Am I the only person he who is of pagan belief? I dont believe in a god, but in multiple gods. I believe in Babylonian paganism. My personal gods are Marduk, Ishtar and Ereshkigal because they symbolize me. Before prayer (three times a week), I say, Marduk is my guide, Ishtar is my heart and Ereshkigal is my companion. In comparison to Christians I dont fear death. I dont believe in eternal life but more like life after death. I dont mourn the dead, I honor them. When I am dead, I wish not to be mourned. I may be devoted to my religion but there are more religious people out there than me for example my friend Eres from Jordan: She hates Muslims and Christians. Although it is more of a passiv hate. I just dont like Muslims and some Christians. Jews are ok, nice people who dont talk much about religion rather stuff about business. We tolerate gay marriage and cousin marriage. Only love between siblings is considered incest here. I dont practice the more radical practices of my faith such as honor killing or protection murder. I doubt anyone practices it.
Forum_Stalker: If you believe in demons, I have a guardian demon. Not all demons are bad. In my religion there is no such thing as angel.

Demons are just the gods of old, rebranded by the right handed to instill fear and hatred. :)

Anyways, if you were the only Pagan, it wouldn't be a religion, it would be an idea. I've known a few Pagans in my time, but it never really spoke to me. Do you guys still have to hug a tree on your birthday?

There are different types of pagans. I think Wiccans or Druids hug trees on their birthdays. I can list those pagan religion that are known to me: Druidism, Shamanism, Wiccan, Jewitchery (mix of Wicca and Judaism), Hellenism (Greek neopaganism), Natib Qadash (Canaanite neopaganism), Babylonian neopaganism (similar to Natib Qadash), Asatru, Romuva (West Baltic), Dievsturba (East Baltic), Kemetism (Egyptian), Celtic paganism, Odinism etc.
Demons are not always old gods. It is only that way in Abrahamic religions such as Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Example for god to demon: Lilitu (babylonian goddess) -> Lilith (Demon in Bible)

Lilith is a wife of Satan ;p

But yeah, Wicca was the one I was thinking of. The only other one you've mentioned that I've studied a little was Shamanism.

I think Shamanism and revival religions are more serious than Wicca though. Wicca is all about witchery and is popular to mainstream culture in Europe. Something wannabe witches and warlocks would join. Wannabes would be just annoying. If you want a simple pagan religion that isnt as complicated as mine or Natib Qadash then try Romuva, Asatru or Odinism. They dont require weekly prayer and their meetings have an option of getting drunk. In babylonian paganism you are only allowed to get drunk in a religious mass if it is a special celebration like marriage, funerals, birthdays, winter equinox, summer equinox and getting a new member. Christians try to find parallels between my religion and Islam but they are opposites. Islam forbids alcohol, homosexuality, eating pork, women having rights and so on. Babylonian paganism allows alcohol, homosexuality, eating pork (some sects forbid eating beef) and women have all rights because its matriarchy meaning women are practically holy.

Transposing gods, at least the pagans made more sense. I would like to say though, in bringing up other cases of gods. Polythesism is derived on a balance of power between entities. Monothesism is utter power in the hand of one entity. No offense, I'd rather believe in aliens than gods. Religion is a form of control, no matter what religion it is. Thus my problem. Free will kind of differenciates those theories of religion, because if we were meant to serve. We would serve. Otherwise, feh... It all seems like a joke.

Teh Wing

Demons was a term in the Grecian and contemporary civilizations for a demi-god like figure, a figure that was not quite a god but still meta-human. Zeus, for instance, was not a demon, he was a God. But Eros was considered a demon. Demons also referred to guardians of humans, or the spirits of dead soldiers that watched over the world.

I believe in God, and I'll say why I read the first couple of posts, and each side has some interesting, and good points.

