Are you an ex Christian?

Yes, eloethan. Well said. To persist in obtusely thinking otherwise is just determined obstinacy, or else a strange and sad lack of understanding of what has been said by several posters on this thread who have made themselves perfectly clear to anyone willing to actually listen.

My understanding is that Jesus thought a lot of religious, political, financial and cultural practices (which were and (I believe) remain intertwined) were "garbage". Isn't that why he turned over the money lenders' tables in the temple, why he said "he who is without sin cast the first stone", why he said that a rich man could not enter the kingdom of heaven, etc., etc. Isn't it likely that he would find the same hypocritical and self-serving behaviour in our current-day religions and would be opposing them as loudly as he did then?

I am an agnostic, but, as I did this morning, I turn out to some local services to help with the musical element. Everyone there knows that I do not take part in the other aspects of the services and have no problem whatsoever with it. But the most interesting thing this morning was that there was a discussion about saints and we were invited to think about anyone whom we regarded as having saintly qualities. I have 3 wonderful children whom I love equally and always have; but I quoted one of my children because she has an exceptional spark within her - her sole aim in life is to make those around her happy, family, friends and those whom she does not know. She is not religious and she has no faith of any kind. But she is the epitome of kindness. She cares for all her neighbours in the widest sense; she and her OH work very hard indeed and make a lot of money and they have given away thousands of pounds to people in need; they have invested in property for their pensions and one of their tenants was in difficulty and they did not charge rent for 6 months while he sorted himself out. This is what I value; not religious observance, not the petty rules that many religions have accrued. I share the view that these accretions are ridiculous (?garbage) and detract from the essence of the message of most religions: love one another.

Because I think they are ridiculous, does this mean that I also think those who keep these observances are ridiculous? - no; misguided in my view, but definitely not ridiculous, as long as those observances serve to help them to keep to the important message. Sadly these observances so often become an end in themselves and lead to a warping of the basic tenet of loving kindness, with the result that their religion is twisted in evil directions.

Some folks say, how can you love anyone if you don’t love yourself. I say, whether you believe in God or not, how can you have faith in anything if you don’t have faith in yourself.

It all begins with you and me like the songs says. Love can build a bridge. God or no God, faith can move mountains.

Born a protestant, no choice. Non-denominational these days. More a spiritual person that a religious person.

When I look back at history, and the fight Christians put up for their beliefs, I feel a bit guilty saying I’m not a Christian.

Well, half of Christ's answer to the "What is the most important commandment?" question was a version of "Be nice to each other" wasn't it?

The other half was "Love God".

Which God? Anyone who doesn't think there is a god (or not the kind of God that is defined in either part of the Bible or in the Koran) is not to be blamed for concentrating on the "Be nice to each other" half, are they? That is not cancelled by their doubts.

No need to feel threatened or insulted by that.

And some is commonsense concreted by time into divine command.

Elegran, deviating from the post by Wilma does not change what was said

'I still think the idea of the world would be a better place if we were all nice to each other, the rest is garbage'o

You Elegran have put in much effort to change this with posts on authodox Jews not switching on lights on their Sabath, FGM and a book about seagulls , does not change the first post, which reading again I find amusing, to claim the world would be a better place etc followed by a nasty comment on garbage and so causing hurt

"I will defend a persons right to practise their faith and to have faith"

So will I, Annie but I am not going to lie and say that I agree that everything that they think is to do with their faith is an integral part of it and must be respected blindly. Some of it is there because of human pride, greed, power-seeking, selfishness and sheer mistaken interpretation.

Hmm not sure about the slaves hoping for a better life on the other shore. If the church hadn't condoned and financed slavery they wouldn't have been oppressed in the first place.

annie When will you understand that NO-ONE is calling anyone "garbage" ? They are saying that the random additions that have attached themselves to the basic message of Christianity are not important. NOT that the pople who "take them as gospel" are unimportant. Not that all religion is "garbage"

Do you believe that EVERYTHING done or taught in the name of religion is sacred? Whatever it is and whoever and whenever it started? Even causing pain and anguish to innocent children?

The word to note here is "in the name of" religion, because some of it has/had no connection to God - to any God whatsoever.

