Should We Believe In God?
“An intelligent man does not need
the promise of heaven to see the merit in good deeds” ~Anonymous
This quote pretty much sums up my
view on religion and/or God. You don’t need religion to know the difference
between rights and wrong, you need empathy and knowledge.
We study religion through religious texts where we learn about different aspects of right and wrong, life and death and everything in between through various stories. Essentially like history books. History books teach us about a world that we know of; Religious text teaches us about a world beyond us.
From the beginning of mankind’s
existence, we have been curious about ourselves and the world around us. At
first we didn’t understand much so anything beyond our grasp was believed to be
controlled by other-worldly powers. We soon termed this power as ‘God’. This
power did both good and bad things for us. As an example, the early Egyptians
had a rain God called Tefnut. Rain obviously helped their crops for which they
would thank Tefnut. But when the Nile would flood due to heavy rains the people
would think they had done something wrong for which Tefnut had punished them.
Overtime, we became not only
curious, but questioning as well. We also found answers. In today’s time, there’s
hardly anything that we humans don’t know about, well except afterlife… and
this is where religion has it strongest hold. It’s funny how we have managed to
scan the near entirety of the galaxies, measure the deepest trenches on Earth
and yet not know what lies beyond the grave.
This is where religion comes into
play. All religious texts mention afterlife. All religions promise some sort of
reward to the soul, whose life was led by the right morals, ideals and deeds.
Each religion also specifies what these right and wrong ideals are.
There are many things in our
world that support and disprove the existence of God. All things that disprove
the existence of God are things that we know of and understand: The Big Bang
Theory and The Evolution Theory are two of the most important theories in
relation to our existence. The former explains the creation of our solar system
and the latter explains how humans came about. While these are only theories,
they have been formed with extensive research and have a lot of evidence to
support it, if not prove it. If proven, these theories will invalidate every
religion’s creation story. They’re a pretty big deal.
All things that support the
existence of God are things we do not understand of know enough of: Afterlife,
religious texts, religious experience, NDE’s etc. For each of these things
mentioned there are billions of questions and few answers. I will mention some
of my favourite questions to better explain what I’m trying to say:
·
Is death the departing of the soul or the
shutting down of bodily functions? Or both?
·
Is ‘meeting God’ a feeling that may have been
induced by someone themselves?
·
Why do we pin everything we don’t understand on
God?
·
Do non-believers think everything we don’t
understand is wrong or imagined?
·
Why do people have different NDE experiences? Is
it based on your religion?
·
Who wrote all the religious texts? Are they
really the word of God?
But not all of believing in God
is based on not understanding. The Cosmological Argument and William Paley’s
‘Pocket watch’ are two very good arguments for the existence of God. Like the
other two mentioned, they are just theories, but have solid reasoning and
certain logic to them. The Cosmological Argument uses the concept of cause and
effect to explain the creation of this world and us in it. It states that
everything has a cause as we keep questioning each effect we will ultimately
reach the ‘First Cause’: God. The ‘pocket watch’ is a bit simpler and easier to
relate to. William Paley, philosopher, makes the analogy of a pocket watch
being like the universe, where every needs the other to work perfectly. Like
the pocket watch, our world is intricate and so it must have a designer: this
designer being ‘God’. These theories cannot be proved, but they haven’t been
disproven either.
Aside from the fact that the
existence of God is highly questionable, there comes the idea of belief and
faith. Maybe the concept of God was introduced for there were no law-enforcers
during that time and some people were just going out of hand. But God is not
traditionally meant to be a law-enforcer who is feared. He has been described
as omnibenevolent (all-loving). He promises consequences for wrong deeds but
essentially loves every one of his creations. In fact, if you are truly
remorseful, he will forgive you. People who don’t have much love in their lives
might find hope and solace in this ‘fact’ about God.
Besides being loving, God is also
omnipotent (all-powerful) and omniscient (all-knowing). Both of these ensure
that God knows what is wrong in the world and has the power to fix it. Many of
us might find that the second part of this has not really happened. They say
‘God helps those who help themselves’, so maybe once we truly work for change
it will happen. In any case, all these descriptions give believers hope and
this is what they thrive for. In a world which is so broken, some of us decide
to look up to a higher power from which they (supposedly) derive power and
courage.
Religions can be a bit outdated
(and dare I say… wrong?) : The Catholic rule of homosexuals being sinners; the
Islamic rule of polygamy being legal; the Hindu rule that widows must shave off
their hair after the husband dies. Overall, all religions teach us what is
right and wrong. They don’t just state it, they explain through various fables
and epic stories, so people truly understand what the message is.
To believe or not to believe,
that is the question. Well, I can’t force anyone and no one can force me. Since
God cannot entirely be proven/disproven so all we can do is believe/not
believe. You can believe in God even when it’s been
disproven.
Just a few pointers that go along
with God and religion: Don’t make your religion your ultimate moral compass.
It’s not moral if it doesn’t come from within. Educate yourself and make your
decisions based on what you know. Religion/belief is a very private part of
your personality; keep it that way. Don’t advertise it, and don’t criticise
based on it. Don’t even force your family into it. Follow the quote at the very
beginning of this writing. Listen to your conscience: the one that riddles you
with guilt when you litter, or ups your self-esteem when you do something nice.
God doesn’t have to be a scary otherworldly power; he can be the tiny voice in
the clearing of your heart.
Look at it this way: without
religion, we would have no fun weddings or festivals.