They've spoken about war,fame, disease, death, ect all existing. However think of it this way, there are certain reason's for all of that. One of my points is this, if there were no problems what reason would we have to pray to God? I mean I pray to God because I'm a Christian, but most people get saved when there dealing with hard times. They need something to turn too, and God is that thing. With hard-ships, Christians can lead people to God. God is a source of hope during times when we face stressful situation's. Another reason is this, God promised us Free Will. God loves us, but what kind of "loving" God would strip his people of their freedom?

That's Tyranny, plain and simple. While God is omnipotent, and could solve all of our "problem's" by solving them, he could be stripping another human being of their free will. Example there are criminals, you say God should make it so there's no violence. In that case all the criminals loose their free will, I don't support violence but I hope you can see my point about free will. And another thing, violence connects people. People unite, to help others when violence occurs. Example Haiti is one of the poorest countries, it's people were suffering. It's condition's grew worse when a major earth-quake occurred, now people all over the world are trying to help better Haiti's condition's,

And of course there are also miracle's, another reason to believe in God. Someone else mentioned Homosexuals not going to Heaven. This is simply because God created men to love women. Adam and Eve Not Adam and John, or Eve and Sally. And I believe there should only be one path to God as well. Someone else mentioned Hitler going to heaven, and a person who never asked for forgiveness for lying can go to hell. This part was easy for me to answer. ANYONE can gain forgiveness, Hitler and the boy can both gain forgiveness.

I think Christianity however is more about a relationship with God, then a religion itself. I also wanted to say my views on creation. I cannot be Atheist, for this reason. I cannot believe the universe was created simply by luck, something so magnificently made cannot be created in a mere accident. I believe a higher power created the universe, and I believe that power is God.

I'm a mishmash - I believe (well, more like acknowledge) the existence of, well, everything. All the Gods, monsters, spirits and whatnot. Three aspects of God and whatnot.

I also prefer the Catholic side of things because Exorcisms and saints are AWESOME.

*avoids actual debating while still making a point*

When I was 14 and being raised catholic I decided I did not want to go to church. My parents were...different from most and made a deal with me. If I did not go to church I would have to read a religious text of my choosing for the hour they were gone. While I could have just slacked off they hit me with another rule, when they returned we would discuss what I read. After 4 years of this I have read the Bible, the Tao Te Ching (a Taoism text), Tanakh (Hebrew bible), Qur’an, several texts of Buddhism (there is no central text) and several studies on all those said religions. This brought me to where I am today. I believe in a God who wishes us to live our lives correctly, but I do not believe in any particular religion. I have a strong belief that they are dangerous. While it is good to understand that god wishes for us to be good and do great things in order to help others all religions have shown that they can be taken and manipulated by those in power and used for their own gain.

Many things they say do not make sense to me. Such as (lets take a hot topic) a gay man lives good life, he helps others, give to charity, lives humbly, ect ect. Then we have someone who believes, (crap who am I going to piss off...the hell with it) Christianity, he hits his wife, is racist, is greedy, ect ect. Am I really expected to believe the man who has lived his life in sin has a better chance of going to heaven than a man who has live a good life and but differs on who he LOVES? No I'm sorry religion to me is dangerous, necessary for many but dangerous. I believe is just God who has given us free will to sin, go to war and do great things. He or She will always try to lead us in to the right path but he will never force us. Those choices we make for ourselves. And I intend to make the right ones.

I'm agnostic, but consider myself a member of a monotheistic religion. I just am not quite sure if God does or does not exist, there is little evidence on both sides, I guess it is a matter of preference. Perhaps when I am older and have better grips on reality and the meaning of events and specific arguments I'll come to believe in one of the sides, I just like to have evidence to back up claims that I make, and both sides offer little evidence, so I'll have to take some time to develop just what I believe instead of being swayed by either side's claims.

