IT would be nice to hear from other 'religious' beliefs beside christian or atheist/agnostic,,,,

more options make for a more 'informative' discussion,,,

Sweetestgirl wrote:

I am a christian and an accepting bhuddist...I am an infant with my understanding of bhuddism

I remain a Christian on the advice of the writings of the dalai lama who wrote that he feels we best understand our religion of origin and recommends we remain with it for that reason

no one would ever understand what I believe, how or why. so I never talk about it

I am not interested in debate, nor have I a need to defend myself or answer questions (I seldom answer)

You're not very good at spelling it either evidently.



I think you should remain with what calls to and what you are most comfortable with too.

Contrary to popular belief on these forums, I am not against Christianity as a personal faith.

What I am against is the constant and relentless proselytizing of the religion to people who do not feel called to it, or who have actually left it after deciding that it isn't for them.

So it's actually the relentless proselytizers that I react too.

The innocent Christians who are simply trying to have peaceful walk with God in the background get mowed down as collateral damage on the sidelines of the proselytizing wars.


I would never bother a Christian who wasn't constantly trying to convince me to believe in their religion.

I could worship God through the Moon Goddess whilst the person next to me is praying to God in Jesus name, and I would have absolutely no problem with that whatsoever.

Where it becomes problematic is when they start proclaiming that I'm rejecting the real "God the Father" by worshiping my fictitious Moon Goddess.

Now the proselytizing war has begun.

And, I ask you, who was it who had cast the first stone?

Me? Or the Christian?

Sweetestgirl wrote:

now here is where I am a rebel as I do not care who cast the first stone

I might ignore the stone
I might pick up the stone and throw it back (he might need it)
I might pick up the stone and suggest we build with it

or I might ask him if he'd like to change the subject to kissing...and catch a baseball game later to satisfy the throwing fetish

Well, your last choice certainly appears to be the most productive and rewarding. You'd certainly distract him from calling your Goddess worship fictitious.

By the end of the baseball game you might have him participating in Goddess worship.

I have decided that proselytizing your religion is a "sin."

If someone asks me what I believe, unless they are truly interested, I am not interested in having a conversation with someone who is happy with what they believe.

I have had to build a thicker skin to 'adapt' to the repetitive negative stereotypes about religion and the bible in this thread,, why do some 'non religous' people have such a problem doing the same

I would love to discuss other forms of spirituality. I've tried to do that on these forums but it always get yanked back to "Christian Proselytizing" here. Leaving me basically not much choice on these forums but to continually explain why I don't believe in Christianity.



I would love to get past that and discuss other possible spiritual beliefs.

I just recently joined a "Wiccan" forum. Trust me, even those forums are not exactly in perfect harmony when it comes to their beliefs, etc. In fact, just in my introduction thread I've already ended up in a "defensive" discussion concerning whether or not my spiritual beliefs qualify as being "Wiccan".

Not that I actually need to be associated with that label, but it just goes to show that no matter where you go in terms of religion there are going to be people proclaiming what constitutes a "True whatever" and what doesn't quite fit that bill.

In very specific terms I would not claim to be a "Wiccan" but I do feel that in general my current spiritual practices could indeed be sufficiently described by that term.

Although, having said that, I would certainly qualify as a "Buddhist or Taoist", especially in terms of spiritual philosophy, if not in terms of the actual practice of those spiritual traditions in detail.

Buddhism itself is every bit as diversified as the Abrahamic religions. There are forms of Buddhism as far removed from one another as Christianity and Islam are removed from Judaism.

So to even say that I would qualify as a "Buddhist" needs to be clarified. Which form of Buddhism?

Actually the forms of Buddhism that I could potentially associate myself with would probably be ancient forms that are not widely practiced today. The closest Buddhisms I can think of would be Tantra Buddhism and potentially Tibetan Buddhism (the Buddhism associated with the Dalai Lama) Although I certainly don't practice it anywhere near to the extent that the Dalai Lama practices it.

In fact I don't practice rituals of Buddhism much at all anymore, save for those that carry over into Wicca. Such as meditation, visualization, and casting circles. The casting of circles was only associated with very few forms of ancient Buddhism and their circle casting was quite different in technical details, but similar in a spiritual sense, as I see it.

