Is there a GOD?

[Dukey]

Hi retro..incisive post from you.

The passage I highlighted is too broad for me to understand.The word universe is being used when I think that human being is what is meant.My reasoning .. the universe is perfect , it is human mind that is not perfect.

Other than that I think the post is a good case for god and christianity as an explanation of things.Definately convincing.

WYSIWYG : I do believe you've hit the nail on the head with that statement.
There is no good or evil in Nature - We just perceive things as good or evil depending upon how they impinge on our own existence.
EDIT: and as such - we don't need an anthropomorphic God to explain problems or good & evil.

 

[2020hindsight]

Some quotes by Sitting Bull

Behold, my friends, the spring is come; the earth has gladly received the embraces of the sun, and we shall soon see the results of their love!
Sitting Bull

Each man is good in His sight. It is not necessary for eagles to be crows.
Each man is good in the sight of the Great Spirit.
Every seed is awakened, and all animal life.
God made me an Indian. I am here by the will of the Great Spirit, and by his will I am chief.
He put in your heart certain wishes and plans; in my heart, he put other different desires.
I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place.

I know Great Spirit is looking down upon me from above, and will hear what I say.
If a man loses anything and goes back and looks carefully for it, he will find it.
If I agree to dispose of any part of our land to the white people I would feel guilty of taking food away from our children's mouths, and I do not wish to be that mean.
In my early days, I was eager to learn and to do things, and therefore I learned quickly.
Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country?

It is not necessary for eagles to be crows.
It is through this mysterious power that we too have our being, and we therefore yield to our neighbors, even to our animal neighbors, the same right as ourselves to inhabit this vast land.
Let us put our minds together and see what life we can make for our children.
Only seven years ago we made a treaty by which we were assured that the buffalo country should be left to us forever. Now they threaten to take that from us also.

Strangely enough, they have a mind to till the soil, and the love of possessions is a disease in them.
The earth has received the embrace of the sun and we shall see the results of that love.
The white man knows how to make everything, but he does not know how to distribute it.
There are things they tell us that sound good to hear, but when they have accomplished their purpose they will go home and will not try to fulfill our agreements with them.
They claim this mother of ours, the Earth, for their own use, and fence their neighbors away from her, and deface her with their buildings and their refuse.
This nation is like a spring freshet; it overruns its banks and destroys all who are in its path.

What treaty that the whites have kept has the red man broken? Not one.
What white man can say I never stole his land or a penny of his money? Yet they say that I am a thief.
What white man has ever seen me drunk? Who has ever come to me hungry and left me unfed? Who has seen me beat my wives or abuse my children? What law have I broken?
What white woman, however lonely, was ever captive or insulted by me? Yet they say I am a bad Indian.
When I was a boy, the Sioux owned the world. The sun rose and set on their land; they sent ten thousand men to battle. Where are the warriors today? Who slew them? Where are our lands? Who owns them?
Yet hear me, friends! we have now to deal with another people, small and feeble when our forefathers first met with them, but now great and overbearing.

Another Chief had a quote once... "When the white man came, we had the land, and he had the Bible - now we have the Bible, and he has the land"

PS "Given enough time, and a prize at the end of a sneeky campaign, Paleface will eventually speak with forked tongue"... 2020

 

[$20shoes]

There is no good or evil in Nature - We just perceive things as good or evil depending upon how they impinge on our own existence.


Dukey, that is a good point. Some bugger once said that "we can only see things through the eyes God has given us", alluding to our own limitations when in comes to the potential for divine realisation. Is it possibly our simple failure to grasp a reality beyond our own physical existence, that gives such weight to our assertions of nature and laws and and the linear traversal of time (biological advancement of man). That is, we fail to grasp how time works - at what point did the second hand start ticking at the beginning of the universe, and from whose perception did time start moving? And if we move linearly, where is the endpoint of time? Does the end of Earth mean all the universe stops moving because there is no perception of time as we define it?
We have to develop constructs that make sense to our rational mind and make sense of the infintissemally small part we play. That is, we may actually make rational constructs due to our limitations to understand as well as spiritual constructs due to our same failures.

