Belief - repost

[andrewducker]

Question three was borked. Rewritten to actually cover all the bases, and not be internally contradictory. Apologies to the 7 people who already filled it in!

[Poll #1427776]

Comments

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

I have to caveat my answers, since I went to a CofE primary school, but stopped believing in God when I was nine or ten.

As far as I am concerned, God is a human construct; I don't believe we need to invent God to understand or explain the universe. Indeed, inventing supernatural powers is such a cop out.

[andrewducker]

I also went to a CofE school when I was young, but I never believed.

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

It is interesting - I certainly took part in the rituals and went to services and so on; but I grew up in a distinctly non-religious household (mother non-practicing Jewish, father not much of anything but CofE at a push by way of upbringing) and was taught to be questioning and sceptical. As I young child I am sure I must have believed, but once I seriously thought about it - and as I learned about biology and geology and science generally, lost that belief - no trauma at all, same as Father Christmas...

[andrewducker]

Interesting. It sounds to me like you're assuming you believed rather than remembering believing. Why do you assume that?

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

I know I believed in God as a young child, because that is what school and teachers taught me; I can't remember when I stopped believing, but it was around the age of ten.

But I am not sure that simply blindly accepting what one is taught is really believing: there is no real choice or decision for a five or six year old. That comes later!

[andrewducker]

Aaah. My teachers told me about God, but it didn't make me believe.

I wonder why.