The Republic of Heaven

I'm an agnostic. I would really like to believe in a god but i just can't really get my head round it.

Also there is always the problem of what God to believe in. After all ancient greeks were prepared to kill and die for their Gods and now there isn't even a suggestion that those Gods could be real. What makes the current lot of Gods any different? There isn't anything to suggest that they won't also be forgotten in time.
The idea of hell is another big issue for me. It doesn't make sense to have a benevolent God to send people to a place of eternal torment. Also, assuming the only way of getting to heaven is to believe in the "true" God peoples fates are pretty predetermined. If you live in a country where a certain religion is prominent then you'll be exposed to it and maybe follow it but if you aren't then it would be really unlikely. Then it isn't really fair to send them to hell.

One thing thats really weird is that pretty much all myths/religions are the same. Most cultures have a myth of the flood, just a different name for Noah which suggests to me that some of it's true.

And just because i love paradoxes: Could an omnipotent God create a stone that is too heavy for him to lift?

@Tyche

Yeah, and if you've read the (christian)bible, you have probably noticed that some of the stuff in there is pretty loony...

there's one about killing babies and pregnant women even...


HAHA, love those as well:P
Another one:

"Could god nuke a burrito so hot he himself could not eat it?"

For me it was a case of experiencing a change of beliefs and then being ready to read HDM. Embarrassingly, I used to be the closed-minded variety of Christian (I hope my wording makes it clear that I'm suggesting that there are open-minded ones as well!). Five or so years ago when I had been originally interested in reading the books, I read about the ideology in some forum which put me off reading them because I was a good li'l Christian at the time. Within the past several years, I got tired of trying to reconcile Christianity with feminism (among other things) and gradually reached a point of being pretty much agnostic.

I regret not having read the books sooner, but at the same time, I think it was a good thing that I read them when I did, because they might not have affected me so deeply if I'd been scandalized by the anti-religious aspects. Reading them when I did made me more, well, comfortable with the conclusions that I had already come to about my beliefs.

There had been spiritual tension for me long before I read HDM. This book wasn't the main reason I don't call myself a christian anymore. Right now, I really don't have any one set of beliefs, I just believe there's something beyond this life, just not any right path or definition.

I am a christian and HDM hasn't altered my beliefs and it is my favourite set of books.

I think that it made me think about god more.

That's basically the main reason I love HDM so much. Pullman and I are kindred spirits when it comes to spirituality, theology, philosophy, whatever you want to call it (not religion). I love the idea of your body and soul going to become one with the universe.

I call myself agnostic because atheist just doesn't seem to really fit me. But I definitely don't believe in God. Well a traditional God. We are our own Gods of course, or I could call the collective universe God I guess, but not God as in some all powerful puppet master, living my life for me.

Nor do I believe in some collective consciousness, it seems to be so popular within the older generations of free thinkers, I attribute it to all the acid in the '60s.

I definitely don't believe in destiny, and there is no true right and wrong, good and evil, its all in perspective.

What do I believe. I believe in what I can see, touch, feel, taste, and even more than that the soul. I can feel that more powerfully than the keyboard beneath my fingers.

I could ramble forever...

I used to describe myself as atheist, but now that I've read HDM and done "research" on PP and stuff, I think I'm the sort of atheist-agnostic he describes himself as being.

To clarify...

I believe that you cannot prove the existance of God with the facts we have right now, and there is much more evidence against it; maybe there is one but we can't know for sure from the evidence we have. I'd rather believe there is none.

There are a lot of posts in this thread I agree with, but I chose to quote these because they sum up my beliefs in a nutshell. I also like Gabrobot's post on page 1. To me, it's obvious that the universe could be created with the functional constants like the speed of light, gravity, etc. that allow life. For all we know, the Big Bang could have happened 175,000 times, and each time the universe collapsed, but then on the 175,001st time, it worked. The existence of a deity doesn't simplify the mystery of the universe's creation, because it's just as illogical that a deity could appear out of nowhere. But wotever, I'm not radically opposed to the idea of a deity creating the universe or directing evolution. Currently, we have no way to disprove that. But when you deny that evolution happened in favor of creationism despite the evidence ... that doesn't make sense. That which I perceive myself or discover through my own reasoning is much more convincing than a two-thousand year old book.

In my personal religion (services held every 3rd Tuesday from 4-7pm) there is only one sin.

Performing any act which you personally consider immoral.

Hmm, Do I believe in God? I think about this all the time, sometimes unintentionally, but the best I can answer is a quote from Phil Collins (I'm a big Genesis fan, but I can't really stand the guy's solo stuff). He said that he likes to think there is someone or something "keeping score" somewhere, but he doesn't go out and give thanks to it or worship it or anything. I liked that thought and that's stuck with me ever since.

