Even if god exists religion can't possibly be the way to god

Unless, hear me out, god is a golden retriever and needs to be reminded how much of a good boy He is
- this golden retriever has committed many atrocities in the old testament
  
  "Bad god!" hits god with a rolled up newspaper
  
  It was a Chihuahua back then
  
  Clearly he wasn't trained properly as a pup
  
  Sadly the doggo walked all over the holy keyboard and wrote the old testament

My go to phrase for Mormons is something like "I believe that, if there is a God, he wouldn't be so vain as to require constant worship, and instead he would just want us to 'live in his image'".
It's fun watching the cogs turn in their heads when you say something like that.
- Pretty sure there are lines in the Bible that directly state it is enough to pray in your heart, without any outward symbols or churches or the like. So yeah, that's not only a witty comeback, but also a good point from the consistency view
  
  I remember a song from my childhood which was sung in the church regularly. And a part of it says something along the lines of "where two or three come together in my name, I'll be among them". Which seems to be a "quote" from Jesus. It's not only written in their books but also in their songs but the whole "we need your money to build bigger churches otherwise God can't hear us" scheme is still going..
  
  Yes there are, it's one of Jesus' teachings.
- Little know trivia in the Book of Mormon, you get a chance to convert after death if you haven't already!
  
  Book of Mormon
  Dum dum dum dum dummm
  
  Yeah, a couple family members converted a few decades ago and the Mormons sent us all a request to list all our ancestors so they could retroactively ‘save’ them. Most of my family being Lutheran, that didn’t go over well lol.
  My grandpa, my uncle, and a few other family pranksters got together and gave them the most outrageous list they could come up with. I had a Mormon kid as a friend when I was young, and some days I wonder if they looked me up, and actually believed I was related to the King of Sweden.

IMO, if God exists it's nothing at all like what any religion says. If a god exists at all, there are only two possibilities I think it could be:
Non-intelligent happenstance. The universe itself. The laws of physics. Whatever; it's a concept and not a literal entity.
An intelligence that created humans and/or other life here or there, but is not really "God" in anyway described by man. They're just highly intelligent beings that bioengineered us long, long ago.
The existence of an afterlife though is more complicated. There's two possibilities, at least IMO:
There is nothing after death. No soul that lives on or moves on. There is just the meat in our skull hallucinating things based on external stimuli from reality to make sense of it all until the electrical signals stop and we cease to exist.
There is something beyond current understanding where consciousness comes from and it can exist in some form after death. Whatever it experiences after death would be something of an afterlife; though it is probably nothing at all like what any religion describes. It may not even be possible to describe it at all because it's just super weird.
- I like to muse on the idea of an afterlife, being that I’m not religious. I’d like to think maybe every life is just an expression of the universe and that we are all the same; and that same either experiences things outside of our existence or understanding, or we simply resume experience but elsewhere, kinda like reincarnation. I’d also like to think we’re all from a higher dimension experiencing reality as if it’s an episode on Netflix, or like the game Roy from Rick and Morty, that would be fun.
  
  Die and come back to reality where you're a 10 year old kid in a sci-fi arcade on a family vacation during summer break.

I find the argument for an afterlife humorous. Spend any time with a pet sleeping beside you and watch them dream. We are no different at the core. There is an abstract 'conscious' involved with dreaming. Do they have a god in their dreams. Is ours better than theirs, who is to say. I attribute such a thought to absurd human hubris.
Modern humans have existed in some form for only 100k years, while 99.9% of all life that has ever existed is extinct. What kind of omnipotent god is that shitty at dust, ribs, and apples that they failed at everything.
The real clincher for me was simply realizing the fundamental nature of stars and the processes that fuel them. That lead me to ask, if god really exists, why didn't they note a single scientific anomaly that is undisputable. Absolutely everything found in any religious writing is fundamentally human. There are clever observations, but every single thing mentioned could be observed or fabricated. There is no higher evidence whatsoever, no ontological knowledge of the universe.
The only people that speak in riddles are con artists. Religion is the highest level of achievement in the skills of con artistry. The best criminals are those you've never heard of, but the pinnacle of achievement is those that do it in plain sight.
- I think all religions were either started, or greatly fuelled, by psychedelics. For example: the description of the apocalypse in the Bible sounds like a bad trip, animals morphing into each other and all. Ah yes, a "vision of the end"- did it happen right after eating some funny mushrooms or perhaps some nice cactus eh?
  ~~also i think jesus had early onset shizoaffective disorder like his mum before him~~ but that's by far my edgiest take
  
