I dont want to believe but then i do?

Most people just throw verses at you and don't even understand. They have never been in your shoes to judge.I know exactly how you feel. It's as if logic and reason tells you it can't be real,but your past in faith pressures you to feel guilt even at the slightest withdrawal. Religion implements the idea that if you question it you are damned. For the religious you're either with them or against them. I turned atheist after seeing a man eat his own waste and drinking water that was contaminated with human waste and so many other pollutant.He needed to survive,but he along with many others never had an education, didn't know what religion or god was yet 'god' left him abandoned. I thought to my self if god did that to a man who wasn't even ignorant,but lacked knowledge,he easily as well turn his back towards me. I felt hurt,but after seeing so many pains I gave up trying to ask him for help.I opened my eyes to all the bad things and realized that god won't help the poor,if anything they needed to help themselves and I was to help them too. I turned to reason for answers and I concluded that he did not exist and if he did he was no less of a traitor than the worst human being.

At first I feared to doubt my religion and god.It was a tough challenge because from the time I was born I was taught that anything against my religion and I'd be damned in hell.I grew a pair and finally took the step and questioned it.I realized that religion and the idea of a god was not more of a manipulation scheme than the monsters my mom told me slept under my bed to keep my in check. Being an atheist removed the idea of eternal damnation from my mind.It liberated me. Before, all my hopes were centered in god. When things went bad I would ask him for help,but no matter what his aid never came. Being an atheist made me rely in me. It strengthened by self belief and reassured me of my worth. When things went bad I felt centered and knew that I controlled the outcome not some being in the sky. In truth, I no longer fear the devil nor god,because to me they don't exist. Fear was there when I started but with time and reason it eventually ruled itself out.

I don't want you to influence your beliefs to turn atheist or stay religious but it's your life and you can only cherish it once.You decide, whether you want to be a slave of faith bound to stay head down for a life time or free yourself from it's grasp and live in the liberty you deserve. Your a good guy and I'm sure that you will stay with what makes you happiest. Whatever your decision is I will applaud it.

I'm the opposite ... from time to time, I would like to have the comfort of such a strong belief but I just don't. I don't ever feel like I'm missing anything though. Making a gratitude list turns my thinking around faster than prayer .. for me anyway.

When my best friend fell in love with and became engaged to a non-Catholic, she felt judged by her church so much that she was married in a Protestant Church. (that was in the last 70's) She still has faith but she no longer attends mass and she prays to Mother Mary. She faced a LOT of hard things in her adult life and I know those prayers have sustained her. On the other hand, I have survived a great deal without feeling that connection ... I found my strength in my love for my children. It certainly kept me going even when I didn't think I could.

Maybe you can worship your God in YOUR way if you have differences with the beliefs of your church.

I don't believe that any loving God would send someone to hell. I know that may not comfort you as a believer but don't be afraid to think for yourself. This will probably be, like so many things in life, a journey for you. I have gone through a spiritual journey on the way to where I am now.

The Catholic Church is especially good at instilling guilt into its followers - such that when the followers attempt to break out into intellectual freedom, the guilt often pulls them back. If you can see this, you can defeat this insidious method.

There's no reliable evidence for God/Yahweh, Jesus, Allah, Zeus, Baal, Odin, Quetzalcoatl, Vishnu, Thor, Shiva, or any of the thousands of other gods that people have worshiped. If any existed there would be reliable evidence. Since no such evidence exists, these gods do not exist. There's also extensive evidence that they are all just delusions and myths - created to help soothe our fear of death, and perpetuated through religion to subjugate the underclass into obedience.

There's also no need for gods to explain the traditional reasons for a god -- origin of the universe, origin of life, origin of species, origin of humans, origin of morality. The psychological reasons that people believe in god(s) are known. See the 1st link for the video, "Andy Thomson: Why We Believe in Gods" or buy his book at the 2nd link. Also, check out Michael Shermer's "The Believing Brain" at the third link, and his "Why People Believe Invisible Agents Control the World" at the 4th link.

Yahweh is typically defined as all-knowing, all-powerful, all-loving, and having free will. Such a god is internally and externally incongruent, and thus cannot logically exist. An all-powerful and all-knowing god with free will can't exist, because it could not both know the future and change it. An all-powerful and all-loving god can't exist and allow the true horrors that occur to sentient beings.

The story of Jesus can be shown to be just a myth created to fulfill prophesy, cobbled together out of stories from the Old Testament and previous gods and myths - created in the 40's and 50's by Paul (ne Saul of Tarsus) (who exhibited symptoms of epilepsy and had delusions of Christ talking to him), the other apostles, the unknown authors of the gospels in the 70's or later, and many other people. The reliable evidence for this is overwhelming.

Educate yourself to the reasons and evidence that drives believers to believe and Atheists to not believe and then make up your own mind. I'm an Atheist but even if you decide that you believe in God, you don't necessarily have to believe in any man controlled Church's explanation of God. Perhaps God is truly loving and wants you to be happy as long as you don't hurt anyone else?

