Above All Else
The Serial Blogmoirs of Christov Smith
Part 2
**The following blog contains events that may be sensitive to some readers, should they be the people that Im writing about. No names or places are ever mentioned, and your privacy is secure. I am merely writing about these events to expand on my personal life.**
I was born into a Christian family, I guess you could say. My mother is Christian. My dad was Christian, but Its hard to describe I suppose the word Christian can be taken different ways by different people. My oldest brother is Christian. My other brother, definitely isnt. I went to a Christian school from Kindergarten to grade 11. In grade 12 I moved to my local public school, merely due to money issues (and the fact that I was going to be forced to take an unnecessary 3rd and 4th science course in grade 12, because the school offered no other courses).
I spent 20 years of my life in a christian environment. My friends were Christian, my family was Christian, I went to church, youth group, various other Christian events, and there was even a mandatory Bible class in school.
I stopped going to church 4 years ago (ish), because I didnt have time. Pathetic excuse, I know.
I guess you could say that this is me coming out, but no Im not gay. Im coming out to everyone saying that I really dont share your faith.
Dont get me wrong, I believe in God. I am definitely not an atheist. I believe in God, not because people tell me to, not because a book tells me to, but for deep personal reasons. And maybe because it gives me hope that theres an afterlife proceeding this pathetic one that were living. I may write about those reasons in another blog someday, the truth is that its something I still have to sort out for myself.
All that said, I dont believe in the Bible. I dont believe in Jesus, and Im not going to spend this whole blog trying to justify this to the world, because Im not trying to make you change your faith. You are absolutely allowed to believe whatever you want, as long as it doesnt negatively affect anyone else. Though I will point out some key factors in my change of faith.
Lets start with the shallower end of things:
-There are a LOT of christian (and similarly faithed) ass-holes. Theres a lot of atheist ass-holes too, and everyone in between. I suppose its my bias because I know so many Christians that they stand out to me. This was a reason I just wanted away from the stigma of being a Christian. But, I suppose, it had no effect on my actual faith.
-Ive watched lives around me fall apart. Like this soap opera: My pastors wife cheated on him with the (much younger and very close friend of mine) worship pastor, they have some kids and are now divorced. That seems to have been a significant catalyst in the downfall of that church, which was once 350 people strong, and dropped as low as 30. Not long after these events did an absolutely ridiculous thing happen. (I know that I dont know the whole story, but this is the way I got it. Either way I still dearly love everyone involved.) My youth pastor who was engaged to be married was seen, out for a very late dinner with an old -female- friend of his. Someone blew this out of proportion, Im sure. I have no idea who. You see, its bad to have friends of the opposite sex, and everything you do with them must come under great scrutiny. It somehow turned into he cheated on her, and of course once someone said that, there was no going back, and he was gone. I didnt see him for a long time, maybe a year or more. I know he had a very dark time in his life during that period. Then we became pretty good friends for a while, having late night beers, wine and cigars pretty often. I will always fondly think back to those days. NOW both parties are happily married, Im pleased to say, with very wonderful spouses, and I couldnt be happier for the 4 of them! But my point is, crazy ridiculous things happen because of the strange rules that some people believe to be part of being a Christian. 6 inch rule anyone?
I know that the last one didnt seem that shallow but it didnt really have an effect on my faith. The following are things that are really what made me not believe.
-Something that Ive always thought since I was a kid, but merely shrugged of because people told me to, is that fact that the scripture was written by humans. Then copied by humans, God knows how many times, adjusted ever so slightly each time. Each person putting their own notes in, to be then copied by the next person. Then translated by another. Then some people decided which scriptures belong in gods word, some people. See a pattern? Ive said that Ive heard God telling me to do things, say things, act a certain way. Did he really? I dont know, probably not. Hes probably busy building another universe from scratch, thinking Jesus Christ, these guys over-think things way too much!
