Why are you, as a person, religious?

Question

Hello, I'm a Nihilistic Atheist that has carried around with him a question ever since he could remember.

I was first raised as a Christian by my family (I live in the USA, not that it has anything to do with it) and now have broken away from that particular religion. One day I decided to look around myself without using any sort of aid, no Bible, no Kuran, or any other scripture that governs life. What I saw was the real world, as it is meant to be seen.

How do you as a person justify your religion? I'm mainly directing this question toward the countless Christians of the world, but I'm curious about others as well.

The answer I want is not that "because I wish to serve God" or "it brings me happiness" or even "because I want to go to Heaven".

I am wondering why you believe you should lead your life by what a book says and not even bother to question it. And furthermore, I would like to state that I believe Hell is merely Christian tool to gain followers, dating back many years.

Answer 1

Why am I religious?..um very deep

I have laid on the grass and watched the clouds go by with an occasional plane, and have questioned many things in life, Why am I here, What is my purpose in life, and so on. It is normal in life for anyone regardless of faith or no faith to make these questions. However, I have read and found peace and solitude in what I have read with God.
I do not do things to please just God, I do them because they please me, and in doing the right things in life, I know that it pleases God also.
As far as allowing a Book to lead my life, I let God lead me, Hell to me is real, I don't believe that it is the man made hell that you see depicted on TV or in Books, or that hell is the grave. If Hell is the grave then we all will visit it one day. You can make your own hell here on earth by the decisions that you make, and sometimes hell visits you without permission, but we have to fight to get out{making decisions}

I can not sit here and Justify Christianity, due to the fact that MAN in his Dominance to rule{meaning that man can not even stand the fact that God is over him} has corrupted the name, and that is just what it is, a name{Christianity}, I'm just a plain old Believer in God, The love for God and the Worship of Him does not need a name or if you choose to name it {Serenity would suit it}

Answer 2

I an a Christian, I chose to follow Gods word because I believe it to be true, I don't try to be a Christian because I don't want to go to hell, athough I don't, I am a Christian because I love Jesus. It really don't matter how many years the bible dates back to, The truth is the truth and you can not take what is the truth no matter how long ago it was written or said, and say it is no longer true, All the Bible has not yet been fulfiled, we are living in the last book, over the years I have seen some of the proffices come true so there is no reason for me to believe the rest of them won't.
As for trying to gain followers it dose not porvide me anything here as a worldly view it dose nothing but take time away from me where I could be doing something for my self or faimly so what do I gain? I only do this because I care about the soles of others. You said you looked around you for yourself, How do you think all that you see was created?
I mean have you really looked deep into all the things that live and everything that makes them live, the inside of all living things, the many things that are so much bigger than us. How do you explane all of this, There has to be something much bigger than us to create all of this, I have prayed to my God about things that seem to be impossable to have happened and seen them come true. I serve God because I know he is there and I love him and I know there is much more to life than this world, and of all the things in this world I am small and it can not be about me, there is something much bigger.
It is my God my creater.(Spell check did not work, please forgive misspelled words, it's not one of my strong points.)
God bless.

Answer 3

I do question the Bible. I often read it to see if I agree with it.lol. I've found that if you put the principles of life discussed in there you find they are true. Often I feel like doing something or saying something wrong but I have faith that what the Bible says is right--for instance you reap what you sow and many many others.
Religion is a personal thing and the Bible applies to each person uniquely not universally. What is true about my life may not be true about yours; we must incorporate the teachings of the Bible into our own lives and leave the judging of other lives to God.
There is a lot of good in the 'real' world but also a lot of evil. A person can fill his life with the good by following the tenets of the Book.

Answer 4

I also broke away from any particular religion and now I just follow Christ. Much of what is taught today is misconceptions of the truth. I believe there are only a few that are truly walking on the narrow road to life. Most just follow the crowd to destruction. I also question everything but my faith in God is strong. I question the teachings of man and God shows me the truth. Sometimes it takes a while but God is faithful if we truly want to know about Him.

Answer 5

Heaven's the bait & the prospect of hell's the clincher of the deal. Almost every religion uses the heaven/hell tactic, in one form or another to draw people into their folds but when you wake up one day and realize you're blind, and that you're blind because you can't see the world, or yourself for that matter, without seeing it through a lens called a holy book, that's when you really feel afraid. At least i did. Like you, I abandonned the religions and the books that promote them and dared to see the world, and myself, through my very own eyes. When that happened, I felt free in a way I never had before- as though some huge cosmic weight had been lifted from me and I no longer was motivated by fear.

I was religious because it's all I ever knew, having been raised with a variety of religious influences, mostly Christian, and stopped being religous because I realized I felt trapped and didn't like it.

Answer 6

As I have grown older find I don't need any man made laws in the name of God., Feel we don't need religions and don't need wars.. I lead a good life helping where it's needed, don't try to cram any hokey poky down any ones trouts As far as hell goes more BS more scare tactics by religious nuts to keep people under control. Look at the religious war going on in the mid east, they treat the women like dogs and give them a dress code, really now does any of this make sense?

Answer 7

I've never met a nihilist.

When you say, "What I saw was the real world, as it is meant to be seen", you are implying purpose by the word "meant". A Freudian slip?

“Unless you assume a God, the question of life’s purpose is meaningless.” –Bertrand Russell (a philosopher, a mathematician and an atheist)

Based upon Russell's statement, logic would tell us that atheists live a purposeless, meaningless, pointless life. What you see as meaning is really just meaningless feelings put there by evolution to control your thinking. Think the right thought and get a shot of feel-goodism drug. Under your world view, your behavior and even thinking is controlled by a drug addiction.

Your world view ought to be truly frightening and drive us to seek God but self deception is very powerful.

If you think you can stand up in a real debate on this, you can email me.

Answer 8

I did question it
I studied for a long time to find the true faith, through science and wisdom. The only thing to me that wasn't empty to me was Christianity. It has mounds of evidence behind it left unseen by the majority of people. In the beginning of the faith, people were brutally tortured and killed in the most gruesome ways of the time, and yet the faith survived. Many Christians have messed up severly, and I'm guessing that's why you would target us first. But we have also established the first hospital and colleges, and changing lives every day. We are flawed just like you, but eventually we'll become better people through our love for others and God. That is why I'm religious.
And by the way, Hell has existed since the original Jews. Christians didn't make it up.

Answer 9

Ok, I was raised as a Christian too, until I was 13y.o.
then I went my own way.
But now I believe in "spirit's",
good & bad.

Answer 10

They will never be honest, but the only 2 reasons are:
1. FEAR of burning in hell
2. The hope of a reward :HEAVEN.
IF THESE TWO THINGS WERE OUT OF THE PICTURE, NONE OF THEM WOULD BE RELIGIOUS.