Potentially, one could pose the question that if there is no God, why is there an incessant advancement of the human race. We all understand the biological benefits of advancing but is there a more philisophical drivinf force at play: What are we striving for? Why was there a need to grow from being a person in 900BC. Why did we just not stop here - the food was good, sex was great (so I've heard) and the climate might have been good). Is it simply an innate force to better our world, is there a yearning for something that we're not yet seeing?

 

[2020hindsight]

sorry , this is a long post - just that , if you crop the songs, then the point might be lost. (assuming there is a point ) - just two people's thoughts on death, Chief Seattle, and Billy Joel.

... my continuance after death will take a number of forms.
1. will be in the form of my body being recycled back into Nature (ie God) and recycled forever more, through the cosmos, stars etc. (of course I'm talking extreme geological time here).
2. through my genes (presuming I have kids);
3. and also through my ideas, communications and actions which propagate from person to person, both directly and indirectly (ie via the internet! etc).

1. I would agree with Chief Seattle, - I lov that concept of , "when you walk on the earth, remember that you are walking on the ashes of your ancestors"

(words and song by Judith Durham), from a television script by Ted Perry based on a short speech by Chief Seattle, 1854. http://www.judithdurham.com/
not that good a song - but sure are interesting lyrics.

you can listen to a few bars of this song on that website (click on "enter". then "lyrics" etc) - but it's not one of her best in the music dept - mainly the words. (imho)

2. Genes maybe, but in my will I want to be buried in my jeans – they’re going with me, wherever we go.

3. Your ideas live on …yep Likewise , Billy Joel seems to adhere to this philosophy mate the following is a repeat of a post on "favourite lyrics" thread...

billy joel, goodnight my angel,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nprteZX80tk&mode=related&search= YESSS!!! found it - Billy Joel sings 'The Lullaby'

I once heard him interviewed over this (THIS YOUTUBE - NB it continues past the break at the 5 minute mark ) - the child (then only 7 or so) was concerned that the parents had just divorced - so he had to reassure her.
"i promised I would never leave you"

She also wanted to know about death. He then put to the child that he would not die whilstever she remembered this song for instance , hence

"Someday your child may cry, And if you sing this lullabye
Then in your heart, There will always be a part of me

Someday we'll all be gone, But lullabyes go on and on...
They never die, That's how you
And I Will be"

Personally I love the concept.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LraZEoRnkPc&mode=related&search= the full song

GOODNIGHT MY ANGEL Billy Joel

Goodnight, my angel, Time to close your eyes
And save these questions for another day
I think I know what you've been asking me
I think you know what I've been trying to say
I promised I would never leave you
And you should always know
Wherever you may go, No matter where you are
I never will be far away

Goodnight, my angel, Now it's time to sleep
And still so many things I want to say
Remember all the songs you sang for me
When we went sailing on an emerald bay
And like a boat out on the ocean
I'm rocking you to sleep
The water's dark and deep, Inside this ancient heart
You'll always be a part of me

Lu-lu-lu-lu-lu-lu
lu-lu-lu-lu-lu-lu-lu-lu-lu

Goodnight, my angel
Now it's time to dream
And dream how wonderful your life will be
Someday your child may cry
And if you sing this lullabye
Then in your heart
There will always be a part of me

Someday we'll all be gone
But lullabyes go on and on...
They never die, That's how you, And I Will be

Here’s that Chief Seattle song – but it has been reworked a bit, rhyme, metre, all those constraints that the red indian didn’t worry about

We must teach our children, That man didn't weave life's web
For he's just one strand in it, So don't destroy the thread

We must teach our children, That the ground beneath their feet
Is the ashes of our fathers, Not something to defeat
We must teach our children, That the Earth is rich with lives
So they'll all respect their homeland, And that our Mother Earth survives
We must teach our children, That what befalls the Earth
Befalls the sons of everyone, In this land of their birth
In this land of their birth

We must teach our children, If they do harm to the land
They bring harm upon themselves, For the soil will turn to sand
We must teach our children, Earth does not belong to man
For man belongs to Earth, And that's the way this world was planned
We must teach our children, That all things do connect
And that we're one big family, All things we must protect
All things we must protect

 

[nomore4s]

A few questions I've never understood about God.(I don't believe in God)

1. Why didn't God just make a Heaven and be done with it? Instead of this elaborate "test" of faith etc - are we just an experiment? Seeing as God knows everything, God surely should have known the outcome.

