The Worlds Departure From Organized Religion

Atheists and theists, although the same chapters, read different stories in the Bible. It depends on where your heart is.

We aren't to make the reality for someone else, you're wrong to believe the reality you think for your own applies to all others.

originally posted by: nugget1
You can scratch Muslim off of that list.

According to various sources, Islam is currently the fastest-growing religion in the world, with predictions indicating that it will overtake Christianity by 2070.

[www.pewresearch.org...]

Well ... that's unfortunate.

originally posted by: Irishhaf
No the scientists had faith that it was there and kept looking till they found it.

Well... no. They didn't have 'faith'. They had empirical evidence that, using the knowledge and technology of the time, best explained the phenomena they observed.

Which is what is fantastic about science over religious faith.

Science can change, adapt and grow over time as new information and discoveries are learned.

Religious faith doesn't offer that. Anything that contravenes existing doctrine is immediately rejected because.. you guys use faith. Not reason or logic.

The only time science uses 'faith' is when someone says, "I have 'faith' that if I leap out of a 30 story building, I will come crashing down and splat into the ground into a gooey mess". That 'faith' is based on repeatable, tested and testable experiments. So, while people use 'faith in science', it isn't the same as 'faith in God'.

Then the above again I offer you scientific examples you go to emotion... I dont think you would know rational thinking if it hit you in the head with a 2x4.

It wasn't emotion. I was giving your an example of how courts work in the human world. Where, at least in western civilisation, you are innocent until proven guilty and the burdon of proof is on the accuser, not the defender. Did you not understand that?

You said god doesnt exist by your own argument you have to prove it.

Do i have to prove the Easter Bunny doesn't exist as well? And Santa Claus? If I accuse you of being a murderer, my claim should be taken as gospel and it's YOU to prove you are not? Does that seem reasonable to you? Would you prefer our courst of law operate like your faith does? I suspect not...

a reply to: noonebutme

I have personal subjective experience that made me believe 'something like the artist formerly known as God' exists.
But you are totally right. Religion let us down on moving forward in our spiritual development and has around 300AD turned into a stale tool of surpression more than anything else.

As overall organization. For a while afterward it helped people deal with the big four in human life: birth, adulthood, marriage, death
But even that is now outdated and not offering what it used to anymore.

However there are people like me who love science, who are aware my experience is useless to everybody else, but still have basically no choice but to believe.
You know what I mean?

It is the decision if you trust yourself, or just accept the lack of experience in many science-peeps as superior.

originally posted by: Peeple

However there are people like me who love science, who are aware my experience is useless to everybody else, but still have basically no choice but to believe.

I believe more is going on than we know.

But have zero belief in a religious concept of God.

a reply to: Annee

I don't, I believe in things meant to happen.

originally posted by: Untun
a reply to: Annee

I don't, I believe in things meant to happen.

Well, that can fall under "more than we know".

a reply to: Annee

The best wishes for the "you" being "we".

Whaaaaat?! No Dirt Man and Rib Woman (Original Sin)? No Noah's Ark? No talking donkeys and snakes?
Can we at least wail and beat our breasts and prepare for the Crapture?

originally posted by: Untun
a reply to: Annee

The best wishes for the "you" being "we".

A general "we" (as in humans).

Not directly you.

a reply to: Annee

Tell me a little more about yourself so I can understand how you got that idea.

a reply to: Plunkenstein

It all turns out well in the end, for that we can be thankful.

I heard Lucifer say a few words once... lol

He said sister you have got my email, get in touch and don't trust your team. Or at least confront them. Stay close to the moari. THE MOARI MAN AND MOARI WOMAN.

My people and your people are the same unit and meeting up. And blagging us.

Demand my release sister to your team. Do it Q.

I'm Christian and read the bible every day. At least 1 chapter every night.

But I don't go to church anymore. Every single one guilt trips you into donating. Some are more aggressive about it, some are more subtle, but they all do it.

