I don't believe in religion. It is not out of disrespect, it is just something I sincerely am unable to comprehend; the fault is mine.
I don't believe in religion because it is impossible for me to understand how anyone, when being completely honest with oneself, can believe they know anything about the universe, death or the hereafter. I find the inability to admit the truth about the mind-blowing concept of our existence on this ball in the sky, and the reduction of it to something palpable just to address our most primal fear of death, dishonest. Mostly towards ourselves. Even if you went through a near death experience, seen a ghost or had incredible premonition, we still cant be sure what that light, or dream or spirit mean exactly.
Read this and pause: Do you truly, truly, truly believe you know?
You know you don't know. We all know we don't know.
Here is this ball. Hanging around (literally) a burning ball of fire. And you are telling me you know about God? You have no idea.
It is not judgment that I am trying to convey. There are wonderful good people that are Christians and Jews and Muslim, and Hindu, Atheists, Confusions or any other religion. But they are good people not because of their religion, but because they are good people. They share their goodness with each other and have much more in common with each other than with rotten apples in their own respective belief groups. These are the similarities that matter so much more than one heavenly father or the next. It is this likeness that should bring us together, for our common good. Not what religion we adhere to.
I believe in this common good and the aspiration for good. It may seem naïve and silly, dream-like and unachievable, but that never stopped anyone from believing anything, so I believe.
I believe we are all the same. That our very basic feelings, experiences and needs are shared among us. Whether we are rich or poor, we still hurt and love. Whether we are white, black, yellow, red or purple, we have to eat. Whether we are Christians or Hindus, we talk to someone in our heads sometimes. Whether we live in the mountains or valleys, we all have a mother and a father. We are all human, but we are somehow branded at birth, and pushed to choose sides.
Have you ever seen a baby born?
Babies are free. They have no prejudice, no preference for who gives them warmth or food. They don't care if they are rich or religious. They just are. And all they want and can give is... love. And we ruin them. We have ruined our own race. While there are other species that kill their own for reasons other than survival, humans made it a species-wide sports. We are the only race that has inflicted that much pain on itself, and I'm not even mentioning others, and yet we keep saying we are evolved. The only way we have evolved is in that we actually make money off of developing killing machines to more efficiently annihilate our own. We have lost touch with ourselves and with our fellow human beings.
God isn't going to solve our problems. We are the only ones responsible for our behavior. We as individuals first and foremost, and those who tell you that one person cannot make a difference are exactly wrong. It is an individual work that requires all of us to practice it to gain the powerful result of peace.
It is an irrefutable FACT that there are good people and bad people in every religion, and to protect someone you don't know because they share your religion, even if they have nothing else in common with you, is simply, excuse my language, stupid.
Think for a second. Pause for a second and think. Do you really, really know?
You know you don't know.
We all know we don't know.