  I don't think Jesus ever existed. Show me 12 guys that experience something absolutely world changing, and none of them write anything about it for decades and then tell me they were factually motivated. This is the premise we're dealing with.
  We were all stupid gullible little kids learning this stuff. Most people are only doing it for the social network, but don't understand it as such. The bias of disregarding all the opposing evidence causes cognitive dissonance and most of the bad behaviors of present society.
  Pragmatically, a group of nobodies managed to survive Rome destroying their civilization because of stupidity and rebellious nationalism. This diaspora was a refugee crisis everywhere else. No one wanted them and their religion was a joke. They had no where to go, owned nothing, and were not even citizens of the lands they inhabited. Most were likely slaves. After a few decades, some started rebuilding a life. It was the perfect opportunity to fabricate some new religious thing if you were a displaced nobody. That diaspora wanted meaningful purpose to make them feel nostalgic over their religious past. The gospels are the tales of some nobodies that didn't have to work because they sold themselves as the product that filled the niche needs of the more successful among that diaspora. They got put up in people's houses and fed well. They likely did so until they got caught by some Romans while trying to grow their religious support base, or because they were overstaying their welcome everywhere they went. Like Paul was probably put on a boat knowing that he wouldn't be able to return, probably a boat likely to sink, and one sent into a storm on purpose.
  It is easy to say all the things that "thousands witnessed" when all those thousands are dead or displaced and unable to dispute anything you've said. None of them wrote down any part of their accounts for several decades. What kinds of reliable stories can you tell after several decades. To top that off, there are elementary school level copying errors that are blatant in nature. They are exactly what I expect from a con. You don't have a case where there are 12 unique accounts or 11 if you want to be pedantic. I can easily picture myself in this circumstance, and I can easily see myself performing this exact con if my alternative was starving to death. There is nothing remarkable about the story. At the time, there were very few people that supported or believed it. A couple hundred years later it picked up steam. That too is obvious. Polytheism is like an anarchic political party. Any fool can conjure a political movement that has potential to overthrow governments using an obscure god of convince and a plausible story that feeds what others want to hear.. Look at Julius Caesar. He largely used his religious role as pontifex maximus to gain power as a populist. Monotheism is far easier to control. The true purpose of religion is quite simple. It is a self sustaining way to suppress the peasantry. This is the common thread throughout all of history. Religion functions as a morality police system with a corpus that is just long enough to occupy the minds of the average person. It is a source of tribal isolation. It is not a meritocracy, so it will not evolve much with time. Conservative sadism and ignorance are an effective way to oppresses or suppress progressive societal elements that might question the corruption and ineptitude of the upper class. Religion creates little gullible pockets of people that are easily manipulated by the upper class and authority.
  So no, there is no evidence for anything more than opportunistic cons and pragmatic government if you really strip away all the layers and look at it objectively. It is a system of feelings over logic because feelings disregard facts and make up their own like imaginary friends no one has ever talked to, or a magical future if you just go about your insignificant life while telling you it will be better next time. Or shit, how about we really rub it in: in the next life "the meek will inherit the earth." That's right, act as low as you can little peasants, and be happy about it. It will be better next time. Your imaginary friend said so about this place no one has ever seen or been to. The majority of humans believe shit like this. If you know this stuff well, you know I did too.
  You can't fix stupid in anyone else; only within yourself. Fighting or arguing with anyone that places emotionally derived belief over fundamental logic is a pointless and destructive waste of time. Sharing reasonable logic with those on the edge can be helpful, but like, I came up with all of this on my own completely independent of external sources.
- You were born into a planet where the moon perfectly eclipses the sun and where the next brightest object in the sky goes on a katabasis that inspired entirely separate intelligent cultures from the Aztecs to the Sumerians to develop the idea that the dead could come back to life.
  The fact that solar eclipses were visible meant that we started to track them, discovering the Saros cycle and eventually building the first analog computer to track them.
  The fact that the odd orbit of Venus as viewed from the Earth dipping down below the ground before emerging again leading to cultures imagining the dead being raised has resulted in widespread hyperstition of resurrection.
  You were born into a generation of humans when a three trillion dollar company has already been granted a patent on resurrecting dead people using computers and the social media they leave behind.
  Absolutely none of the above features of your world can be attributed to selection bias by something like the anthropic principal, but absolutely can be explained by selection bias if you are in an ancestor simulation - for life to exist unusual celestial features contributing to life recreating itself is unnecessary, but any accurate ancestor simulation should exhibit features of a world that lead to it eventually recreating itself.
  The physics of your universe behaves as if continuous at both macro and micro scales, up until interacted with, which is very convenient given state changes by free agents to a continuous manifold would require an infinite amount of memory to simulate.
  But yeah, sure, the idea of an afterlife is humorous. Humorous like the Roman satirist Lucian in the 2nd century making fun of the impossibility of a ship of men ever flying up to the moon.

