I do not. I will try to be succinct, but no promises there. I will also assume that you are talking about the Judeo-Christian God, for simplicity's sake.
I was raised and indoctrinated into the Christian faith, and specifically was schooled in Catholicism. I was actually quite the zealot in my youth. Sometime in my adolescence, I began to notice discrepancies in the Catholic dogma. I can recall that the first test of my faith was pondering on the notion of purgatory. I remember thinking "if purgatory is not mentioned anywhere in the Bible, and this faith is derived from the Bible, then where did the idea come from?" The was merely the first stone in the avalanche, which culminated in me reading the Bible, cover to cover, searching for a way to restore my faith. Upon completely the book however, I could no longer call myself a Christian. There were just far too many wildly fallacious claims. The whole book is historically inaccurate, widely apocryphal, and embarrassingly contradictory. I have found this to be true of other religious texts as well. Specifically, in the Bible, I had the hardest time reconciling the two different God characters from the Old and New Testament, respectively. One was a spiteful, vengeful, angry, jealous, genocidal maniac; the other was a forgiving, understanding, compassionate, loving god. If you ever take the time to read the whole Bible (which I highly recommend), you will see that God is two completely different characters.
Geography plays a huge part in which god(s) you believe in, a notion that always plagued me in my adolescence. The only reason that I grew up believing in the Judeo-Christian God (aside, of course, from my parent's influence) was the fact that I was born in America. Had I been born in Iran, I would have been raised a Muslim; in India, a Hindu. Another glaring oversight that the religious reich seem oblivious to is the issue of chronology; when you were born having a great influence on your religion. Many religions have waned or been completely phased out over time (Norse, Greek, Roman, Egyptian, etc.). It is foolish and vain to think that your (the rhetorical "you") religion will be exempt from the test of time. In a few thousand years, children will be reading about Christian mythology in their history textbooks, and something new and, most probably, more absurd will capture the zeitgeist of that era.
God can be a great many different things to each person, but there are some more or less unified themes; that He is omniscient, omnipotent, altruistic (cares for the plight of His creation), and that he can temporarily suspend the laws of nature (read: Miracles). How anyone can live in this world, and be exposed daily to the ills and trappings of man, and still believe in a "loving" God is beyond me. Visit a muscular dystrophy ward and tell the dying children that "God loves them, and that their illness was all a part of his divine plan." It sounds pretty callous when thrown into that relief. Now take a look at the miracles of the Old Testament. In that tome, God was constantly interfering with his creation. The book is rife with dues ex machina. Why is it that now God has turned a blind eye on his work? Where now is his influence, his interference? How is it that a god that is all-knowing would inspire the scripture writers (who were supposed to be infallible) to write such fallacious, inaccurate things?
This is getting a bit long-winded, so I'll wrap up. To an open and analytical mind, religions are clearly a device of man. There have been thousands, there will be many more, and I see no reason to adhere to one simply because I was indoctrinated into it as a child. Do yourself a favour and read the tome of your religion, then read an excellent book by Richard Dawkins called "The God Delusion".
I was raised and indoctrinated into the Christian faith, and specifically was schooled in Catholicism. I was actually quite the zealot in my youth. Sometime in my adolescence, I began to notice discrepancies in the Catholic dogma. I can recall that the first test of my faith was pondering on the notion of purgatory. I remember thinking "if purgatory is not mentioned anywhere in the Bible, and this faith is derived from the Bible, then where did the idea come from?" The was merely the first stone in the avalanche, which culminated in me reading the Bible, cover to cover, searching for a way to restore my faith. Upon completely the book however, I could no longer call myself a Christian. There were just far too many wildly fallacious claims. The whole book is historically inaccurate, widely apocryphal, and embarrassingly contradictory. I have found this to be true of other religious texts as well. Specifically, in the Bible, I had the hardest time reconciling the two different God characters from the Old and New Testament, respectively. One was a spiteful, vengeful, angry, jealous, genocidal maniac; the other was a forgiving, understanding, compassionate, loving god. If you ever take the time to read the whole Bible (which I highly recommend), you will see that God is two completely different characters.
Geography plays a huge part in which god(s) you believe in, a notion that always plagued me in my adolescence. The only reason that I grew up believing in the Judeo-Christian God (aside, of course, from my parent's influence) was the fact that I was born in America. Had I been born in Iran, I would have been raised a Muslim; in India, a Hindu. Another glaring oversight that the religious reich seem oblivious to is the issue of chronology; when you were born having a great influence on your religion. Many religions have waned or been completely phased out over time (Norse, Greek, Roman, Egyptian, etc.). It is foolish and vain to think that your (the rhetorical "you") religion will be exempt from the test of time. In a few thousand years, children will be reading about Christian mythology in their history textbooks, and something new and, most probably, more absurd will capture the zeitgeist of that era.
God can be a great many different things to each person, but there are some more or less unified themes; that He is omniscient, omnipotent, altruistic (cares for the plight of His creation), and that he can temporarily suspend the laws of nature (read: Miracles). How anyone can live in this world, and be exposed daily to the ills and trappings of man, and still believe in a "loving" God is beyond me. Visit a muscular dystrophy ward and tell the dying children that "God loves them, and that their illness was all a part of his divine plan." It sounds pretty callous when thrown into that relief. Now take a look at the miracles of the Old Testament. In that tome, God was constantly interfering with his creation. The book is rife with dues ex machina. Why is it that now God has turned a blind eye on his work? Where now is his influence, his interference? How is it that a god that is all-knowing would inspire the scripture writers (who were supposed to be infallible) to write such fallacious, inaccurate things?
This is getting a bit long-winded, so I'll wrap up. To an open and analytical mind, religions are clearly a device of man. There have been thousands, there will be many more, and I see no reason to adhere to one simply because I was indoctrinated into it as a child. Do yourself a favour and read the tome of your religion, then read an excellent book by Richard Dawkins called "The God Delusion".