I'm poor AF and yet my white bread hard-working ass has never benefited from a charity. It's always me who is expected to give to others. I can't even afford a car and walk to work. I live in a dilapidated trailer in a trailer park. I don't have any money to give. I need money.

Christ never asked for money. He let Judas handle the money bag. When he had to give money to the tax man, he told his disciples to go catch a fish and they would find a coin in his mouth. The only time he became violent, was when he flipped the tables of the money-changers in the temple.

When I read about him, there is something innately good there. He was a truly good person. But I don't find that goodness in the church. Any of them.

Nobody gives a damn about me, and I include God in that damning assessment. I don't think God is good. How could you create a world full of suffering and evil, and pretend your stupid ass is as clean as a whistle? He shares at least some of the responsibility for what he has done, and he's ignoring us. At the least, he is ignoring me. But I can look around as see plenty of people just as poor and miserable as me, so I don't think I'm alone, not by far.

Some like to pin it all on the devil Well who is more evil? The devil or the asshole who created the devil?

Either he didn't create everything
Or he's not omniscient
Or he's not all-powerful

Or he's all of the above, and did everything on purpose, which means he's the most intensely evil being to ever exist. More supernaturally evil than any of us could possibly fathom with our limited human consciousness.

Epicurean Paradox

Epicurean reduced it to a mathematical equation. There's really not any counter to this other than blind faith, and that doesn't disprove it it just means you reject reality and substitute your own.

I still read the bible, pray, and continue to believe in God.

Not because he is perfect, but because his stinking, rancid, dysfunctional self is the only God I have. Who else would I believe in? Who else would I pray to?

I am an imperfect being, created by an imperfect God, and am trapped in his imperfect world. I hate my existence, every second is misery, and I want out.

That's how things are.

Take any religion and it protrays itself as "having answers" it paints a beautiful picture, with a beautiful god and a beautiful way of life to live. But then the 8 billion people here have to walk out of their churches and temples and back into reality after they spend hours being preached at, and live their miserable lives in this miserable world and none of the words matter when they are suffering.

That's why religion is failing. It was verbal crack in the dark ages but the drug isn't giving modern day man the same buzz as it did his forefathers.

And that's probably a good thing. We need real answers, not dogma.

a reply to: MalOscp

Sounds like you've experienced the bolded part of the prophecy below:

“But know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here. For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, haughty, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, disloyal, having no natural affection, not open to any agreement, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, without love of goodness, betrayers, headstrong, puffed up with pride, lovers of pleasures rather than lovers of God, having an appearance of godliness but proving false to its power; and from these turn away. From among these arise men who slyly work their way into households and captivate weak women loaded down with sins, led by various desires, always learning and yet never able to come to an accurate knowledge of truth.

Now in the way that Janʹnes and Jamʹbres opposed Moses, so these also go on opposing the truth. Such men are completely corrupted in mind, disapproved as regards the faith. Nevertheless, they will make no further progress, for their folly will be very plain to all, as it was with those two men.” (2 Timothy 3:1-9)

Christendom (the religions that claim to represent Christianity, but are actually counterfeit versions of Christianity) is run by "men [who] are completely corrupted in mind, disapproved as regards the faith". "Lovers of money" and themselves (and their own desires and pleasures, satisfying their greed, etc.) "rather than lovers of God". Elsewhere in the Bible these people are described as putting on a pretense, outwardly appearing zealous for God and very spiritually clean (like white-washed graves or gravetones) but being completely rotten on the inside (having a rotting corpse inside the grave).

No wonder organized religion by such men is failing, "for their folly will be very plain to all". ("in the last days", remember, it's part of this prophecy, and it's exactly what we see playing out and described by someone in this thread as being caused by the rise of the internet exposing their folly, or making it "very plain" to see for more people; of course, that's not the only cause and this development has been ongoing for longer than when the internet became more widely used*)

*: For example, the part Christendom played in both world wars led to a severe loss of prestige. As the Concise Dictionary of the Christian World Mission explains: “Non-Christians had before their eyes . . . the evident fact that nations with a thousand years of Christian teaching behind them had failed to control their passions and had set the whole world ablaze for the satisfaction of less than admirable ambitions.”