2. In the scheme of the universe we are the equivalent of nothing more then the smallest bacteria on the nail of our little toe, yet we seem to be the centre of the universe as far as religion is concerned. Did God create this whole universe just for us? I find this hard to believe.

3. Why does this supreme being want us to worship him? Maybe God has an ego?

I was forced to grow up in a strict church environment and as such saw too many inconsistences in religion to believe in a God.

IMO the only reason there is a God is because mankind invented God to explain our own mortality and the many unexplainable things in our world. People need God to believe in because they need/want there to be more to life than just our current physical existance, that there must be more than just this. As long as people continue to believe in a God there will be a God.
We seem to be the only living organism on this planet who needs to have a God, yet all the others seem to exist okay without one.

 

[barney]

I cant see how evolution can be argued against.
Its happening all the time.

I'm just bouncing in between dinner and playing my wife scrabble (three nights in a row lol)

Firstly, have to say what a great debate has developed here .... well done to all contributors ...............

I don't have time to get too deep, but re your point above Tech, ........ it is commonly scientifically accepted that "evolution" is generally caused by "mutation" of the original cell structure, due to chemical or environmental
modifications ............... ie Evolution is a simply a "degredation/modification" of what was originally there in the first place !! .................. No real point I'm making other than evolution could be described as a "decreasing" phenemenom which actually lowers our "options" as a species, as opposed to how most people percieve it, thinking that it creates "more" options ............. therefore initial life form/forms would have been required to have "all" the available structures of life to allow for evolution "mutation" etc to take place .................. Hope that makes sense to somebody out there .................. Just a side issue really, but worth considering with respect to the original question ...................... Cheers ........... I will now go and find a triple letter score for my "Q" !!!!!

 

[tech/a]

Barney.

Evolution of existance not from the Big Bang (Or whatever) to where we are now.

Not just the human species.

 

[Out Too Soon]

This thread got way off track right from the beginning! The question was "Is there a GOD?" & there have been countless posts about religion following.
There are so many religions the chance of your own faith being right & the rest wrong are incredibly remote (mathematically & logically).
There is so much more than our 5 senses can sense, including other dimensions many physicists now beleive exist, If there is a "GOD" it is so far beyond our comprehension......
Closer to home nature, our mother Earth & the continuation of "being" beyond the grave?
Star Wars had it right, there is Good & Evil everywhere we look (& shades of grey), opposing force that permeates the Universe, Yin & Yang,

"May The Force Be With You"

PS: I am nominally a Buddhist because The Buddha said His Way (to enlightenment) was not the only way just the way he had found. i.e he left the door open to all faiths & beleifs. If only Mohammed & Jesus etc had been so wise.

 

[retroaugogo]

A few questions I've never understood about God.(I don't believe in God)

1. Why didn't God just make a Heaven and be done with it? Instead of this elaborate "test" of faith etc - are we just an experiment? Seeing as God knows everything, God surely should have known the outcome.

2. In the scheme of the universe we are the equivalent of nothing more then the smallest bacteria on the nail of our little toe, yet we seem to be the centre of the universe as far as religion is concerned. Did God create this whole universe just for us? I find this hard to believe.

3. Why does this supreme being want us to worship him? Maybe God has an ego?

I was forced to grow up in a strict church environment and as such saw too many inconsistences in religion to believe in a God.

IMO the only reason there is a God is because mankind invented God to explain our own mortality and the many unexplainable things in our world. People need God to believe in because they need/want there to be more to life than just our current physical existance, that there must be more than just this. As long as people continue to believe in a God there will be a God.
We seem to be the only living organism on this planet who needs to have a God, yet all the others seem to exist okay without one.

He chose to create us for His own pure enjoyment. It's no different with us - parents simply choose to have children to love them and raise them.

 

[2020hindsight]

Barney - you old devil, lol - playing scrabble with the missus, when the rest of us are sorting out the universe here lol.

