Maybe you haven’t noticed it, but many people are deeply irrational.
Here are a few reasons people believe:
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Meaning and Purpose: Religion can offer a framework for understanding the universe and our place in it. It can provide answers to big questions about life, death, and morality.
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Community and Belonging: Religious communities can provide social support, a sense of belonging, and shared values. This can be especially important during difficult times.
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Comfort and Hope: Religion can offer comfort in times of grief or hardship. It can also provide hope for the afterlife or a better future.
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Tradition and Identity: Religion can be a core part of a person’s cultural heritage or family identity. People may feel a connection to their ancestors or cultural background through their faith.
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Ethics and Morality: Many religions provide a moral code that guides people’s behavior. This can be helpful in making decisions about right and wrong.
I don’t believe, but I can see why people stick with it and don’t look beyond it. You can get all these things without religion, its just not something that’s taught/passed down in the same way as religion is. Additionally, deconstructing is very difficult. You’re raised to believe something to be real and you’re expected to just drop it and step out of Plato’s cave? You’d look like a madman to any friends/family who aren’t willing and ready to step out and look around.
As a large language model, I cannot endorse any one religion
Come on, this list of reasons was written by an LLM
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In some religions walking away from the church means being excluded from family, social, and business contacts. So cutting ties with everyone you know basically.
So better start believing in some magic men.
You can just like, say you do. I think a lot of people who check “Christian” in the US have little to no involvement in it beyond saying “thank God” occasionally.
I remember reading a story in my Spanish lit class about a guy who wasn’t attending church, and his mother was freaking out, so the family priest went to talk to him. And the priest was like, “I totally get it. After all the evil I’ve seen I don’t really believe either. But I continue in this because it is my life, and I can provide comfort to people. Consider attending because you love your mother and it will help her.”
For the same reasons they always have.
The year has little to do with it. The only things we’ve really undeniably progressed in over the past century are scientific knowledge and the level of technology. Existential philosophy hasn’t exactly made breakthroughs recently, to my knowledge.
Each person still needs to find their own answer to the fundamental questions of “why am I here” and “wtf is death and how do I deal with it”.
Our mechanical, scientific understanding of reality provides fairly depressing answers to these questions. Religion? Sunshine and roses.
Also, on a more practical factor: childhood indoctrination and cultural inertia. Most people are raised in religion and they find it “good enough”, so religion continues.
The year has little to do with it
The irony. Why exactly does the entire world accept the current year as being 2024? What are we 2024 years away from?
For the same sort of reasons there are (generally) 12 months in a year and there are 7 days on a calendar, and for the same reason that “John” is a name, and why London is placed where it is, and etc?
Because some dudes decided some stuff, and some other dudes decided some stuff influenced like that, and so on. And some stuff got changed, and some stuff was inconvenient to change or there was no real reason to change it.
The year is ironic in the exact context you quoted I guess. But the days of the week and many months were named for other mythologies.
What I was actually saying is that the same reasons for belief apply whether it’s 2000 BCE or 4000 CE. Humans remain human, and religion fills an inherent need.
There’s other religions than Christianity - large ones - that do not consider the birth of Christ as particularly meaningful. The fact that we’re using it as a point of reference is meaningful - the Christian religion has been very influential - but it is hardly some grand irony you seem to imply.
Serious answer:
I can’t speak for anyone else, but I believe in a religion because I’ve found it to be personally beneficial.
I was a pastor for many years and saw much of the best and worst religion had to offer. I haven’t stepped foot inside a church since COVID broke out and don’t know that I ever will again.
My personal beliefs are still a significant part of my life, but I understand why someone would ask the question that spawned this discussion.
You find it personally beneficial, but you haven’t actually answered the question.
Yas queen. COVID’s not over! And even so, God and your soul aren’t important enough to risk contacting the common cold lol
I’m not religious at all. But in responding to your question OP: we don’t have to understand why people believe. Religion just isn’t for us, and that’s fine. Other people find it has value, and that’s fine too. The fact that religion has lasted this long with this many people is proof in itself that there’s some value people get out of it. We don’t have to get it to understand that.
