[awareness]

I brought this from the open forum. Hope I got the formatting right.

Originally Posted by aron

I think the poster Trapped also expressed frustration on this forum at having 'conversations' with a silent God.

In my case, post-LC, I tried a number of other groups. Some were extremely fundamentalist - women wore head coverings, didn't speak in church, etc. Eventually I just wasn't getting better. My anxieties, frustrations, inadequacies, shame, just wouldn't go away. I was a shame-based and fear-based human being trying to pretend that I was 'godly' and it was so miserable!

Eventually I just quit. I actually got into science. I wasn't militantly atheist, or even openly atheist, but certainly I became agnostic. Just wasn't in the mood to pretend any more. Life is too short. If God doesn't want to talk with me, I'm not going to talk with God.

But eventually, God came back into my life. It's pretty amazing to me, looking back. Little by little I just became 'aware' of God. I don't know how to put it. God's presence came back.

It's a journey, I guess. Anyway, I don't judge anyone, wherever they are in their journey today. Theirs is just as real to them as mine is, to me. But I recommend people like Dawkins and Hitchens and anyone who tries to think. Ravi Zacharius is actually pretty good. Another one I like is Neils Bohr the physicist. There are a lot of good thinkers out there. You can really learn a lot.

But I'd like to come back to Nuclear's testimony. And about learning to think critically.

Originally Posted by Nuclear

Science has throughout my childhood been something I was fascinated with, I ate it up as a middle/high schooler. Even now despite being an engineering student I enjoy learner more about the natural world. As I’m sure some of you can relate, this often conflicted with a literal interpretation of the Bible, especially creation. I managed to postpone what would eventually happen with stopgaps like the “gap theory” with regards to the age of the Earth, among other things. The doubts I had still remained relatively weak, but the cracks were there.

I still remember that night vividly. I was browsing the internet and fell down an internet rabbit-hole on the validity of the Bible scientifically and based off of historical record. The openness that the subject matter was discussed with was something I had never encountered before, but I couldn’t stop reading. It sort of shocked the sort of jaded way that I had always looked at the bible away. The whole book, creation, Noah’s flood, Moses, treatment of women, of other cultures, it all looked so different. Really looking at it and seeing how it fit into our modern understanding of how the universe and life began, stuff that I was aware of but would always mentally try to blend in with the Biblical account, it just made so much more sense standalone.

Originally Posted by aron

I don’t know if any of you have had that experience, but the dam really broke that fast. I went in with few but nagging doubts and near absolute faith in the LC and then later going to bed with my entire worldview broken and shattered into a million pieces. I was physically sick for several days after, but after I felt so liberated.
I've shared this before, that my anecdotal observation is that the LC loses young people in droves, not merely to purchasing LSM materials and going to LSM-sanctioned meetings, but to Christian faith. And I believe this is because they repress critical thought. They avoid problem-solving. Just call "O Lord Jesus" three times and all your problems will disappear. When I was there, we were specifically told not to think. "Just exercise your spirit, brother" meant, Loudly repeat whatever ministry snippet was in front of us. Suppress, avoid, deny. Suppress, avoid, deny. "Let's all call on the Lord"...

This leaves the young ones quite unprepared for life, which for many of us involves trying to think. You know, actually facing things. And being around others who think critically. Even when one does, in the LC (going to college for example) religion is not included. "The Ministry is always right" is the default non-thought mode. One papers over and ignores the 'cracks' in the thought-world system, and puts nagging unanswered questions into the closet, where they don't truly shut up, ever. Eventually, one day the person decides to face things and pretty much right away they realize it's all a sham. It's a make-believe system with no true objective basis that they can find. And so out they go.