Does anyone think religions r man made? But believe in God? Does anyone not believe in God? Does anyone believe there religion is not man made?
127612
All religions are man-made. They were necessary as the original laws of behavior of peoples of a community. There needed to be some "Chief of Police" with the power and authority to enforce the man-made laws, and that Chief of Police needed to have powers that would make most people tremble at the thought of violating the laws. So, god was created with man-made rewards (heaven), and punishment (hell) to herd the people in the way the elder men (they were all men) thought best for an organized society.\n\nHeaven is a necessary concept for many people, especially for those who are being daily crapped on here on earth, and receive promise that things will get better if they only keep behaving and accept their plight in life.
192875
Wouldn't it be great if there were smarter questions than this one?\n\nNo, not everyone believes in God. By having one religion will only lead to conflict and suffering. There will always be people with different beliefs and/or non-beliefs. Having one religion for over 6 billion people is crazy. Grow up.
219424
You have to remember that religion is man-made.  Who knows, maybe none of them are really right...maybe they all are.  Here is a link that was posted in another question, and the link to a religion and ethics page.  Maybe these will help you in your search.  I hope you find answers that your heart and mind are happy with. :)
293921
Yes I believe in God, but not the way traditional Christians do.  I'm a Gnostic Christian.
106051
There is no one god, no argument with that. Does it prove that every single other claim by any religious system is false? Not necessarily. All the flaws you pointed out refer only to the axiom of single omnipotent entity. How about the collective of entitites who created the universe together, without actually creating the man, at least not intentionally? Just a suggestion, no brainwashing intended here.\nSome people have taken the modern science as a god of its own, and refer to it just as religiously as Muslims to their\ngod. I suppose this god has to be more benign, but that is not the point. How was Stonehenge built? The Pyramids?\nWhat happened a single second before the big bang? To my mind, science doesn't give satisfactory answers to those questions because it is intent on the materialistic view, rejecting the interactions of several kinds of energies.\nScientific assumptions are not invalid, they are just, in my opinion, part of the greater whole, of the science that encompasses everything that has been discovered, and more.\nIn the same way, I can see a seed of wisdom in certain religions, without accepting them as the whole truth.\nTo me, any inflexible outlook on the world, being totally monetheistic, or totally scientific, is inaccurate. Binary thinking, black versus white, is a the kids thinking mode. Adults ought to realize the world is more complex than that. And yes, there can be a Democrate who is a Republican. I would probably vote for such, because he would share some of the Republican opinions that I welcome, and some of the Democratic ones, that I would approve of.\n(Our problem is that there is no such person currently, we always choose one extreme or the other). T.S. Elliot said it's a property of the brilliant mind to contain two contradictory notions at the same time. At the same time, this is my own addition, inability to do so, is the trait of the younger mind. Not a worse one, just a younger one.\nThe fundamentalistic view of the Muslims is based on their inability to operate with complex notions. It is all about\nus versus the enemy, even if "us" happen to abuse us. Good versus bad, "we" being the good of course. And so on. Brainwashing is easier accomplished when the mind decids it wants simple explanations to anything, and is too rigid to accept any other. In main stream religions, Muslims are guilty of it more than most, no matter what the politically correct approach says. But they are not the only ones. Communists, Atheists, Democrates and other monotheistic religions are just as guilty of it, and there are many other kinds of thinking categorically.\nThe point is, don't dismiss everything, just because one crucial point of their creed fails. Or else, you're being just as inflexible in your mode of thinking as they're in theirs. Would you reject all mysteries of the world just because God doesn't exist? Would you believe in science as blindy as they believe in their god? What is then the difference between you? Are scientists not real people? Don't they write their dissertations to prove what they intend to prove? How many of them can be completely, inhamanly, objective when one of their baby projects is challenged? Some of them have simply different techniques of brainwashing. If they decide the string theory is looking good, how many scientific publications would be allowed that claim differently?  How different are some of them from the preaching pastors? Just food for thought, no attempt to convert, I don't really have anything to convert you to. LOL.
624727
Simple. It's more than just not believing in a god. It's living my life without a god or religion telling me how to do it. I believe I can live a succesful and happy life without thinking some god is going to help me. I also think that religion spreads hate, fear and oppression. \n\nThanks for asking!
