Pagans, Christians, Witches, all: Why, in your opinion, is there religion?

Answer 1

Instinctively we KNOW that the Universe is GREATER than the total sum of its parts. Even Athiest have that instinctive knowledge, they just refuse to accept it as Deity, and that's perfectly fine too. Those of us who've gone the way of Religions (even us Pagans and Wiccans believe in Deity), have chosen to consider that bit that is GREATER than the sum to be God(ess). We acknowledge it (he, or she), accept that it is a loving force and that it is by it's nature entitled to worship in some form or another. Now that form of worship or acknowledgement has come to be known as Religion and on this planet there are MANY Religions. Even a from of worship that is followed by ONE person can legitimately be considered a Religion (Which explains ALL the different forms of paganism and witchcraft for, essentially, they are each a Religion of one member).
A Religion is simply a method and a way of worshipping that power that is outside of the physical, mundane world and is beyond it on the Spiritual plane of existence.

BB,
Raji the Green Witch

Answer 2

It's completely understandable and respectable to have someone say that but I think it's not true. Anything you don't know or that you aren't ready for is evil because you failed at it. That's what happens to people who say that. maybe it could also have been someone who was told to say that to encourage others to feel the same way, you know as trying to set an examples. Many Christians usually do that. I'm sorry but those who do that are fundies that believe that all that matter is what they think and that they own the ultimate truth. The ultimate force, higher power or whatever you want to name it that's gonna keep you sober is your will and that's why you were given it. You'll do nothing if you don't want to. When a person's mind's made up there's nothing you can do or say to change it. We are free will beings, it sucks sometimes but that's the way it is and that's the only way in which we can laern from our rights and wrongs.

Answer 3

It's a human need. We need explanations, and until science took off, religion was the way to explain these things.

People need to believe in something, they need to look towards something for their explanations. As science has grown and grown Atheism has increased, because science can now offer more answers.

Now religion has become more about the why, it's more moral, rather than explaining the how. Science gives us our how, but the cold reasoning doesn't always create a pleasant why. Religion gives a different why, to science, and as such a different meaning to life and the occurrences in it. Neither one's better than the other, they just offer a different perspective to the world.

Answer 4

Hi sister,
This is a hard one to answer. I honestly believe that the Gods/Goddesses continually find ways to let us know that they are here. I think that in some ways it is a way of explaining things and why they happen, especially in the days before people understood the world and science, but there is still so much that can't be explained and I do believe these things are down to the Gods/Goddesses.
Thanks for the beautiful question,
Love and Hugs,
Blessed Be.

Answer 5

Hail Lassie,
You know, I sweetly think of the ancient tribal peoples of the earth and how they revered this magical wonderment we all live in. How their lives were a prayer of ceremony, ritual and rites unto the Spirit-that-lives-in-all-things that they felt and knew. And I too, sadly wonder why man became so impelled to structure and restructure, ad infinitum, ad nauseum, the wisdom of the One we all love so much. How this inner grace was bred out of us and forced into believing that our natural oneness with, is now demon spawned.
Once the sacred, most precious knowledge of our world was common place, now has been torn apart, divided and warred about. Not only separating us from this oneness but even from each other.
My heart yearns for the days of old.
Blessings

Answer 6

Because the sun rises and the sun sets and all things live and they die. There is a mystism and beauty in everything to an atom to the sun.
Some people don't need to believe in a divine for that (my husband) and some of do. Do I NEED to? I'm not sure. But I do. I believe several Divine's are behind it actually.
Perfect example, I was taking Biology this summer and had a chapter on chemistry and I kept thinking "Wow, the divine's are so precise and have such elegant desighns!" My husband looked at that chapter and said "That looks really boring." LOL TO each thier own.

Answer 7

With all my 'life' experiences, if anyone SHOULD be an atheist it's me. I guess the reason I still hang on is because I need to believe that there is a bigger reason to why we are here, and that there is something else after. It would be nice to know that there is a greater destination than this world and we will be able to see departed loved ones later on.
)o( Blessed Be!

Answer 8

Hilda R. Ellis Davidson, the recently deceased Oxford scholar whose works form the foundational study of ancient Northern European religion relied upon by modern heathens like myself, said it as well as anyone I've ever read:

"At the root of religious belief there lies the idea of the sacred, of a power outside man and greater than men. This may be embodied in many different forms: in sacred trees or stones, in the person of the divine king, in the mystery of the Christian incarnation. The instinctive sense of this power, recognized in some form wherever men come together, however simple or complex their society may be, appears to be [its] moving principle."

Or as I like to say: "It's the most human thing about us."

Answer 9

I'm not sure I entirely believe this, but I very much like this quote from Cicero:

"The gods exist because nature herself has imprinted a conception of them on the minds of men"


I'm not certain why *religions* exist, but I think Cicero had his finger on it, about why we worship.

We are surrounded by wonders. That things exist at all is a wonder. That life exists is a wonder. That life is conscious of itself is a wonder.

The earliest worship honored those wonders in and of themselves, without personification.

Answer 10

IMO, it was invented by early man to explain all the mysteries in life. Why are we here? Where did we come from? What is a rainbow? etc.

Science was unknown and it was the only explanation they could come up with. They were superstitious and anything "magical" was to be feared and needed an explanation. Simple as that really.