Quote: Hello Jacob,I was wondering if you would consider posting something biographical. Your perspective seems extremely rare so I'm wondering about the circumstances which brought that about.Also, are you close to admitting to atheism? Frankly, I hope not. Not that you wouldn't make a good one. You would. But the other side just needs you more.I'd be interested to learn what sort of satisfaction you derive from your faith, assuming it isn't just a cross you bear. Do you attend a church or is your Christianity a private affair?
I wouldn't generally but since somebody asked and since there is a corresponding thread for reasons to be atheist.
I was raised in an anglican household, where faith was something we did on sunday morning between 945 and 1030. As a teenager I was therefore what you might call a social christian. Went to university and while there got into a modest amount of trouble with alcahol and other recreational substances, to the point where I was using them because I needed to rather than because I wanted too. I would not be able to get up and go into clinic without a couple of shots of rum and some pain killers inside me. I was also very out of place at uni, I didn't really like most of the people there and hated going out (but did so because I was young and stupid and trying to conform). Also got quite involved in self harming, which is very easy to do when you have a ready supply of scalpels and sutures. I practiced closing wounds on myself.
Scraped through the course and graduated in a haze. Started work but was still lacking in either boundries or self control. In this state I had my religious experiance and was born again in the classical evangelical sense. I won't bore you with the details.
My life, at that point, improved rather dramatically. I dried out, stopped staying up for 36 hours at a time, started to enjoy life. Got married to somebody I had known from before university, had a career, 2 kids etc.
During this time my religious beliefs moderated from what you would think of as fundamentalism to a more liberal sort of faith. I was exposed to the writings of an American ex Baptist minister by the name of tony campolo, who has written lots of books on the subject of liberal christianity, and the concept of red letter christianity, that being that the words of Jesus in the bible are more important than the rest. I somewhat extended beyond that and now consider the rest of the bible, especially the OT to be very errant. The inerrancy of scripture being one of the things that i discarded by the wayside. However the Sermon on the mount
My view at the moment is that I see the bible as much like a self help book. I read it, the bits which resonate I think "gosh yes, that seems right" and the bits that don't I put down to a bad day on the part of the author. I see the bible as special, probably because that was the context of a very useful and positive religious experience, but not infallible.
Intellectually, I admire atheism and I suffer a good deal of dissonance because a big chunk of me, the scientific and analytical bit, has a sneaking suspicion that its actually correct. This is cemented by having done a diploma in hypnotherapy and being able to recreate religious type experiences in others, on demand. However my right brain, the sloshy and emotional bit is still nausatingly in love with the concept of an all knowing and all loving force, loosely defined as "love". In many ways I would like to be an atheist, but to do so would mean giving up my comfort blanket / crack pipe / happy-moist-joy feelings on tap. So no, I'm nowhere near to atheism.
Having said that, I am acutely aware that my experience is absolutely no proof of the reality of anything I choose to believe in. As such I'm a rubbish evangelist, as the best I can ever do is "it worked really well for me, give it a go". Which is much the same line drug dealers use and for much the same reasons. I try to deal with the dissonance the same way I deal with the things in medicine I don't understand. Some things seem to work in defiance of the fact that I / We don't understand them. I don't stop using them just because I don't know how they work, and I don't try to force the facts to conform to my model of how they work. But I'm happy to use and to recommend them BECAUSE they seem to work.
So there you go. For what it's worth and on the off chance anyone is interested. It's not a unique story, nor an especially interesting one.
Any questions? Anyone else want to say why they are Christian?
"Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken."
Sith code
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken."
Sith code