I do not condemn or scoff at anyone for what they choose to eat or why, but can say wothout blame that I do not believe that God gives two hoots whether anyone eats this or that. In the case of Jews not eating pork or shellfish for instance, at the time that became the rule they were living in a hot climate at a time without refrigeration or running water, shellfish is lethal of it goes off and pigs were known to eat all kinds of refuse, including human faeces. Not eating these things was a sensible custom. Some leader must have seen the link between these foods and diseases, and banned them. That ban went into the list of what people should not do, ranging from murder to wearing clothes made of two different fibres.

On the other hand, I believe he gives thousands of hoots about mutilating children so as to be quite certain that they will not transgress one of the rules that their community believes was set by him.

Elegran, you are now including FGM with not switching on a light on the Sabbeth or saying Hail Mary. I really found your list unkind.

I do not believe Christ would have dismissed anyone as garbage

I have never defended the wrongs done by Christians and there are many but I will defend a persons right to practise their faith and to have faith

What is so hurtful is thinking of Christians in the Middle East who are being murdered , slaves who only hope of freedom was being welcomed on the other shore , to dismiss all this are garbage

I have just read an interesting book, Annie, called "Jonathan Livingston Seagull: A story" by Richard Bach (Author), Russell Munson (Photographer) It is on Kindle, and I think you have one. I believe you would like it.

Of course, you may think it is blasphemous of me to see it as a parable about religion, but that is how it struck me.

The hero is a seagull who sees that there is more than just the round of chasing fishing-boats for scraps that his fellows spend their lives doing, and longs to fly - to ^really" fly, not just to get around in the air. With much persistence, hard work and practice, and many failures, he does just that. The account of his learning, and the photographs that go with it, is inspiring. Slowly he teaches some others to do the same, until he is an acknowledged guru and leader. Then he vanishes, but his work of teaching the marvels of advanced flight is continued by others, for generations.

But his message somehow changes. He is revered so much that myths arise, and the gulls become obsessed with silly details, like exactly how they should be commemorating him on the anniversary of his departure, what were his exact words about a certain maneouvre, the size of the stones that they drop onto the cairns of his followers whenever they fly over them (many just avoid the cairns so as not to get it wrong)

" The classes changed, with years, from wide soaring poems in flight to hushed talk about Jonathon before and after practice; to long recitations on the sand about the Divine One, with no flying ever done by anybody" The kind of thing that Jonathon Seagull would have been sad at, and labelled garbage, with no connection to flying.

Christ would have been very depressed too at the kind of things that obsess some SOME PEOPLE do in his name, and I suspect he might even have used the term "garbage". Female Genital Mutilation to make sure that their daughters do not transgress and have sex. Self-flagellation as punishment for imagined sins.

Many many more. No connection whatsoever with the original flight of the spirit. These are the garbage, not the faiths or the people, but the rubbish that has been added over centuries by those who couldn't understand the message.

Just so Iam, and these criticisms from some who defend the practices carried out in Buck House !

doubt existence of God I don't think it makes any difference to most people. If he's there that's fine if not I don't really care, but a lot of people do, why. I worry about the main things in life, family.

Anniebach You certainly know how to fight the good fight.

Sorry but how do you separate a person from their actions? Perhaps you should read her post listing sacred cows, not switching on a light on a Jewish Sabbeth, followed by her second post claiming she cooks kosher

Why nit pick ? Does me going to confession affect your life? Does me taking the blessed sacrament cause you problems? No.

What's wrong with saying - I don't believe in God? - Nothing

What's wrong with saying - it's garbage? - it's an insult at best, hurtful at worse

Where has elegran mocked those who would never eat cow? I don't even need to look at her posts to know that she hasn't. She may have mocked the custom and other similar religiously invented and observed food rules. She will not have mocked the people who abide by such customs.

I am surprised at your apparent reluctance (determination, even) not to see the difference I and others have outlined on these matters. It does not fit with your usual clarity of mind.

I am not prickly Elegran, I asked a simple question, what difference only eating kosher food to not eating cow or not switching on a light? You listed these

We must agree to differ, Anniebach. Your prickly outside is so keen to defend your inside that it sees insults where none exist, so this conversation will get nowhere.

Elegan, why the need to bring up the way an authodox Jew observes their Sabath or The Hail Mary being used in penance etc, you did mock these . Do they affect your life? Do they cause harm to anyone? If you had condemned the murder of people working in an abortion clinic I would agree with you, not switching on a light was so petty and to me you were scoffing at people who keep to a commandment

Why cook kosher food yet mock those who would never eat cow ?

