Religion is a funny thing. Regardless of what religion one chooses, there is virtually no factual evidence to back up most of its claims. We are entreated to "believe" precisely because we cannot "know". I have no problem with this. I am well aware that I choose to believe in my gods for reasons that make sense to me but I do not "know" even whether they exist.
(I should throw in a warning here. Some might not see this as a politically correct post.)
At any rate, it seems that a lot of people don't see things this way. On a long train trip recently (22 hours), I was seated in the dining car with three people - all born-again evangelical Christians, eager to share their beliefs with me. The first indication that I was in trouble was when one of them said that "God had led" her to take the train. People eating in the dining car of a train tend to try to be friendly, so I attempted to steer the conversation to safe topics. I asked about travel. Two of them went on and on about the delights of visiting Israel and walking "where Christ walked" and the other talked about missionary work in Kenya. I brought up movies and books. They talked about the Bible. Families? One of the women pointed out that hers had disowned her because she became a Christian. Finally, I just ordered more wine and tried to focus on finishing my meal.
Needless to say, three people who are "saved" cannot just sit idly by with a heathen in their midst. My own beliefs were questioned (when I said that I am a Pagan, they looked at me quite blankly) briefly, then they began telling me how wonderful their god is.
First, I have no problem with the Christian god. As a polytheist, I am happy to acknowledge his existence, and if people derive joy from worshipping him, why would that bother me? I devoutly believe that all religions are equally valid and deserving of respect.
Second, I do have a problem with any religion that teaches that it is the "only" true religion and that you must believe in it or horrible things will happen to you/ you're an evil person/ whatever. So when one of the women told me that the Christian god "is a jealous god", all I could think of is if he's all that he says he is, what does he have to be jealous of??
Another thing I don't understand is this Old Testament/New Testament thing. They appear to be two very different gods. So what happened? Does god have a multiple personality disorder and the good alter finally took over? Or he "saved" himself and became good?
That said, I fear Judaism doesn't make any more sense to me than Christianity does. The "original" god wasn't a nice god at all! He told a man to kill his own son to prove his love to god! (Okay, he reneged at the last minute, but hell of a practical joke!) He was always going around "smiting" people and killing them off en masse. Sort of the original mass murderer. So why would anyone worship this god?! Fear, okay, sure. But worship??
From my limited knowledge, Jesus sounds like a good guy. But even he, I gather, said one had to follow his god (the same one who thought having his son crucified was a good idea. And this heinous act "saved" us how??). Perhaps it's an occupational hazard. Perhaps I see dysfunction everywhere, but if a god who refuses to allow anyone to worship other gods, who demands total loyalty and fealty to himself, isn't the definition of a raging narcissist, what is?
Truly, I was not trying to be provocative so I kept chomping down on my tongue, rather than expressing these views, but you can see how well their attempts at converting me went. The only thing this conversation did was remind me of all the reasons I left Christianity in the first place.
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