583124
(Note: I was raised Catholic and now consider myself agnostic.)My observations of religion throughout history:  Religion has always been there.  All religions give guidelines for how to live life.  Many people have died for the sake of religious beliefs.\n\nReligion has always been there...  How many religions (including all of the "extinct" religions) have there been?  How many do you worship?  Do you really have reason to believe that yours is the right religion?  Haven't you noticed that most children worship the same religion as their parents?\n\nAll religions give guidelines as how to live life...  the 10 commandments: dont kill, dont steal...   Yup that these types of things sound good to me.  Did I really need a list of things I should not do?  What about torture?  Why isn't that on the list?  Through education I developed a moral compass and a concious.  A way of knowing what is right and wrong.\n\nMany people have died for the sake of religious beliefs... This is my beef with religion.  It unites those within it, but it divides those of the different religions.  If its such a good thing why do so many die in its name?\n\nSo why am I not atheist?  I honestly don't know if there is a God or not.  Maybe God did create everything and is now on the sidelines.  I hope their is a God.  I really do.  My dad's passing was one of the hardest experiences of my life.  I hope he was not reduced to nothingness.  Still I must be honest with myself.  I DONT KNOW.  Anyone who says they do is lieing in my opinion.  If they did really know then it is no longer a question of faith.  Sure if I met God I'd worship him/her/it/them.  But I'm not going to blindly follow ANYTHING, much less something as powerful as religion.\n\nIf there is a God and they stand in judgement upon a person's death I do not believe that God will care if we went to church on Sunday, gave money to the church, or repented before our death.  They will care how we lived our life.  Did we try to improve the lives of the people around us?  Did we try to do the right thing?  Did we treat others as we wish to be treated?  And if there is this judgement followed by a heaven/hell, I believe I will be meeting my dad in heaven.  Until then I will try to do the right thing, not because of religion, but because ITS THE RIGHT THING TO DO.
11350
All religion is made up.  All religious concepts were created by man.  Limbo is a myth.  Christianity is a myth.  The bible is fiction.
631440
FYI I'm a Christian...if you read any history at all, religion has been around since humans became in existence.  Every culture discovered by archeologist's has had some form of a God.  From the ancient Aztecs, ancient Egyptians, and the Mesopotamians. The Majority of humans on this earth (87%) believe in one God or another...their "religion".  It is only the Atheist who do not believe in any power greater than themselves.  Pretty weird.
488230
God didn't make varying sets of rules for different religions. Man made all religions but one, and made his own rules for each. God made a set of rules for HIS religion, the one true one.
410564
religion is part of who we are....it is the only thing that can never be "eliminated" as you say. Sorry to know you don't think God is real...
323045
In my opinion there has to exisit some kind of god to explain the unexplained.  I mean we all were'nt created out of nothing.. something had to start the ball rolling and in my mind the somthing was god/allah/buddah.\n\nI think religion is a different story of the same entity.  Unfortunately some have chosen to use religion as a scapegoat to be greedy & violent.
669249
If they are more intelligent than us,then why would they believe in something they have NEVER seen.Why would they believe something that as been written by human beings.Why does anybody believe in something that can't be proven.They would think that religious people,who believe in this Great God that is supposed to be so powerful he can do anything,are completely bonkers because,If this God is so powerful why does he let so many  people on this Earth suffer in so many ways ????
498660
Definitely, and that applies to all other religions as well.\nIn order to stay in power, all religious leaders will tell\nyou to believe that their god is the true god which makes\nme believe that god was actually created by man. So.\nwhat does it make us?
41681
I believe religion is man made and spirituality is God made.\nToo many man made religious beliefs and rules, spirituality is the relationships between man and God.
192528
It's true that people have created gods to try to help them make sense of the world around them and life in general, but i wouldn't go as far as to call man god. Since we are limited in  the things we can do compared to all the things imagined gods are able to do. You might be able to argue that man is his own god, but in the sense the question is asked i would have to answer no.
178501
I believe in God but not in the traditional sense. To be honest, I've asked your very same question many times before. To understand it, I looked around me to see the natural order of life; how things worked and the cycles there are. Personally, I don't believe we were created in God's image. I don't believe that we are his only creation or his/her greatest creation, for that matter. The way I choose to view creation is simple; every thing is purpose oriented. Like a sports team, every player/ component/ creature, is an equally important part. Our lives however grand or simple, are part of an incomprehensible mass of life called creation. Creation being every thing from the stars to the microscopic germs on our hands. All things are of different masses and scales. The only thing that all things share is that, they exist. Think of it this way; solar systems are comprised of planets, galaxies comprised of solar systems, a universe comprised of galaxies. We and the world we live in are a small piece of possibly an infinite space. I don't know what our purpose is in life but all I know is, we are supposed to be alive. Every piece of all creation, is like a gear in a machine; each gear turning the other to make some thing move or react. It would be very egotistical and narrow-minded to believe that we are all that there is. Especially considering there is evidence to support the contrary. Every time you see a dog, bird, cat, cow, worm, what ever, that tells you that we're not all that there is. Heck, every time more dinosaur fossils are dug-up, that proves there was life, long before we existed. So we are just another in a long line of creatures. No more or no less special than our predecessors or our future successors. I view our lives as part of an experiment. God wants to know what we'll do; what things we will discover; what horrors we will create, how long we will last, how far we will take our selves. To what end? I don't know. But we, like every thing else, exists to simply live. We do what we want with our life. In my opinion, God does not feel good or bad about the things we do. He/she wants to know how things pan out. We're important to he/she because we are a part of him/her. God is some thing we cannot really understand. God is our creator but beyond that, that's all we know. What is the use of God, you ask? What is the use of anything? To me, to be alive is use enough. We have the ability to do great things. Our lives are what we make of them. God or the idea of God, perhaps is a constant reminder that there is always some thing beyond what we know. In a way, that guides us to the answers to our questions. Well, that's not a diffinitive answer in the least but I'll say this; if I did have the answer, I'd be a very rich man!