Annie I have never ever scoffed at anyone for their faith, or at the faith that they believe in. I have never scoffed at my beloved daughter-in-law or complained when she cannot travel to any family gatherings on a Saturday because to do so would mean utilising the spark in the car engine, I just time those gatherings for a Sunday, when everyone can be here, and I cook food for her which is kosher.

I have never scoffed at you either. I admire your many virtues and I respect your beliefs, so don't accuse me of arrogance toward you or of thinking myself better than you.

If you had read my post with your eyes open, you would have seen that I differentiate between the teachings of Christ and the teachings of the church leaders who in the following centuries added all kinds of rules and regulations of their own, mostly so as to exercise political or social control over their congregations. I would also differentiate between the original teachings of Mohammed and the hatred of infidels that characterises Islam today.

Also some of the "added beliefs" are superstitions going back way before Christ. Whether a body is cremated or buried is one, and the belief that the body must have been whole for the soul to be accepted into heaven is another - the Egyptians when mummifying their dead used to add false bits for any missing parts to make them complete.

Where or when did Christ say that you must have all your parts or you would be locked out? Now THAT is garbage. I am not putting blame on an ordinary person who has been taught that, I put it squarely onto the leaders and teachers who taught it when they only need to think a bit to see how it doesn't fit.

Ruby, anger is usual with grief , it passes my love . There is room in our lives for ?friends and God. I have found when I have suffered a bereavement someone new has come into my life , I don't mean to replace the one who has died, but a new friend or friends

Lucky, I have never mocked anyones ' faith or non faith , I have never expected anyone to share my faith .

I respect those who say there is no God, but to say people's faith is garbage was uncalled for

What if I said to you - your attempts to care for others when you have no faith is garbage? That would be so not true and it would be cruel.

How many Christians who are going through realy dark times did or could have read Wilmas post ?

Have faith in the good people around you ruby.

"I was aware of his love which was far too strong to dismiss" - Annie - I am sure that you an understand that this is your experience, and for those who have not had this then your logic is bound to make little sense. That does not mean that they feel their desire to mock you - your experience is your experience, just like those of others who have no reason to feel as you do. I am glad that you have a strong sense of being loved by a supernatural being - I am sure it has been a great help to you during your challenging life.

For the rest of us, our role is to care for those around us to the best of our ability and to make that caring and kindness our goal.

I'm in a strange place at the moment with this one. I have been a believer all my life but after this year with my dad dying and a good, honest, kind friend dying too, my belief has been shaken.

But then I do think I am in the anger stage of my grief with my dad at the moment too, which I am finding hard. It's not nice to feel angry towards someone who is no longer here but some of the things he did when I was younger are coming into my head and the rose coloured glasses of the last few years have slipped slightly, leading to me feeling angry and frustrated. Frustrated because even in his last few years I wouldn't have been able to ask him why he did what he did when I was younger, as the dementia had already taken those memories away, or he had chosen to forget certain things. I did ask him some things but he couldn't remember. So I feel I will never have the answers to my needing to know.

My ex husband hit me, in the early years of our marriage and I went back home to mum and dad to stay for the time being. Both parents had a conversation upstairs which I heard saying that I couldn't stay there. Neither of them went to see ex husband to give him a roasting. But then they had lived their married life taking chunks out of each other so I suppose they would have been hypocrites to have done so. It didn't help me though and I felt totally unloved. I went back to him as I felt I didn't have a choice.

So in a lot of conflict at the moment. I am invited later today, to a memorial service from the church who did my dad's funeral. But I don't think that I can go and listen to it all today. Plus I don't want to be around others who have lost people too. Not just now.

I sometimes wish I could turn my mind off for a bit, like my mobile or the tele and have a break from my thoughts.

I've made a new friend of a neighbour, a lovely lady, and I have said I will drop in for a cup of tea sometime, so I might do that later after I've had some sleep.

Take care everyone. X

As we meet different people than hardly surprising. Elegan most certainly put herself forward as superior to Jews, Hindud, Christians , Muslims , by scoffing at what to them are part of their faith. That authodox Jews have followed the teaching of their faith by not switching on a light on their Sabath is no different to those who practice the other nine commandments . I do not know one Catholic who pray the Hail Mary as penitence do so because they believe it finds favour with God, it is an act of penitence .

I respect atheists who have the grace to just say - I don't believe in God , those who dismiss it as garbage lack grace or respect for people's feelings as do those who defend them