OTS - when you say "May the Force be with you" is that the Police Force? or something else lol. The only force I've got going for me is... gravity?

PS here's that song I mentioned back there - I like it anyway
Mark Schultz song "Walking Her Home"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVZiWTmKNc0&mode=related&search=

 

[Dukey]

There is no good or evil in Nature - We just perceive things as good or evil depending upon how they impinge on our own existence.


Dukey, that is a good point. Some bugger once said that "we can only see things through the eyes God has given us", alluding to our own limitations when in comes to the potential for divine realisation. Is it possibly our simple failure to grasp a reality beyond our own physical existence, that gives such weight to our assertions of nature and laws and and the linear traversal of time (biological advancement of man). That is, we fail to grasp how time works - at what point did the second hand start ticking at the beginning of the universe, and from whose perception did time start moving? And if we move linearly, where is the endpoint of time? Does the end of Earth mean all the universe stops moving because there is no perception of time as we define it?
We have to develop constructs that make sense to our rational mind and make sense of the infintissemally small part we play. That is, we may actually make rational constructs due to our limitations to understand as well as spiritual constructs due to our same failures.

Potentially, one could pose the question that if there is no God, why is there an incessant advancement of the human race. We all understand the biological benefits of advancing but is there a more philisophical drivinf force at play: What are we striving for? Why was there a need to grow from being a person in 900BC. Why did we just not stop here - the food was good, sex was great (so I've heard) and the climate might have been good). Is it simply an innate force to better our world, is there a yearning for something that we're not yet seeing?

VBQ !!! Very Big Questions $20 - and by and large they are beyond me... I've always wondered why time seems to get faster as we get older. But then each new day or year is a smaller fraction of the sum of your life right?? - Maybe it's another version of relativity?

A couple of ideas recycled from others about 'advancement of mankind and purposes'.

Evolution in the broader sense of 'development based on best-fit' can be seen in many realms in addition to the biological one.
ie - think about the development of the car. From chariots, horse drawn wagons, engines and gearboxes, to on board computerized fuel injection etc. Its an evolutionary process - driven by mans desire for better/best transportation. Good design changes (adaptations) are retained, crazy ones are rejected (like the guy who strapped a jet fighter engine on his pick-up!... and killed himself - maybe an urban myth?) - but you get the idea.

I like the ideas of Robert Pirsig - who is the dude who wrote 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance', followed many years later by 'Lila'. In the latter he develops a kind evolutionary philosophy/metaphysics in which evolution acts upon a hierarchy of realms, with each successive realm taking a kind of 'moral' priority over the prior ones.
1st = physical realm. Atoms, rocks - non-living stuff.
2nd = biological realm - speaks for itself and the process is Darwinian evolution.
3rd = he proposes as 'social' realm - which is where organisms interact and form societies of various kinds.
4th = is (i think) the Intellectual realm - where we humans reside - probably alone.

So I from this model you might say that our advancement has largely been driven by 'Darwinian evolution' - the aim of which is simply to 'best-fit' the organism to it's environment. Maybe this kind of evolution dominated until the point came when we broke into the "intellectual ' realm. Then, we started using our own unique intelligence to push our 'social' and 'intellectual' evolution in different directions. (example - we humans couldn't fly but we wanted to, so collectively, we used our intelligence to 'evolve' our land based transportation - using lessons from Nature - to make them fly. Then we evolved from bi-planes to F18 jets... and bomb the crap out of each other - go figure?) This kind of evolution seems to be faster than the 'best-fit' that happens in the biological realm... and getting faster all the time!!

So I think that in effect - evolution has jumped beyond the biological and social realms to a 'the higher intellectual' realm. Maybe this happened about the time that civilizations really started booming - like around your figure of 900BC ??
But now 3000 years later - and equipped with our more evolved intelligence we can decide our own purposes or aims (as individuals and as a race).
Just what that aim or the purpose of Mankind should be I'm not sure.
Maybe the biggest question of all time - especially for those of us who don't believe in a conscious God.
'Preservation and even cultivation of life on earth and maybe even in the wider universe ' could be a possible candidate??

Phew - I've worn myself out. gotta go eat some curry.

