How important are faith and religion in your life?

Not to spur a religious thread here but do you think ppl who have deep faith are happier or more complete than those who don't?

nope

didn't really work out last time you weren't trying to spur a religious thread...

No.

Because everyone has a different starting point, a different personality and differing degrees of faith. Also life experiences and conditions affect us plus family and cultural conditions, i.e. the environment.

Note: atheists do like to think theists are a product of their cultural conditioning like its some sort of indictment indicating brainwashing. What they never consider is that God might have planned it that way. Our culture is an additional source we draw nourishment from. If faith is like a seed then culture is the soil that nourishes it.

Faith is an additional resource but it doesn't change your starting point though it could help change your environment and final outcome.

(I picked up the culture is our dirt thing from a Buddhist...Thich Nhat Hanh, who said we tear ourselves away from our roots at our own peril.)

faith is how i make it through my life. faith is how i know everything is gonna be fine.

What do you mean by faith?

I certainly have many beliefs which are not examined in detail. Debating helps but will eventually reach the "nihilist treshold" anyway, so naturally I have beliefs I simply hold to be true for no other reason than trusting them to be right.

Faith plays no role in my life, except as a source of amazement that there are apparently normal, functioning people who have this mysterious thing that makes no sense to me whatsoever.

I regard faith as a huge defect, an irrational and chronic disease that has defied treatment for millenia.

faith is probably a side-effect of a trait in our DNA which makes us trust what other people tell us during our early life. if our mother told us the lion was dangerous it was EV+ to listen, it increased our chances of spreading our genes if we had blind faith in whatever the elders say. thus if our elders tells us that gods exist, killing infidels is right or working on sundays will lead to eternal suffering we just trust that it's true because it's generally an EV+ strategy to trust elders.

since I am a human I have inherited this trait which unfortunatly sometimes can have negative effects to my life. I inherited most of my parents beliefs and it wasnt until I was 20years old I started examining them and came to different conclusions which right now might be somewhere between what they believe and what is truth. it is really hard to overcome old beliefs, most of them are probably right but some of them I have found to be wrong which makes it likely that other of them also are wrong. it helps being aware of what tendencies I have so I can try to overcome them if necessary.

Solid.

I think without faith in God my life would be about 99% the same- perhaps a little 1% of optimism would vanish. Im not religious in that I dont subscribe to any one faith, but I do have a strong belief in God (or what ever you would like to name him/her/it).

The popularly held belief of something along the lines of (above):

"I regard faith as a huge defect, an irrational and chronic disease that has defied treatment for millenia."

probably comes from a reaction against organised religion rather than a quiet belief in God. It is in short, pretty stupid. Why anyone would take offence at someone having a quiet belief in God is just idiotic- equally as much as someone taking offence at athiests. As much as I believe in a God, I couldnt care less if other believe in whatever they like. If it makes people happy then it cant be a bad thing. All in all, some people will live life with a positive attitude, some with a negative attitude. I would guess that people who believe in God probably have a more optimistic attitude which again cant be a bad thing.

On a lighter note, check out the "athiest bus campaign" going on in the UK. Its funny stuff, even if they are wrong

If you make another conclusion it can't be solid. Pick your poison.

Not important at all.

I think people that credit faith as a big reason they make it through life try to make you believe they are uber-happy, when in fact they worry daily about whether or not their faith is justified.

Look at Big Erf. Lately he's been posting as if he's the happiest dude in the world. But just two/three weeks ago he said he was never posting here again because it was causing him to question his faith and his beliefs.

It's like a roller coaster ride methinks.

Well, I have faith that the sun will rise every morning until, of course, it actually doesn't. That's about it.

Sorry tame, you lost me. Is there something I need to explain?

Nah, I'm just saying in a roundabout way that I do not think a person who can not take a lot of things for granted can function.

Even the atheist have deep faith.

Since the word very often means "belief in god" or some such, it is a rather dumb word to use on an atheist. Beliefs would be more suitable.

Sure you can use it, but then again I could also claim christian means "oily person" (which linguistically is fairly correct).

Each individual will act differently with faith. And faith can mean many different things.

I do not feel that I have much faith at all. I do not think that being a Christian requires that you have much.

It is something that in theory I wish I could change, but in reality if it did change I would not be the person that I am anyway.

I think Stu is indicating that athiest are biased. Faith or the absence of faith: both are a bias.

You're right the word faith is not suitable until you understand the above concept.

But the atheists I've encountered on this board are every bit as dogmatic as the theists and sometimes much more because they outnumber them (you're bound to have more fanatics with the increased numbers).

I believe to hold any belief or idea at all will inevitably involve some degree of certainty and can border on dogmatism. Rather than being angry over the other poster's degree of certainty its much more important to foster a civil environment so the dialogue can proceed.

The reason why so many discussions degrade to name calling is that people are so in love with their own ideas and they are expecting a capitulation from the other side and when it doesn't come they get frustrated or irritated by that.

But human nature is just not that accomodating. People will always insist on a degree of personal control in forming their own beliefs. (The funny thing is for theists they are suppose to give this faculty over to God more and more and be led by the Spirit...but its hard for us to realize that...so its just as hard for a theist to be accomodating as an atheist.)

Everybody is biased. It is not possible not to be. Without bias a human could not function cognitively because everything would have to be re-discovered every time we encountered it. The best one can do is to be aware that one is biased.

So that faith should mean "biased" seems rather silly. Bias is a perfectly good word for its use, faith is a perfectly good word for its use.

As for atheists being as dogmatic as the christians on this site, I completely disagree. That again is moving what a word means. Being dogmatic does not mean being stubborn, convinced or argumentative.

Most atheists on this site that I have seen are closer to nihilism and/or moral relativism than they are dogmatic.

I think when your beliefs are challenged and you defend them there will be many times when you appear dogmatic to the other side. This medium is very limited. You can't see the other person and the opposing group likes a "cariacature stereotype" to rally around and demonize the opposing side.

Theists are routinely accused of being "dogmatic" on this board on very little acquaintance. For the most part all atheists just assume it, I think, you're one of the few exceptions (congratulations! That's why you're a favorite poster of mine. I respect your intellect and civility.)

While I've been here I've actually done a lot of other religions investigation and I believe I have a better sense of other religions then most atheist posters on here.

The main tactic of atheists is the question. They ask questions about things as a form of attack that they themselves don't even know the answer to and when you give them the correct answer they don't even acknowledge and thank you for it because to do so would be to let their guard down. That is a type of dogmatism.

They seize the question because that gives them the offensive and they never have to do the hard part of defense. A couple of atheists like subfallen and madnak are the exception. They have much more defined and articulate ideas but most of the other posters don't. They always push the burden of proof on the theist then refuse to examine it.

Usually the smart ones on here when I turn something up get real silent. The less smart ones they insult.

I've been doing this a long time and I know the atheist group gang bang tactics pretty well. I'm always just amazed at the smarter posters tolerance of it. I've got to think they enjoy it on some level.