Miriam Websters Dictionary defines an agnostic as : a person who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable ; broadly : one who is not committed to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God or a god

Its not that I do not believe in God, afterall, I find it hard to believe the universe is a result of random events. I refuse to believe even that. I think it takes faith to believe in evolution and that evolution is a religion in itself and I just dont believe in evolution; it's too much left to chance for my faith to carry.

But I also dont believe God or any god cares about people or the world. I dont think he/she is interested in us. I also do not believe in organized religion even though if I were to commit to any religion I would commit to christianity simply because of what Jesus said; that the greatest commandment is love thy neighbor as thyself. Also being a woman, I feel that Jesus was the first Woman's right activist in that he stopped some hypocritical men from stoning a woman and he also drank water from a samaritan woman who had been re-married multiple times. As a feminist, I am totally a fan of Jesus.

But I dont like when humans get to together to make laws on humans because GOD told them to make such laws. Jesus preached so much kindness and asked us not to judge others that I find it hard that even he advocated organized religion afterall he was against the Pharisees etc and even welcomed the gentiles.

I believe in doing good for goodness sake and because even animals do good to themselves and yet we cant see any real rationalization going on with them.

I believe in Loving one another and not just someone who shares the same religion with us (Jehova's withnessess, mormons take note)Jesus ate with tax collectors yet these jehova's withnesses shun every other person who is not like them. they are not followers of Christ

I am totally against the hijacking of the lives of ordinary Nigerians by the mega preachers in Naija. I am also totally against the tyranny of fear that such preachers spread around in order to keep captive members, i.e "You cant prosper unless, you are starving one of your four kids and giving that money to us".

I also am against the American evangelicals that use Christianity to cover their real intentions : racial segregation and hatred.

But I am fumed about why any creator is not intervening in the crisis that has enveloped the world since time immemorial and please BORN AGAINS dont give me that end of the world nonsense, the end of the world has been coming for 2000 years now.

I strongly believe but humbly assert that If God were to be physically present on earth to stand for trial he would be given infinite incaceration for crimes against Humanity, Neglect, improper subjugation,
false advertisement hence fraud by not reigning in his pitch-men i.e pastors that impregnate their members etc. creation of natural disasters such as hurricane katrina and tsunami ( afterall didnt he create everything), Not reigning in the devil but instead giving him the power to subjugate, imprison, threaten, frieghten,steal lives., and war crimes such as asking moses to clean out all of canaan.


Lastly, as indifferent as I feel toward any thought of a God, I am also very hungry for there to be one that actually cares. But let it not deceive anyone, I will not be a christian, muslim or anyother. and also, I am afraid of telling my family how I believe and allowing them to know why I dont go to church anymore.

Does anyone feel the same? Or am I the lone agnostic Nigerian. I dont mean athiest. I am not an atheist.

Good for you!
Your belief should be a personal thing based on how you see and percieve your world. Not by what some desert mad man decided to drum up.
No guru, messiah, pastor, apostle, grand master, ayatollah or rabbi can lead you to any god, hence they should not be allowed to influence your personal belief. Cheers!

Thank you, I was brought up listening to mega preachers who secretly are doing dubios acts. it can be hard sometimes to decipher legitimate reasons against things as opposed to culturally acceptable/ religious inspired discrimination.

get wise owu gal very quickly becos u r goin down the road of all unwise men please.

What makes you think your way is the wise path? ??
The problem with most religions is they arrogate themselves the right to wisdom and declare their faith the one true and only way. This leads to religious intolerance and conflict. . . sickening!

which religious conflicts have u seen please give evidence it is all in yr head tudor really. go out there and see people worshiping without beign bothered by other religions even in iran tudor.

horse703:

which religious conflicts have u seen please give evidence it is all in yr head tudor really. go out there and see people worshiping without beign bothered by other religions even in iran tudor.

This must be a big joke!
Take a trip to jos nigeria. . .

Hello and nice to hear you views about your beliefs or lack there of. I think you are doing the right thing in subject the notion of god and religion to critical examination. Wish you plenty of gusto in your search for answers.

