The first time I met someone who believes in God
My parents never mentioned God or any religion. Not necessarily atheist — nothing against. The subject just never came up.
I grew up across the street from a Catholic church. (440 South Clay Street in Hinsdale, Illinois.) Like any temple of a religion you’d heard nothing about, it had no meaning to me.
My best friend, Mark Hemstreet, lived next door. We were eleven years old, playing in the snow. I hit my hand on some ice and said, “God damn it.”
He looked at me, surprised, and said, “You took the Lord’s name in vain!”
I said, “Wait, are you kidding or serious?”
He said, “Serious!”
I thought he was straight-face kidding. I honestly didn’t know anyone believed in God. Because the subject had never come up, I thought God was just like Santa Claus. A sweet idea, but almost nobody over the age of eight actually literally believes it, right?
I said, “Wait, so do you believe in the Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy?”
He looked scared and said, “Dude. This is serious. If you don’t believe in God, you’re going to turn into a locust on Judgement Day. They told us at Sunday School.”
I laughed and said, “Oh really? Well if they’ve got all the facts, then what kind of locust will I be? Will I stay this same size, or shrink down? How does that work? What are the details?”
He didn’t answer but was really concerned for me, and said, “You can’t joke about this stuff.”
Because that was my introduction to religion, I used to find them ridiculous. But now, as an amateur anthropologist, I’m trying to understand them all. See my next post on this subject.
Hinsdale? My dad grew up in Riverside (started in Cicero) with cousins in Hinsdale. Always enjoyed our visits (the zoo, Wrigley,etc.)
I enjoyed the introduction. What was the next significant chapter of you and interacting with those who believe in God?
Coming in the next post. I try to keep one idea per-post. — Derek
The prefix "a" means without, as in amoral. Theo (the) means God, so atheist means firmly, decidedly, without God.
The base (root) word "gnost" means "to know," and the suffix "ic" means "characterized by." So a man who is agnostic hasn't firmly rejected the existence of God, rather, he just doesn't know.
By the way, these parts of modern English come from Latin and Greek, by way of the Norman conquest of southern Britain in 1066 A.D. Historians delight that "William the Conqueror" made a census of who and what was in his new kingdom, because we still have his records. At the time it was called "The Doomsday Book" because, like doomsday, it missed nobody.
(The time travel novel of that name is very good, and I have memorized a paragraph from it that moved me)
Incidentally, one of my university classes that I am most grateful to have taken was a one semester vocabulary course in Greek and Latin for science majors. It has helped me as a writer to see where parts of words come from. I sure wish I had taken it before I took anatomy.
I do believe in God. I was in a Sunday school class and we had a person who was skeptical of God and him being real. The teacher asked him a question. Would you rather go through live believing in God and find out He's not real, or continue disbelieving and find out He's real? That stuck with me and during times of turmoil in my life, we all have it, I recall this conversation and I reaffirm my faith. Now I've never heard of being turned into a locust before, that's a new one. I just wanted to pass that along.
Best of life to you.
Derek,
You were given Brussel sprouts and told they were straw berries. Look into Dallas Willard an perhaps read "The Divine Conspiracy". Dallas was a philosophy professor at USC and also a Christian.
Don't confuse sprouts with strawberries.
Allen
Hi Derek, This is the Topic that caught my eye. I grew up going to church every Sunday and when my Dad got seriously sick to look after him and couldn't afford us around our Mum put us kids into a boarding school so we could be together. We went to church Sunday-Friday. Educated on the Bible and loved all the fims and Bible stories. We grew up God fearing and God has been a part of my life still. I believe whole heartedly in the teachings of Christ and go to him to pray every night and thank him for everything he's given me and for whom I am today. Read Claud Bristols books but start with THE MAGIC OF BELIEVING. he has WRITTEN THREE BOOKS.
I grew up going to church and believing in God. At some point in my late teens though I had to make a mature decision as to whether I really believed in God and his son Jesus who died on the cross for my sins or if it was just stories. I believe there's an abundance of proof of God but it's up to each of of us to search and then make a life-altering decision. I chose to belive.
Thanks for the insight into your childhood, Derek. I grew up in a household professing to be Catholic. In my 20's I had heard people say religious things but not a single one could answer my questions. While on sick leave due a hernia in my 20's, I decided to prove their beliefs in God were a joke. I read the whole Bible. I found what I had heard from the clergy was wrong as well as their interpretations. Genesis chapter one covers all the dinosaurs and cavemen. Chapter 2 takes place after the last ice age after the Earth had been virtually destroyed. Contrary to what the clergy says, God is seeking relationships, not religion and rituals. And saying "God damn it" is not using His name in vain; it's swearing to someone by His name to lie. That's using His name in vain.
Haidt in his book The Righteous Mind presents the theory that development of belief in the supernatural served to provide order in society. We needed to convince small groups to allow us to be with them as trust worthy group members.
Obedience to the norms made you worthy to be a group member with a good reputation.
The problem with me and some "believers" is that they think their beliefs and rituals and rules are THE way not a way. Your religious beliefs should make you a better member of your society, not a judge of everyone without your beliefs.
