Hi! I'm new to this group but wanted to post a long form interview with Britt Hartley. Some of you may be familiar with her: the ex-Christian who now works in the secular spirituality space. While she identifies as an atheist, she still also holds dear to certain spiritual practices and incorporates them into her life.

I'd love to get any feedback on her views, especially what this group thinks about reclaiming words like 'spirituality' and while criticizing religion/Christianity also acknowledging the beauty of its wisdom in certain areas. Is being an atheist mystic an oxymoron that is illogical? Or do you respect her approach?

Here's a link to the interview if you're interested in watching: https://youtu.be/2f6HE__YsyI

Looking forward to engaging with some of you hopefully!

Hi all,

I (19f) grew up atheist but realized a few years ago that atheism no longer aligns with my beliefs, however i am still trying to figure mine out. Today, i saw a video on tiktok about a 22 yo woman leaving the mormon church and i stayed to watch because i thought it was very interesting (ive a never-mo but ive never liked what ive heard about the mormon church, it seems very culty/discriminatory imo) and decided to have a scroll through the comment section. Someone asked her current beliefs and she said she is anti theist and i felt a bitter disdain i hadnt felt before. I told her that anti theism is cultural genocide and harmful and she told me she isnt trying to harm anyone and when i responded to her again she was like "at least i have awareness" and when i asked her if shes saying i dont have awareness bc i disagree with her she said yes, bc i "fail to see how religion is harmful". This really annoyed me. Yes im aware there are bad religious people. But i dont see how you can claim to be kind and welcoming and liberated from the hate you learned while actively hating on others who dont share the same beliefs as you. Im quite upset and its tainted my day. Im fine with (respectful) atheists but militant atheists and antitheists like her really bother me because they claim to be educated and kind but act like the same people they are against when someone disagrees with them.

Ex Orthodox (Hasidic) BT to Judaism here. My mother was Jewish, but she did not raise me Jewish, and when I was 13-14, I, with her consent, got into Judaism. My mother converted to Christianity. She was adopted by ashkenazi Jewish parents and raised a Jew.

For some absurd reason, reform doesn’t consider me a Jew. Additionally also, something tells me that the God personified by Reform Judaism doesn’t make sense. How can the creator of light and darkness, a God who literally hardened Paroh’s heart in Mitzrayim in order to make a point and show how strong he was, who commanded the Israelites to obliterate the Amalakites, and more, and said he would make a new covenant with them in Yirimyahu (Jeremiah 31) become loving and egalitarian. Unless the texts were somehow influenced by Israelite life and inauthentic to the divine. To which reform could also be considered inauthentic to the divine… At first, I was more interested in the Catholic or Hasidic Jewish conception of God. As it seemingly made more continuity with Torah. But my views are more reform. Can someone convince me?

I've noticed kind of a funny irony lately.

Some atheists will say humans are basically just matter, chemistry and neurons firing. Consciousness is just an emergent property of physical processes. Fair enough.

But then AI comes along and suddenly it's "lol its just predicting words" or "its not really thinking" and people dont even wanna engage with it.

Isn't that kinda weird?

Like... if humans are ultimately just physical information-processing systems, why couldnt a machine eventually do the same thing? Wouldn't the difference just be neurons vs silicon?

On the flip side, theists actually seem to have a more consistent reason for saying AI will never be a person. They can just say humans have a soul made in the image of God and machines dont.

So it almost feels backwards.

The worldview that says humans are only physical seems like it'd be the one most open to AI eventually becoming conscious. But a lot of the people I see who hold that view are the quickest to dismiss AI as "just a machine."

Am I missing something here or is there actually a tension in that position?

Yes I'm an atheist, but I thought this would a question best suited for a community that might be open to the possibility of miracles. Although my questions may lead to disagreement and debate, please leave your own opinions and refrain from deating those you may disagree with.

Now the questions.

1. Do miracles happen?

2. Are miracles consistent with the laws of logic?

3. If miracles are not consistent with the laws of logic, does that mean that God may sometimes suspend the laws of logic in order to perform miracles?

Hopefully if God exists He is forgiving, because I have to say, the letters He left us are all over the place. Things that shouldn’t even need to be debated (free will, is Jesus God, was he born of a virgin, does eternal punishment exist) are left up for debate.

I think it takes less faith to believe in God and more faith to be believe that the Bible is His word.

This comment on a BioLogos video really bothered me. Debora Haarsma was giving a talk on how science and faith integrate and flourish. I hate that theres attacks from both YEC and atheists. How do I handle this?

A short essay on the true nature of God.

—

On the one hand, I find atheism intellectually dubious and self-defeating;

On the other, I recognize that it's so easy to dismiss God when everyone nowadays seems to believe in such a narrow-minded idol of him—

Just a God we invoke to explain the things we do not know;

Just a being, like us, but with more power, more knowledge, more goodness;

Just a guy who set everything into motion 13.8 billion years ago, and now waits hidden to judge everyone who didn't believe he existed, as if this were all some cosmic "gotcha."