 

[Julia]

ditto that!
If bullmarket was still around this thread would have turned to **** on the very first page
Good thread tech

I was thinking exactly that earlier today, Mint Man. Thank goodness he appears to have given up.

 

[Wysiwyg]

Barney - you old devil, lol - playing scrabble with the missus, when the rest of us are sorting out the universe here lol.

OTS - when you say "May the Force be with you" is that the Police Force? or something else lol. The only force I've got going for me is... gravity? PS here's that song I mentioned back there - I like it anyway
Mark Schultz song "Walking Her Home"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVZiWTmKNc0&mode=related&search=

That is bizarre 2020.I just spent an hour looking at the Sir Isaac Newton: The
Universal Law of Gravitation and tuned back in here at about 10.08 to see you had mentioned gravity .I have never been to the site before and that would have to be coincidental to be mentioned while I was there..

 

[2020hindsight]

That is bizarre 2020.I just spent an hour looking at the Sir Isaac Newton: The
Universal Law of Gravitation and tuned back in here at about 10.08 to see you had mentioned gravity .I have never been to the site before and that would have to be coincidental to be mentioned while I was there..

apologies in advance (this is several times more corny that Kansas in August) :-

They speak of forces, global, massive, starting with this big bang theory
then of course the planets passive, spinning round for eons weary
gravity's a certain bet, - little there to worship , ha,
- what you sense is what you get, (the one I fight's inertia )

what you worship, what you love, is yours to choose, where crossroads fork -
should you choose some god above, or simply "walk-the-conscience-walk"
what we choose to call "life's light", one day will sadly be "put out" -
through the long eternal night, I'll remain, I fear, in doubt.

My own version of all this ? "An honest man is the second noblest work of God - right behind an honest woman"
The other biggie (although I just enunciated it for the first time) is "the biggest sin is to leave the world a worse place that when you arrived " (BTW, if you hadn't already guessed, I agree with Chasers that having sex under apple trees is only a very minor sin - probably only a couple of Hail Marys and God will understand - until the next time )

 

[2020hindsight]

yet another question, closely related. Was Jesus closely related to God?

Retro introduced the topic of CS Lewis, and I just realise that he wrote 'Mere Christianity'. I read it years ago - suspect I would fault it more now than I did then ... For example the following :-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._S._Lewis Trilemma
In the book Mere Christianity, Lewis famously criticized the idea that Jesus was merely a human being, albeit a great moral teacher:

"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. [[there's that word again ]] You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronising nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to." (Lewis 1952, pp. 43)

According to the argument, most people are willing to accept Jesus Christ as a great moral teacher, but the Gospels record that Jesus made many claims to divinity, either explicitly — ("I and the father are one." John 10:30; when asked by the High priest whether he was the Son of God, Jesus replied "It is as you said" Matthew 26:64) — or implicitly, by assuming authority only God could have ("the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins" Matthew 9:6). Lewis said there are three options:

1. Jesus was telling falsehoods and knew it, and so he was a liar.
2. Jesus was telling falsehoods but believed he was telling the truth, and so he was insane.
3. Jesus was telling the truth, and so he was divine.

[[ fourth option :- 4. Jesus was being verballed - by people writing this 20 or 30 years later]]

Lewis’s argument was later expanded by the Christian apologist Josh McDowell (in his book More Than a Carpenter). (McDowell 2001) The term "trilemma" (which Lewis did not use) is often used to refer to this argument. Although widely repeated in Christian apologetic literature, it has been largely ignored by professional theologians and biblical scholars.[1]

Lewis's trilemma appeared at a time when secular scholars, such as David Friedrich Strauss, had portrayed Jesus' miracles and resurrection as myths. The concept that Jesus was not God but a wise man had gained ground in academic circles. The trilemma opposes the idea that Jesus was not divine, without relying on miracles for proof. In accepting the premise that Jesus had claimed divinity, he contradicted a viewpoint, popularized by H. G. Wells in his Outline of History, that Jesus had made no such claim.

