posted on Jan, 11 2010 @ 04:31 AM
Obviously, the religion of one's ancestors enjoys a great advantage over competing belief systems. One of the problems that early Christianity had
was its once-novel notion that religion was something that the individual chose, and that this choice was to be based on belief. Nowadays, we take it
for granted that individuals, not nations, have a religion, and that what the individual does with the religion's story is to believe that it is
true.
You have found a religion that speaks to you. That is all anybody can say of their religion, I think, very much including the religion that is
atheism.
Would you have found the same religion if your search had begun in a different place, or with different resources? Nobody can say for sure.
Your story does show that you made an active search. You did not limit your horizon to something your family followed.
On the other hand, you undertook your search in a space where Christians were thick on the ground. Also, it is very unlikely that you exhausted the
search space. I doubt any person could really explore even all the different versions of Nicene Christianity in one lifetime.
I suppose the odds are that if you had begun somewhere else in the search space, then you would have ended up somewhere else in the search space. But
maybe not... Christianity could easily have had a "beacon" effect for you, and you might have refused to settle until you found it, because of some
affinity between who you are, and what it is.
Taking advice from members of one credal religion about your own religious choice, already made, is probably not a great idea. Atheists, Muslims,
Catholics... all of the elective credal religions will tell you that you really ought to have chosen theirs... 'cause after all, that's what your
advisor chose.
And the sweet part is that the Atheist, Muslim, Catholic, or whatever, each knows what the others say, each knows that they all say the same thing,
and yet each is convinced that his or her religion is different from the rest - in the sense of being factually correct. The only one that is
factually correct.
If there is a god, then he must find this spectacle hilarious, maybe starting with the hoot that a bunch of apes could think that they know anything
about gods in the first place. And if there isn't a god, then that's just tragic, that such a great gag like that is going to waste.
[edit on 11-1-2010 by eight bits]