CDWolfe
Progressive Deist
I grew up as a Southern Baptist, but am now more of a Deist with Christian roots.
I have been away for over a year and things have changed in my life. While I have gained in knowledge about world religions as well as ancient history, it only served to confuse me even more. I feel I am too skeptical and I tend to question everything. I have doubts and use reasoning when looking outside of the box. Here are some of my personal beliefs:
1. I believe in God. He is the creator. I do not believe the Genesis stories of creation, at least not in a literal sense. I lean more toward theistic evolution.
2. I grew up believing in Jesus as the messiah and Son of God, and while I still hold to that belief, it presents questions. I find myself wondering if the Jesus story was just a copy of an older story, or if there is any truth to it at all. I feel blasphemous for thinking such, but my rationale mind weighs evidence objectively.
3. I do not believe in the exodus story, nor the global flood story. This would be a long discussion as to why.
4. I believe in free will. Because of it, God does not interfere with any choice that a human makes. Bad things happen because someone chose to do something bad, not because of some evil arch enemy of God.
5. I do not believe in Satan as the devil, nor do I believe in demons. God is the creator of all and if He wanted He could simply uncreate those beings if they were truly evil. I see it more as Satan serving a specific role and is carrying out his assigned duties. The theme of good vs. evil is manmade, and found all throughout mythology and folklore.
6. While I do pray, I tend to think that prayers are typically not answered. Maybe it is because of free will, or maybe God has simply moved on to create elsewhere. Regardless, more times than not people are left with unanswered prayers.
7. In studying ancient history/religions, I am open to the idea that people were nomadic and their stories traveled with them. Those stories were borrowed from culture to culture and grew over time. The Romans adopting Greek mythology and changing the names is a prime example. Ancient Babylon and Egypt serve as the catalyst for many of those stories. This leads back to #2 above.
Where do I fit in?
I have been away for over a year and things have changed in my life. While I have gained in knowledge about world religions as well as ancient history, it only served to confuse me even more. I feel I am too skeptical and I tend to question everything. I have doubts and use reasoning when looking outside of the box. Here are some of my personal beliefs:
1. I believe in God. He is the creator. I do not believe the Genesis stories of creation, at least not in a literal sense. I lean more toward theistic evolution.
2. I grew up believing in Jesus as the messiah and Son of God, and while I still hold to that belief, it presents questions. I find myself wondering if the Jesus story was just a copy of an older story, or if there is any truth to it at all. I feel blasphemous for thinking such, but my rationale mind weighs evidence objectively.
3. I do not believe in the exodus story, nor the global flood story. This would be a long discussion as to why.
4. I believe in free will. Because of it, God does not interfere with any choice that a human makes. Bad things happen because someone chose to do something bad, not because of some evil arch enemy of God.
5. I do not believe in Satan as the devil, nor do I believe in demons. God is the creator of all and if He wanted He could simply uncreate those beings if they were truly evil. I see it more as Satan serving a specific role and is carrying out his assigned duties. The theme of good vs. evil is manmade, and found all throughout mythology and folklore.
6. While I do pray, I tend to think that prayers are typically not answered. Maybe it is because of free will, or maybe God has simply moved on to create elsewhere. Regardless, more times than not people are left with unanswered prayers.
7. In studying ancient history/religions, I am open to the idea that people were nomadic and their stories traveled with them. Those stories were borrowed from culture to culture and grew over time. The Romans adopting Greek mythology and changing the names is a prime example. Ancient Babylon and Egypt serve as the catalyst for many of those stories. This leads back to #2 above.
Where do I fit in?
) stories that have lessons to teach. Some people take them literally ('purana' means 'history'), but some are so outlandish, they can only be moral lessons. Same for the bible stories... lessons.
