Fear of hell

I hate the fact that I'm afraid to go to hell for my unbelief. I don't need Christianity, it does nothing for me. What helped me with my awful thoughts was The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. That was life-changing. I find Christianity to be a waste of time.

The only reason I ever think about this ridiculous religion is because I'm afraid that Jesus is the only way to salvation and that if I don't believe I'll wake up after I'm dead and fine myself burning in hell, surrounded by hate and fear.

Why would God send anyone to hell? How rude!

Why don't we have true religious freedom, freedom to decide what's best for us?

I feel forced to be Christian, forced to be a sheep, a follower, a clone, conventional and boring.

 

You don't need to go to a church or follow a certain group to talk with Jesus. (If that's your belief) or any other deity for that matter if Jesus isn't your "savior" or belief system.

It's not the walls of a building or words in a book that's important. Connect.

 

Unless you live in the Middle East, how don't we have religious freedom?

 

^^Because we're conditioned from an early age to believe that if we don't accept Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior and follow his example, we will burn in hell. So it's extremely difficult to deconvert.

 

Every post of yours is the same. You complain about feeling pressured into acting a certain way, but the only one actually putting pressure on you is yourself.

Do what you want to do, believe what you want to believe. Don't let a book written by a bunch of dead men dictate your life.

 

If I went on a road trip with 12 other guys, I know what I'd do

So I know in my heart (and by heart I mean pants) thats what Jesus did

And Gautama buddha, we all know what he was doing for 40 nights under that tree to get to enlightenment, thats right, chockin the chicken, slappin the salami, jackin the beanstalk

 

Thanks. I appreciate you slapping me awake :sunny:

 

I can't relate. I thought this fear of hell thing was a myth. It's literaly impossible to take it seriously. It's like silly special effects on a B movie with no plot continuity. If there's something more unconvincing than a Democrat vs. Republican political debate, hell would have to be it.

Still not quite convinced. Eggsprog may have a point.

 

People are always going to be trying to pin you down, define you, control you. Doing this makes them feel more in control of what is ultimately an unpredictable and out of control world.

You can't really stop them from doing this. You can't control their actions or thoughts, only your reaction to them.

 

You've never heard of someone being afraid to go to hell for being gay for example?

On an aside: do you tell people in your country that you're atheist? Are atheists perceived as evil/weird?

 

To be quite honest, even if I had, I would have immediately deleted it off my memory banks. I hope yummy gay boys go to hell, because that's where I wanna gooooo.

I suppose I would be confronted for being an atheist, but I am a fiercely private person. I don't go around making a splash about my atheism. Not that I am in the closet about it. In fact, I have no problem owning up to it. For example, I post funny facebook memes ridiculing religion on Facebook. But I WILL NOT give you any room to argue with me about it.

As for everything else, people can think I'm weird all they want. It's no skin off my ass.

 

It would suck if I committed suicide to escape the suffering in life just to suffer in hell. So, I understand what you're saying in that aspect, but as you already know, it's not just Christianity that states we will go to hell if we do not accept the Lord, that and commit suicide. Actually, now that you have inspired me with this post, I'm going to grab a book from the library and see what other religions believe suicide means a one way pass straight to hell. I mean all religions (as far as I have learned) have a deity that needs to be worshipped, so maybe they all have the same convictions regarding suicide.

 

I don't agree with that. I mean I was raised the same way but here I am some 18 years later not conformed and a solo devoted pagan.

I wouldn't be too afraid of hell, it's warm down there. Where you don't want to land is Hel for it is freezing cold down there and instead of a horned asshole there's a ghastly cold and icy goddess who I can only imagine is very very evil and that excites me to class her as one of my top goddesses of the Pagan pantheon. :2thumbsup:

 

How did you shake off that fear?

 

There's no such thing as fire and brimstone hell. It's a fairy tale designed to control people.

It doesn't even make sense. What do they have there that we don't have here?

It doesn't matter what religion you are, just be a good person. Stop wasting time worrying about some fictional place and be more mindful of your actions and who you are as a person in your day to day life.

The only hell that exists is when you don't live righteously and then when you are old all you see is all the fucked up shit you did in your life.

 

I can answer this as I struggled with the same thing when I first stopped believing in God.

Being religious requires faith but I think becoming agnostic or atheist takes a leap of faith too. Once you truly stop believing in Christianity the whole thing just seems ridiculous. Maybe you are just not to that point yet.

