How I Broke Free from Various Belief Systems and Found Myself Agnostic

Posted by Joemar | Filed under Philosophy

When we were born, we were automatically trapped within a culture with a certain belief system. This shapes how we understand all things around us. In most cases, it also dictates how we should behave. It pervades our whole personality so much that when it is challenged and we realize that something is wrong about it, it can  shatter our orderly understanding of the world and leave us utterly confused.

Once we stand on a new belief system, we will be faced with suspicion, indifference and worse are stigma and discrimination from people that we don’t share the same beliefs with anymore. This is the price each one of us has to pay if we change the way we see things…if we change our worldview. I would understand why many people would just stick to what they were raised with and never dare to challenge it, much less to adopt a better and more realistic one.

When I was a child, I saw things from a blend of animistic Catholic Christian worldview. As early as high school I realized that there is more to reality than what this view can offer.  I began to question my beliefs, I doubted the existence of God, I tried to understand how science can explain how things came about. Hence I became known to be an “atheist”. (I didn’t know then the difference between atheism and agnosticism.) Due to a poor grasp of the science behind evolution and cosmology,  I reverted to the Christian belief system but I struggled to understand what true Christianity really is.

Having no solid catechetical background of Catholic doctrine, I easily fell prey to many “Bible only” Christian groups. I jumped from one of these groups to another in trying to get as close to Biblical Christianity as possible. In the end, I bemoaned the lack of external standards to which “Bible only” Christians can test whether they are interpreting the Bible correctly or not. I sought to study how the Bible came to be and through this I rediscovered my Catholic faith, though not the same Catholicism I used to embrace before. It felt liberating how the biblical message is protected from being messed up by private interpretation through the infallible authority of the Church.

However, this new vantage point enabled me to tackle questions at higher levels. I began to scrutinize the historicity of Jesus Christ, the proofs of his resurrection, and other miraculous claims of Christianity. I realized that the very bedrock of Christianity is actually shaky. It is built on shallow evidence of testimonies of witnesses. These kinds of evidence can suffice to establish murder or any crime in a court but would not be enough if you want to prove a very incredible claim such as the resurrection from the dead. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.  The same is true with other religions. Extraordinary claims are proven by testimonies of witnesses, which are accepted by most, despite the enormity of the claims and the conflicts of these claims with reason and science.

Confused once again, I managed to slowly understand things without the baggage of revealed religions. All that was left was my belief in a personal God, which I sought to justify using the often repeated philosophical arguments for God’s existence. Along with my growing interest and knowledge in science, the weight of these arguments began to lighten. The argument from design is not very appealing now as it used to be. Without the need for an intelligent designer, the argument from causation can lead to any picture of the ultimate cause, only one of which is a personal intelligent God. The ultimate cause could then be just energy or some simple but universal physical law.

However, since these are purely philosophical arguments and are beyond what science can prove or disprove at the moment, the only honest answer is that we are not sure…that we actually don’t know, which is what agnosticism is, essentially. As Richard Dawkins pointed out though, agnosticism is actually a spectrum. In one end of the spectrum are those who are 99.9% sure that God exists while on the other extreme end are those who believe with 99.9% probability that God does not exist. For the moment, I am probably lying somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, 50-50. I think it is still possible that we can discover in the future a form of a God governing the universe, maybe (just maybe) the kind of God that Albert Einstein and Baruch Spinoza thought about.

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Permalink | Comments (View Comments) | February 14, 2010

  • mohamad antar aziz

    nice writing Joemar Taganna
    but you can write more

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Vincent-Granados/1756102177 Mark Vincent Granados

    A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading. C. S. Lewis

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Vincent-Granados/1756102177 Mark Vincent Granados

    You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you. It is easy to say you believe a rope to be strong and sound as long as you are merely using it to cord a box. But suppose you had to hang by the rope over a precipice. Wouldn't you then first discover how much you really trusted it? The same with people…Only a real risk tests the reality of a belief.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Vincent-Granados/1756102177 Mark Vincent Granados

    I remember way back in college how you guys do bible brainstorm, I never bothered to give you my opinion since you try to understand it for intellectual simulation besides I'm not as intelligent as you guys. and the point of view you had way back then is, God is defined by religion and interpretations of the bible. my understanding of the God is different, I know God by the way I see little miracles that happens in everyday in our lives. and I mean miracles as Miracles that do not, in fact, break the laws of nature. when I hear a friend say hi, I see it as a miracle. how it warms my heart, it gives encouragement and comfort. I dont associate the feeling as a mere impulse on my brain, It makes more sense to me, and that I know I am living life. I know I am not mere a creature walking on this planet whose sole purpose is to find logical basis for things I do not understand.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Vincent-Granados/1756102177 Mark Vincent Granados

    You've got nice blogs here joe. i like your posts. he he

  • Joemar

    Thanks Mark.

  • Joemar

    Probably this explains why some atheists eventually profess a belief in God in their death bed…safe choice at that point in time, rather than risk being eternally damned. :) Fear of death is the basis of all classical religions.

    However, these things have never been a matter of life and death to me. Besides, I view death differently. I am not the only agnostic/free thinker who thinks that death is nothing to be feared. I am in fact curious what lies beyond it.

  • Joemar

    Many things have changed since college :) But I miss those really deep and heated discussions we had with our good old friends in UP Tac. Hope we can discuss again soon. But I have a totally different point of view now.

    One can always adapt a model of thinking (or imaginary explanation) to interpret events and phenomena. Whether or not these explanations are true is a different question.

    If you're just concerned about making sense or in giving meaning in what goes around, religion is more than enough. But, if you care about truth, you've got to limit your imaginations to what can be confirmed by a reality check (for scientists, this would mean an experiment).

    Religion is a pursuit of meaning regardless of truth, science is a pursuit of truth regardless of meaning.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Vincent-Granados/1756102177 Mark Vincent Granados

    yup I should agree. we should never believe out of fear and let us never fear to find out if what we believe is true.
    but as for me who believes that there is a God, Holding on with the belief that God exist is not of much importance. if I believe that God exist then same is true that I believe that there is an adversary called the devil. now if the devil rebelled against God and then the devil himself must have know that God exists. why would he rebel on Someone who don't even exist?
    If the devil believes that God exist and if I would only hold on with the I belief that God exist. then what is the difference between the devil and me?
    the devil believes that there is a God, mark vincent believes that there is a God. ha ha ha. look at it. see the difference? no difference! ha ha ha
    I might as well be an agnostic if that if is the case.
    If you are going to ask me why I believe in God then. my answer would be, as best as I know how: I believe in God not because I fear death. or to prove I am godly. or to just persuade people on my belief because I am intelligent than what i really am, God knows I am nothing but a fool, or because I am hopeless and I only delude myself to an infinite God hoping he will make me rich or a rocket scientist someday or I'm losing touch with reality. i just believe in God as I believe in a friend. because I consider Him as a friend. I guess I believe in God not because i am born in culture that believes God, a God who grants your every wish come true just like a genie or does magic tricks which makes me astounded. I believe in God not because he is incomprehensible so I have no choice but to believe in something lofty for me to understand, i believe he gave me a wandering heart to understand him deeper His character.
    I thank you jo for making this blog. it makes me reexamine my heart and the soundness of my beliefs and what I hold dear in me. perhaps I am not doing an exhortation to anybody regarding my belief in God, but a scrutiny of the logic and reason of my own belief.
    he he he
    thanks for replying

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Vincent-Granados/1756102177 Mark Vincent Granados

    there is something I don't like about region it put's my point of view on a seclusion with the people of that certain region. but I know my God is beyond region.

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