I used to play backgammon with a young Turkish Muslim man… he was an excellent player and I loved playing him…. one day we were chatting as we were playing and got onto the subject of religion, I said as you did there are many different roads to the same destination… he was horrified he told me that being Christian it was an insult to Mohamed…. he refuses to play me from that day…. if we are drawn together in a tournament he withdraws…. so hurtful… and so blinkered
I believe we die then go in to the soil to enrich it and help the crops grow for the next generation.So maybe i will come back as a bowl of cornflakes.
@a certain sadness wrote:
I believe we die then go in to the soil to enrich it and help the crops grow for the next generation.So maybe i will come back as a bowl of cornflakes.
just gone off cornflakes
@anc wrote:
I’m sorry, but Scep did make me chuckle: as long as rational doubt is retained to stop you going off the deep end like some American right-wing evangelical nutters
share the joke?? *me slow
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