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As of late, I've been doing a lot of thinking, especially in regards to christianity and whether I should go back. I've talked to a couple people about this, and so far the answers seem to be along the lines of "awesome" or something of that nature. And, I suppose from their perspective it is, especially since I've really only talked to christians about it; then again, I really only know christians who I would feel comfortable enough asking for advice on an issue such as this. I guess, this is where I am supposed to say that I am in need of advice; I mean, I'm not quite sure what I should do here.

I suppose I shall start at the beginning, that is how I came to be so inspired. The first seed of inspiration came from reading an article while I was in the bathroom, of all places. The article was on the Opus Dei, and how it is different than the Opus Dei considered in Dan Brown's novel, The Da Vinci Code. This seed was hardly more than enough to get me to think 'hey, maybe I should go back.' Once I put the article down, and washed my hands, I had pretty much forgot about it. Then about a week later, I saw the movie The Da Vinci Code; this movie gave me two inspirations, the first one was, 'hey, I should read that book', the second came later that night as I was falling asleep, it was pretty much the same as my very first seed, that 'hey, I should give christianity another try.' This time, it was enough to get me to talk to one of my friends about it, whom I haven't talked to in almost a year. His advice to me was something like 'why not, I mean, really, it wouldn't hurt.'

At this point, I had seriously thought about it for a day or so. After this period, I again, forgot about it; at least, consciously. However, it wasn't till earlier today... maybe by the time this is posted yesterday, that I was the most inspired. It wasnt until I had spent the weekend with Gavilan and gone to one of his church services, that I was most inspired. Now, I'll be honest, I didn't much care for the service, I thought it was a bit outlandish; but then again, what is someone who was born and raised catholic going to think about a born-again christian service?

So, here I am. I am at the point now, where I want to take this consideration further, but, I don't know how to; or maybe, I'm not sure I really want to. I mean, I am pretty content being a deist and all; but, it still feels like something is missing. That there is something greater out there. I've also got many, many questions that I need to answer, as well as general points that I need to work on before I can make any real progress.

In general, my biggest fallback point is this, and I shall summarize to the best of my ability: It seems to me that I follow a fairly christian ethical code, however I do so without the religion, and being the pragmatist that I am, I find that if I dont need the religion to follow the ethical code, I see no reason to follow the religion itself. That is to say that since I see no real value in my holding of the religion to be true, I see no reason to do so. I say this because, as I have just stated, I hold a rather christian ethical code (albeit, mine may be more along the lines of a more 'liberal christian'), and I have been able to do so without the relying on the religion. So, it would seem to me, that I have no use of the religion, since I find that religion exists to help one live a certain way of life, to be a better person, if you will. My other fallback point is that, over the past couple years, I have become very self-sufficient spiritually. Meaning that, over the past couple years, I have not used spirituality to help me through the times that had passed. What is unfortunate about this is that these past couple years have been really tough to get through for me, especially my parents divorce. And through this time, I had no spirituality to help me; further, this time had had the effect of solidyfing my non-need of spirituality. I think my final, largest, fallback point is that, I have come to the realization that, when I was younger, at a time when I was a very devout Catholic, I had been slowly turning into one of those extremist types. That is, I now notice that I was slowly becoming what I would soon come to hate. At first, the extremist types were enough to push me away from christianity, but, now that I notice I was becoming what I hate, it was my fear of becoming one of 'them' that kept me away.

