Sometimes I'm jealous of others' belief in a god.
It could be some sort of irony. I used to believe in God. I was a religious leader in my community, had certification to instruct in a religious capacity, and found great comfort in the certainty that there was a giant, magical love cushion waiting to catch me when I fell. Until I got deeper into my faith and practice. Then religion was exposed to me as a hegemonic patriarchy designed to control sexuality and personal choice.
I remember realizing mid-prayer that I was serving a false ideology.
False in that I didn't believe it. I stood up and had a long talk with my spouse. He'd left the faith long before. I'd been trying to "save" him for years.
A curious thing happened: I decided to just let faith be for a week. I'd come back to all my practices and prayers after that time. And I did. But it was empty.
The emptiness hurt.
What do you do when that place inside you once filled with a belief in God is empty?
It turns out religion was a way for me to abuse myself. It was an extension of the strict regimentation of eating disorders and various other forms of self-punishment. When I let go of a belief system telling me how to believe, I was able to believe in myself. I filled that emptiness with love for who I am and who I can be.
Gone were the artificial barriers barring me from recognizing my sexuality and my value as a woman.
It's amazing to be free of that clutter. All the discipline I put into religion I now put into compassion. I believe in what we can offer one another, especially outside the bindings of prescripted faith.
Yet, I wouldn't say I'm an atheist. I believe in something. Maybe a common source. Anyone else here in the same boat?
Here's what I said on my sexuality ICYMI: [https://steemit.com/relationships/@honeyscribe/i-ve-never-had-casual-sex-and-i-want-to-open-my-marriage]
It's just about a gap between the church and religion or you mean that religion is supressing your sexuality?
Try Hinduism, maybe? They don't have problems with sexuality:
Great image! I think it's about doctrine. When I do engage in spiritual enrichment, I head to a Buddhist temple. But there is more to it--this idea of there being one "right" way to practice. There is no room for individuality, only commonality.
not anymore, India has a fundamentalist version of hinduism now which is sweeping across the country. it's a victorian prudishness coupled with hindu monotheism (pick one god and no one else), it's quite disturbing actually
Really? But how about initial sexuality?
I'm shocked! How come it's victorian prudishness in India?
Don't feel bad. You are in the same boat as most of the world's population - part of the great falling away that Paul says will occur just before Jesus returns.
"Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first." 2 Thes 2:3.
Love the image. Hahahaahhaaha. I do feel in good company.
One of the Great Truths of life is this.
If you ever find your self in agreement with the majority, you are certainly wrong. :o)
The irony of the quote.
Aren't a majority of the people in this country Christians?
Most people who claim to be Christians do not obey Jesus and therefore must not really believe who He is and are therefore not His true "sheep".
Jesus said, "But because you are not My sheep, you refuse to believe. My sheep listen to My voice; I know them, and they follow Me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one can snatch them out of My hand.…"
But most people who claim to be sheep are in for a surprise. Two more Jesus quotes:
"I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth."
"Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness.’"
So feel free to criticize false Christians. As you can see, Jesus also criticizes them.
agreed. nice quote.
You say that you had faith and then lost it.
Yet, lookit - all you ever had and described having - were the outside trappings of a religious life. Like so many women, you were and still are but a clown, a dressed up mime trying to ape and exaggerate the movements of spirit you've never had, because that was your job in the circus.
As an ordinary woman without any profound Jean d'Arc gifts or leanings, you never had faith to begin with, and were never supposed to clownishly pretend to have it.
Your prescribed path lay through love. Loving and unconditionally serving a righteous husband, one who has unshakeable faith, would ironically have saved you by connecting you to the Kingdom of God through the husband. Sadly, today's circumstance has inverted all this for you and left you stranded for good.
This is . . . a comment for the ages.
You're still breathing, so the life of spirit is not over for you.
If you ask me, you have been quite unlucky in your choice of husband. I know this because I've read your post about "open marriage" and the dead giveaway is that he tolerates the very idea of it from you. You simply cannot be a happy woman with a man like that, honeyscriber.
Meanwhile true happiness is right next to holiness (from the word "whole"), so how can anyone expect you to be spiritual without even being happy, whole?
The belief in a god is a conforting delusion, no doubt.
Like the magic of monster spray at bedtime. :)
The raison d'être of all delirium is comfort
Fascinating. I underwent a very similar transformation. There's something which you may not have considered yet, however.
As some previous commenters have noted, religion is not God. I totally agree. As a Christian I can only speak from my years of studying the Bible, apologetics, hermeneuitcs, secular art history, and contemporary history. We have to realize that religion is also not the Bible. The Bible was spoken/written by people who had no intention of inventing the "religion" of Christianity. They were simply people who were trying to tell the stories of their lives and the lives of others that they bore witness to. They did this because they believed that God was speaking through them and that the whole world needed to hear what He had to say.
Ok, you say, then which one is true and which are false doctrine? That's an extremely important question to ask and then seek to answer. If you believe in God, and if God loves us as His children and only wants the best for us, can we ascribe to a religion that promotes severe gender inequality? Hatred? Killing? As I've studied the Bible more and more through actual scholars instead of listening to pretentious televangelists, I've found our that these questions have answers. Not all religions can support the same one God or a version of polytheism. They're at odds in more ways than they align. But God is very real underneath all of that. Corrupt religions are also very real. You have to dig deep to find the answers you need, and these answers likely require reading/talking/listening to many different "scholars" (or equivalent in amount of time and effort spent studying the topic) or people who have had amazing experiences that corroborate God's existence. It's a little complicated, but absolutely worth it. If we could drop the materialistic delusion we would see an entirely different purpose for ourselves.
as long as you believed and admitted that your made some mistakes, then ask God for forgiveness, he will listen to a sincere hearts of prayers. just keep believing, although, we are just humans committed a lot of sins, still God were able to save us and all we can payback to God, is to continue doing good into others and share what we can share.
"He who has the Son has eternal life.
He who rejects the Son will not see life
for God's wrath remains upon him." John 3:36
The real question is - how old are you? Young people think they believe lots of things and when life gets real and they face true struggles they find out what they really believe. It's easy to toss God aside when you're young and healthy and life is full of possibilities.
I am definitely in the same boat lately. I grew up in an extremely conservative and religious home and had religion drilled into my skull from the time I dropped out of the womb. I had this ridiculous fear of hell fire and brimstone instilled in me to ensure I never questioned my faith or church. Once I cut ties with my parents and moved away from home, I was finally able to think for myself and abandoned my faith. Like you said, I still believe in something. I just don't what it is exactly. I'm studying more into other faiths, and I've found some I like and some I hate, but I'm happy I'm finally thinking for myself.
Thanks for the great article. :) It was well-written and thought provoking.
I'm agnostic myself and I fully resonate with what all of your points. However, I would say that my feelings are rather muted, since I don't believe spending your days on philosophy rather than working is what put us on this Earth in the first place.