I love Wicca now. Or at least a lot of the rituals and folklore that is associated with it. Wicca does not represent a specific "God" or "Goddess" to me, even though some Wiccans do associate it with very specific deities.

In fact, that very issue is one of the things that is often highly controversial even with in Wiccan circles (if you'll excuse the pun)

I view the "God" and "Goddess" as psychic visions of a single spiritual essence of reality. In some sense I think of that essence as our higher self.

What Cowboy refers to as "Our Father" I see as our very own "Higher Self".

So in a sense, we could be speaking of the same spiritual concept. Although I seriously doubt that Cowboy would accept this view.

Cowboy would probably hold out that the Father is a totally separate entity from us, and that we are not "one with the Father", especially not until we have accepted Jesus specifically as our savior, etc.

By from my point of view, if there is a "God" then my spiritual practices through Wicca, or Buddhism, or anything are all recognizing the same spiritual consciousness.

This is why I have no problem moving from one religion to another. I've never changed "Gods" in my life. All I've done is change the way I view God.

This is also why I can indeed recognize Christians and Christianity as being a valid religion for those who chose it.

Does it matter whether the stories in the Old Testament actually came from God? Does it matter whether Jesus was actually the only begotten son of God? Etc.

No, it doesn't. As long as a person believes that they are honoring the spiritual creator of all life though that religion then they are.

So in that way, Christianity is just a valid spirituality as anything else.

There's just no need to hold it out to be the only way for everyone else.

Instead of "building a thicker skin" why don't you actually open your mind to the idea that maybe we're right instead of dismissing anything that contradicts what you believe or have been told?

This is one of my pet peeves about religion, it creates a closed mind to where people are incapable or outright refuse to look at anything that goes against what they have been taught. I know you'll disagree with me and that's fine, but nevertheless if you cannot allow yourself to objectively look at something to see whether it's really true or not, your mind is closed.

When we cease to learn, we cease to truly live, because life is about learning. You cannot really live if you won't let yourself learn given that, you stunt your own spiritual growth.

I think people need suffering in order to learn compassion for others.

It is through your own suffering that you learn empathy and compassion.

This is a world designed for suffering. That we were born in this world is the only reason one can say that we were born in sin.

People are not born with the ability to love others or have compassion. They learn it.

Very true. You never know what you have unless you've done without. This is done cause we "the Human race" didn't know what we had while in the Garden of Eden, thought we could have/do better eg., eating of the fruit to gain what was promised by the serpent.

We live this life with the disease and other tragedies we will know what we have in Heaven. We won't take it for granted, we will be grateful rather then thinking we could do/have better. This is all a learning process more or less.

You never know what you have unless you've done without.

Christianity was never meant to be discussed anyway.

It was meant to be Told..yes...but then move on...which is

what I am doing now.

God said, Go TELL the Good news......

not , debate or "discuss" or argue or push the good news.

Just...GO TELL..... then move on.......


I've Done told all that needs to be told on here now.



Take care....Be Blessed...Everyone Now.

Love You All...Always ...So Does God

I am in 100% absolute agreement with you on this one MorningSong.

I too believe that even these stories themselves have Jesus instructing his disciples to simply spread the word but not to argue about it, and to leave and kick the dust from their shoes if people aren't interested in hearing what they have to say.

So as far as I can see to relentlessly proselytize the religion to people who have clearly already "heard the word" is to actually violate the very instructions of Jesus according to these very stories.

So people who take it upon themselves to dedicate their lives to trying to convince non-believers via relentless arguing with them are actually violating the instructions given by Jesus according to these gospels anyway.

So they aren't even following the message that the believe supposedly came from God themselves.

Relentless proselytizing is not even compatible with the stories of Jesus truly.

So true. I am grateful for everything I have and everything that comes to me. I ask and it is given.

I've been without a home, no money, etc. I am grateful for a roof over my head, running water, food, etc. I never understand some young people who complain because they don't have designer clothes and people who feel they are entitled to things for no reason and have no gratitude at all.