Of course, religiously motivated wars are nothing new. But in contrast with the past when nations of different religions warred with one another, the 20th century has increasingly found nations of the same religion locked in bitter conflict. The god of nationalism has clearly been able to manipulate the gods of religion. Thus, during World War II, while Catholics and Protestants in Great Britain and the United States were killing Catholics and Protestants in Italy and Germany, Buddhists in Japan were doing the same to their Buddhist brothers in southeast Asia.

originally posted by: imitator
It's possible those polls are pushing a narrative.

it's always been this way. "The younger you are, the less likely you are to associate with an organized religion." They just left out the 2nd part, "The older you are, the more likely you are to associate with an organized religion."

Also, there are always demographic shifts and changes that influence the religious landscape. Some religious communities are growing, offsetting declines in others. Especially with immigration in the US, those people are usually more religious than most Americans... and they are coming in by the millions.

You're misunderstanding why that is.
People are moving away from religion with every generation.
And good for them!

originally posted by: TheValeyard

originally posted by: imitator
It's possible those polls are pushing a narrative.

it's always been this way. "The younger you are, the less likely you are to associate with an organized religion." They just left out the 2nd part, "The older you are, the more likely you are to associate with an organized religion."

Also, there are always demographic shifts and changes that influence the religious landscape. Some religious communities are growing, offsetting declines in others. Especially with immigration in the US, those people are usually more religious than most Americans... and they are coming in by the millions.

You're misunderstanding why that is.
People are moving away from religion with every generation.
And good for them!

It's true generally speaking but not for all religions and geographical areas on this planet. Take for example the religion of Islam.

originally posted by: Maximus3

originally posted by: TheValeyard

originally posted by: imitator
It's possible those polls are pushing a narrative.

it's always been this way. "The younger you are, the less likely you are to associate with an organized religion." They just left out the 2nd part, "The older you are, the more likely you are to associate with an organized religion."

Also, there are always demographic shifts and changes that influence the religious landscape. Some religious communities are growing, offsetting declines in others. Especially with immigration in the US, those people are usually more religious than most Americans... and they are coming in by the millions.

You're misunderstanding why that is.
People are moving away from religion with every generation.
And good for them!

It's true generally speaking but not for all religions and geographical areas on this planet. Take for example the religion of Islam.

Middle East: Are people losing their religion?

Jennifer Holleis -- 02/04/2021 February 4, 2021

Recent surveys indicate strongly that across the Middle East and Iran, almost half the population is loosening their ties to Islam. Governments have reacted differently to calls for reforms of institutional religion. www.dw.com...

originally posted by: Annee

originally posted by: Maximus3

originally posted by: TheValeyard

originally posted by: imitator
It's possible those polls are pushing a narrative.

it's always been this way. "The younger you are, the less likely you are to associate with an organized religion." They just left out the 2nd part, "The older you are, the more likely you are to associate with an organized religion."

Also, there are always demographic shifts and changes that influence the religious landscape. Some religious communities are growing, offsetting declines in others. Especially with immigration in the US, those people are usually more religious than most Americans... and they are coming in by the millions.

You're misunderstanding why that is.
People are moving away from religion with every generation.
And good for them!

It's true generally speaking but not for all religions and geographical areas on this planet. Take for example the religion of Islam.

Middle East: Are people losing their religion?

Jennifer Holleis -- 02/04/2021 February 4, 2021

Recent surveys indicate strongly that across the Middle East and Iran, almost half the population is loosening their ties to Islam. Governments have reacted differently to calls for reforms of institutional religion. www.dw.com...

That could be true but it's different to abandoning their religion.