Having said that, allow me to make a number of observation on your original post:

Owu gal:

Its not that I do not believe in God, afterall, I find it hard to believe the universe is a result of random events. I refuse to believe even that. I think it takes faith to believe in evolution and that evolution is a religion in itself and I just dont believe in evolution; it's too much left to chance for my faith to carry.

At face value, evolution is one of the most counter-intuitive of concepts. I hope you are not conflating the theory of biological evolution with the theory of "cosmic evolution". Biological evolution by Natural Selection explains the diversity of life on the planet while Cosmic evolution explain the origin and subsequent complexity of the cosmos. These are two different things that are driven by very different mechanisms.

Now, allow me to help you with thinking about biological evolution, by considering the following questions:

1) How old do you think the earth is?

2) How old is life on earth?

3) Where and how is petroleum fuel made in nature. How long does the process take?

4) Do you know what dinosaurs are? What happen to them?

5) What are fossils?

6) What is the following 1) The Cambrian Period, 2) The Precambrian, 3) The Jurassic ?

7) Why are there exactly NO fossils of mammals and birds in Pre-cambrian rocks?

8.) Do you know what Kangaroos are and where they are found naturally?

9) Why do some whales have fully developed hind legs?

10) Have you heard of an event in the history of the earth called The End-Permian Extinction event?


I hope you consider these questions in some depth and I would really like to exchange view with you if you so wish.

But I also dont believe God or any god cares about people or the world. I dont think he/she is interested in us. I also do not believe in organized religion even though if I were to commit to any religion I would commit to christianity simply because of what Jesus said; that the greatest commandment is love thy neighbor as thyself. Also being a woman, I feel that Jesus was the first Woman's right activist in that he stopped some hypocritical men from stoning a woman and he also drank water from a samaritan woman who had been re-married multiple times. As a feminist, I am totally a fan of Jesus.

Jesus may have said the "Love your neighbour" commandment, but that was hardly original nor unique to him. In fact, if anything, Jesus "stole" it from the Old testament, Leviticus 19: 18. Further, Greek humanist such as Socrates made similar pronouncements many hundreds of years before Jesus.

Am an surprise you consider Jesus to be very pro-woman. Amongst his 12 apostles, none was a woman. Why did he not show that way be elevating the status of women in his society, by selecting at least one woman into the ranks of the 12? Just as he said nothing against the institution of slavery, Jesus showed little special attention to the plight of women.

In fact, in one occasion he describes a Samaritan woman who was looking for some favours from Jesus, as a "DOG", and that his favours were not available to non-Jews.

Jesus's divorce laws forbids a divorce woman from re-marrying.

The story of the woman caught in adultery is fabrication and was not in the original manuscripts of the Gospel of John.

The new testament forbids women from speaking in churches and requires them to be submissive to their husbands.

It further says that women are saved through child-birth.

There's more. Jesus and his doctrine does not bode well for the women folk, I submit.

I also do not believe in organized religion even though if I were to commit to any religion I would commit to christianity simply because of what Jesus said; that the greatest commandment is love thy neighbor as thyself. Also being a woman, I feel that Jesus was the first Woman's right activist in that he stopped some hypocritical men from stoning a woman and he also drank water from a samaritan woman who had been re-married multiple times. As a feminist, I am totally a fan of Jesus.

Are you saying Christianity supported the rise of feminism?

seriously?

I think she referred to Jesus the person and not the religion that was built around his personage which is christianity.Christianity and Jesus are totally different entities even if christians will try very hard to convince themselves that they are one and the same.
I agree with her that Yeshua was a feminist activist.But christinaity is hardly a feminist religion,atleast not in the old days.

bawomolo:

Are you saying Christianity supported the rise of feminism?

seriously?