I can identify with your doubts, and even the guilt you feel. Some days it seems impossible to believe there is a God who exists and who cares about the details of my life. In those moments though, I try to remind myself that God doesn't *need* anything from me - he is who he is whether or not I believe in him. And if I believe something about him that isn't true, he's not offended by that. I know he'll help me to understand him in time.

Dont let anyone tell you what to "believe" in, theist or atheist. Because then you are following their beliefs. I would advise you to live life and develope your own relationship with nature and with the universe and with humanity. If this steers you back around to your former religion, then so be it. But at least you utilized your own freewill and made your own choice. In the end thats all any of us really have.

The mystery's of faith an GOD are beyond human comprehension.

Faith concerns questions which cannot be settled by evidence.

How can the universe create itself out of nothingness? Given the fact that the universe began to exist, it must have had a “cause” that originated it.Doesn't it make more sense to assume the existence of a Creation.

You can't see the wind, but you know it is there because you can see what the wind is doing. You can know that the wind is there because you can feel it.God is like the wind, you can't see him.

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You have the right and ability to choose your own destiny. God does not force anyone to heaven. It is your choice and your choice alone. It is up to you to be responsiblle for your own actions. God actually creataed you in a way that you CAN have faith in him. Its because of the subtle craftiness of men that lead us astray to think otherwise.

Faith is like a seed. We need to plant it with the hope that it will grow. However, it will not grow it it is neglected. We must norish it and water it and it will then grow. And as we continue to nurture it, it will grow up into something healthy and strong.

Faith is the same way. We must first WANT to have faith (planting the seed) and we must then nurtuer it (do things in our lives that we support the faith, ie say a prayer, read the scriptures, listen to others that have faith. As we nurture the seed (our faith) it can begin to sprout and grow. The more we nurture it, the bigger it will grow.

Those that say, I just can't believe are those that won't even plant the seed, or throw it away without even experiementing on it.

If you plant the seed and nurture it, you WILL be able to experience faith and trust in God. Its what God wants of you and all of his children.

If God really wanted you to believe, wouldn't he give you something more solid to base it on? Then you wouldn't have these problems. Think about it.

And if somebody says "faith," like IRX said, that's the same as wishful thinking. The only reason you would ever consider it valid is because the religion says so. Of course they do! What else have they got?

Please understand that this question comes from my own experience of struggling with my beliefs: Have you considered the possibility that your problem is conflicts among your various beliefs? Or the possibility (which may come to the same thing) that your problem is with a church or authority figures in that church, rather than with God or Jesus?

I think many--possibly even most--Christians reach a point where the accumulation of things they've been taught, and things they're being told by authority figures, stops making sense because of conflicts. (In my case, it was a specific conflict between what I believed in and what the church leaders wanted me to accept from them.)

Some Christians simply decide to stop thinking for themselves and accept what they're told, even if it's not what they were taught earlier. This, of course, isn't a purely religious solution; it's more of a political one. (See "1984" by George Orwell, where the Ministry of Truth is specifically in charge of sorting out and tracking lies.)

Personally, I think that sort of acquiescence is a bad idea. God (if we allow the assumption of a creator God) plainly made us to think. In fact, every one of us is made to think a bit differently. Unity can be achieved by accommodating those differences, or it can faked by imposing uniformity on everyone, but that sort of fake unity is a debasement of human nature.

What I recommend is that you take the time to sit down and study what you really believe in, and how the beliefs fit together, and if you find any conflicts, consider what beliefs you should leave behind. That is, turn the jumble of beliefs you accumulate, from others' teaching you, into a belief system that is your very own. Whether that will leave you a Christian when you're done, I don't know. But at least you'll be able to be honest, with yourself and therefore with others.

In my case, the main things I jettisoned were: (1) the notion of the Bible as somehow, magically, inerrant; and (2) my trust in churches, church organizations, and church leaders. Item (2) was an obvious and direct result of my walking away from a church where the leadership colluded to do something very nasty. Item (1) was a bit more remote from the situation, but related to it, in that I realized any form of worship of a piece of software was in essence establishing an idol (in this case, the Bible itself).

I'm not a Catholic myself, but I have favorite Catholic authors. This excerpt from one of them might help:

No pot—so far—has asked questions of the potter in a voice the potter can understand; when it does, it will be time enough to compare pots to men. The criticism is not aimed at St. Paul who dropped the phrase in the midst of a great spiritual wrestle, not as a moral instruction. But it has been used too often by the pious to encourage them to say, in love or in laziness, “Our little minds were never meant...” Fortunately there is the book of Job to make it clear that our little minds were meant. A great curiosity ought to exist concerning divine things. Man was intended to argue with God.

-- Charles Williams ("He Came Down from Heaven")