I had no religious upbringing whatsoever, for which I am now thankful. Oh, except I was baptized because everyone else in the family is religious (catholic), and my parents gave in to that.
I have a real problem with organised churches or cults, and a problem with the idea of there being a god. I have always been an atheist, agnostic at best sometimes, but I picked "Buddhist" because I wanted to say which sort of spirituality I'd be closest to.
wow, isabelle. we are spiritually identical, it seems.
i identify myself as agnostic, but usually lean towards atheist. but i do identify with many buddhist ideals, and respect them, and appreciate them, but would never convert or consider practicing rituals. i live my life trying to be the best person i can be, and that's all i think is expected of us.
i wasn't raised a certain way, although certain family members tried to sway me when i was much younger, but it didn't work. i've always been turned off by it, even since before i could understand it. i wasn't baptized either. my family is part catholic, part protestant, part pseudo-christian, part atheist.
She thought the B'hai B'hai were pretty good, but apparently they were only pro-women on paper and not in actual practice.
del, i've heard this as well. but any religion that was not founded in recent times is most likely anti-feminist. i'm a feminist myself, and any religion that would in any way consider women a lesser being makes me sick. buddhism doesn't realy acknowledge women. i'm not sure how present-day is, but you know, buddha is male, monks are male, so that immediately turns me off. just the thought that a church would sooner ordain a child molester, as long as he is male, than any woman, is baffling even in these times. what's more baffling is how widely accepted the practice is, and goes unquestioned..
i also have respect for pagans, as far as religion goes. i mean nature is all around us. we are nature. makes more sense to me than worshipping aliens or supreme beings and then destroying everything they supposedly created in their name...