It’s a lot easier to control and oppress people when they have the fear of god in them.

"Give me your entire life and I'll give you rewards beyond your wildest dreams... that you can only see after you die."
One of the greatest grifts in all of history.
- I can’t think of a better one overall

I'm just going to drop this here:
https://whywontgodhealamputees.com/
- Interesting website. They have a page about prayer too https://whywontgodhealamputees.com/superstition.htm
- I agree with this and do not dispute it.
  However, I think there is value to the human mind in performing ritual, meditation, and positive thinking. We can think ourselves into feeling better. The placebo effect works, even in you know about the placebo effect.
  Jesus didn't know about these things 2000 years ago, but the stories about him make him seem like a worldly rabbi. He might have seen evidence of people getting better from disease through the power of prayer. (Never amputees, though.) The human body can fight disease; it can never regrow a limb.
  The human mind also tends to remember positive experiences, and tends to ignore things that don't seem to work. This is how fake psychics and cold readers work. You send out a bunch of guesses, and get a couple of "hits", and the client remembers the hits. We all remember the hits. It's harder to remember the misses. (Side note: I experienced a palm reader at a party and experienced this first-hand, and despite knowing their techniques, I still felt it a little.)
  All this makes me believe that our brains are generally susceptible to a construct like religion. And that there could be some value in meditation, ritual, and positive thinking. However religion is frequently a grift and makes people do bad things - it doesn't have to be, though. Being quietly spiritual is ok, which is what Jesus taught.

People universally agree that Jesus Himself is a great dude - despite (because!) He told the over-religious Karens to fuck off, and just plainly do such things as take care of widows & orphans. So wherever you may end up, maybe start with that and see where it takes you?
- Using the term “universally agree,” on the fast and loose I see.
  
  Obviously... sort of. Fascists hate him for bucking authority, neoliberals too bc how dare He prioritize anything at all over profit - like why take care of the poor when you can (literally) fuck them over, even use them as slaves?
  Though I would think the word that they would take issue with would be the "great" part rather than the "universally agree" - they can all see who He is, bc His actions made that plain leaving no room for doubt (like He could be a loon but... whatever the reasoning, at least He lived authentically according to whatever principles He expoused) - they just don't agree that those properties are themselves what they want to see put into the world.
- And nowadays, over-religious Karens (and political despots and greedy evangelicals) use Jesus to oppress and exploit others. If this Jesus had the power the fables claim, he would put an end to all of that shit, stat. Looks around and gestures
  