I have a serious problem with the way that the Church proclaims that you will only go to Heaven if you really, truly believe in (and give yourself to) God. That to me sounds like "Believe in me or else". I think if they still do that now (no idea on what used to be called R.E. when I was at school), then that is nothing short of bullying or terrifying youngsters into it. How can that be right? I wrote a quote from Hitchiker's Guide to Galaxy in another thread, but a part of that still rings true here - God is told "...without faith you are nothing" and I really believe that. If God is somewhere within each of us, then that leaves whatever fates we may face up to us, but if there is one and only, like a big cheese shepherd, then I guess that 100% faith thing will leave him with a lesser percentage of Mankind, because do even the really devout have total faith or do the ever have an element of doubt, or raise questions if a loved one is tragically killed prematurely (How could a God let this happen?)

I've only been to church services once or twice, when I was very small (that I know of, anyway). I've no idea if my parents wanted me to be a catholic or whatever - I've never been bothered to ask because it doesn't bother me at all. Sure, I had to fill in questionaires at some point, and under Religion I would either leave blank, or, when pushed, write Jedi, but I think Agnostic would probably suit me best. I keep meaning to look up the pros and cons of Humanism, as to me people in the present are surely more important than anything when I've snuffed it? But there again you see is the classic catch-22 - you won't know till you do keel over, and by then you can't really report back to anyone else (and around here, if you went around saying "I've seen the Afterlife, and God doeslook like Charlton Heston, they wouldn't even let you home for your pyjamas..)

I have seen one unexplainable thing though. I saw a full matchbox move by itself 8" across a TV top, with another witness, but that to me is not any proof of an existence of a supreme being. I don't even know what kind of evidence would convince me, in the same way as most UFO sceptics won't accept em unless they land on the Whitehouse lawn and do something entertaining to Bush, but I can say I'll keep an open mind on it, listen to other people's opinions, but I don't know what'll change me. Anyway, it could be that all our lives are predetermined from birth; every single thing is mapped out. I do believe that every thing happens for a reason though, even the tiniest event, and that includes random events like "freak" tornadoes in Manchester etc, rather than divine warnings. I believe fundementally that I was meantto read HDM, as my friend Lee could've easily leant me any other of her zillion books. I believe that the day after I completed TAS I was meant to see a 5 minute trailer for GC on morning tv - 10 seconds either way and I'd have missed it. Erm, if anything is keeping score, I'm grateful for this one guys!

Heaven or Hell? Well, if everything is predetermined,and there is a God, then I was screwed years ago.... or having written this I'll be crushed by an over-amorous cow tomorrow!

If there is a spectrum of agnosticism, I would consider myself to be on the spiritual end. I am open to the possibility that there could be a source of love and understanding that is beyond my comprehension.
Just because the Authority claimed to be God, that doesn't mean that he was. And just because someone claims to understand God, that doesn't mean that they do.
Although I can see that there is truth to be found in the stories of many religions, I have never been able to follow any religion that claims to be The Only Way.

HDM didn't really affect my beliefs, but it did make me have less fear of those who claim to know the One True Answer that Cannot Be Questioned and would try to use that claim to control me.

My son received a scary chain e-mail yesterday that claimed that if he didn't forward it to 10 people, then someone would appear and kill him in his sleep. He recognised it as ridiculous and deleted it, but it still left him a bit anxious at bedtime. He overcame his anxiety by talking about how he was going to go up to the classmate who forwarded it to him and tell him that he deleted it and say "Ha, I'm still here."
That is how I felt reading HDM, even though I only went to church a few times as a child I was bit anxious about confronting someone who claimed to be God, but the ending gave me reason to say "Ha!" to anyone who uses fear and superstition to gain power.

Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because if there be one he must approve of the homage of reason more than that of blindfolded fear.
-Thomas Jefferson

I don't believe in God(s). His Dark Materials didn't have anything to do with it; I happen to enjoy The Chronicles of Narnia as well. Neither affected my beliefs.

I'm an atheist humanist and one of the things that has helped me realise that's what I was all along without knowing the term for it was reading authors like Pullman, Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett - they are not afraid to acknowledge that some people believe in God but show that humans can have motives and morals without one.

However, I've always been interested in religion and one of those atheists Dawkins resents for respecting religions even though I don't believe myself - but only up to a point, not affecting people in a negative way. I think learning about different ideas and cultures makes people more understanding and I've even considered going into Religious Education / Ethics and Philosophy if I go back to teaching.

Just a brief point here; whilst I adore PP, his metaphysic in the books is somewhat confused, both philosophically and theologically speaking. I'm glad he continues to inspire atheistic discussion but his work is in no way consistant or coherent in this fashion. I haven't read far back on this thread so I don't know if you get this or not but I thought I'd put my theology degree to some use! haha