-Ive seen very little evidence that the stories told in the bible were true. Or that Jesus even existed. And this all comes back to the same thing as the last point. Every fact I hear supporting Jesus being truth, or Jesus being false, are all passed down from various sources. I have watched Zeitgeist, and it raises some interesting points, most of which are complete garbage, and completely falsified. Ive also watched things disproving Zeitgeist most of which do the exact same thing, just spew out information and expect viewers to believe. Ive searched for any information I think I can trust in regards to any of this. I have found none that I can trust. It is always somebody saying something, passed from someone else, that is probably a lie.
Let me tell you a little about our universe.
Everything that has mass has a gravitational pull. Thus the sun being bigger than the earth, is pulling the earth towards it, luckily for us our planet is caught in its orbit and the gravitational pull is keeping us at a safe distance from the sun. The same thing happened with our moon, its caught in our gravitational pull and is now orbiting us, and thus goes on with the rocks orbiting the moon. If I jumped out in space, I would have a gravitational pull as well. I would be dead, but I would still have mass warranting the gravitational pull.
Now, this expands outwards as well. Obviously theres countless suns in the universe. And this applies to all however many duodecillions (its a word, look it up) of them there are. Theres planets orbiting them, and moons orbiting the planets, and smaller things orbiting them.
One hitch in this though, is that the universe is expanding, moving outwards. Everything is being pulled apart. Sort of like stretching out silly putty. It doesnt really make sense, but its there and its happening. What is this force? I see it happening but I cant explain it (apparently no one else can too). To me that is God. That is what I believe in.
I believe in science, as an organic and growing entity, though not possible without something to start it.
Weve all heard someone say Believing in the big bang is just as crazy as believing in God! well it goes the other way too. As far as Im concerned God created the big bang, and said Oh shit, good luck with that! Or if not the big bang, whatever it was that caused our universe to form. We will probably never know exactly how it all started. Things we discover will constantly change the way we see the universe for decades to come.
I just hope that space travel comes during my lifetime. That will be exciting.
CHRISTOVIX
EDIT: I Found this video at the wonderful Wimp.com It explains a little better, what I was talking about with the universe expanding.
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ATwVApurIQ4[/YOUTUBE]
The Serial Blogmoirs of Christov Smith
Part 2
**The following blog contains events that may be sensitive to some readers, should they be the people that Im writing about. No names or places are ever mentioned, and your privacy is secure. I am merely writing about these events to expand on my personal life.**
I was born into a Christian family, I guess you could say. My mother is Christian. My dad was Christian, but Its hard to describe I suppose the word Christian can be taken different ways by different people. My oldest brother is Christian. My other brother, definitely isnt. I went to a Christian school from Kindergarten to grade 11. In grade 12 I moved to my local public school, merely due to money issues (and the fact that I was going to be forced to take an unnecessary 3rd and 4th science course in grade 12, because the school offered no other courses).
I spent 20 years of my life in a christian environment. My friends were Christian, my family was Christian, I went to church, youth group, various other Christian events, and there was even a mandatory Bible class in school.
I stopped going to church 4 years ago (ish), because I didnt have time. Pathetic excuse, I know.
I guess you could say that this is me coming out, but no Im not gay. Im coming out to everyone saying that I really dont share your faith.
Dont get me wrong, I believe in God. I am definitely not an atheist. I believe in God, not because people tell me to, not because a book tells me to, but for deep personal reasons. And maybe because it gives me hope that theres an afterlife proceeding this pathetic one that were living. I may write about those reasons in another blog someday, the truth is that its something I still have to sort out for myself.
All that said, I dont believe in the Bible. I dont believe in Jesus, and Im not going to spend this whole blog trying to justify this to the world, because Im not trying to make you change your faith. You are absolutely allowed to believe whatever you want, as long as it doesnt negatively affect anyone else. Though I will point out some key factors in my change of faith.
Lets start with the shallower end of things:
-There are a LOT of christian (and similarly faithed) ass-holes. Theres a lot of atheist ass-holes too, and everyone in between. I suppose its my bias because I know so many Christians that they stand out to me. This was a reason I just wanted away from the stigma of being a Christian. But, I suppose, it had no effect on my actual faith.
