A pragmatic perspective on religion
I'm not anti-religion I'm just a free thinker. I believe in freedom of religion and question everything. Some things stand out for me in the debate over religion. If God is all seeing and all knowing then he knows all consequences. The consequences of what I would have to call patenting the spirit realm, or in my opinion all good people's spirits going to live in a realm of light for all eternity, as an exclusive club for one group of religious people no matter how bad they were doesn't seem fair or like something a loving God would do who loves all of his creations. The consequences of that from a Christian standpoint would be over 6 billion people burning in hell for all of eternity when they die no matter how good of a person they were. God would know that creating an exclusive afterlife for only one section of religious people would create holy wars against other religions in the name of saving souls by ending lives and conquering and forcing one religion onto the world through war and devastation which would lead to hundreds of millions of deaths. If God can do anything and God cares about the greater good what is the greater good making a spirit realm where all good people ascend into a realm of light for all of eternity and can come back and interact with the people and possibly be Spirit guides or an exclusive afterlife that excludes 3/4 of his creations and condemns them to eternal damnation forever? And if God loves all of his creations to answer seemed obvious to me. And based on stories from mothers with children that could only be explained by reincarnation I believe the soul reincarnates and has for millennia. I think everyone should be allowed to ask these kind of questions and think for themselves. Don't get me wrong though, I'm not saying religion cannot be a force for good and someone's life and in the world. I just see Christians acting nothing like Jesus, not following his teachings, not following the positive commands of God and doing harmful things and not feeling bad about it. And there is a case to be made that morality does not require religion. I'm sure you can find a good number of atheists and agnostics who have a strong moral compass but absolutely no religious foundation for their moral compass and if there are exceptions to a rule it's not really a rule it's an overgeneralization or an oversimplification. In this case I think it's making something natural, having a moral compass, religious when that's not necessarily the case.
I believe religion serves the purpose of forcing a commonly accepted morality on to a large population of people and uniting them. While being well-intentioned there are negative consequences to this system of religious control of the masses for their own good. But don't get me wrong, I'm in 12 steps I've heard many stories of people who communicate with God either through their inner voice, through their higher self, through direct contact with the voice of God and through nature or the universe so I think getting communication from God is completely possible. I just have never heard anyone saying God tells him anything negative about other people and it's advice is geared towards helping that individual be better, feel better and live a better life and is all about personalized solutions to real world problems. And you don't hear anyone in 12 steps saying their way of understanding God will or has to work for everyone or for anyone they just say what has worked for them and encourage people to utilize the system to gain a conscious contact with God how you understand it or how it comes through as the solution. It's an individualized solution not a one size fits all system. I specifically have issue with the idea that God created LGBTQ people and also guaranteed them eternal damnation after a life of suffering at the hands of his chosen people. That's not a loving God who loves all of his creations.
And sorry to get political was the last thing I'll say is when Trump said, the Democratic party (many are Christian) is the party of evil and Satan that was doing what Jesus fought against and using religion to take advantage of people which was one of the few things that made him angry with righteous indignation. (Christ was all about love he had love for the outcast, the sinner, the sex worker and the heretic and he didn't offer a harsh reality for them like he did for selfish rich people (it's harder for a rich person to get to heaven and for a camel to go through the eye of a needle) and those taking advantage of faith (flipping over the tables of those charging money in the temple).) And I'm not saying that's a Christianity problem I'm saying that's a bad people hiding behind the shield of Christianity as a prop of the performative game of mass manipulation. And again I'm not anti-religion I'm just pro self empowerment. My case in point is that most people who actually read the Quran choose peace people who trust bad people taking advantage of the Quran choose terrorism. Christians who read the Bible and take the positive commands of god, teachings of Jesus and living as Jesus did as a model for how to be a righteous human being seriously become great people. If you're a naive Christian who ends up at a Christian nationalist Church out of curiosity and trust hateful, racist, misogynistic and just really bad Christians who cherry pick the Bible to sell their hate-filled beliefs that's not a Christianity problem that's a bad people taking advantage of Christianity problem.
The belief in the spirit realm being a universal destination has been around so much longer than Christianity or any official religion. Shamans have been communicating with spirit animals from the spirit realm and Spirit guides from the spirit realm for tens of thousands of years. Beings from the spirit realm have been teaching shamans and those who can commune with them about the spirit realm. All we know is that you go to a bright light and I believe that the spirit realm is a realm of light where the spirit ascends to after you die. But perhaps if you are a good enough person then your spirit doesn't get trapped on Earth as a ghost (disembodied spirit) or shadow person (both of which I have personally seen) or something along those lines. I'm agnostic about hell but believe it would only be for truly evil people. I have seen Spirit guides personally. I'm not saying shamanism is the one size fits all spiritual system and solution for everyone because I believe in freedom of religion and freedom of choice and freedom of self-determination. And I think if you are open to it and take it seriously positivity in every religious system makes a person better and more interested in creating peace in the world. When you find that source of inner peace and desire for external peace from Christianity or any religion or shamanism or your own moral compass and the desire to be a good person or 12 steps it's not a matter of how you found it but a matter of how you live it..... ....
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A pragmatic perspective on religion
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