  First part:
  Second part:
  But I am not prepared to take the latter on faith alone - b/c free will is a removed. Allowing a Lord of the Flies type of situation means... well... this.
  Do you ever wonder how life must have been in The Matrix? Like, I've heard that the Bay of Pigs scenario brought us within like a hairsbreadth of WWIII, and it was only narrowly averted by what amounts to a probabilistic confluence of factors, but if you modeled it multiple times you could end up with VERY different outcomes - like after the fighting settled USA on top, or Russia on top, but the vastly most likely ofc would be nobody on top but everyone (1st-world participants anyway) obliterated, etc. So would The Architect there allow those permutations, or did he guide them towards a desired end? And if so, why bother, if he got what he wanted regardless? Or perhaps he didn't really care one way or the other, so long as sufficient people were alive to steal their energy from, but b/c of the latter he would work to prevent such a worst-case (to the machines' purposes) outcome. But if the Russians were capable of threading that needle, and taking over the USA without obliterating too many human lives, then was there an incarnation of The Matrix where Neo (or you know, The One by whatever name) was born to a Russian province, a conquered USA? Fun thoughts...
  But anyway, regardless of all the religiosity add-ons (people that try to use Him for their own selfish agendas), Jesus was just a most excellent dude!
  As for whether He is (a) "God" or not, people ofc disagree. I think yes, but I also join with others of many faiths who regardless or even outright because of their religion - including atheism - try to be the change that we want to see in the world, without getting hung up on our philosophical differences. Ironically the main camp in opposition to that are fascists, which at this point heavily features evangelical so-called "Christians" in the USA (who are also so-called "Patriots", so-called Pro-"Life", so-called "defenders" rather than destroyers of democracy - they really aren't big on telling the Truth, even/especially to themselves!).
  This is the part where shit gets tough, b/c words no longer have meaning, if we (the tolerant) allow (tolerate) people (esp. the intolerant) to call themselves whatever they wish. Ofc nobody for one second would confuse Trump himself as an authentic "Christian" - they just use him for their own ends - but what then is a "Christian"? Is it someone who, like Jesus, is most excellent to one another by showing LOVE (kindness, patience, gentleness, compassion, etc.), or is it rather someone who Karens people, literally killing them... or worse (diddling kids, slavery, wage theft that is... is that even any different?!?)
  Ironically, Jesus is only ever recorded to HATE one group of people: the intolerant religious butthurt crowd who say one thing, do the precise opposite, but expect you to go along b/c if you don't they will literally, flat-out, straight-up kill you. As they did Him.
  So yeah, I would hope that even atheists could join in on hating the "Christian"/"Patriot"/Pro-"Life" crowd, as Jesus Himself demonstrated that He did. To them I would say the message: don't let the fascists confuse you with "words" - just b/c they call themselves something doesn't make it true. What then is a "Christian"? Who da fuq even cares at this point, it may be a lost cause, but The (OG) Dude I thought was pretty cool:-), again imho.
- People agreed with this so much that at the time, they murdered him for it.
  
  "People" didn't disagree with him; the Roman governor did. And it wasn't even a matter of disagreeing with Jesus's message; Pilate just saw him as a troublemaker.
  
  Meh, for them it was a Tuesday - it's just how authoritarians are - and rightly so even, if you believe that way (it is internally consistent I'm saying). Overzealous mods banning people and murder are differences in degree, not of kind.
  But, if you believe the lore, Jesus being "God" meant that He actually had the upper hand and while he could have stopped it, chose not to, instead allowing them their freedoms even at that cost and significance, to both Himself personally and others in the community and even around the world. It's a fascinating tale! One that I believe but regardless even, there's depth there.
  Or you could go the other route and presume that Jesus was not any kind of "god"... in which case he lacked the upper hand - or did he? He could have altered his behavior to fit in with the authorities of his day, but chose not to. Like Robin Hood, he dared to defy those conventions that he considered wrong, and died as a result, knowing that would happen.
  So either way, he was genuine. How could you look at the likes of Mr. Rogers or Jesus and think "he's a bad dude"? Except ofc if you want to keep people in slavery and ignorance, i.e. the religious leaders. Jesus was a revolutionary, a bad dude as far as they were concerned, but a good one for anyone who enjoys the idea of someone being authentically whoever they want/need to be, or for an authoritian who believes in God, there's really a quite narrow range in-between occupied afaict solely by piss-baby fascists who believe neither, and in my comment I was not caring about those who preach intolerance.:-P But obviously you are right, they do exist.
  Whatever someone's "religion", I say:

Well I never thought that prayer ever made sense in the first place at least with the God I was raised to believe in. I was told God had a perfect plan which included all of us and he wasn't willing to deviate from that plan even to spare his own son from suffering. Given that, I stopped praying because it made no sense to me, there is already a plan, the plan won't be changed so there's no sense asking for anything.
That was my logic as a kid at least but now I don't pray because I no longer believe.

Religion is a way to avoid accountability.
- It is the ultimate giving up of your personal free will.. and they make it a fucking SELLING POINT.
  Like door to door lobotomy salesmen.