All the comments here that explain religion solely as dumb or irrational are just as closed minded as the people they’re criticising.
On point, additionally religion has also effectively associated itself with spirituality. It’s also associated itself with caring for others, volunteering, community, togetherness and acceptance. Additionally it’s a great place to network and organize communities. Even if belief has faded, tradition is usually important with that group of people.
Hard disagree. Religion has a measurable impact on people voting against the rights of minorities, and it deserves every bit of scrutiny it has coming its way.
It’s not like Bigfoot or flat earth. This shit is having serious consequences for others, physically and mentally.
Religion itself? Or man using religious dogma to justify the uglier natures of their internal belief systems and cherry-picking religious quotes to shoehorn their false righteousness into moral discussion? Religion is a powerful tool and it can be used to drum up donations for an orphanage, or leveraged and wielded by people who aren’t seeking to enlighten themselves at all apart from learning how to use religion to control people.
Both. Texts like the Bible tell you how to conduct slavery, endorses violence against men who have gay sex, and in no uncertain terms (and in many different ways) tells you women are worth a fraction of men and shouldn’t be trusted to preach.
Yet there are things that aren’t endorsed in the Bible are far too commonly preached by Christians. Like being against trans people, opposing abortion rights (in fact the Bible tells you how to induce an abortion and that you should do it if your wife cheats on you)… and like you said, some drum up donations for the express purpose of leveraging control over others, or to buy private jets, in spite of the life Jesus led and in spite of his teachings.
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I left my church because they wouldn’t just let me attend. They wanted me to commit to actively proseletyzing outside the church, to bring more people in.
It didn’t feel right. I think if a thing is good enough, nobody else needs to nag you to sell it. You just want to tell people about it because it’s been so good for you.
This is a pretty broad question, it really depends on what you mean by “believe in religion”:
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Believe that a particular holy book is literal, historical truth.
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Believe in the moral teachings of a particular holy book and follow its practices.
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Believe in the existence of a universal higher consciousness (God)
1 is a vocal minority, and the reasons have been sufficiently explained elsewhere in this thread.
2 is much more common, and can derive from a number of reasons. Cultural identity generally determines which holy book (and interpretation thereof) you follow, but the attraction to moral framework is deeper than cultural identity. Having a set of guidelines to inform moral behavior, and a method of alignment and focus (prayer) is very valuable.
3 is a metaphysical consideration, and pops up even in 2024 because consciousness is still a mysterious phenomenon. Every explanation leads to roughly the same conclusion: if consciousness is an emergent property of complex interconnected systems, then it stands to reason that the most complex interconnected system (the universe) is more likely than not to be conscious; if consciousness is some external force that complex systems can “tune into” like a radio, then it stands to reason that “consciousness” permeates the universe; if consciousness is something else which defies scientific description, then it stands to reason that there exists some agency to dictate the rules.
Those are, broadly, the rational explanations of consciousness of which I’m aware, and they all imply a universal consciousness of one variety or another. If you can think of another I’d love to consider it.
If you meant something else by “believe in religion”, let me know.
Another big reason is reason number 4
- Gives a sense of community and cultural connection that other things don’t quite provide.
I’ve met a not so inconsequential amount of people in my life that when pressed admitted, they don’t believe in god, don’t believe in the moral teachings, but attend a place of worship because they think there is no replacement for the interwoven community and cultural connection their place of worship provides. Many people simply like the community connection of their root culture. This is especially true in minority groups (black church, synagogue).
That’s another big reason to practice for sure, but I think it’s a stretch to call that belief.
None of the things by themselves fully justify “belief” in a religion yet many people claim they are without a true belief in the entire system. It’s the problem with such a vague question. By a narrower definition very few people attending a place of worship are true believers. Someone can believe in god, but not really believe in the rules, and still say they are “religious”. Someone can believe in the rules, but not god, and say the same. I think if you are practicing the religion to some extent then you have a right to call yourself religious if that’s how you view yourself regardless of your true beliefs on god, rules, etc. Cultural impact matters more than we give it credit for.
