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[twystidmynd]

I've always been attracted to religious movies and ideas and such. Christianity in particular is fascination to me; not in a spiritual way, but more in a mythological way. I do wonder, though... what would it be like to actually be religious

Comments

[eyemakeup]

I just like the phrasing "reasonably certain God exists" because, mainly, of the word "reasonably" in this context. You crazy science guys.

it seems to me that religion exists just to keep people from feeling alone. Now this I agree with. I agree with it because I think that one of the most crippling fears humans can have is the idea that they actually might lose their loved ones to oblivion, for one; religion provides a sort of antidote for that. Also, like your example, it can make you feel like you're "with" someone else at times that would otherwise be hopeless. I always have a kind of awe for deeply spiritual people.

I'm not "religious," nor can I bring myself to really believe in a "grand scheme," but at times I feel... something. And that something keeps me hoping, maybe.

All in all, this was a great entry.

[twystidmynd]

Well damn, this is a comment from someone I didn't expect =P

[eyemakeup]

O rly :] well bam! Also, hi.

[nleseul]

The need to not be alone is a part of it, but I think that things like myths, heroes, and ritual are very important to the human psyche as well, and those have historically been provided almost exclusively by religion.

I actually kind of wonder if the rise of secular fiction as a literary phenomenon is causally linked to the increasingly secular culture. People might sensibly find that they don't need explicitly religious mythic figures like Jesus and Buddha so much when they realize they can get the same feelings from non-religious (but equally mythic) figures like James Bond, Superman, or Frodo.

I'm rather curious-what makes you certain that God exists?

[twystidmynd]

Well... it's basically a simple question of asking myself a question.
Would I be happier believing that there is a God, or that there isn't?
With any question that I cannot find an answer to, I basically ask myself what makes me happiest. Although I'm a micro-pessimist, on the macro level, I believe that the universe is a generally happy place, leaning more towards the positive than the negative, and thus in the grand scheme of things, whatever makes me happiest is most likely to be Truth.
Thus, I'm reasonably certain that God exists. That isn't to say I'm 100% certain, but I'm as certain as I can be while still being able to attach the modifier "reasonably."

[nleseul]

I can actually kind of accept this argument.

One thing Ayn Rand wrote about a lot was what she called the “benevolent universe” premise, which is essentially the idea that the nature of the universe is generally such that it is a good place in which to exist. That's pretty similar to what you're saying.

The key difference is that the Randian benevolent universe doesn't guarantee happiness-rather, it is simply a universe that contains no explicit malevolent forces, and as such gives conscious beings the freedom necessary to take action to produce their own happiness.

Incidentally, Rand considered the idea of gods to be an element of the malevolent universe worldview, on the logic that a god would be capable of going around violating identity and causality all over the place and generally making existence incomprehensible for people. I think her view of gods wasn't entirely consistent with her philosophy, though-if gods exist, then they wouldn't be capable of violating identity, because they must necessarily have identity by

[a_strange_day_]

Check out that article I posted on my livejournal.

Buddhism certainly ain't about avoiding feeling alone.