Welcome to Gaia! ::

The afterlife is a highly contested territory of religious warfare. I will describe a select few general ideas.

First, hell and/or heaven. These are essentially places which are described, generally, as 'bad' and 'good' places, respectively. They are often described differently by each individual. A popular description of hell is a pit of fire where the unbelievers go after they die, and suffer for all eternity.

Second, reincarnation. Essentially, each individual's soul is reincarnated - after death - into another creature's body. Animals other than humans are often included in these beliefs.

Third, nothingness. Essentially, nothingness is what comes after death in this belief.

[x]



Welcome to Pouncey's discussion thread about religion in all its forms and lack thereof.

This is a place to share our knowledge of religion or lack thereof.

There are a few rules for this thread:





Essentially, what these rules mean is that instead of making a post like this:



Or like this:



( I've seen far too much of both for my own liking. )

You should instead make one like this:



Or like this:





Pouncey is a formerly Satanic man who currently ( At the time of this writing. ) has no religion. He was born in mid-1988, making him 18 years old at the time of this writing.

He was not raised to believe any specific religion to be the truth, but later adopted the tenets of LaVeyan Satanism. [x] [x]
[x] His parents are non-religious and Protestant.

He spent time in the Royal Canadian Air Cadets at the age of thirteen.

At the age of sixteen, he was diagnosed with schizophrenia, and is on his second type of anti-psychotics, which are working well.

At the age of eighteen, he has yet to finish highschool, but has dreams of going to college in a science or engineering program, and becoming a mechanical engineer working alongside the military.







Lord Mark, if this topic is not to your liking in one or two parts, let's discuss it prior to deletion, please.

"One thing I've learned from Gaia is that even if they enter the poll, they don't necessarily read what was written.

"Anyways, onto the topic.

"I used to be a LaVeyan Satanist back in 2005, till early 2006, when I realized it was completely unnecessary. My views had swayed further and further from the religion's tenets, and even if they hadn't, there would be no reason to affiliate with them, because my views would have been the same either way.

"I never met any other Satanic people in person; most of them were on the Internet. They seemed rather intelligent, but I got the feeling some of them were young, because they kept attacking Christianity as a whole.

"Of course, pretty much everyone on the Internet who're both young and non-Christian [ With exceptions. ] tends to attack Christianity if they even care.

"Enh, most of the people here probably don't even know what the religion's about.

"Is it time for a topic change?"

"I don't claim any religious affiliation to myself. I belong to no single set of beliefs.

"I took much away from Satanism. Exactly what I took away, I don't know. But I've changed a great deal since the beginning. Reading the book over a few times helped me to realize the old Sun Tzu reference ( Another book I'm slowly reading. ) of knowing yourself and knowing your enemy and knowing where the battle is, then in a hundred battles no danger of defeat.

"My beliefs have kind of mellowed over the same period. Before, I'd vehemently argue against certain religions and certain deities. Now, I just don't care. That could be a result of long-term arguing though. I got tired of the adrenalin, as it always made me feel sick afterwards.

"My beliefs are that peace is always a nice thing to have, but violence is sometimes a necessary thing. I know someone who said that 'being completely pacifistic is fine, perfectly fine, as long as you accept that sometimes you live under people like Hitler, or Stalin,' - to paraphrase - and I agree with that. I don't think wars should be fought over religious differences, ideological differences, etc. etc. More tangible things, like resources or human - or animal / alien, as the case may be - suffering, those I can kinda agree with every so often.

"I believe in no deities. None whatsoever. I regard them as avatars of the self, representing to the individual whatever he or she wants to recognize in him or herself. I kinda agree more with the Hindu version of a deity, or any pantheon, more than any other monotheistic version of a deity. The Hindu one's kinda interesting, with the facets of a single deity idea. Kinda more in tune with my interpretation of what a deity would be. But I don't believe in any sort of metaphysical or supernatural deity as a reality. At least, not one which interferes in our physical world.

"I don't believe in any universal truths or morals. I believe there are some things which are usually true, and I do have a set of morals which I apply to myself, but I don't believe everyone should have these beliefs. And my morals are really extensions of my own emotions and gut feelings than anything else. I feel sad if an animal is hurt, so I'm not going to do it if I can help it, for example. I don't steal because I don't like being stolen from. I'm not going to set off a bomb or spray machine gun fire in a crowded place, because I don't believe people deserve death. There are grey areas though, such as in euthanasia or the death penalty, where I feel both ways about it.

"My morals are subject to change as other parts of myself change. Many of them, I just don't see them changing at all. I can't imagine what would make me believe they're the right thing for me to do. As for universal truths, there are none for me. Most things change. Some things don't. H2O will always be water in some state. The mountains will wear down from erosion. Contained within those two sentences are examples of change and non-change. And even then, one of them may change. Mountains may not erode if the planet is blasted apart and no longer has the means to erode it.

"I know values are part of religion, but I can't identify many of my values. They exist in my subconscious. Two I know of are love, and laughter. If I love, I'm happier than I was before love. If I laugh, I'm happier than before I laughed."

"Sounds good, as long as it works for ya."