Personally I would argue
a) does Jesus's philosophy of forgiveness work or doesn't it? (irrespective of any reference to Son of God / Divine / etc)
b) If it works, then why not try to live by it, accepting him as a moral teacher (only). And what compulsion is there to accept the (completely separate) argument that he was the Son of God.
(Notice how I was very self-controlled above, and didn't give all those other explanations ... eg "5. Jesus found out he could turn water into wine, and had just installed a new 2000 litre water tank" etc

 

[2020hindsight]

Further to previous
a) it's a shame that JC was resurrected and "beamed up" to Heaven, body and soul - if he was buried somewhere, we could do a thorough DNA on him, and get a few more clues about big daddy.

b) If God is a Sphere (as Xenaphane proposes) , then why doesn't Jesus have at least a bit of a spherical look about him - maybe a beer gut or something ?

ok ok , i realise i'll go to hell for this post - but the moving keyboard writes, and having writ moves on....

 

[Wysiwyg]

Further to previous
a) it's a shame that JC was resurrected and "beamed up" to Heaven, body and soul - if he was buried somewhere, we could do a thorough DNA on him, and get a few more clues about big daddy.

b) If God is a Sphere (as Xenaphane proposes) , then why doesn't Jesus have at least a bit of a spherical look about him - maybe a beer gut or something ?

ok ok , i realise i'll go to hell for this post - but the moving keyboard writes, and having writ moves on....

:topic 2020 .. that is humorous but expect some punishment to be handed out.Hell will be the least of your worries .

Trials
There were extensive efforts to root out the supposed influence of Satan by various measures aimed at the people who were accused of being servants of Satan. People suspected of being "possessed" by Satan were put on trial. These trials were biased against the accused. Brutal techniques were routinely used to extract the required admission of guilt. They included hot pincers, the thumbscrew, and the 'swimming' of suspects (an old superstition whereby innocence was established by immersing the accused in water for a sufficiently long period of time).

 

[$20shoes]

yet another question, closely related. Was Jesus closely related to God?

... eg "5. Jesus found out he could turn water into wine, and had just installed a new 2000 litre water tank" etc

With our glut of wine, I wish he would com back and turn wine into water.

Seriously though, the concept of Jesus as God is not unfathomable. If you use my arguments that we are a manifestation of God loving God, then there is potentiality for the spirit to be completely (consciously and subconsciously) aware its true self. How is gets to this point I do not know - is there any intervention involved? When you realise yourself, you can't help but walk around saying "God's da Bomb, MAN" (from the lost Gospel of $20Shoes) (Oh yeah, speaking of Bombs, you should do your own research on a newly listed - BOM. Has promise).

We can also use a positive construct - we can only know what life if like without a divine figure if we have had a divine figure.

I don't want to enter into how religion has taken the story of Jesus and tinkered with it. There are some things I accept and others that I need to question.

My main point, and that of Donald Walsch, is that you may actually somehow be God trying to experience God. The notion, which might be too convenient for some, is that a punishing God, or hell, disappears.
SATAN BE GONE. I'm not sure where this leaves Satanists?? Perhaps they could put on a show for us at you local thatre-restaurant.

 

[2020hindsight]

SATAN BE GONE. I'm not sure where this leaves Satanists?? Perhaps they could put on a show for us at you local thatre-restaurant.

I liked Unc Festive's one about the dyslexic santa worshippers
DNA = national dyslexic association.

PS did they have paternity tests in those days ?
when JC said "I am the son of God" was this just speaking relatively, or was it a relative speaking ?
wysiwyg, thanks for those comforting comments about thumbscrews etc.
(you know the one about the big bolt of lightning comes down and hits the priest and the blasphemer playing golf - and the big voice booms out "JESUS I Missed."

 

[The Mint Man]

2. In the scheme of the universe we are the equivalent of nothing more then the smallest bacteria on the nail of our little toe,

So what does that make the bacteria... and the backteria on his toe? I think I might start another thread, 'What came first, the chicken or the egg?'

I was forced to grow up in a strict church environment and as such saw too many inconsistences in religion to believe in a God..

Ive heared that sooo many times before, good on you for having your own brain and/or saying what you really think. I have seen familys that just wont allow other family members believe in anything other then 'their god', beliefs or religion.