Personal Narrative: A Sense Of Being Forced Into A Religion

In the beginning I understood my Christin faith as an academic. I did as I was told, I read my bible, and I followed the Ten Commandments as any teenager does; when it suited me. I wasn’t a horrible teenager, I was raised in a small farm community that really didn’t understand someone with a vole at the end of their name, or someone who wanted to walk to the library and read rather than hang out on the steps of the malt shop/gas station. My formative years were the 1960’s. There was so much conflict and rebellion and hatred. By the time I graduated and was supposed to go out and make my way I was thoroughly confused with and rebellious. Problem was I wasn’t sure what I was rebelling against; the “rebel without a clue.” But, in the end I wound up being a successful trial attorney; I even ran for Congress! I became a Master of the Universe; I was a Goddess that walked on the earth. I believed that God already had enough on his plate, wars, famine, disease, atrocities; why should I plague Him further? After all, the Bible says: “God

In recent days I had the opportunity to go back to North Carolina for a few short days. There, with a heavy heart from a loss in the family, I had nothing else to look towards. I’ve always heard of individuals finding peace, faith, blessings, and love of Christ from attending church. I’ve never been a person who put their faith into a higher power. As I was growing up my parents never wanted to force me into any religion without me knowing everything about it and choosing which route to take on my own. As the years treaded on, I never bothered myself to learn about the many different religions and what each stands for. So I used this opportunity as mine to attend church for the very first time. I attended the Roman Catholic services held

As a child I was forced into a religion I knew absolutely nothing about. My mother woke me up early every Sunday and got me ready for mass. I hated it. I didn’t comprehend why I was being forced to attend and listen to some stranger talk for hours, about something I did not understand. This continued for a couple years until I was around 8 years old and my family became inactive. Although we became inactive, our faith still lingered and we continued to pray every night, and not leave our homes without a blessing. A couple years later I felt as if something was calling me to attend the church. I started

Growing up in a Christian Orthodox religion I went to church every sunday and attended sunday school as well as all church related festivals. Going to college and working became an excuse on why I stopped attending church regularly. When college came along I absolutely hated the idea of taking a religion class as a required course. I was so close minded and complained relentlessly about taking this course. As time went on in class I told myself, “there is no way this professor is going to turn me into a Lutheran.” Little did I know my professor was trying to open the doors of knowledge and expand my views in both science and religion. I came into theology one hundred and one believing I knew everything there was to be known about God. I was arrogant and foolish. My perspectives were so narrow, like my mind. I did not allow my professor to enlighten me with his knowledge. I believed that since I passed my tenth grade Sunday School exam there was no more to learn, or no mind great

Dawkins signifies, to many, that the deity is an outmoded myth in the modern world. The author

When I went into Grade 9 religion, I thought that it was going to be one of the most useless and boring courses that I took as religion is not significant in my life. About a quarter in to the semester, I was surprised when I realized that I actually enjoyed going to religion class every day. The heated discussions about controversial topics, the interesting lessons and the captivating movies were all responsible for the best hour and fifteen minutes of my weekdays. I was raised by parents who didn’t believe in any religion, but they never forced their belief on me. Until a year ago, I was completely uneducated about the Catholic faith. However, I learned a lot about Catholicism during religion class. That’s when I realized that just because

I study the bible , pray and worship God, it's my favorite thing to do every day,besides teaching everyone I know what I have learned from Gods word. I have two grown daughters from a previous marriage who inspire me always to continue in the word of God. I am blessed to be married for the last 25 yrs.

8 billion people in the world and how many do you think are the same? none, no one in this world of 8 billion people are the same there is always something that makes someone different from someone else identity is one of those things that make us different. There are other things that make us different like fingerprints, hair, clothes, ect... but one that no one has is our full identity some people might have part of it but not all. Identity is the one thing that can make us who we are fully. Identity is defined as "the fact of being who or what a person or thing is". When I think of identity, I immediately think of my religin. My religin Is my identity. I identify myself as a child of god. I have gone to church all my life and I think

