If you had a choice?

[Charity]

How many theists here have essentially the same religion as their parents?

I do not have the same religion that my parents did......In fact mine is even more fundamentalist and back to the absolute than theres. I think that everyone should experience different religions, and at least have some understanding of them before making a choice........Of course I would rather my children believe like me but I really can't expect them to, it is their own choice.

 

[lilithu]

How many theists here have essentially the same religion as their parents?

This should be interesting to see.

How would one see? Even if both parent and child identified as the same faith they still could believe very different things.

 

[logician]

How would one see? Even if both parent and child identified as the same faith they still could believe very different things.

Emphasis on the word "essentially", I don't consider different Protestant faiths, for example, to be different religions, or for that matter converting from being a United Methodist to being a Catholic, since the basic beliefs are very close to being the same. I'm talking going from Christian to Islam, or Judaism to Christianity, etc.

 

[Popeyesays]

I was raised Christian, but given the right and privilege to investigate widely. I became Baha`i almost a year after I first heard about it.

My wife was Christian, not Baha`i, she interviewed me about the faith because it was an assignment in her sociology of religion class to investigate a religion of which she knew nothing. We married a year later, she became a Baha`i about six months after our marriage.

Both our daughters were raised with the obligation to determine the truth for themselves and both are Baha`i's since they were fifteen (age of spiritual maturity). For our older daughter that was twelve years ago, for our younger daughter almost five years ago.

Regards,
Scott

 

[sandy whitelinger]

My choice and brief reason why: Islam, Jewish and Christian. Not a hope, all 3 are based on a fairy tale books. No proof has ever been found outside of these books on any of these faiths. Wrote by man to control man. Not for me...no thanks.

As a general statement that is incredibly ignorant.

 

[lilithu]

Emphasis on the word "essentially", I don't consider different Protestant faiths, for example, to be different religions, or for that matter converting from being a United Methodist to being a Catholic, since the basic beliefs are very close to being the same.

I don't consider different denominations to be different faiths either. That's not what I was talking about at all. Within the Catholic tradition alone there is a wide variety of beliefs. I've met Catholics with whom I disagree utterly and others who have made me think, "hmm.. I could be Catholic" because we see eye to eye on so much.

My point is that even if people choose to retain the same label that they were born into, it doesn't mean they haven't thought about their faith and made it their own. Your continued assumption that you've thought more about religion than others just because you've rejected it and others have not is tedious.

 

[Somkid]

Buddhism. Though...I already practice it philosophically.

Zen Buddhism? Not all Buddhism is philosophy and some of it gets down right tricky with Deva's heavens and hells. I'm a Ch'an Buddhist so, I don't buy any of it I am a stone cold atheist with a warm compassionate heart toward my fellow human beings but you see what I'm saying.