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I followed / checked out / believed in, several others first. Reincarnation, etc. Then for a time in my life I was driving at 3PM everyday, and began to listen to the "Bible Answer Man" on the radio. (It was the host before the one now, Walter Martin.) Everyday he would take and answer questions, often really 'touch' questions - and I was amazed that there were soooo many answers!!
Also, I thought more about reincarnation - thinking if that were true, then the population should be shrinking (as more souls finally 'graduate' or something) - and that societies and mankind should be improving, getting better (as our souls 'advanced' in earthly experience or whatever) and yet they didn't seem to be, and the 'karma' element didn't seem to 'add up' - because if one did something bad to another, was the victim really 'attracting' that, or 'owed' that somehow? I couldn't make the 'math' work any longer.
As I listened and learned more about Christianity (from a non-denominational view) I was able to see the big picture and how awesome and amazing it really is.
And, that was about 30 years ago, the rest is 'history' as they say.....
This is just a general question for anyone who believes in a religion. What criteria did you use to decide that out of all the religions in the world, the one you are currently following is the right one?
I’m a Christian. More specifically, I’m a Latter-day Saint (LDS), aka “Mormon.”
I’m LDS for several reasons. For the first 18 or so years of my life, I suppose you could say that I was LDS because I lived in my parents’ home and was raised by practicing LDS parents. For the next 20 to 25 years of my life, I was LDS because I was comfortable with the things I’d always been taught, and found no reason to question them. For the last 20 or so years (let’s say from about my early 40s to the present), I’ve chosen Mormonism for the following reasons:
1. I have found that Mormonism’s answers to the following questions to be more satisfying than any other answers I’ve heard:
Where did I come from?
Why am I here?
Where am I going after death?
2. I am uplifted by the teachings of Mormonism. I know that I have a Father in Heaven who knows me personally and loves me deeply. I don’t believe that He sees me as a depraved and wicked creation but as a daughter who is on an extended trip away from Him, who He wants desperately to return to His presence.
3. I like Mormonism’s understanding of the nature of God, of the Father’s relationship to the Son and of my relationship to them. I like that the God I believe in wants me to know Him and not see Him as an unapproachable, incomprehensible essence that I should worship but not understand.
4. I love Mormonism’s approach to the age-old dilemma of how it is only through Jesus Christ that we can be saved, but that, at the same time, there are billions who have died without everhaving had the opportunity to know of His gospel. The God I believe in and the gospel that I embrace has provided a means for all mankind to hear, understand and accept the gospel of Jesus Christ.
5. I am comforted by Mormonism’s teachings about the afterlife. It is such a wonderful thing to be able to have the faith that the family I love here in mortality will still be my family when we are all resurrected.
6. Mormonism has made me an infinitely better person than I would be without it.
The basic criterion was the difference I saw between the articulation of the "golden rule" in which the version of doing to others what you would want them nto do for you stood out as a proactive choice rather than a tit for tat choice.
I don't feel like I chose my religion but rather it chose me. I had left Christianity and for 20 years was quite happy as an Atheist. Never explored any further into religions, saw no purpose in doing so. Than a personal experience occurred that convinced me Allaah(swt) was real and I was Muslim only I did not know it until that moment.
This is just a general question for anyone who believes in a religion. What criteria did you use to decide that out of all the religions in the world, the one you are currently following is the right one?
ALL religion is man-made. I follow the Bible and not any denomination.
I was raised and educated in the strict Catholicism of the 1950-60s, so have a solid background in Christianity.
Christianity didn't answer my questions to my satisfaction. So I turned away from it and tried different paths. None of the man-made religions with their "holy" books made much sense. Eastern thought and mysticism teased with promise - that perhaps more discipline on my part would have become something more - but didn't.
My spirit led me to Nature which led me to Animism - which is a belief system, rather than a religion.
Till I read a Christian prophecy book teaching of One True God of which mankind is involved in His Prophecies
of how world events are turning out. Even though I had Christian relatives. They never had, or have they ever effected me as that book did. So I started searching out this One True God for myself. And now His way consume my beliefs.
And I am satisfied with seeing the world the way His prophecies are recorded for present and future events.
And to know that I am a part of it, is more wonderful to me.
OK? and that proves what? In my rural community in the middle of nowhere the predominant religion is "nothing-ism". Or a cultural Christianity where they do nothing but attend church now and then, get married in a church, and their funeral in a church. For all intents and purposes they might as well be any other religion.
I suppose my point is that I doubt any current believer in religion will post here admitting that it was being born into a Christian society that most influenced his/her decision to be a Christian.
This despite the fact that cultural assimilation is the most predominant reason people believe what they do.
Instead, they'll have all kinds of mystical reasons - from being overcome with the "spirit" to having God walk into the room. But it won't be because of their culture. Nope.
And I'm not just picking on Christians here - it's the same for Muslims, Hindus, and any other religion. Even non-deity religions like Buddhism.
Atheism is really the only belief system that cannot be attributed to culture - unless you live in Albania. Independent theism comes in at a close second.
But people won't admit to cultural assimilation (and peer pressure) because that would suggest that it wasn't some inherent Truth about their religion that got them hooked.
Sure, some people do convert from one religion to another - or move from belief to non-believe and vice-versa.
But by and large, almost every nation has a strong majority religion, and that is because of all the cultural pressures placed upon us to adopt whatever religion is prevalent. There are a few exceptions, but this is usually because of heavy migration patterns (France becoming increasingly Muslim isn't due to thousands of French Christians converting to Islam, but because of immigration).
Where I currently live, I'd probably be lynched if anyone thought I was a Muslim, for instance, and I'd have to drive at least 60 miles to find the nearest mosque. I couldn't even tell you where the nearest synagogue is, but even in this little town of approximately 400 people, there are no less than a dozen churches in and around town. So where do you think kids will end up going to worship? Yeah, a church.
There isn't a lot of access to non-Christian faiths unless you live in a city with a lot of multi-culturalism (something that is almost totally absent from small town America).
You could move and people do to be near their religious affiliations. I don't think I live in a huge city but we have a mosque near us and a temple.
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