I was raised as a Catholic, as is the norm in RoI, but quickly started to move away from the religion as an adult.
It was strange, because on the one hand, my Mother was pretty devout, but my Father as a committed Socialist was kind of caught between 2 stools so to speak.
As he was by far the biggest influence on me as a child and young man, I slowly went down the route of becoming a "lapsed Catholic", which I find a peculiar phrase.
So I have a situation where I say I've left the Church, but the Church says I can never leave having been Baptised into the faith, to which I say, f**k off.
I suppose I'm more of an Agnostic than an Atheist, and the main reason for me leaving the RCC was that I don't believe religion should be based on guilt.
I believe that religion should be a celebration of life, but the RCC, at least in Ireland is all about control through guilt to me.
It causes a bit of friction when I go home to visit; I refuse to go to Mass, and won't take part in any religious activities, which doesn't go down well with the more devout family members, who think maybe I should just go along to get along, but to me that would be hypocrisy.
So I don't follow a religion, I'm not exactly a "believer", but I'm not really an Atheist either.
I suppose the reason for being an agnostic, is that I find it equally strange of people to say "there is definitely a God" and "there is definitely no God".
There's no certainty, there is only belief, and on a personal level, we understand so little about our Universe, that it seems arrogant to me to dismiss anything.
We don't really know the size or extent of our Universe, we have theories about multiverse, and just on a single question, we have no idea what makes up the vast majority of the Universe around us, not being able to detect around 90% of it.
That question alone, about Dark Matter (and the various spin offs) means we cannot possibly begin to understand the nature of the Universe.
Yes we've made some progress with the Universe as we perceive it, or the "observable to us" part of it, but the reality is that that is a tiny fraction of what is out there.
So it's entirely possible that there is a God, just as it's entirely possible the Universe is a Hologram.
Which begs the question of "Is what we think of as God, merely the creator of a holographic Universe?"
It's a minefield of metaphysics, and better men (and women) than me have struggled with similar questions throughout the history of mankind, but it's also kind of fun.
And that's where I am today.
Logged