Now, for the questions, or rather, the points that I must find some sort of answer for, for some reason or another. I suppose the best place to start here is with the general, why I want to believe. Now, the answer to this is, I want to believe because I truly believe; I know that, at this moment, I cannot be more specific than that, though, I'm not sure I need to be either. I can also say that at the moment, it would seem that I am wanting to use this belief as a tool to get me out of hell, and this is not what I want. I dont want my belief to be a tool to get me out of something, or into another thing - I suppose what I am saying here is that I want my belief to be pure. Another thing is, I am completely unsure what I believe to be the case with the whole issue of free will; at one time I had believed in free will to the point of radical freedom, and at yet another, I had believed in determinism. The former being that anything one does is a choice made by said individual - e.g. deafness is a choice, greatness is a choice, etc., the latter being that ones actions are not chosen by the individual, they are merely reactions to the environment around the individual. Right now, I am at a point where I can work under both assumptions, that I is, under certain pressupositions, I can use a system of determinism to justify a great deal, and other certain other pressupositions, I can use free will to justify a great deal (damn you philosophy). Another question I have is, in general the whole literalness of the bible. At current, I feel that I am rather agnostic on the whole issue. I cannot quite seem to find a ground I want to stand on. I can say that, 'hey, its wonderful that Jesus existed, and was this awesome prophet' and on the other hand, I can also say 'well, it's awesome that so many people can use this fictitious story to help become a better person.' I know there are more, and they shall probably surface with the more advice I get, but for now, these are it for the moment...

Sorry about grammar mistakes... and about length.

If you quote the whole post, I'll probably die inside.

Yeah, I suppose.


Thanks.

But, realize, my logicalness is also my downfall. I almost need to understand it to believe it, hence my problem coming back to christianity. I cannot quite understand God, and therefore, I am unsure of what to make of it.


I am not sure of what to make of this.


Hmm. I suppose.


The problem here is that, I'm also a proud person. I am only sorry in the sense that it may have hurt someone/thing else. Yet at the same time I am not sorry for any of the experiences I have had.


I'm not sure being Catholic again is what I need right now.


I suppose this could be the case.

I find the beginning is the best place xd


Yeah, I think I shocked a lot of people with this, myself included.


I'm still none to keen on phrases like this, since I still have a very deistic view on God.


Yeah, you've made me frustrated as well. But, they were fun.


Don't worry about length.

Well, I am having a hard time arranging my thoughts right now. I truly believe this to be you finally feeling God's call. Whether you believe that or not, I don't know, but I hope that you feel it. First off, I want to tell you how very thrilled I am to read this. You are truly intelligent, and what you said is really quite true. You intelligence probably did get in the way of you comming back to God. I will try my best to help you out, and answer any and all questions that should be posed.

As for not knowing what to make of what chickenlips had said, that is a bible verse. What it means is that you were once with God, then you left God. Past that, it is up to you to decifer.

chickenlips said that God loves you TILL the point of death. This isn't exactly true. God loves you even unto death is what the bible says. This is in reference to the fact that Jesus died on the cross for you. And yes, I said for YOU. He wants to be your saviour, and he will love you no matter what you decide, and no matter where your soul resides.

And you shouldn't worry about your intentions being pure. Do you want to be saved? Do you love God? Do you know you are a sinner in need of a saviour? That is what matters. Don't tell me your sins. Don't even worry about telling any person. No human can save you from your sins, and no person can forgive you of your sins. That is what the bible says, and that is what I will stick to. By the way, I am still a sinner, and I am still saved. Once you are saved, you are always saved, in spite of your sin.

chickenlips said do what ever you did to glorify God. I would say something different than that. If you truly want to glorify God, ask him to save you. That is the most glorifying thing that anyone can do for God. I personally don't agree with the Catholic beliefes. But, it isn't up to me to judge any Catholic, so I will leave it to God.

As far as being none to keen to what windswept said, I can only pray that you will one day see the truth in that statement. The fact that you even brought this up means that you are already open minded about this whole thing. That works for me.

I will be quite blunt if you will allow me to. Religion does no person any good! Religion sends people straight to that devils hell. Plain and simple, religion will do you no good at all. Faith will. Faith saves people, not religion. Faith can move mountains, not religion. Faith can keep your mind sane, religion will only lead you to an asylum. Religion is a set of rules that one follows to be a better person. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, and the presence of things not seen; Hebrews 11:1. It sounds oxymoronish, yes. But it couldn't be any more true than that. People say I am an extremist, I say I am sold out for the things of the Lord. I don't believe in living a strictly "Christian" life. I believe in loving my God, living for my God, and trying to lead others to my God so that they may be saved as well. I don't believe in trying to be sin free, because it is impossible.

You want some ground to stand on? Christ is the rock of our salvation. If you have to stand anywhere, don't stand in the sand that surrounds you, stand on the rock and be safe from the tide.

