Why I am an agnostic now
Apr. 10th, 2007 10:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
greybetaSo, recently I’ve changed my religious views on my facebook to “Agnostic.” Dictionary.com defines an agnostic as:
1. a person who holds that the existence of the ultimate cause, as God, and the essential nature of things are unknown and unknowable, or that human knowledge is limited to experience.
2. a person who denies or doubts the possibility of ultimate knowledge in some area of study.
To put it more plainly, I believe in God but I simply cannot acknowledge that Jesus is the only way to know him because I don't believe knowing God is exclusive to Christianity.
Then there must be a question that arises. Why, if I believed in Christianity before, would I be willing to switch to agnosticism now?
Well, it has to do with my time off. I meditated and I realized something heinous about myself. I was one of those people who had faith that the good Lord would take care of anything and everything in my life. All I had to do is sit and wait.
But the more I thought about it, the more irrational it seemed to me. I mean, I’d always wanted to study history but my parents wanted me to be a doctor. Even when I did switch I could never feel their full support. It seemed to me that if I fully pursued my wishes to teach history, I’d fail to meet their expectations. But if I went back to being a doctor, I’d fail at meeting my own expectations.
This is what you call a vicious circle. Or, as one of my electrical engineering professors said, it’s a circuit that just keeps the room warm (before it burns out).
The rational play for me is to resolve this cognitive dissonance. But, to do that, I would have to do the one thing that I thought I would never do. And that would be to become an apostate of something I held very dear.
I had to renounce my faith.
If I came back to Christianity now, I would return to my former state. If I am to quit blaming God for everything that goes wrong in my life, then I have to put that responsibility on myself.
Now, I know many of those who I worked in ministry with might say that is not much different from their faith. Fair enough.
But then if you put a gun to my head and asked me if I believed that claiming Jesus Christ was the Son of God and the only way to heaven, I would say no. I would deny the exclusivity of Christianity (or any religion for that matter).
But…Jesus died for our sins, didn’t he? We’re all the children of God. We can’t store up so many good deeds and commit crimes to balance the ledger. Salvation is a gift, it can only be given, not earned.
And yet, I think about all the terrible things that happen in the world today. God does a lot of good in this world, and yet he allows a lot of evil.
And in that lies the fearful power of Jesus. I mean, my goodness, if people didn’t believe in Jesus then how could so many good things happen in the first place?
Then again, plenty of other religions allow people to cope with reality. What makes Christianity different?
Jesus died for you.
That’s the first thing you have to admit if you are going to be a true believer in Christ. My problem is that I had it backwards.
In other words, Jesus already died for me. I still had to die for him.
In the Baptist Church, believer’s baptism signifies one’s death to be reborn. I had it wrong. I thought that one baptized one’s self to die, but the truth is that you’re already dead before you become baptized.
The belief is that “once saved, always saved.” Then the answer in my case was that I was never saved in the first place. Rather, I claimed to be and followed the outward forms of being saved, but inwardly I had no such intention.
That’s what Christians talk about what they talk about denying themselves. No, they’re not going to starve themselves to death. It’s a denial of who they are, and it’s not a one time thing. Nope, they’ve got pick up their cross and carry it daily.
Or to sum it up more tidily, the exclusive nature of Christianity is irrational to me. I remember Jesus saying that one should be cold or hot because he would spit out the lukewarm people first.
If I am to be a true believer, I can’t just believe in the parts of Christianity that make sense to me. I also have to believe in the parts that make little sense to me.
In that case, the rational thing to do is to reject it in its entirety.
Unfortunately, I’ve discovered that I’m a rather irrational person.
1. a person who holds that the existence of the ultimate cause, as God, and the essential nature of things are unknown and unknowable, or that human knowledge is limited to experience.
2. a person who denies or doubts the possibility of ultimate knowledge in some area of study.
To put it more plainly, I believe in God but I simply cannot acknowledge that Jesus is the only way to know him because I don't believe knowing God is exclusive to Christianity.
Then there must be a question that arises. Why, if I believed in Christianity before, would I be willing to switch to agnosticism now?
Well, it has to do with my time off. I meditated and I realized something heinous about myself. I was one of those people who had faith that the good Lord would take care of anything and everything in my life. All I had to do is sit and wait.
But the more I thought about it, the more irrational it seemed to me. I mean, I’d always wanted to study history but my parents wanted me to be a doctor. Even when I did switch I could never feel their full support. It seemed to me that if I fully pursued my wishes to teach history, I’d fail to meet their expectations. But if I went back to being a doctor, I’d fail at meeting my own expectations.
