A question of faith.

[Ryan Naylor]

I'm an atheist. I see no way of reconciling the way the world is with the act of a just and benevolent God, even a deistic one. I would like to believe in something, but can't. If it ever come down to it, I would go for something like Buddhism.

However, I do believe in science and human dignity, and am tolerant of other people's beliefs. Except fundamentalists. Sorry.

[Shadowsworn]

I agree with you, Whisper, about confession. It just doesn't make any sense to me that confessing your 'sins' to a priest has any more worth than going over them yourself.

[Dominique]

As I recall, the idea behind confession to a priest is that sin doesn't only affect an individual's relationship with God; it also affects the individual's relationships with their family, their friends, and eventually with the entire community. Therefore, confessing to a priest isn't just confessing to someone who supposedly has a better link to God than you or something like that; it's confessing to a representative of the community you've affronted. (There were towns in medieval times that actually had completely public confessions so you could confess to the entire community, but that obviously led to many, many omissions . . . so they just pared it down to the priest eventually.) I'm not trying to say that everyone needs to agree with this idea, just explaining what it is. ^_-

[ScS of the Fraternity]

As a former catholic, I recall some talk about confession being one of the most important and useful elements of Catholicism. The idea is that people can confess their sins and receive real closure. Penitents can get real forgiveness from a person in authority, in a completely safe and anonymous environment.

Of course, I quit church before my first confession, so this is all taken from discussions with a history teacher who was a catholic.

[Shoon VII]

raised Pentacastal with a twist of Santeria.

[AdamGarou]

raised Pentacastal with a twist of Santeria.

I bet THAT was an interesting mix. Care to elaborate? What I know about Santeria I pretty much got from one of Nathan's articles in a USS netbook (the tale of the "Nueva Aragona" cluster, I think), but being a Pentecostal myself, I'm certainly curious about how your upbringing meshed the two. At first glance, the teachings wouldn't seem all that compatible.

It appears we have people with just about every religious background/belief system imaginable here, sharing in a common love of Ravenloft and roleplaying in general--from Catholics and Jews to Wiccas, Witches, "Pagans", agnostics, atheists, and even those who seem to take what they need from a half-dozen sets of teachings. The fact that we can all come together with this common interest and have civil discussions is pretty impressive.

[Gemathustra]

It appears we have people with just about every religious background/belief system imaginable here, sharing in a common love of Ravenloft and roleplaying in general--from Catholics and Jews to Wiccas, Witches, "Pagans", agnostics, atheists, and even those who seem to take what they need from a half-dozen sets of teachings. The fact that we can all come together with this common interest and have civil discussions is pretty impressive.

Ravenloft, my dear Professor Fuzzykins, it's all about the love and togetherness.
Or dying in some unpleasant way.
One or the other.

[AdamGarou]

Ravenloft, my dear Professor Fuzzykins, it's all about the love and togetherness.
Or dying in some unpleasant way.
One or the other.

*smirk*

I make ONE comment about language clarity six months ago, and I'm forever labeled as "Professor Fuzzykins".

Talk about a name that's striking fear in NOBODY's hearts...

"Hello, I'm Adam Fuzzykins, and I'll be your instructor for Linguistics 101 and Lycanthropy 103..."

[Reginald de Curry]

At least he's not calling you "Fido".

[Gemathustra]

At least he's not calling you "Fido".

"Fido"?
Never.
"Phaideaux," on the other hand...

[AdamGarou]

At least he's not calling you "Fido".

"Fido"?
Never.
"Phaideaux," on the other hand...

If we're going Cajun here, then I prefer "Phydeaux"... as in Phydeaux Boudreau Thibodeau, of the Bordeaux Thibodeaus.

Arf!

[Merilee Markuza]

I belong to the Baha'i Faith. We believe there was direct revelation from God from 1844 to 1892, giving the world detailed guidance on how to solve our problems. Our central doctrine is the unity of humanity, getting rid of all prejudices and discrimination.

I believe in God and prayer, and answers to prayer that occasionally might be more-or-less miraculous. Other than that I'm not sure if I accept the supernatural, angels and demons and such.

As for D+D - the cover art on an early, perhaps the first, Dungeon Master's Guide showed humans who had entered a place of worship, killed two reptilian worshippers, and were desecrating the statue of the god by prying out the gemstones it had for eyes. I found this offensive. When people condemned fantasy RPGs as satanic, I was amazed they never noticed that the goal of the game was "kill 'em all and then steal their treasure", which in my opinion is the only real evil thing about the game. So why am I still playing after 25 years, and chose a Neutral Evil Ravenloft character for my username? Well, heck, I never said I was a saint.

[Tobias Blackburn]

Roman Catholic here, but with very liberal views on a lot of topics. There is no need to enforce your view on others. Especially if their actions have no effect on your life, right?

Humans wrote the bible after all. God may be infalible, but mankind isn't.

[Wiccy of the Fraternity]

Humans wrote the bible after all.

And rewrote many times over, always cutting out the best bits it seems.

God may be infalible, but mankind isn't.

Well said.

The other day I posted on a religious Live Journal community, stating that I pray, I have been inundated with e-mails since, so I will say here that witches do pray. It is amazing how often people are suprised to hear that, lol. If we didn't pray, how would we invoke the deities, since prayer is the simplest form of invocation?

A sample of my prayers is as follows:

Lord of day, Lady of night,
Guide my self and others though darkness and light,
Grant us what it is we need,
Protecting us always from our greed,
Heal our wounds and cure our ails,
Help us find our path when we fail,
Give us fire to warm our souls,
Grant us Earth to strengthen our bones,
Fill us with water to we do not thirst,
Fill our lungs with air so we may breathe,
And give me ether to get me through the worst.

It's a simple thing and it doubles as a useful protect and healing spell that requires no tools, but I never use them anyway. It does save me going into a trance though, through which I regularly perform all my rituals

[Tobias Blackburn]

Humans wrote the bible after all.

And rewrote many times over, always cutting out the best bits it seems.

And let's not forget what was lost through translation.

Of course, then we get into the twisting of intent and meaning. To give any examples opens up quite the can of worms, so I'm leave it at that.