-Ive watched lives around me fall apart. Like this soap opera: My pastors wife cheated on him with the (much younger and very close friend of mine) worship pastor, they have some kids and are now divorced. That seems to have been a significant catalyst in the downfall of that church, which was once 350 people strong, and dropped as low as 30. Not long after these events did an absolutely ridiculous thing happen. (I know that I dont know the whole story, but this is the way I got it. Either way I still dearly love everyone involved.) My youth pastor who was engaged to be married was seen, out for a very late dinner with an old -female- friend of his. Someone blew this out of proportion, Im sure. I have no idea who. You see, its bad to have friends of the opposite sex, and everything you do with them must come under great scrutiny. It somehow turned into he cheated on her, and of course once someone said that, there was no going back, and he was gone. I didnt see him for a long time, maybe a year or more. I know he had a very dark time in his life during that period. Then we became pretty good friends for a while, having late night beers, wine and cigars pretty often. I will always fondly think back to those days. NOW both parties are happily married, Im pleased to say, with very wonderful spouses, and I couldnt be happier for the 4 of them! But my point is, crazy ridiculous things happen because of the strange rules that some people believe to be part of being a Christian. 6 inch rule anyone?
I know that the last one didnt seem that shallow but it didnt really have an effect on my faith. The following are things that are really what made me not believe.
-Something that Ive always thought since I was a kid, but merely shrugged of because people told me to, is that fact that the scripture was written by humans. Then copied by humans, God knows how many times, adjusted ever so slightly each time. Each person putting their own notes in, to be then copied by the next person. Then translated by another. Then some people decided which scriptures belong in gods word, some people. See a pattern? Ive said that Ive heard God telling me to do things, say things, act a certain way. Did he really? I dont know, probably not. Hes probably busy building another universe from scratch, thinking Jesus Christ, these guys over-think things way too much!
-Ive seen very little evidence that the stories told in the bible were true. Or that Jesus even existed. And this all comes back to the same thing as the last point. Every fact I hear supporting Jesus being truth, or Jesus being false, are all passed down from various sources. I have watched Zeitgeist, and it raises some interesting points, most of which are complete garbage, and completely falsified. Ive also watched things disproving Zeitgeist most of which do the exact same thing, just spew out information and expect viewers to believe. Ive searched for any information I think I can trust in regards to any of this. I have found none that I can trust. It is always somebody saying something, passed from someone else, that is probably a lie.
Let me tell you a little about our universe.
Everything that has mass has a gravitational pull. Thus the sun being bigger than the earth, is pulling the earth towards it, luckily for us our planet is caught in its orbit and the gravitational pull is keeping us at a safe distance from the sun. The same thing happened with our moon, its caught in our gravitational pull and is now orbiting us, and thus goes on with the rocks orbiting the moon. If I jumped out in space, I would have a gravitational pull as well. I would be dead, but I would still have mass warranting the gravitational pull.
Now, this expands outwards as well. Obviously theres countless suns in the universe. And this applies to all however many duodecillions (its a word, look it up) of them there are. Theres planets orbiting them, and moons orbiting the planets, and smaller things orbiting them.
One hitch in this though, is that the universe is expanding, moving outwards. Everything is being pulled apart. Sort of like stretching out silly putty. It doesnt really make sense, but its there and its happening. What is this force? I see it happening but I cant explain it (apparently no one else can too). To me that is God. That is what I believe in.
I believe in science, as an organic and growing entity, though not possible without something to start it.
Weve all heard someone say Believing in the big bang is just as crazy as believing in God! well it goes the other way too. As far as Im concerned God created the big bang, and said Oh shit, good luck with that! Or if not the big bang, whatever it was that caused our universe to form. We will probably never know exactly how it all started. Things we discover will constantly change the way we see the universe for decades to come.
I just hope that space travel comes during my lifetime. That will be exciting.
CHRISTOVIX
EDIT: I Found this video at the wonderful Wimp.com It explains a little better, what I was talking about with the universe expanding.
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ATwVApurIQ4[/YOUTUBE]