theration first of all jesus did not have only twelve disciples, he had more than twelve and they shuld have definitely included women. what do u mean by fabrication, who fabricated and why? prove it please. the samaritan woman also described herself as a dog what do u say about that. please this conversation was a metaphorical conversation between the two and both understood each other. u seem to be very informed about scientific issues theration but u cannot understand the bible the same way u do scientific issues im a scientist(biologist) i know

horse703:

theration first of all jesus did not have only twelve disciples, he had more than twelve and they shuld have definitely included women. what do u mean by fabrication, who fabricated and why? prove it please. the samaritan woman also described herself as a dog what do u say about that. please this conversation was a metaphorical conversation between the two and both understood each other. u seem to be very informed about scientific issues theration but u cannot understand the bible the same way u do scientific issues im a scientist(biologist) i know

Well, we all know that Jesus had a select group of close companions, made of 12 individuals, who were all MEN. These were the companion who were at the Last Super, the Pentacost, etc. None of these were WOMEN. PERIOD. To be sure, he had followers who were women, but the core group were all MEN.

Biblical fabrications and corruption was quite common. As for this story, if you have got a recently published bible, turn to John 7:53 to John 8:11 where might see warning concerning this story. Also visit the site http://www.religioustolerance.org/john_8.htm for further details.

Dear Theration,


thank you for your scholarly explanation above. I must admit though That I feel as if you are only trying to show off your knowledge rather than refute anything I actually said.
1) I said I don’t believe in evolution. Natural Selection may result in the diversity of the species, but it still attributes the ORIGIN of the species to random events. THAT I find hard to believe. I don’t think we were atoms that became some water dwelling then land living amphibians.
You asked a lot of questions about How old the world is, I don’t know…. But I don’t believe scientist have a good estimate either. You asked about dinosaurs, well in all honesty I don’t know, but as I said the explanation about them is unconvincing either way. It takes a degree of faith in what evolutionary scientists say to believe. Since I don’t think they know all the answers, and new discoveries are made everyday that change previous theories, I don’t think dinosaur fossils are conclusive proof of evolution. God could have made them for all I am concerned and so it could be argued either way.

Theration, I believe you should censor the way you use grammer, You said Jesus "Stole"…, Well dearie I do not care to check it, but if he did use words that were already in the bible that is said to be inspired by him and his father who are said to be one and the same, I believe he borrowed it,or RE-ITERATED it.

None of his disciples were women, till this day, that is debateble which Is why the DA-VINCI-CODE is a hit movie and book


2)Jesus showed little special attention to the plight of women"

I don’t think Jesus came specifically to improve the plight of women over the plight of HUMAN BEINGS. He showed great attention to the plight of human beeings in general which is what he came for. Unless you consider women a separate species, you can continue with your analogy.

On this issue I think you twisted the truth, he did not call the woman a dog, he used an analogy. Seeing as Jews saw others as dogs at that time, he used the most compelling one. I think he would have still used it if the begger was a man.

You go on a rant about JESUS DIVORCE LAWS, that’s where things get murky, because I believe those are the laws of his apostles and disciples, the ACTUAL doings of jesus to me are different from what those ones went on to advocate.

horse703:

get wise owu gal very quickly becos u r goin down the road of all unwise men please.

Horse703, since you are wise why dont you wisen me up with some real wisdom, seeing as I dont know where to get it which is why i am not wise?which unwise men do you know followed down which path? speak clearly and articulate yourself so that i can perceive "true wisdom" ohhh all knowing one.

bawonmolo,

I am straining not to give you a snide answer.
Feminism is not a bad thing because you seem to assume it is. Feminism is a movement to improve the way women are treated as human beings. it is not wrong to advocate the rights of women who are also human beings. Feminism is humanism. it is not different from the civil rights movement to grant black Americans basic human rights. it is not different from advocating the end of slavery. it is not different from advocating the right of children not to be trafficked into prostitution. I have said nothing about christianity advocating anything. I said by example of behavior, Jesus Christ advocated for women to be treated fairly. which he did by equating the sin of adultery to the sin of lying, cheating etc.

Do not assume you can outwit me with spin. Please.

jagunlabi

thank you very much. you said my mind.

@poster hello , just read ur post , am new here on nairaland, i consider myself a deist, just letting u know u r not alone in ur doubts