If we are certain about any one thing about religion, it is exactly what we make of it. That is to say that when Christians speak about God or the bible they speak only about what they find important and pertinent, whether to themselves alone or all of Christianity. Any new Christian speech seems to be paradoxical in both the fact that it threatens the validity of the religion by calling into question scripture or other church ideas, but also allows a breadth of new believers. I'd like to delve into when this question is portrayed as a completely new idea brought into Christianity and when it is used to shed a new light on a preexisting concept, How do humans reconcile new ways of speaking about God and what kind of problems that arise from

As I reflect on the “Who Are You? Document” and my Self-Knowledge Survey, I cannot help but think about my past and all things that have led me to this point. I was raised in a very religious household. My father was a pastor and we spent most of our time at church or in bible studies. When I was much younger, this excited me. I greatly enjoyed being a part of the worship services, praying before meals, and our religious traditions around the holidays. My parents protected me from the realities associated with life outside of the church, but as I grew older, I would acquire small tastes of the realities of life outside of religion and over time, I grew bitter at my family for “protecting” me from things that my religion taught were bad, but

There are millions of people who have dealt with similar issues such as coming to terms with their religious beliefs. For me, it wasn’t as difficult as it must have been for others, an example being my parents, to grow up not feeling particularly connected to any religion. While they raised me with the option of choosing or not choosing a religion, my parents were not raised with that liberty. It must be difficult to not share similar ideologies as those close to you so deeply believe in, this being a sentiment that addresses multiple topics, not just religion (Pearce, 2007). I realize how lucky I am to have been given the option and opportunity to make my own decisions about such a majorly detailed subject. I was given absolute freedom to go whatever direction I chose. Though I never felt attached to any religion I’ve looked into, I greatly appreciated the chance my parents gave me to formulate my own

My mother told me that technically, I'm Lutheran, as her and my Father had me baptized. However, it was never really enforced, she tells me, so I have the freedom to be whatever I choose. The only religious ritual I can remember were nightly prayers. I wasnt exacty raised with them, and my Mom taught them to me more as a last ditch effort than anything else.

Growing up in a Christian home and then slowly departing from that teaching can be difficult for most Christians and more than a struggle for some. Yes, I’m certain that we are all aware that the bible says “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” Proverbs 22:6. I’m not sure if I agree with that anymore. Why? Well, my parents raised me as a Christian. I went to church, not faithfully but I went majority of the time. I was in praise dancing and even went to bible study. Now it’s like every since I came to Olivet, I feel as if religion is forced upon me. I didn’t feel this way when I was younger. I’ve departed from giving God my full attention, attending church regularly, being a full-time Christian, and reading the bible. I believe in God, but something is missing. I want the freedom to know him, not the force.

It was not until my freshmen world geography class where I learned about the variety of religions, that I began to question what I truly believe in and what was the right religion for me. My parents being catholic passed on their religious beliefs and actions naturally to me. I grew up with the same catholic stories and traditions for ages and I never really understood it as a child, therefore I never really believed in them. For the majority of my life I heard these stories, beliefs, and practices but never dedicated myself to them because I had inhabited a general and open prospect in life. After learning about the vast majority of culture and religions that other people practiced I spark of wonder came upon me as if I needed to know more about the other beliefs that there were. At this moment I truly realized that the Catholic religion was basically forced on me and I didn 't have the option to choose freely on what I want to believe in. An important tradition in Catholicism is attending a religious retreat. I had been trying to avoid participation in this retreat because I figured there would only be stuck-up, uptight, catholic people trying to force their beliefs on me and attempt to change me and expose me to a completely strict lifestyle. However, to not upset my parents, I agreed to go but I told myself that I would not participate in any of the activities, that I wouldn 't talk to anyone, and at the end of the day go home without my beliefs changing. On the ride to

Growing up I always lived in a religious household. We always prayed before we ate, prayed before we went to bed, and always went to church on Sunday and Wednesday night. While I never questioned these actions and never tried to rebel against them, I still didn’t understand the importance of them either. I was merely walking in my parents footsteps, doing what my parents told me, singing along to the children’s songs in Sunday school, gave a tithing of my allowance every Sunday, but my life was void of the real meanings of my actions. This went on for years. Because I had not yet read through the Bible to understand why these actions had any meaning, they were just things I did all the time and I thought that was normal and that was what it meant to be a Christian.