Why are people religious?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:^I should mention that several of the near death experiences I've had were miraculous in nature to others too. I had one woman who thought I was dead, because she saw what happened and assumed the person died. When I told her I was the person involved she couldn't believe it and couldn't believe I was here. Some of the ways I was saved defied physics. So yes, no doubt in my mind it had nothing to do with me and EVERYTHING to do with God! I trust fully in God and know He will protect me and help me EVERY TIME! I know He knows the best thing for me and is always on my side!

Not OP.

Thanks for your post. If you feel comfortable sharing, could you tell us more about the near-death experiences? Why did you think they were miraculous?

[Anonymous]

This article: Why Do People Believe in God? has an interesting take on why people became religious. It was interesting to learn that religion did not come about until population sizes grew large enough to have strangers living within the population.

[Anonymous]

Our brains are wired that way.

[Anonymous]

When you look at creation, the stars, planets, and all the amazing plant and animal life on earth, when objectively observing it all one can only rationally conclude that it was no accident, that it was purposely designed, not an act of randomness. Therefore there is a God who created all things. For me, it was "check mate": I could no long deny, given the weight of evidence before my eyes, the fact that there is a God.

The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.

Psalm 19

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fear of death, gain a sense of control when there is none, upbringing, community, comfort, etc

I respectfully disagree with this one. It is decidedly *surrendering* any sense of control and trusting my life to God that leads me in my “religious-ness”...and recognizing that this surrender will quiet fear of death, as I am secure in my faith that no matter what happens in this life, the Lord cares about me personally and I have surrendered my life to Him and claimed Him as my Savior. Agree that this gift is a warm comfort that envelopes me even in the darkest of times. I sincerely pray that all who are led to ask Him into their hearts to be Lord of their lives will hear the call and respond. Amen.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was raised Jewish and still identify as such, though it’s nearly all cultural (I had my Bat Mitzvah and plan to do that with my daughter, but we are not a very religious family).

Anyway, my first truly spiritual experience was when I was living in rural Thailand. A monk taught a few of us how to meditate. I swear to you I saw my third eye and felt the presence of some sort of power connecting all of us together.

I have also felt exceptionally strong connections to those who have died (relatives, but also people I did not know when they were alive). I know that sounds insane, but it’s helped me believe in souls that outlive our material bodies.

So I do not believe in the typical Judeo-Christian God, but I do believe in souls and in a power that connects everyone. It’s a vaguely Eastern philosophy, but doesn’t fit into any box.

Just want to chime in that I share your beliefs. I label myself as agnostic since I do believe in a higher power, but don't feel the need to label.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When you look at creation, the stars, planets, and all the amazing plant and animal life on earth, when objectively observing it all one can only rationally conclude that it was no accident, that it was purposely designed, not an act of randomness. Therefore there is a God who created all things. For me, it was "check mate": I could no long deny, given the weight of evidence before my eyes, the fact that there is a God.

The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.

Psalm 19

I agree with you, but this is so general, which is why I'm agnostic. Do you consider yourself Christian? And if so, what made you land there?

[Anonymous]

None of the things atheists will assume.

"I do not seek to understand so that I can believe,
but I believe so that I may understand;
and what is more,
I believe that unless I do believe, I shall not understand."

-St. Anselm of Canterbury

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because God is AMAZING! If you had ever touched into His energy and power you would never ask the question God is so good!

You don't need religion to feel this energy and power.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When you look at creation, the stars, planets, and all the amazing plant and animal life on earth, when objectively observing it all one can only rationally conclude that it was no accident, that it was purposely designed, not an act of randomness. Therefore there is a God who created all things. For me, it was "check mate": I could no long deny, given the weight of evidence before my eyes, the fact that there is a God.

The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.

Psalm 19

I agree with you, but this is so general, which is why I'm agnostic. Do you consider yourself Christian? And if so, what made you land there?