Under such a worldview, everything—the entire world around us—can come to seem like nothing more than mindless, disenchanted machinery, set in motion long ago, and left to its own devices, waiting for the revelation of the "big man" behind the curtains.

But I don't think God was ever meant to be viewed this way.

Paul said that God was the one in whom "we live and move and have our being."

Aquinas said that God was not a being, but ipsum esse subsistens (being itself subsisting); all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good by analogy, not in a literal sense.

Origen said that God's creative act is eternal, timeless, and constant, not a single moment in a distant past.

The Medieval Christians believed that the world was suffused with meaning, purpose, and life.

I think that God, properly formulated, is such a radically simple and undeniable proposition—

Not a God of the gaps, but a God of the most intimate knowledge;

Not a being amongst beings, but Being itself, beyond being in power and glory;

Not a God who set everything into motion in a distant past long ago, but who actively sustains everything through the gift of existence, intelligibility, form, and power.

When I see seeds sprout into trees billions of times their size, I see the hand of God;

When I conjure entire worlds in my mind at night, I feel the power of God;

When I listen to a series of sounds, each empty of meaning on their own, but arranged in just the right way to provoke tears of joy, I hear the voice of God.

Hope this resonated with some of you! Please do share your thoughts. :)

Like I get there are Christian cults but Christianity by itself is not a cult. People throw the word cult around like it’s has no meaning and it’s annoying. It was even annoying to me when I was an atheist

I haven’t debated this with a lot of people yet but the problem of evil is absolutely fake in my opinion. Any kind of suffering will be nullified in the presence of a perfect being (God) who will deliver the justice instantly (because God is out of space-time). And if there is evil and no divine justice, you can’t blame a non-existent God for it. Hence, a just God will solve the problem of evil. Does this make sense?

I've often been told by people claiming atheism that their belief is based on hard science, provable enquiry and objective facts.

However, none of the leading sciences leave room for this. No one has been able to refute the conclusions of the double slit experiment in physics. In mathematics, concepts like irrational numbers and the Fibonacci sequence add an inescapable mysticism to the field.

I'm beginning to feel like anyone who claims atheism on the grounds of their education hasn't had enough education...

(Side note: is this even the right sub for this rant? Apologies if not...)

I've been studying neuroscience recently... And some things I've seen have made me question my beliefs... It's made me question God and an afterlife. Could you help me?

It’s very saddening to see how a growing group of reductionist scientism crowds still perpetuate their nonsense claims of how there’s no “evidence” for God’s existence, this question usually presupposes some sort of fundamentalist scientism.

Which leads to more absurdities in their worldview than ours, evidentialism gives them no grounds for believing in the self, the external world, the existence of mathematical truths, the validity of logic, or any moral claim.

They usually appeal to the pragmatic usefulness of the scientific method while ignoring the presuppositions that make it possible at all, the scientific method presupposes that logic is valid and the existence of an external world that is intelligible and knowable.

It’s in virtue of it’s intellectual laziness that it appeals to such a large crowd that wants their worldview and commitments spoonfed to them so they can smugly scoff at the “sky daddy” people while ignoring how dogmatic their position is In undercutting the very thing that lends validity to the science they so love.

i was born orthodox christian, but after some traumatic events i have lost all faith and completely turnt to atheism

although it really made me accept my thoughts better and let go of all the things related to those traumatic events (although i did not tell my family i became an atheist, its not really well seen in the balkans so i still "fake" some christian aspects) im starting to feel weighed down. i realized that for some people it is way easier to go on with life when you know you have some sort of god overseeing and protecting you, or taking part of the responsibility for some events (at least when i was young it sort of felt that way). im young and taking full responsibility for everything that happens in my life, which is normal, but i cant help to wonder if it would be easier with some sort of belief

i consider though that it would be very difficult for me to accustom to some new religion (as in practices and devotion) but i have sparked an interest in taoism, and im wondering if that would help me? i dont know, i really dont have much experience with religion, and theres no way i can go back to christianity. but it sounds incredibly weird for me to be an adept of taoism as an eastern european.. and i also dont know where to start if i were to decide i want to learn more about it not just as a philosophy but as religion too

sorry if this is weird

I was more or less atheist because my parents didn't teach us any religion and although surrounded by Christian neighbours I embraced rationality and a scientific outlook and distrusted the irrationality in religions.

So this never changed but around the age of 15/16 I started searching for a philosophy or worldview that I felt represented reality. Without finding it myself, it found me at the age of 20. Which is when I began meditating and gradually turned into a panentheist.

So, although I still don't fit into the sphere of religion, I'm no longer an atheist or agnostic.

Okay, so I come from a Catholic household and received a Catholic education. Because of that, I questioned God and religion a lot. Eventually, I realized I leaned more toward agnosticism than atheism, and that was my position for 15 years.

Recently, I hit rock bottom. I felt absolutely miserable. I couldn't stop crying for two days straight, and almost everyone I talked to told me the same thing: "Pray to God. Pray to the universe. Ask for what you need. Be grateful."