Rikonah - Please don't edit my posts next time like that without asking me first. I didn't edit yours to add anything. Sorry, it's a pet peeve of mine.

To an extent, I also disagree with what the quotes read. I've removed them only because I don't appreciate that you did that. I'm not angry, and I hope you're not either.

For reference, here's those quotes:

Don't be.
Sorry to have.. embarrassed you?
There's nothing to be embarrassed about.

here is the more (copied and pasted from a blog):

Honestly, I'm not sure that I'm cut out for religion/belief/faith/whatever you want to call it. I mean, at times I want something to believe in, and in a way I kind of feel like I need something to believe in. For example, every time I think about the origins of the universe, I cannot do so without thinking about some sort of higher power; however, every time I contemplate free will, I cannot accept that theory without first holding onto the idea of a deistic god.

I don't know what to do, it seems that my problem is most likely my thinking. Right now, I want to change or at least I say I want to change - although I'm pretty sure I do (want to change, that is). I guess what it is that is annoying me at the moment is that I don't know how to change the way I think. When I have changed my thinking in the past it wasn't through any conscious effort of mine, it had been automatic - or rather it seemed that it was automatic. Though it was not that the change happened in the sense that one day I thought one way and the next day I thought a completely different way; it was a far more gradual change, happening over a period of weeks or months.

It also seems that my pride, impatience, and logical side seem to interfere as well. I mean, I am definitely prideful, to say otherwise is more than a bold-faced lie. I don't like the idea that I need to be saved, I really don't. It makes me feel weak in some way, it makes me feel small; and I hate it. Further, I'm more than impatient, I want my questions answered right now. And finally, my logical side has a hard time allowing me to believe or accept something that doesn't seem to flow logically. Now, there is one more thing, but before I get there, I want to elaborate a little on my past in regards to my logical side. I have noticed that in the past, when I went through my questioning phase, I wanted answers, although not just any answers I wanted logical answers. And it seemed that the more logical the answers got, the more I fell away from God. And this is where my problem resides. I think that in order to have a belief in God, at least at this moment, I have to let go of logic. And this is something that I am not sure I want to do. Finally, it seems that I want proof.

Now, this last part seems to be yet another huge problem. I've talked to my fair share of Christians and a lot of them say things like 'I see proof in the everyday world' or 'I just have faith,' and other stuff like that. Well, I look in the world and you know what I see? I see a tree here, a sky up there, and a picket fence all the way out there. In all of those things, I see nothing but the thing itself. I see God nowhere. Maybe the problem is not that I don't see God but that I don't know how to see God. Well, maybe its not quite that either, because I know there is a god, and I have evidence of this god. I'm not sure how I know there is a god, I just do; often times I will say that the reason I believe in a god is simply because I cannot believe in abiogenesis, but I doubt that this is actually the case. And the evidence of God I do have is not something I could ever see outside of a certain setting; that is, every time I am at some sort of church service, I feel the presence of something, something larger, I assume this to be God. However, once I step outside the service all I have is the memory of the feeling and sometimes remnants of that feeling. So, even after I'm out of the service, I cannot see God in that tree over there. It happened at my dad's wedding. I was able to see God in the wedding, I was able to see God through the happiness of my dad and my step mom. But once the service was over, I no longer saw God there. So, maybe the problem I have is that I don't know how to look for God outside of certain settings. Or maybe its that I need to be in a certain psychological state in order to gain the evidence that God is there.

I really don't know. At times, I feel this is something I want to do, but then at other times I don't know that this is what I want to do. What you have to understand is that, right now, this is a huge commitment for me - one I've made in the past, and later broke. And now, I'm not sure I'm ready to do that again, I'm not sure that I can trust God again, and I think most of all, I'm not sure I'm worth it...

Ironic isn't it, I have so much pride and yet I have self-worth issues too.

Edit:
About Bible translations, I simply refuse to ever read, let alone own, a copy of the KJV/NKJV. Quite simply I have heard too many bad things about that version...

Besides, I already found a version I like, CEV I think it is.