Myself, I don't necessarily believe in "A" god. The main reason for that is that, there is just as much of a possibility of there being just one god and a whole bunch of lesser subordinates, or there could be a pantheon. But, I do indeed believe that there is something out there. One difference I have from many is that most think of gods as being a "higher power". That is one possibility, another possibility is that on whatever plane of existence that the god(s) reside on are just simply a way the hell more advanced collection (or single) beings that have found a way to do something that cannot be done (whether because it hasn't been discovered, or because it is a law of our plane). And that thing being creating matter out of nothing.

I suppose, if you had to throw me into a classification, it would be Christian, but that is mostly just because I was raised in the environment somewhat and it is the religion that I am most familiar with. The thing that I disagree with the most (with Christianity the most I find, but with a lot of other religions as well) is that the teachings, all of which are written and shared by man, proclaim that absolute fealty to an omnipotent being that no-one can get in touch with is mandatory. Now, assuming the founders of the religion didn't make that kind of stuff up to control their followers and it was actually shared as such. If you were an all powerful being in the eyes of something you had the power to create, would you not embellish yourself a bit.

Another argument that I dislike hearing from people is the whole "well there is war, disease, famine, etc. why does an all loving god not fix that right up". And my answer for that is two words, Free and Will. We were given free will to do what we want, war could easily be solved if people chose not to go to war with one another. And famine, disease, all that kind of stuff...considering how much research has been done in the past to solve such things (Polio and scurvy are two diseases that used to be horrendous and now are all but non-existent) if the world chose to fix war by not fighting then there would be billions of surplus dollars in the world for funding into research to help solve disease and hunger and homelessness, and addiction, and everything else that plagues our world. So the real questions isn't "why doesn't God fix it all for us" but more "Why don't we use our God given free will to fix this shit ourselves".

I think when I started this post I had more in mind to say, but I have dragged on enough already, so I will leave it with this for now.

I don't believe in any God because my logic and rationale tend to get in the way. May be to blunt of an answer for some, but whatever.

I am a strong believer of evolution. I do believe, however, that there was once a man or many men and women who people considered "god[s]" becuase they could perform amazing things. If someone today could turn water into blood would we consider them a god or an illusionist? Maybe the people many others thought of them being "god[s]" were just ancient illusionists. I'm not trying to make anyone a non-believer, just my opinion on the subject.

I'm not even going to attempt to explain everything I believe. But I'll try to give it to you in a nutshell...

God (and I'm using that term loosely for reasons too complicated for me to bother explaining), if one happens to exist, is not a perfect being as just about every religious belief depicts their respective deities. If they were, wouldn't this world they allegedly created be perfect? Would this world's inhabitants not be perfect? Logically, yes they would be. But, obviously, since none of those are perfect, then God (again, using the term very loosely), by logical default, is also just as imperfect as the alleged creations. So where does that leave us? Well, that leaves us to decide for ourselves. That's what humanity is all about, right?

And before I get griped for not truly answering the debated question, I just wanted to say, that that was the whole point. We decide for ourselves, in our own faith/decision/belief/whatever if God (for lack of a better term) exists or not.

Personally, I think a little Wicca Witchcraft would be good for the world. We've all been so consumed by scientific debates and politcal divisions that there just doesn't seem to be room for fantasy anymore. Men once dreamed of flying, well I believe we should dream of magic as we once did when we were kids. You'd be surprised how soothing it would be to the heart and soul.

Proto, wicca is another religion - thought process and controls, filled with on/offs, 1s and 0s, it is another fallicy, an illusion. It's there to protect those who don't want to look at the truth, but hide behind a - in your own word - fantasy.

Science is the only way forward, as only science questions itself. Since when did Christians or Muslims, or even "Wiccans" question their religion thoroughly? It's the religious that stand in the way of progress, and because of them, the modern world is technologically and intelectually 100 years behind the point it should be at.

Protoman X wrote:Personally, I think a little Wicca Witchcraft would be good for the world. We've all been so consumed by scientific debates and political divisions that there just doesn't seem to be room for fantasy anymore. Men once dreamed of flying, well I believe we should dream of magic as we once did when we were kids. You'd be surprised how soothing it would be to the heart and soul.