This 👉🏼 #3 👆🏼
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In 2024 life is hard and you can’t do anything about it in most cases. Religion gives you an excuse for why it must be so, so that you can keep grinding away.
Indoctrination.
Indoctrination and ignorance, notice how a big chunk of its members are old people. Younger people are less interested, thankfully. Also, for some people, it is a social club.
Weirdly I know quite a few people who converted to being religious as adults. As children, they weren’t raised with any particular religion.
I think people just want something to do and some encouraging people around them.
I thought about that as well. I’m not religious and i don’t know anyone who is, but i talked to some elderly people of whom i knew they are religious about it. And surprisingly, they pretty much gave up on it. One couple told me how ass their childhood was because they were scarred into believing in fire and brimstone when they don’t behave. The other lady who was very Christian, said that she wished she didn’t basically wasted all theis time with Christianity, even tho she liked the whole community aspect of it and the “tradition.”
And like i said, religion isn’t part of anyone’s life that i know, especially in my age group. But for the last 2 years or so it started popping up on tinder that Christianity somehow is still going. Not strong or anything, but it went from nothing to seeing two or three jesus freaks a month or so.
They are raised with it and old habits die hard.
The fact that some people start as atheists and later become religious demonstrates there has to be more reasons than just that.
Never personally met an atheist that had found religion or heard about one, other than in American evangelical stories, but I’ve met a few non-religions people who have later in life found religion. Although I live in a quite atheaistic country, so there is a lack of peer pressure or need to talk about such things.
Never personally met an atheist that had found religion or heard about one
Well congratulations, now you have. It isn’t quite as rare as you might think.
personally
Everyone is everything in the internetz.
What about the internet makes this easier to lie about? I could tell you the same thing to your face and you still couldn’t fact check it.
Gods are literally just a psychological comfort blanket to explain the unexplainable. Most religious people don’t put that much thought into what they believe, challenging concepts are just tucked nicely away in the “Gods will” box and they move on. I think everyone copes with those brain shattering concepts in their own creative way or risk getting buried alive in anxiety.
Because the lowest common denominator is much MUCH lower than you think it is.
This means it’s easy to indoctrinate and easy to maintain that for a massive number of people.
Scientific illiteracy is extremely high, and actual “6th grade reading comprehension” is the highest level of literacy for > 50% of a country like the U.S. and ~20% are low literacy or actually illiterate.
This means that half of everyone in the U.S. can read and understand what they read at or below a 6th grade level. This isn’t “reading big words”, it’s “tell us about what you read”, “what is the relationship between x & y” type questions.
This comment for example, up to this point only, would be difficult to understand & comprehend for > 50% of people in the U.S. (it demands an 11th grade reading comprehension). And may be misread, misunderstood, or not understood at all.
People are driven to religions to cults and alt conspiracy theories when they don’t understand how the world works around them. They latch onto extremely simple often misleading or incorrect ideas of how the world works because they can understand it and it “makes sense” within their sphere of ignorance (we all have one, this isn’t meant to be a disparaging term).
This means that the problem is that humans are just not smart enough to escape religion yet. It’s the simplest answer, and it appears to be correct.
I agree. At the root of it, people want to feel safe. This is a fundamental need. Religion does this for them because they don’t need to make decisions and they’re promised that if they follow it they will indeed be kept safe. Also spiritual bypass is awesome.
Having been raised in a religious household and having escaped it later in life to become an engineer/science nerd, while being ostracized by my, incredibly, incredibly disappointing parents because they refuse to learn new things or acknowledge scientific studies that conflict with their religious views:
This answer is unequivocally, absolutely, a 100% correct take on humanity and their need for the “simplistic” and incorrect answers religion gives about the world around them.