This is what you call a vicious circle. Or, as one of my electrical engineering professors said, it’s a circuit that just keeps the room warm (before it burns out).
The rational play for me is to resolve this cognitive dissonance. But, to do that, I would have to do the one thing that I thought I would never do. And that would be to become an apostate of something I held very dear.
I had to renounce my faith.
If I came back to Christianity now, I would return to my former state. If I am to quit blaming God for everything that goes wrong in my life, then I have to put that responsibility on myself.
Now, I know many of those who I worked in ministry with might say that is not much different from their faith. Fair enough.
But then if you put a gun to my head and asked me if I believed that claiming Jesus Christ was the Son of God and the only way to heaven, I would say no. I would deny the exclusivity of Christianity (or any religion for that matter).
But…Jesus died for our sins, didn’t he? We’re all the children of God. We can’t store up so many good deeds and commit crimes to balance the ledger. Salvation is a gift, it can only be given, not earned.
And yet, I think about all the terrible things that happen in the world today. God does a lot of good in this world, and yet he allows a lot of evil.
And in that lies the fearful power of Jesus. I mean, my goodness, if people didn’t believe in Jesus then how could so many good things happen in the first place?
Then again, plenty of other religions allow people to cope with reality. What makes Christianity different?
Jesus died for you.
That’s the first thing you have to admit if you are going to be a true believer in Christ. My problem is that I had it backwards.
In other words, Jesus already died for me. I still had to die for him.
In the Baptist Church, believer’s baptism signifies one’s death to be reborn. I had it wrong. I thought that one baptized one’s self to die, but the truth is that you’re already dead before you become baptized.
The belief is that “once saved, always saved.” Then the answer in my case was that I was never saved in the first place. Rather, I claimed to be and followed the outward forms of being saved, but inwardly I had no such intention.
That’s what Christians talk about what they talk about denying themselves. No, they’re not going to starve themselves to death. It’s a denial of who they are, and it’s not a one time thing. Nope, they’ve got pick up their cross and carry it daily.
Or to sum it up more tidily, the exclusive nature of Christianity is irrational to me. I remember Jesus saying that one should be cold or hot because he would spit out the lukewarm people first.
If I am to be a true believer, I can’t just believe in the parts of Christianity that make sense to me. I also have to believe in the parts that make little sense to me.
In that case, the rational thing to do is to reject it in its entirety.
Unfortunately, I’ve discovered that I’m a rather irrational person.
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no subject
Date: 2007-04-10 07:01 pm (UTC)I'm curious how Christianity fails its followers in their ability to cope with reality. I consider myself able to cope with it, and I'm wondering what one has to ascribe to to be unable to see the reality around them. Then again, it is pretty difficult to see all the reality around oneself. I freely admit that there is plenty out there that I have not experienced, nor will I be able to understand. The world is too big to experience everything first hand, and I don't exactly trust TV and movies to tell me how things really are.
Which brings it to an interesting point. I believe that all truth is God's truth. There is nothing out there that is true that isn't of God. This allows me to believe that other religions have some things correct. They must have found some truth, or otherwise they wouldn't last too long, would they? It's like science. There are many truthful things in science, and I think a regrettable offense to Christians as they grow up is that they are told that truth only comes out of Christianity. So, when they find some truth outside of Christianity, it can be a scary thing and rocks the boat.
With all that said, it needs to be said that I think that Jesus was the most correct. I think He was God, and what he taught resonates with me more than anything else I have studied or read up on. Jesus says "Follow me." He didn't say, "Follow my religion," or "Follow your local church." I think that following Jesus can lead one to Christianity or their local church, but that wasn't what was commanded specifically. And we humans are faulty things, aren't we? We aren't going to get everything right, and as soon as we start basing someone else's words as the ones that should come before Christ's, well... that leads to troubles that I don't even want to start to address in this limited comment space.
So, all that to say, I believe people that are searching for truth are searching for God, whether they know it or not. But when the person that resonates the most with me in His teachings says that He is the only way... well, I'm going to believe Him. This also leads me to believe that other routes to God may look good, and they may indeed have some truth to them, but I don't believe they are complete.
I hope this helps in some way. This is basically how I feel on the subject, and I'm not looking for flames or debates. But honestly, if there's a way of living that has worked for me, and I think it's the best way, I'm going to want those I care about to enjoy that same life. It isn't a matter of 'converting,' but moreso wanting to see a friend enjoy what I enjoy, because I believe there's nothing better out there.
-Ryan
no subject
Date: 2007-04-10 09:30 pm (UTC)The reason I'm agnostic is that I cannot say with complete confidence that Jesus is the only way. But, who knows, I may turn around into your view one day.