How Important is Religion in Your Life?

Controversial? Not at all.

I am an atheist (for scientific and logical reasons). I am also very tolerant. My wife is a devout Buddhist, other members of my family are Christian, I had friends at University who were Hindus and (moderate) Muslims, my Bridge partner was Jewish as was a very close female friend (later the wife of another close friend), who was the daughter of an Auschwitz survivor.

Religion and lack of belief are a personal choice, and should not be imposed by anyone upon anyone else - and certainly never forced upon others by violence. And there should certainly be no place for religion in politics, or in schools for that matter.

For me Religion are the guidelines to live life. It tell me what to do when wake-up, how to wear cloths, how to wear shoes, how to speak to my family and others, how to eat, how to do business, how to give rights to your family, how to respect your neighbors, infact ever aspect of life. It also answers me, who is God, and why i have been sent to this world. It also tell how to run the state, judiciary system i mean every aspect of life, nothing is out of it.. So religion is very important for my life.

Now coming to claiming superior. Superior means "Higher than another in rank, station, or authority". But i think people think "My religion tells me ultimate truth or my religion is true (some people add only before this line)". But when we look into religion's definition, we can clearly see that religion is the set of beliefs, spiritual practices and "Ultimate truth" of what they beliefs. So, according to the definition, every religion follower should think that his religion is true. So its means, if some conflicting statement comes like Jews says, God is one, & jesus was just a human being. While christian says "Father, Son and Spirit are Gods, and they all are one, while Jesus is the Son of God". Which means Jews will think christians are wrong while christians think they are. So a religion follower is meant to believe he is carrying ultimate truth.

So today i feel, no religion follower is present.. only people has adopts the identities... like christians, jews, budha, or muslims etc..

I think there is a difference between being religious and having a personal relationship with Jesus. I do not think of myself as being religious. Being religious to me is being legalistic, like the Pharisees in Jesus' time. I attend church regularly and am active in Home Bible studies and honestly, God is an active part of absolutely every area of my life. I seek His guidance at work and with my children and with my dreams and hopes. When my daughter died God was at my side. Being a Christian is putting your trust and hope and faith in our Creator and loving Him. It is the daily surrender of ME and desiring what God wants for me. He does know what is best and the Bible says there is just one way to get to the Father and that is through Jesus Christ. You can't get there on your parents or husbands coat tails. It is your choice and your call. I do know if you truly want to know the truth and you ask God to show you He is faithful and will reveal Himself to you. God bless you and I hope you find what you are looking for. Go belongs everywhere especially in the leadership of this country.

Hi sleblanc, I most certainly agree that religion has no place politics. Many people down through the years have used the fact that they were a Christians,attended church regularly and knew the Bible just to get votes. In recent years it has been shown that many of these people are no better than others, and would do anything to get elected. The real Christian doesn't talk much about his beliefs, he lives them. The same would be true of other religions, such as Islam, keep religion out of politics as we are not all followers of any religion. I am not religious but spiritual and try to follow the golden rule which in found in all the major religions of the world. Blessings.

I am a Christian but I am fed up with "organized hypocitical relgious sects and groups that are more of a feel good social group that pick a few biblcical scriptures to base their entire faith on and think the pastors are infallible. They sit and rarely read the bible or what it really says or why, they don't question or challenge. They have cliques and shun anyone not good enough, dressed well enough or poor. They have a ritual not any spontanity or true search for truth.

I do believe in God and a creator and creation and I do pray and believe in and experinced miracles but as to religion don't have one specfic place to meet or fellowship.

religion was important in my life 2 years ago. now religion means you are delusional. ever since these bible scholars came out with their discoveries in the past 20 years, they have debunked so much of religion. making it a field where the human mind invents a lot of myths to explain things around him. should the information that we have now be accessible to those people who wrote the bible, qur'an and whatever, there would not have a religion today. except for unthinking people with lots of prejudices and unreasonableness. for example, the prejudice against the female gender is accepted only in the light (or darkness) of religion. how stupid is that!

To be honest, my story is exactly the same as yours! I'm so glad someone else sees it how I do and that it isn't just me. Honestly, I can't really see myself ever going to church when I move out of my parents house, I just have a lot of problems with what religion teaches and blindly following something that I have no proof even exists makes me feel very awkward and its not something I enjoy.

Well most of the people here seem to be an atheist here, well I have a difference in opinion here........I am a christian........not because my parents brought me up in that way but because of my personal encounter with Jesus.......if I go to narrate the entire episode maybe I would fill up an entire page........My family was just like yours few years back........we used to go to church only if we manage to get up in the morning......we had no room for prayers in our lives.......we were the perfect example of shameless Christians........

But one day our life changed like hell........we went thorough lots of pain and difficulty......my dad had a shelf full of medicines which he had to take without fail......my sister fell ill.......my mother got kidney stone.......probably I was the only one little safe(but I feel into wrong hands few years later in my teens probably)......we went to every kind of evil doers to get cure for our ailments, we did every kind of idol worship as possible......science had no answer to any of our problems....the reports were normal, medicines were still on, but there was no relief........

So there was a time when we had to come back to our own god(Jesus) and my father said "Let it be, I have tried everything out and I don't think he will be able to help me or my family out" but still he went ahead and thought to give it a try.....trust me the very first day we attended one of the prayer meeting our life had already changed........within few weeks all the ailments of my father and sister had gone, my sister is happily married now and my father does not take a single dose of medicine.......we all are in prayers, and we are happy to choose Jesus in our life.......

I am not saying this to change your view about religion, since you brought up this topic and related religion to science I thought that you would like to know that science and religion CANNOT go hand in hand........most of the time it does but not always like in my case........

My view is no one can force you to believe in something unless you get a first hand experience of something........some people try to find him and some people just sit back for him to come.......the choice is always ours!!!!!

have a nice day!!!!

i guess i should speak it this way that i dont belong to any religt i would like to
give my best respect to them who have their beliefs if they really can practise what
the preah,i dont think that would be bothering me anyway,how important is religion,i think just like art, science and philosphy it is important as it can be

yes, great topic indeed! if my relationship w/ my god makes me into a religion,then it is most impt. to me. i led my family into this religion and most of my family members are into it.we have a better life than before.i will not convince you that my religion is superior, it's just that i know what i know, it's life saving and it's founded on unconditional love.