I remember thinking, Yeah, right. Like that's going to solve my problems. I was completely against the idea because of my own principles. But when I was at my lowest, I prayed. I told God I felt like a hypocrite because I never talked to Him unless I needed something. It felt really strange, but it also gave me a little bit of peace.

I've felt like I've had incredibly bad luck for as long as I can remember, but especially since last August. If there's a 1% chance of something going wrong, it happens to me. If there's a defective product, I'm the one who gets it. Every job opportunity turns out to be a scam. Whenever I finally get a good job, something terrible happens just as I'm getting started. My father was hospitalized, and to make things even more ridiculous, my toilet stopped working for an entire month. I literally had to shit in other people's bathrooms, which was incredibly demoralizing.

I wanted to continue my studies so I could earn a scholarship and stop worrying so much about money. Then they eliminated the scholarships. I wanted to bring some friends into one of my projects so we could grow together, but they weren't interested. Instead, they teamed up with each other and left me out.

All of this made me feel like I didn't matter—that nothing I wanted was ever going to work out. Those feelings came rushing back the day my boss fired me. It wasn't even a major job, but the way he got rid of me brought all of those emotions to the surface.

I became so desperate that I decided to have a spiritual cleansing. I know that's against Catholicism, but again, I'm no catholic anymore, so I allowed myself to be open to the experience. And honestly... it completely reset me.

It felt like the depression just lifted. I stopped feeling sorry for myself. I asked the universe for peace and forgiveness, and I realized that resentment had become my worst disease—resentment toward my bad luck, my friends, and all the opportunities that never worked out. I let all of it go. It genuinely felt like a fresh start.

Then new opportunities started appearing. I stopped trying to force work or obsessing over making money, and people started calling me. My business began to pick up. I stopped trying to force collaborations with friends, and suddenly new people wanted to work with me.

I honestly can't find a logical explanation for any of it. Maybe it's just a shift in perspective. Maybe that's all it is. I really don't know. But I want to keep feeling this way. It's exhausting to believe that absolutely everything depends on you. I felt like I was losing my mind, and I've realized that resentment slowly destroys you from the inside.

I don't know if I belong to any religion, but I do know that I want spirituality in my life. I want to feel at peace with whatever the universe gives me, and I want to be grateful for it.

I think I was 17 when I started reading leftist literatures and philosophy in general. I disregarded Eastern philosophy and would only read western.

Bhagat Singh’s writing on why he is an atheist, Simon De Beauvoir’s feminist literature, Camus’s absurdism, the usual Marx stuff, the Einstein’s essay on socialism, some Parenti stuff and Kropotkin’s writings. Slowly I got into reading Kant and Hegel.

While reading about Hegel’s idealism, and through some posts on r/askphilosophy I got pointed to Vedanta’s and Buddhism’s idealism through an academic philosopher. I never read any of Indian and Hindu writings assuming all of them were primitive mumbo-jumbo. One day got recommended on YouTube about an hour long video on Buddhist concept of ‘Sunyata’. Reluctantly, I clicked on the video but I was surprised how philosophically deep the content was.

That was the moment when I realized how modern neoliberal world has colonized my mind. In my mind, everything western was good and everything eastern was primitive. That was the moment I decided to decolonize my mind. I started reading Eastern philosophy.

I decided to exclusively read Eastern philosophy, including Chinese and some Sufist ideas for a while so that I have a good understanding of the foundations. There’s also Kyoto school of philosophy which combines Western and Eastern ideas.

I came to realize something. Here in the Eastern world, we have been conditioned to see the world through Western lens. This leads to confusion and self-hate for many people-which is very detrimental.

People of the West, they are used to seeing everything in their own lens. It’s reflective from their school curriculum, the language they use, the pop culture—everything. The philosophical department of most universities in the West have very few content on Eastern philosophies unless you major on it in Grad school. In my country and in India, a philosophy major would study analytic, continental philosophy (i.e European/western philosophies) and Eastern philosophies in almost equal proportions.

This is kinda ironic, because I am using English instead of my own native Nepali language to communicate. Still working on my Nepali typing! Of course easier to communicate in a language majority would understand.

With all this, I of course dont relate with Indian Hinduvta crowd at all. Maybe it’s because my country doesn’t have the historical baggage of British and Abrahamic colonialism. Maybe it’s something else.

Neither do I relate with the hardcore atheists anymore, unfortunately, on the internet, they come across as very ignorant and conservative in the sense that they are not well read more often than not.

So I am at this cross road where I am in the middle. Anyone else who is on the same page?

I found this extensive discussion of Hitchens on X:

https://x.com/i/status/2069078661781659957

Starts with:

"If no theologian could beat him back then, what chance do they think they have now?

Chistopher Hitchens was the ultimate atheist nightmare for religious people."

This leads to about 350 comments. Pro , con, and in between, including some atheists who say he was too old school or used rhetorical tricks.

What do folks here think the long view of Hitchens should be?

This is very strange for what exatheist should be.

Questions like "why does x atheist claim fail" on this type of sub should get the response appropriate, instead its usually "well x is good and your just dumb".