Why are Christians scared to die?

[Homeless Nutter]

How can you claim that deep down in my subconscience I "know my beliefs are all BS?" 
[...]

Because actions speak louder than words. Your beliefs are simply something you've been taught. Your actions betray your real nature. Which is why people, who claim to believe in afterlife - still sin. If someone can't stop themselves from dumb little pleasures, like gluttony, or masturbation, which put salvation at risk - THEY DO NOT BELIEVE. They're just faking it.

I believe in gravity. I have never tried walking off of a roof, because I "had doubts" about gravity, or "was tempted" to fly. I'm not retarded. And I'm supposed to believe, that other people would risk fate infinitely worse than death - Hell - just for a quick hand-job from some skank in the Safeway parking lot, or some such "forbidden" nonsense? BS. You can lie to yourself, if you want - I'm not buying it.

Also - are you poor? No? Then no - you DON'T believe in what Jesus said, about the rich people and heaven.

[Catholic_Lady]

Instinct and beliefs are 2 separate things. We are still human beings and we are still of this world, so we have instincts and natural tendencies. Faith is the calling to raise above that.

I may have the instinct to punch someone in the face if they mistreat someone I love or something, but my beliefs say that doing so is wrong. The fact that I still have the urge to do it even though I don't, doesn't mean that "deep down I think it's actually ok."

[drfuzzy]

Some of you people are funny. You can't fathom anyone coming to a different conclusion/belief as yourself, so you assume they must be insane, or delusional, or that they "deep down know their beliefs are BS."

Sheesh.

We all do that, don't we, CL?  Most of us are convinced that we're right, and the other side is wrong.  We hear it from preachers here quite often - - many have outright said that we KNOW god exists, but we just hate him.  
    Seems to be a human trait that we all need to get rid of.  (bad grammar, sorry.)     

[Catholic_Lady]

Yes, obviously I believe Muslims are wrong, and Hindus are wrong, and Buddhists, and atheists, etc etc etc....

But it never crosses my mind that all these people who don't agree with my Christian faith are all insane, delusional, or deep down don't actually believe what they say they believe.

[drfuzzy]

Ah yes.  Insane takes it quite a bit too far, particularly when we're talking about a belief that was probably ingrained through parents and culture before the person even started school.  Yes.  And I have used the term delusional when I should not have done so.  Hmm.    

Of course, there HAVE been a couple of real wack-jobs show up here too.  

[Homeless Nutter]

Instinct and beliefs are 2 separate things. [...]

No, not really. Those are just labels we put on things we think and do. They're largely arbitrary and very intertwined, especially on subconscious level. Some of your beliefs - including many religious ones - are just your instincts, that you accepted and aggrandized. Not to mention, that you use instinct and intuition, in order to cherry-pick through all the horrible stuff in the bible and choose the more agreeable bits to believe in.

For example - you instinctively know, that smart people, who do science are more likely to understand biology, history and such, than - say - a bunch of savages in the desert 3000 years ago. So - all of a sudden - Genesis is allegorical, you don't believe in its literal interpretation and you do accept evolution. But you also have an instinct to accept beliefs of your parents and other people in your community - and so you believe in all the catholic stuff...

[robvalue]

Instincts are still us. They are a part of us, and they feed off our beliefs. It's just we may not consciously be aware of the full extent of our beliefs. Our conscious mind is only a very small part of our overall mental makeup. Instincts wouldn't be any use if they didn't factor in our beliefs about how gravity and physics in general work, and so on. And if we feel like doing something in the heat of the moment, then we believe on some level it's an appropriate action. Just not necessarily consciously so. Our instincts don't have the time to lay out rational arguments, and in some ways they show us what we're really like when we don't have time to rationalize or weigh things up. I'm more and more of the opinion that the conscious mind is something of an illusion, a slave to the subconscious. It's the mind telling itself stories.

Personally, I think my instincts work in parallel with my conscious beliefs, they are just more knee-jerk. If I have any sort of contradiction, I'm unaware of it and I'd be interested if anyone pointed it out to me. Generally if I feel the urge to punch someone, it's someone I still believe deserves to be punched even after I've calmed down. It's just that with a cool head I wouldn't dish out just what people deserve.

[Angrboda]

When I was still psychotic, I believed that my death would free me to return to the home dimension which I had left some time ago. I viewed this as an extremely good thing. Thus I was chronically suicidal for 12 years, during which time I made three attempts on my life. When people ask me how I lost my fingers, I tell them of how I went outside in 20 F below weather and took a bunch of sleeping pills. The most common reaction is that I must have been really depressed. But I wasn't. I tried to kill myself to return to my home dimension. I believed that by dying I would be freeing myself. So yes, if you truly believe, the question as to what's stopping you is a very real one. Yes, instinct will pull us away from trying to harm ourselves. But if you truly believe, then why do you not at the very least 'want' to die? Why do you not want to die like I did?

[scoobysnack]

When I was still psychotic, I believed that my death would free me to return to the home dimension which I had left some time ago.  I viewed this as an extremely good thing.  Thus I was chronically suicidal for 12 years, during which time I made three attempts on my life.  When people ask me how I lost my fingers, I tell them of how I went outside in 20 F below weather and took a bunch of sleeping pills.  The most common reaction is that I must have been really depressed.  But I wasn't.  I tried to kill myself to return to my home dimension.  I believed that by dying I would be freeing myself.  So yes, if you truly believe, the question as to what's stopping you is a very real one.  Yes, instinct will pull us away from trying to harm ourselves.  But if you truly believe, then why do you not at the very least 'want' to die?  Why do you not want to die like I did?

Thanks for sharing your story, and I'm glad you are still here to interact with. I've been there myself, and also glad I'm still here. There is so much to experience in life. When I was younger I had basically planned to be dead by 21, but decided it wasn't the best solution, so here I am at 34 and still kind of surprised to exist.

[ignoramus]

Matey, if God brings you peace, then your belief has paid off.
We'll all be dead a very long time!
Enjoy the very brief moment here while you can...

PS, you don't logically need to justify any of your beliefs to us. Just to yourself.
Catch...