What a juxtaposition we are in when teaching our kids “How to Live”. They are so mouldable before their critical thinking skills are developed. I was a practicing Christian but left the church when my three boys were young. I didn’t want to unfairly influence them with my belief system. They are grown up now and not Christians, my beliefs have also modified but I often wonder how our lives might have been different and if I did the right thing. Will we all turn into locusts.? What a responsibility.
On September 5, 2021 my daughter drowned. On July 29, 2023 my son took his life. Walking through the fire of grief I realized Jesus is with me, closer than my breath.
I believe.
I used to not.
"God is love" - 1 John 4:16
Jesus didn’t come to earth to be born and to die a brutal death as a sacrifice for the sins of the world to start some religion he came to save the world from religion and from their sins if you want to know if this is true or not, simply go to him in prayer and ask him if he’s real, that should save you a lot of research on religion
He said himself he is the way the truth in the life and there is no other you don’t need religion just his grace will do
God bless you as you search Russell Scherer
I am reminded of a passage from Bruce Barton’s book “What Can A Man Believe.”
“In every human being, whether emperor or cowboy, prince or pauper, philosopher or slave, there is a mysterious something which he neither understands nor controls.
It may lie dormant for so long as to be almost forgotten. It may be so repressed that the man supposes it is dead.
But one night, he is alone, in the desert, under the starry sky.
One day he finds himself with bowed head and damp eyes beside an open grave.
For there comes an hour when he clings with desperate instinct to the wet rail of a storm-tossed boat, and suddenly, out of the forgotten depths of his being this mysterious something leaps forth.
It overreaches habit; it pushes aside reason; and with a voice that will not be denied it cries out its questionings and its prayer.”
Thank you for all you do, Derek.
I've always been glad to have been raised Catholic and to have attended Catholic schools. I believe in the basic substance of it. Some of the history of the Church is egregious and parts of the Bible are questionable. The religion is made up of imperfect people, hence it's not perfect in all aspects🤷♀️ I've considered mainstream Protestant denominations, but at this point will probably ride it out as a Catholic😎
This bit of pith greeted me from the marquee sign outside a church: "As long as there is the unknowable, all hope is possible." All the words hooked together to make a cohesive sentence, but after contemplating it for few moments I realized it's exactly the meaningless folderol that you have to be willing to accept in order to believe in a supreme being that created us and metes out rewards and punishments for living by certain rules. All my life I've been taken for a "Mormon" by Christians and "a fine Muslim" in Afghanistan despite being a lifelong atheist. I've never needed God to tell me right from wrong - the Golden Rule from the Bible (and every other religion) is sometimes challenging to follow, but to do so seems to make one a stellar example of their religion, whichever one it is.
Belief is our enemy. It divides us and doubt unites us. This is wisdom from an old Cheyenne spiritual warrior. I was southern baptist, read the entire bible at 19 and discovered how it was a lot of bullshit and contradictions. All religions are evil and belief in any gods is for weak=minded fools
Whenever I see conversation on this subject, I'm inspired to send out a song I wrote about the attacks on Christianity. It's called God's Gone Missing, and here's the You Tube link
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EiX3q0PULo
I once said, "Spirituality is the new religion."
That would because it has no "should," no punishing peer pressure, no sacred scripture that new converts believe in more than those brought up in religion do.
A self-described "recovering nun" once opined, "Religion is taught, spirituality is caught." She meant, as above, no iron "shoulds."
In a large circle of students on folding chairs, one lunch hour in the college chaplain centre, I said I write in my journal god with a small g, not a capital G, "because I don't want to get mixed up with the bad guy God in the Bible." As we shared, I learned that about half the circle, including the chaplain, had once (not now) used code words for God for similar reasons.
I am reminded of how some folks who were badly hurt in their childhood will refer to their parents by their first names, not Mamma and Pappa.
Thought-provoking. I have no religious beliefs. But I think God exist.
I had a lively conversation about God recently with my friend. It was fascinating for me, that when we abandoned "facts" then the concepts in Christianity he was into, and Taoism I study were in fact perfectly the same. And I started to see that almost everywhere people believe in the same God, they just use different stories reflecting the culture and times when these stories were created.
I find God to be the most interesting thing to talk about, but first we have to decide what God means.
So... What does God mean to you?
You ask, 'what does God mean to me?"
In Alcoholics Anonymous, where many members come from grumpy individualistic and atheist backgrounds, they are encouraged to choose their own understanding of God, rather than automatically have the one of the Church whose basement they may be meeting in.
One member chose an oak tree as his Higher Power. One night he came to a meeting outraged, saying, "They cut down my tree!"
The science fiction book series "The War Against the Chtorr" is about ongoing character training for the hero (who starts out a spoiled high school kid) One of his mentors says, "God is whatever you use as a power source."
I love God so much. I love life a lot and God has given us this Reality. I am also religious now and used to also think God is a lie. These days I truly believe in eternal life and that reality is intended by God to be Paradise for all living beings.
Thank you kind readers for reading this post and stay wild.