I am the OP of the Psalm 19 post. I am absolutely a Christian but it took years for me to get there.

I was raised in a Christian famiy who were members of the Baptist church, but church was just something we did, had little meaning to me, a cultural thing like Thanksgiving or going on an Easter egg hunt. I personally hated church, sitting there listening to some stupid old man drone on and on about stuff people did thousands of years ago. Who cares! Around 12 years old I "stepped forward and proclaimed my faith" but the real reason I did so was because I wanted to try that communion juice and eat one of those little wafers like everybody else. Monkey-see, monkey-do. At church one day, when I had tried the patience of the Sunday school teacher,she said, "I knew when you arrived in my class you were a devil. I knew once you got the feel of things you'd be troublesome. I could see the devil in you. "

That was true. I was a hyperactive and aggressive child who enjoyed getting into scrapes and causing all the hell and mayhem I could. I especially enjoyed tormenting girls, teasing them until they'd cry or run away. I was a cruel kid. One of my favorite things to do was take a magnifying glass on a sunny day and find bugs to kill under the burning focused sunlight. I still to this day know the smell of a burning caterpillar and I always wondered if it were similar to the smell of burning human flesh. Perhaps had I not later become a real Christian I would have graduated from burning bugs to burning humans. The Sunday school teacher was right that I was a hellish devil of a kid.

When I grew up I dispensed with religion altogether because it was meaningless to me, had no relevancy. I became at that point agnostic: I did not know or care if God existed. If God did exist, it was some kind of remote, indifferent entity, a self-contained self-renewing form of energy that created stuff then went on its way, for that's what gods did I guessed.

After I finished focusing on college and a career, always in the back of my mind was the question "Well, does God exist or not?" I would keep ignoring the question but it wouldn't go away. I did not care to know, did not want to know. Religion was stupid and church a big boring waste of time. I just wanted to do my own thing and not be bothered with that stuff.

One day, a Christian friend brought to me a pamphlet from the University of Notre Dame where his father had gone to college. It was titled something about "The Existence of God". I do not remember the exact title. I began to read it, scornfully, then I planned to give it back to my friend and say "Yes, a bunch of crap like I thought it would be."

But that isn't what happened. The book of Apologetics made me start thinking about things I had not thought of before, like the existence of matter, cause & effect (God is the great 1st cause) and other things. I gave the book back but instead of being an asshole like my usual self, I did not say anything other than, "It was interesting. I'll need to think on this some more."

And I thought. I started reading the bible, not the cartoonish Sunday school stories but the bible itself, beginning with Matthew. The more I read the more I saw that Jesus was not this ordinary dude wearing sandals looking like a hippy which is how he is portrayed. No, this fellow started to speak to me. I started to see the truth of what he was saying.

And then I came to a realization, probably helped by my background in computer programming: the existence of God is a binary choice. Either God exists or God does not exist. Either the light switch is on or the light switch is off. There can be only 2 possibilities. And where did the hydrogen come from? Either it has always existed in infinite quantities as Ingersoll posited, and through random processes over unlimited time formed itself into the things we see today like stars and animals, or God who has always existed created the hydrogen and all other matter and formed all the creation that we see.

The more I thought the more I could see that non-living matter does not just form itself on its own into living things.

After that, it was like caked mud that had covered my eyes began to crumble away. I got on my knees and asked God to forgive me, that I had gone 180 degrees in the wrong direction and that I had been wrong about God, and about Jesus. I said "Jesus, I call upon your name to save me. Please. I was so wrong, please forgive me."

Jesus did forgive. I started going to church regularly, made a real and true profession of faith, and was baptized in the name of Jesus.

As I have grown in my Christian faith, God has shown me other things about the creation. For instance, God is a magnificent programmer. It is God who programmed a hen to sit on her eggs, for how with such a small brain would she know to do so? And once they hatched, to feed the baby chicks?

