Most personally convincing reasons you don't believe.

[emjay]

Trying to get back into the thread now, I agree with that but you come from a very different perspective... well almost very different. I'm like you are for every other religion other than Christianity... can just dismiss it out of hand as a bunch of silly, made-up characters... but since I have a background in Christianity I can't do that here so much, though I wish I could, believe me. If I hadn't grown up with it I'm pretty sure I'd see it just as you do, and just as I do about other religions, but as it stands it's too deeply entrenched to be able to treat it like that, and needs something more. Tbh I think it probably needs a psychological intervention - somehow - to defeat rather than reason alone. The question of how to unlearn something... the brain moves forward so (imo) when you forget something, you only forget how to trigger it, not the actual thing... so it's still laying there dormant even if you no longer think about it.

I totally understand that. I was lucky to not get programmed into a religion, but I did get programmed in other ways that still affect me today. Even though I know those thoughts I have are irrational and unfounded, I can't simply dismiss them. It takes regular challenging of those thoughts. I find writing it down helps a lot, and then writing what the evidence is for and against that thought. It's when it's bouncing around in my head unchallenged that it gains the most momentum.

Maybe some sort of cognitive behaviour therapy would help with thoughts that are still troubling you, it did wonders for me.

Cool, thanks for the advice Rob   Do you find it sticks... emotionally I mean... when you do the pros and cons? Cos I think you've gotta fight emotion with emotion in this sort of thing. I found out relatively recently, just by accident really, that it was possible to turn a intellectual argument into an emotional one because on their own they don't have much emotional pull. What I did was, for want of a better word, meditated on different aspects of these ideas by just keeping them in my mind and imagining them repeatedly but very loosely... just essentially glancing at these small ideas every now and then seemed to build them up into strong emotional beliefs.