The idea of "the power of prayer" is stupid on the face of it. First, you're presupposing a omnipotent diety that can and does directly effect the universe, changing the outcomes of events based on it's desires, whims, plans, whatever. And you think THAT diety is taking requests? When "God answered my prayers", you think that had you not requested it, it wouldn't have happened. You think that God answers to your puny human concerns? That shit is arrogant as hell.
But furthermore, it also flies in the face of two other common beliefs about God, at least in Christianity. "God gave man Free Will" and "It's All Part of God's Plan(tm)" (don't get me started on how those are already two mutually exclusive ideas and hundreds of millions of believers just ignore that cognitive dissonance). Many of the things that one prays for, like "getting that job", "winning that award", "ending the war", etc. directly involve altering the decisions and actions of others, which means that God would be stripping them of free will. Also, the most classic call to prayer is to heal the sick, or preserve one's life. But surely if God has a plan for everyone's life, at minimum everyone's birth and death must also be planned. How can he answer your prayer to save your life if it's his plan for you to die, yet still have an plan he's always been following? The irony is that people like to pull the "all part of God's plan" platitude particularly when someone has died before their time.
The one that really makes me annoyed, or even angry, is when something terrible happens, people are hurt or killed, and someone who was supposed to or had almost been there says something like "God was watching out for me". It's so self-centered and arrogant to attribute your simple dumb luck to God's will in that situation. Because, not only does it assume you are God's most special little guy that he's constantly paying attention to and protecting, but also that God willfully condemned those others who did fall to this terrible fate that he supposedly saved you from. It's all arrogance. I can't stand it.
- Like Carlin said
  Well suppose the thing you want isn't in God's Divine Plan? What do you want Him to do? Change His plan? Just for you? Doesn't it seem a little arrogant? It's a Divine Plan. What's the use of being God if every run-down shmuck with a two-dollar prayerbook can come along and fuck up Your Plan?
  
  Exactly. RIP, George.

That made me conclude that religion is probably fake, no matter if there’s a god or not.
That's not it. All religions are real - regardless of whether the things any given religion worships is real or not.
Religion is as real as money, borders and race.
- Your just kinda messing around with words when people think religion and talk about it like this they are referring to the beliefs like a god making the world. While yes thats also religion thats not when people mean in this context since everyone knows things like churches exist

Have you ever played a game of telephone? Even if god did speak to people why would anyone ever trust a human messenger that is so prone to misunderstanding? Unless a god arranged the stars themselves in a way that communicates a presence there's no reason to trust human prophets about their distorted views of the divine filtered through a meager tube of experience.
- I always say this. Any "real god" that created everything and gave their word to humans to pass on will be distorted by the end of the day.
  Humans are greedy and selfish and they will change the word to be proven right. That is what I have faith in. The human ability to fuck up shit for selfish reasons.

Lots of good discussion going on here, majority of folks have covered off on the pitfalls and deceitfulness that comes with religion so thought I'd give an alternative perspective.
I think in some ways religion is a very helpful tool. It provides people with guidelines to live a good life - 'as long as you do these things everything is gonna be alright'. It takes away uncertainty. It gives people purpose. Pretty sure they attribute a lot of humanity's early adoption of cleanliness and hygiene standards to religion. The whole 'invisible man in the sky is watching you' thing does wonders for keeping people accountable behind closed doors.
Whether or not it's fake is up to the individual. Personally I define religion as a 'way of living' (a pursuit or interest followed with great devotion). Do I subscribe to organised religion? No. Do I think that it's fake for those that do? Definitely not. Can different faiths be praying to the same god/s? Yes, I think it's possible, we are all connected.
What I'm getting at here is that even if you think it's fake, it's important to continue questioning and exploring the spiritual or religious aspects of the human condition and develop your own understanding for yourself.
Religion has typically been used as a tool for controlling the masses but to dismiss it solely as a manipulation tactic is an injustice. There is more there to be uncovered if you are willing to look.
The world needs more faith.
- Counterpoint: faith and religion have caused more wars, misery, and death than any other single source in human history. We've had literally thousands of years of being led by religious leaders, maybe it's time to try something different. The world needs LESS faith.
  