In the dark, a spider spins a web. It cannot see the web as it spins, and it is not taught to spin because the mother and father spider are dead when it emerges from the egg sac. A great intelligence, a great programmer, had to program that spider to spin a web, and create it with spinnerets and oiled foot glands so ti doesn't get stuck in its own web. And how with its tiny brain would a spider know that it could catch its food in a web? How could it know this? It cannot.

And so, I am a Christian. I have since examined the Mormons (another Gospel, another Jesus), Hindus (pagan idolators), Muslims (the Koran says Jesus is not the son of God; Jesus said that he is the son of God), and Judaism (they reject Jesus which the book of Daniel clearly predicted the time of his coming) and am confident and sure in my faith and can with confidence reject other religions.

I know this was long but to the best of my ability I have told you the truth about why I am a Christian. It was not some random decision, was not because my family is Christian, but the result of serious study and contemplation and observation. As I continue to live, this verse from the bible rings true:

...for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. --Hebrews 11:6

To become a Christian, you must first believe that God exists. You cannot mutter a bunch of words claiming you accept Jesus when you do not seriously even believe God exists. I hope this gives you some clarity concerning my faith. And I have been ridiculed aplenty for stating my belief, called a simpleton, brainwashed, Stockholm Syndrome, that I'm just stupid, and all manner of words saying I don't know what I'm talking about concerning God.

I have a living faith. I have seen with my own eyes the difference between "Me before I was born again" and "Me after I was born again." It's like night and day. When I was in the darkness I preferred the night and wanted to stay there, but God called me into the light. God called me out, he "check-mated" my mind to the point it was impossible not to believe in God because the evidence is overwhelming. Jesus knocked, and I opened the door. I have no regrets, none at all.

Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God --John 3:3

I wish everyone could come and see the majesty of Jesus, his supreme benevolence, and to experience being born again, of being a new person. But God has to call you out of the dark. You cannot just wake up one morning and say, "Yeah, think I'll be a Christian today for now on." No, it doesn't happen that way.

Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
--Hebrews 11:3

For me, there is no going back. When Covid came out, I had no fear. It has been foretold that there will be plagues and disasters as the time of the end approaches. I have an unwavering calm in my heart that steadies me wherever I go. The bible calls it "a peace that surpasses all understanding" and this is true. When I ought to be distraught over things, in the center of my heart the waters are calm even though a storm rages all around me. I cannot explain it, and to tell others this calmness they just think I'm sedated or something even though I do not drink alcohol or use any kind of drug (unless you count caffeine in coffee).

Well, that's enough writing for now. I hope you found this interesting or at least useful.

[Anonymous]

The majesty of the universe and creation coupled with the fact that “something cannot come from nothing” leads me to conclude there must be a God. I’m religious in order to thank God for all of it and humble myself in hope that I may experience God’s divine energy.

[Anonymous]

Because of hatch, match and dispatch

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a non-religious person I'm curious as to what draws one to religion.

So you prefer to believe in total annihilation at death, then?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a non-religious person I'm curious as to what draws one to religion.

So you prefer to believe in total annihilation at death, then?

NP. I'm not OP, but as another non-religious person, I would like to think that an afterlife exists and I respect the views of those who do think that. But I personally don't believe in it, even though I would prefer it to annihilation.

[Anonymous]

There is comfort in belonging to something bigger than yourself that transcends place, race, class, and time.
I'm Catholic. My ancestors have all been Catholic going back at least 1400 years. I marked the same milestones in life that they all did. We share the same rough beliefs.
There are over 1 billion other Catholics on the planet. They, too, mark the same milestones. We share the same rough beliefs.
For all its (many) faults, the Catholic Church is by far the largest provider of charity in the world.
If I were starting from a clean slate, I might be Episcopalian or something similar. But I don't start from a clean slate, and I value tradition and history.
I'm also a big institutionalist and believe in the great power of institutions and the power of people to change institutions for the better, albeit very slowly. The Catholic Church is the world's biggest institution.