When did you accept God in your life, or realize you did not believe in him?

well, i've always been skeptical of religion (or at least the other-wordly aspects of it). the more i learned that the physical world fit together so well, the more i realized it didn't need the supernatural to make it work.

and the church does have a pretty poor history when it comes to accepting science. i think after a few "heretics! oh wait... um... our bad" you start to get the idea that maybe they just aren't very good evaluators of the truth.

 

That's good.. im' sorta the same way.

 

To make it work, no. But how about to set it up?

Agreed. But there are churches out there who think science and God go together like hand in glove. There's a pretty good site -- Reasons to Believe -- that is an example of this relatively new marriage between science and faith. The astrophysics alone is staggering.

 

What I didn't say there (but I'll say now), that after 8 - 10 years of research and debate, I have yet to see anything that blows a hole in Christian doctrine.

 

maybe. but then, why accept one form of other-worldliness over another? if i'm to turn by back on all my experience in the physical world to accept something that is beyond my ability to really conceive, then it seems that all such inconceivable options are equally appealing. christianity would simply be the option of convenience. unless something in me stirs to accept it, which it hasn't.

i think astrophysics might look like the work of a supreme being because out understanding of it is still pretty rudimentary (in the scheme of things) and, in truth, we're talking about the universe here. astrophysics must, by its very nature deal with questions of origin and extents. it attempts to deal with such insanely vast numbers and concepts that it's no wonder a brain that evolved to deal with life on earth would have a hard time grasping it.

but i'll check out that site...

 

Who said anything about 'turning your back on your experience in the physical world'? I'm finding that Biblical Christianity and modern science fit together very well. A few perception changes may be needed (and I'm talking about how literally to interpret the Bible and how reliable things like carbon dating are), but generally speaking, neither forces you to pick one over the other.

Cool.

It's not just about being overwhelmed, though. The greatest evidence for Intelligent Design I'm seeing is not the unknown, but the intricacy and complexity of the known. And just as compelling is the 'small scale' evidence of biophysics on the cellular and even atomic levels.

 

what i meant by "turning you back" was ignoring the empirical evidence you can touch and adding a ethereal aspect that is beyond physical reckoning just to see how that fits your personal vibe. my personal vibe is fine without adding backstory that is beyond this world.

put it this way. the supernatural to me is like saying there's a space ship floating above los angeles that's been there for 1 million years watching us. only, we can't see it or hear it or observe its presence in any measurable way. plus, it's essentially inert, tho it's possible it affects us without us knowing. when you die, you can see it and can even tour it, but of course, you then become immeasurable yourself.

there's something very placebo about the whole thing.

ehh.... i looked around a bit. lots of intelligent design which seems to upset the right as much as the left. normally, i'd take that as a bona fide, but in this case, i think it's just looking at where we are and trying to fit the square peg of religion in to the round hole of science.

you'd be surprised at just how complex we can make something when we view it holistically. have you heard of the game "life" on the computer? it illustrates the concept of emergent complexity where simple basic rules iterated a bunch of times looks like an amazingly complex system.

http://www.math.com/students/wonders/life/life.html

there's a java applet, but it seems like the loadable patterns (the ones that are truly interesting) don't seem to work. maybe it will for you.

there's an experiment in swarm intelligence where simple rules in simple actors can sort gravel into piles by color once the process is iterated and many actors are put to the task.

now, i suppose you could say that god created those base atoms and those universal forces, but i'm not sure why you'd need to.

 

What if it was true that god did create those base atoms and universal forces? Wouldn't you feel the need to at least give him the credit for that?

 

My discovery of the book Lucifer Rising: Sin, Devil Worship and Rock & Roll was my first clue that I was on the wrong path in life. From my Baptist background I'd drifted into the "nondenominational Christian" category, whatever that really is. True to my lifelong attraction to the strange and unknown, I'd also read on mystical and unorthodox subjects as well, "just for intellectual knowledge."

Lucifer Rising is a comprehensive history and rundown of Satanic philosophy, culture, music, and literature from ancient times to today. I bought it because I'd always been a Christian apologist and wanted to "know the enemy" for purposes of evangelism. But this book turned out to be a Who's Who and What's What of everything I was really into. My favorite authors, my favorite musicians, my biggest historical interests, and many names I had heard of in other works but had never connected before.

Later, having already read what amounted to the Cliff's Notes version of The Satanic Bible, I finally read the real thing. It was like reading all the little things I'd never been able to say to myself. Between that and Lucifer Rising, I had to ask myself: "If I'm a Christian, why is everything I'm into... everything I'm about... everything I associate with the real, inner me... in a book on Satanism? Could it be this is what I've been all along? Doesn't that make more sense that going to such ridiculous lengths and pain to try and make Christianity fit?"

So I went with it. I didn't join any groups, and there are no silly "blood oaths" in Satanism... all you have to do is start living like a Satanist. It was easy. I created my ECILAM online persona with which to put out my erotic cartoons, and stopped feeling guilty about it. I started getting serious about my writing. I stopped beating myself up about stupid shit. I stopped making women and romance the most important thing in my life, and my love-life immediately went through the roof.

Life in general became ten times better than ever before. I stopped being depressed all the time. I knew I was on the right track. But some things were missing. Satanism had done its job of purging the guilt and weakness of monotheism out of my system, but on its own it was a sort of shallow replacement for my deeply spiritual nature. Besides that, I soon learned I wasn't very interested in "blaspheming" Christianity or trying to "destroy" it. It just no longer pertained to me. But soon I discovered the link between Satanism and the authentic religion of my pre-Christian ancestors... Asatru.

The book Lords of Chaos: The Bloody Rise of the Satanic Metal Underground covered information on some more of my favorite heavy metal musicians, and the culture from which they came. I knew that many of these guys held loyalty to their "Old Gods," but didn't know much else about it. But the more I learned, the wider my eyes became.

I knew of the Teutonic-Germanic Gods from storybooks as a child, but on re-learning of their traits, values, and the legacy of the people who worshipped them... I was immediately drawn to the Allfather Odin. Odin is chief among the Teutonic Gods, but is primarily concerned with wisdom, knowledge, warfare, writing, inspiration, magic, and death... all my interests and passions. Everything about this diety resonated with me on a personal level. It was too "spooky" to be coincidence. I had to learn more.

And this learning is continuing even now. The Odinist, or Odian path, as I'm practicing now, is not as concerned with inner cosmology (are the Gods literal, where do we go when we die) as with daily values and how I will apply the Nine Noble Virtues into my life here in Midgard, the everyday world. I'm just starting off, relatively speaking, but I know that it's a great fit. It's natural and right, because I'm reconnecting with the spiritual legacy of my Northern European ancestors.