While it's true that Wicca could make the world a bit more fun, for lack of a better word, wouldn't it make more sense to believe something that would give people balance in their lives, understanding for their fellow humans, and other such lacked attributes? Daoism encourages these things, but, true to it's form, about half of Daoism is unnecessary attachments.

What I've noticed with religion is that most people go with this formula: If I can understand it more about it than I can about other religions, then I will use that chunk of what I think I understand about it to explain what I do not understand.

I think it's mainly for this reason that Christianity has become so popular. Every religion has to have a good-sized chunk of it you're not supposed to understand, but Christianity takes it to the extreme, folding back onto itself for explanation so many times it's pattern of understandability looks somewhat like a barcode printed on a Chinese paper fan. It gives the whole thing a greater sense of mysticism, a feeling of something greater than yourself.

Other religions, like Buddhism, don't do this as extremely. While Christianity needs to use backtracks such as "doubt is a sin" to keep itself together, that being the main one, other religions are instead either so simple to comprehend that the mystic aspect comes from what little is not fully explained, such as the universal force of Buddhism, or the Dao of Daoism. You're told enough to get the gist of it, but you never quite know for sure.

@MoonMan: Yeah, maybe it is, but who cares, exactly? We have enough technological advances to keep the world set for a good while, so why worry about progressing further? You do realize, that the more mankind relies on technology, the weaker they become as a species, don't you? Humans once had instincts comparable to predators of the natural world. It is theorized that ancient humans could see things with the naked eye that we could not today. Why is that? Because as a species, we've grown so dependent of our science and technology that we have essentially become couch potatoes as far anything else goes. Do you really wish to progress to a time when all humans are essentially tubs of lard who live their entire lives sitting on a chair that does everything for them? Yes, I just referenced Wall-E, but that movie made a very good point. Personally, I would much prefer to live in a time when humans were stronger and had more instinct. Technology makes things too easy. Where's the challenge in it? How are we supposed to become stronger as a result? There you go, I ranted a little but that is my answer to all you "Science is the only way" extremists. Yes, that's right, I used that term on science and not religion. The coin can flip both ways.

@ИɐnophяƎɐk: Off topic, but, how the hell did you make your username look like that? That is so cool!

Now this may not be related to the question entirely but I believe that it is hard to place any description upon the concept of any sort of higher power and that it is unfair to call someone unintelligent for believing in any deity, be it the Judaic and Christian god or any other cosmic force. I my mind, I would say that whether you believe or not your opinion remains entirely valid because the fact of the matter is that there is simply no way of proving whether or not that the believer or non-believer is right. Both sides of the argument possess aspects of validity that I believe each side should accept. In other words, believers should allow themselves to be aware of the advancements that has been made by modern science and the non-believers should accept that somethings cannot be explained with any other phrase than "That was a miracle." the fact of the matter is that neither should be frowned upon for who they are as it is a great and wonderful feeling to have faith in a higher power that seeks to take care of you but We also live in a world with so much hate and evil that it is horribly easy for one to look at such suffering and ask themselves "how can there be a benevolent force if the world is the way it is?"
I, personally, have chosen to live my life as a Pagan. I worship no true god or pantheon but rather choose to believe that Mother Earth will provide for us what we need so long as we give our Earth what it needs, essentially viewing humanity and nature as a symbiotic nature. This of course leads into that conversation of conservation of nature, that we need to care for animals and for plant life as well as the fact that it is so sad that humanity has come to point where the majority believe that nature is a infinitely renewable resource and that we can take what we need without replacing it at the end of the day. Of course, that conversation has nothing to do with the question at hand and so I will leave this at that. Thank you though, for taking the time to read my rant even if it does not fully pertain to what was asked at the start of this thread.