michski

IMHO There's a lot of blah blah blah yada yada going in circles thinking going on here...

We obtain our belief structure through experience and everything I'm reading here reminds me of a simple bumper sticker that says "Question Reality"

As we mature in age and experience we enrichen our personal aquisition of beliefs as we experience the act of living. Our minds and thoughts are really our only true possessions. We experience all things subjectively and nothing is shoved down our throats or into our forebrains without our consent. We simply must dare to think... To not think about our lives and the world around us breathes out the silence of consent that can and will bind us.

Keeping an openmind is entirely different than holding a suspicious mind...

Take them one at a time, each person and thing and situation and search for your bias separating the reality here before you from your programmed perceptions and your projections. And this exercise will afford you a revelation as divine as any that the Scriptures could provide you with."

To put the above quote into action is to aquire a belief system.

paulmh

Yup.

Crashnburn

The name of the fora is secular connections.

The purpose of the thread was to reach out to those secular individuals here.

Some of my PTSD is directly related to church.

I sometimes need secular people to reach out to for support.

I already stated to each their own, which I thought ppl in here would understand means I respect your right to your own religion or non-religion.

How hard is it to respect my right to disbelief?

Again, the main purpose of my introductory thread in this fora is to reach out to like minded individuals in the secular connections fora.

equus

And you've got them!! Hang on in there and if you find a poster difficult you can use the ignore function. I can't remember where the button is but i'll find out again if you can't see it.

Keep posting - we are here and ready to listen. Secular is all good round these parts....

Edit - the ignore function is in the 'CP' control panel, bottom on the left - just press it and it takes you to a page where you can add the name of anyone you want to ignore, once done you'll never see anything they post. Pooof!!

Morning Glory

Welcome to the forums Crashnburn.

I'm glad you joined us.

paulmh

PLease don't misunderstand Crashnburn - I'm afraid I wasn't responding to you, but to the drfit the thread had taken.

Welcome again!

Don S

Welcome from an unrepentant, unreconstructed secularist.
Don S

doorknob

Welcome Crash,

You're in the right forum. This debate was already going on before you arrived...

DK

aloneagainor

I did not realize what I wrote was perceived that way, though it does not surprise me, I do over-analzye. Understanding beliefs and reality and subjective/ objective thinking is extremely important to me and I may have gotten carried away in trying to work through it here in writing. Because I don't understand where this thread went, I want to state it was in no way my intent to offend or bore or bother anyone or disrespect anyone, so if I did I thatI apologize, it was not intended that way. I am an addict with deficiencies. I'll try to be careful with what I write.

historyteach

Alone,
We're all in this together; working it out together. No need to apologise for that!

Shalom!

michski

Sorry if it was me that offended.. it certainly was not my intention. I welcome you to sober recovery and totally respect your right to disbelief.

I believe that the words disbelief and belief can never be opposites. To have disbelief denotes another belief. It's all semantics.. but I was never speaking towards your disbelief in the god stuff... I was speaking about belief period.

Crashnburn

I believe god doesn't exist...*scratches head* Thought I already explained that too..
I'm really not offended...
I've hung out on enough secular forums on the internet. Even Internet Infidels..I don't bother to hold grudges. We're okay, it's okay.

Thanks to everyone for their kind supportive gestures. Appreciated.

indigo

Welcome to secular, I respect you as a sentient being and your right to disbeleif as I respect people's right to belief. Glad to have you here.
indigo

Abbadun

Hi

I was listening to a radio show

http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.o...th/index.shtml

and the guest was John Danforth who is a former U.S. senator and U.N. ambassador, a lawyer who is also an Episcopal priest. He calls himself a traditional Republican and a moderate Christian. A part of me first thought "Ah...Geeeeez!!"

After listening to him I heard a man who is living by his beliefs but truly trying to respect the beliefs and opinions of others.

Abbadun

windysan

Tim Leary died.

He's God now.

historyteach

Good example, abbadun!

Shalom!

aloneagainor

Good example, Windy.
Dang cows.

Live

I spent some time studying the world's major religions and it seems that most of them share basic universal truths of what I would call ethics. That said, I am an agnostic. And frankly I am just looking for a place here where I can be me and still feel comfortable.
I was taught in college that being an agnostic is actually a bit harder than for those who have faith beliefs. We do not have that sense of comfort that those who have faith beliefs derive from their belief systems. Altho' from my perspective I can see how certain belief systems can result in great pain, those who believe that they are protected by their belief systems such that when tragedy strikes, they are shaken and may wonder why me? Other belief systems do not foster that sense of being protected and would ask why not me? I make no statements about others' beliefs being right or wrong, I am simply saying that I believe it is unknowable.
I often find that when I express that I am agnostic, others find it threatening or else feel the need to convert me.
So I am sort of introducing myself here to see if I can feel comfortable in this forum.
I will not ask anyone to defend their faith or lack thereof to me and I ask no one demand this of me.

live

windysan

Driving through the country this week I saw about a million of em.

I didn't tumble any turds.

Just looked out the window and smiled.

My spinal fluid was "tickley".

doorknob

I always believed that one couldn't get addicted to hallucinogens due to the inablility to trip consecutive days without multiplying the dose. I've certainly done my share. More acid than shrooms though. It's been about 6 years since I've touched anything in that category. I'm not sure I could handle it anymore...