Trying to find out what keeps me coming back to Xtianity?

I have no idea what it is, but there must be something that keeps my interest alive enough to get this confused *sigh*

When I compare the two I see no comparison, Paganism, to me is liberating... nothing is prohibited unless I choose for it to be... everyone is accepted and no one is wrong or evil just for being who they are meant to be. Most of the time I see Xtianity as a set of unreachable goals and unrealistic rules that doom people to failure before they even start. You can never be good enough, without sin enough, and most things to do with sex, abortion, homosexuality, even tattoos are bad, or evil and shouldn't be done, or are such major sins that even thinking about them is so wrong that it "angers God".

I wonder if it's to do with me being very much a loner and seeking people to connect with... the pagan community is so broad that it can be difficult, nay impossible sometimes, to find people that believe as you do (it's been said there are as many pagan paths as there are pagans), but with xtianity there is at least the fact that most people have the belief in Jesus in common.

I wonder if I'm sort of jealous of the comradeship that having similar beliefs with other people can bring, being an individual is great and all, but sometimes it can be fairly lonely... paganism may be seen as an umbrella, but it's one hell of a big one and unless you follow one of the more known about paths it's possible to get lost wandering around underneath it.

I'm also wondering if it seems to be an easier way to believe... just read this book, follow what it says and everything will be ok. Paganism can be very intense and sometimes I just get conflicted and oftentimes also quite fed up with having to do all of the research on my own and having no one to compare notes with. I know Kate West said that the path of the witch would make your life harder, but I never thought it would be quite so demoralising sometimes! Being a lazy person by nature, I work better if I have a set path that I can follow at my own pace, rather than starting out and trying to make my own up as I go along.

I feel as if I just can't win, and to feel that in regards to yourself can be incredibly frustrating. To think that you have your thoughts and beliefs set, and then find yourself changing your mind halfway through and having to u-turn and feel totally foolish, is not a good look for someone that hates drawing attention to herself and also hates feeling embarrassed.

Maybe it has to do with the way I feel other people see me... to suddenly go from being a fairly agnostic person to being pagan wasn't that far of a leap, but to then go to being a xtian, then swinging wildly between paganism, xtianity and agnostisism at a fairly rapid rate of speed (and also on a semi-regular basis) just makes me a laughing stock (or at least that is how I feel I am perceived!)... my confidence is so low that I will actually change the things I tell people I believe so that their opinion of me raises... and I shouldn't have to do that... not for anyone!

Another thing, is that I have no one around me that cares about any religion - at all! My parents just can't be bothered with any of it, and Sissy is such a rampant atheist that she actually laughs at some of the things I say or gets so angry at what she sees as someone that she knows is intelligent seeming to throw her brain away and just accept a pile of old crap (she has told me this in the past). Pingu has a passing interest, but I don't know him at all well enough to mention something as private as my beliefs.

I just wish that there was something that I had as a solid foundation on which to build the rest of my beliefs... but I can't even think of where to begin looking for that one thing that is unshakeable and not up for change, let alone what it even is!

Maybe that is why I envy most xtians... regardless what else they may disagree on they have Jesus/God as that one thing around which to build the rest of their own faith. Could I use Selene as the same thing? But I don't feel about Her the way that xtians feel about Jesus/God... She has never told me what to do, but has given me space to use my brain and find my own way. I feel that She is happy to let me do whatever I wish, She isn't jealous, or demanding, neither do I fear Her. I do the little things I do for Her because I want to and not because a book or other people tell me that I must. If I choose to do nothing for Her, ever again, She would be fine with that... no problem, catch you later.

I think it's something that is going to infuriate and puzzle me for ages yet... maybe if I regularly write it out here it will eventually become clearer (hopefully it won't get anymore confusing, lol!)

What the hell is WRONG with me?!?!?!

Why am I even thinking about Christianity again?!?!

It makes me feel guilty, all of the time, I get nothing positive from it... and whenever I go to places like CF I am repulsed by the hate filled bile that flows from the people like sweat from a Swede in a sauna!

The more time I am around Christians, the more I feel like one... yet something always hangs on to my Pagan roots, and I constantly feel that Selene is with me... way more than I ever felt/feel that God/Jesus was/is with me. Just contemplating quoting the bible at people or calling my self a christian and wearing a cross fills me with utter revulsion, it really does... yet I'm back there, reading threads and just re-enforcing the reason I was driven away every other time!

I need to see a head doctor... or at least get a firm hold on what I truly, truly believe in... without being swayed or guilted into it.

Man! I spend waaay too much time online around things that are toxic to my mental health, LOL!

What do I really believe?

That is a question that I have been pondering for a few days now... and I really have no idea, to be honest!

I know what I don't believe, so I suppose that is a start. I'm going to make a list of the things I don't believe.

I don't believe:

1. that there is only one god
2. that humanity is born bad from the start
3. that all gods and goddesses are just parts of one great big god and goddess
4. that all gods/goddesses are a small part of a great big "Ultimate Spirit" or something like that
5. that death is the end
6. that hell is a real place of torture that lasts for an eternity
7. that the bible is relevant to the people of today
8. that any one faith has all the answers, or is the only way or is superior to the rest
9. in using magical power for negative reasons (be there hexing, cursing, whatever)
10. that if people don't use bodily fluids in their spellwork that they are not a "proper" pagan/witch
11. that being "fluffy" is a bad thing
12. that anyone has the right to be scornful or mocking towards anothers choice of faith

The things I do believein are harder to write down, but I'll try, purely to examine them and see if I truly do believe them, or whether I'm just saying I do to please others.


I do believe:

1. in some sort of afterlife... I don't think that it all ends when you die. I love the idea of the Summerlands, a place to meet all of your ancestors, rest and recuperate before choosing whether or not to be reborn and continue learning all that there is to learn.
2. that all of the gods and goddesses that have ever been are still here with us, each of them is a seperate entity with their own strengths and weaknesses, and that their powers lay mainly in the strength of their followers and not with some super powerful godhead (how that works, I have no idea).

***MASSIVE U-TURN ALERT!!***

After having spent some time thinking about it (and although this entry is time stamped as quite early, this was saved as a draft and the time is now 11.18pm) I don't think I believe in any of it... any of it at all. I think I maybe an atheist, more probably a humanist... most definitely an agnostic.

I'm not sure that gods do actually exist, in fact I'm sure they don't (though if others need them or want them, that's fine)... I think, in the past, we had to find something to explain the unexplainable and gods and miracles fit the bill, so we used them. Why should powerful beings care about us? Why should they help us, guide us or pay us anymore attention than we pay to ants on the street? If they exist, they don't need us, why would they? They would have powers that we mere humans can only dream of, so why would they need a lesser species like humanity? If they don't seem to care about us, why should we care about them either?

Death is a scary subject, so we invent places to go when we do so as to not be scared anymore... it doesn't make them anymore real... it just means that we can go on kidding ourselves that this is not the end of us, that we'll see the people we love and care about again, thereby easing our sense of loss at their passing.

I think I spend far too much of my time thinking about religion and faiths and stuff that is unimportant in the long run. I was planning on lighting candles for people tonight, but what would be the point? Do I really think that it will do any good for the man that is, at this moment, dying from pneumonia? No, not in the least... it's just something that a lot of pagans say, just like christians say "I'm praying for you", and that does nothing either. All it does is make us feel better about the fact that there is sod all we can do to help... it lets people know that we are thinking of them... but really, it does no good!!

I think I am slowly coming to the conclusion that everything I've been hoping to find, and all of the things that I've for years been trying to convince myself to believe, is all... complete... and... utter... BOLLOCKS!!!