| Why am I atheist? To say that I am, would be a complete lie, for in fact, I am not.
It is overwhelming to come here and see how many people on this forum deny any existence of a God. Throughout my life, I have been in frequent debates over my religion, but more so on interpretations of the Bible and not the [basic] existence of a deity.
But, I went through quite a few months last year completely denying every theological teaching I had ever been given and struggled with believing, myself, that there was a God. I denied my parents, and basically my first 17 years of my life. It was a rough time, but the only guidance I was given by my father was to simply go back, and read the Bible. I did, and finally realized what I truly believe. I believe in the Bible and its teachings. Meaning, I believe in a God and that Jesus is the son of God. This probably means that I am, indeed, a minority in this forum. But I'm fine with that.
What bothers me is when people criticize another's beliefs [or lack there of in the case of athiesm] when in fact neither position can and will ever be fully proven. This is what I have learned as I struggled with my accepting my own belief. Christianity is based on faith. It's something I cannot visually see, but instead a feeling infested inside of me and have faith to believe it to be true. I know many of you all must have logical proof of everything, but dealing with religion, you won't always find it. I myself, must always have logical reasoning behind doing something, but dealing with religion, I have learned that logical proof is not going to be found. Why you ask? Because if there was logical proof for the existence of a God, then everyone would accept it to be true without being passionate about it. Having faith in something you cannot see or prove is more glorifying/satisfying than simply receiving facts and [knowing] them to be true. God won't give us this desired proof because by understanding his existence, man would be on the same level of a jealous God. Without this faith, my belief is nothing. But, wouldn't my religion be radically weak (and wrong) if only based on faith and not science? No. Scientific theories are not, believe it or not, unchangeable; common sense will tell you that. Saying that one cannot prove that God exists, so he doesn't is a burden of proof fallacy. Likewise, saying that you can't prove that God doesn't exist, therefore he does is the same burden of proof fallacy. So, one cannot prove that God doesn't exist because scientific facts are not full-proof, and neither can I prove that He does. Many of you have said to not believe in a God because the belief is too radical to be proven. But, this would hold true more so in the agnostic belief that a higher being is unknown and not provable, whereas athiestic belief is actually the full absence of belief in any supreme being. (I know, people have stated that they simply do not believe in a God, but judging by all of the pages, it seems most simply do not believe because it cannot be proven). So again, the belief in a God is more or less having the faith that one exists. If you are not willing to humble yourself in having faith that a higher power exists, then your belief is just as justifiable as mine and I will not judge you either way and I would hope you to do the same.
Wowee, that is one wall of text. But, if you read and at least respect what I had to say, then of course, I will respect yours as well.
__________________ ||Gamertag: Wowee 22 || ||AIM: dpiswithyou ||
Last edited by Wowee 22; 05-12-2008 at 12:52 AM.
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