Also, I realized at one point if I did worship a god it wouldn't be a god who sends people to hell for stupid reasons. That type of god is shallow and much too human. If I believed in god I would believe in a god who operates outside of silly human emotions and concepts, like wrath and vengeance and punishment

 

I just finished reading the book Love Wins by Rob Bell and actually agree with a lot what he has to say. He argues that hell and heaven aren't just places you go when to die but are ongoing states. Why would people want to commit suicide if hell wasn't a present reality?

To me hell is a psychological negative feedback loop in the mind. You have negative thoughts that cause painful emotions and for some it's never ending. 95% of pain is mental.

I think the concept that hell is a place you go when you die and fire and brimstone preaching has been promoted heavily by the church to control people and consolidate power. It can be very eye opening to read the Bible with an open mind using the right translation. Young's literal is less tampered with.

 

What do you mean by "ongoing states"? Do you mean hell only exist in our minds and there is no such thing as hell? Then what is there instead?

 

I'm really glad the OP made this thread. And I'm glad that someone (Meli) posted some advice that was actually useful (not that some of the other things ppl posted weren't useful as well) and talked about how at some point she went through something similar.

I never went through the exact same thing (going to church and continuing to be a church going Christian because of fear), but I have gone through something similar. To those that say this topic seems impossible and that they were brought up the same way and don't understand it... you may not have grown up the same way and went through the same thing.

I may come back and comment more in this thread and on this topic but for now I will just make a few comments about what I personally went through and what helped me without writing a book. Like many people I grew up going to a Christian church. At first it was no big deal- no super crazy religious parents but when I was about 14 my mom started going to a new church and got.... well, to say it nicely, super into it. Jesus became in a sense her new husband and her LIFE and she, I believe in a well intended way, wanted the same thing for me and my brother and was GOING to get it. We became totally submerged in a (mega) church culture and I had mixed feelings about it. I had to go every week (sometimes more than once a week) and part of me wanted to and liked it and did believe... but a part of me never was really sure if I did and even at the time resented being forced into things. The last day I attended a Christian church, other than a couple xmas's to humor my family, was the last Sun I was 17 years old. During those teenagers years I was in a very odd state of believing and being happy in that but at the same time, never totally believing and buying the whole story. In a very real sense I was stuck in a place of fear and doubt. (for me it kinda rang like.... I wish I Could totally buy this whole thing-but I can't-but what if I'm wrong...because I may be wrong and I really hope I'm not wrong.. I just didn't KNOW and the fear was very real. It wasn't there all the time but it would creep in now and then and be very scary.)

I consider myself someone who is all but 100% (99.95% or so..) de-programmed....cured of that... healed.....whatever you wanna say to describe it and it's truly hard for me to describe what helped me. Time was part of it but also it was just learning about all different sorts of spirituality and religion... I found that I came to some of my own conclusions about what sort of God I would believe could exist and that I'd be interested in knowing or being a part of. Like Meli I also came to believe that any God that would damn someone to Hell for not believing (when we aren't exactly shown proof of what is real, right, correct!) isn't a God I wanted to know anyways. So basically I told myself that any God I would want a part of or to believe in is too loving for that. One thing I did was say a sincere prayer (and I view prayer differently than a lot of ppl-I view it more as just opening the connections between ourselves and God... the universe... our interconnectiveness...) in which I told God that I believe in what I feel is right and if I am wrong it's not because I don't want to be right and to please look at my soul for what it is..the type of person I am and try to be and if I happen to be wrong about anything to not let doubt and disbelief keep me from God. Because I don't think that being honest is wrong (a sin). In any case, and I just let it go.

I KNOW that no loving God would condemn anyone for being wrong and not being able to believe certain things. I had also told myself many times that the bible was written by men and the church and not God and I know that God (which I believe we are all a part of.... but I do not believe it in a literal biblical sense), the God that I do believe in, knows that my spirit is filled with love and good, true things. And I know that that is enough. You just have to come to realize that you are a part of God (if that's what you believe.... for me that's what I believe and what I had to do to help myself. Sure it's diff for everyone!!) and to be confident and believing in the things that you feel are true.

Maybe that won't help you at all but hope it helps you in some way. I totally understand that some people get so deeply submerged in a certain type of dogma that even if you don't believe it, it can mess with your head.

Anyways, said I wasn't going to write a book and I guess I did anyways, lol! Good luck!