  I am in complete agreement with your statement, excepting the final line.
  Organised religion leading society's and their involvement in government is definitely detrimental.
  What I aim to bring to light here is that religion, belief and faith in something greater than oneself is (in my belief) healthy for humanity when it is driven by personnel introspection.
  I feel that all too often we have very intelligent people who completely ignore the entire prospect or field of spirituality due to the negative light it is cast in.
  I'm also happy for people to ignore it but speaking from my own experience, I never thought to investigate this side of the human condition as I had wrapped all notions of spirituality up with the atrocities and lack of logic or reasoning of organised religion. Religion was bad and stupid and I wanted nothing to do with it. But I've since grown and adapted my world views & hope to share my experiences from an empathic viewpoint to maybe assist others who can relate.
  When I say we need more faith, I don't really mean faith in any particular god, entity, alien or higher power. I mean more so that faith in oneself, faith in the connected nature of all things and faith in the universe, this form of faith is a very empowering source of energy that we as a collective can draw upon.
  It's open to interpretation and appreciate your response.
- It provides people with guidelines to live a good life - ‘as long as you do these things everything is gonna be alright’.
  which is a fucking lie. the most decent people I've known have been plagued by disease and preyed upon by the strong and greedy. do these things and MAYBE, if you're really fucking lucky, you won't die an excruciatingly painful death and/or have your loved ones murdered and your life's work stolen.
  those seem like the odds everyone gets, regardless of faith.
  The world needs more faith.
  no, the world needs justice, balance. waiting for faith to solve things isn't going to help anyone.
  
  They are lies to some and to others they are promises.
  I don't disagree that organised religion can and is very manipulative.
  Sorry, I wasn't very clear - was less about whether or not the guidelines are real or have an impact (which is arguable either way) but more so that people want to be reassured that they are 'doing the right thing'.
  And my reason for highlighting this is to provide an understanding for the people that do follow religion - that it's a very natural human response to look for certainty or predictability and for some people religion provides that by providing a structure for them to build their moral compass and world views around.
  Again, whether or not that's a good or bad thing is up to the individual.
  You mention justice and balance and I agree that balance is definitely required. Justice is a more complex notion, one which generally involves consequences or punishment.
  I'm unsure of justice being useful, as long as we are divided and pointing fingers we will never truly meet our potential as a species. We can do amazing things when we work together.
  When I say faith I am not implying that someone or something is going to intervene and save the day. I'm definitely not advocating inaction. But as I mentioned in another reply, faith in oneself and the people around them to make the right decisions and hold themselves accountable is a good starting point. Faith that this existence is just a tiny part of a much greater existence and faith that what you do matters regardless of how inconsequential it may seem.
- The world needs more faith.
  Upvoted just on this and you're right. I have faith but fuck religion. Religion is man made and flawed AF. I have a deep relationship with "God" and talk to them regularly. People need to drop their inhibitions and expand their minds.
  
  Issue is you can believe anything from faith and thats why atrocities happen because x god told them too. Or X priest says this thats how cults exist a group of people believe crazy things with no evidence whatsoever. Which is exactly what faith is belief without evidence.
  
  I'm glad to hear that, keep that communication going! I feel the same and it makes me smile knowing that there are similar minded people out there. Thanks for the kind words stranger, lead by example.
- I mean your wishy washy guide to life stuff sounds cool and all. But it is just flat out wrong no questions. People have used faith to justify genocide racism sexism slavery and more.
  Faith can lead to any conclusion at all thats why faith is a problem I can believe in white supremacy based on faith and I can believe in loving everyone based on faith but because you can’t verify faith both these stances are completely equal.
  Ironically jesus the most well known religious figure world wide told people specifically not to wash their hands in Matthew 15.
  You can believe anything from faith which is why its used for atrocities and why the world doesn’t need more faith

-like praying and stuff never worked for most people I know,-
Like they wished for a car or a pony and didn't get it?
- What about praying to not die of cancer or for jobs and/or places to live? Or praying for a child to live, or for no Genocide etc. Lots of nonselfish prayers out there.
  
  Then planes would never crash, there would be no crime, and all guns would shoot jello. Who wants to live like that?
  
  Not dying of cancer is selfish. It mainly benefits yourself
- You don't understand, it is God's will if you get it, if you don't it's his plan for you...
  It's a win win for him. And of course all those telling you what to do in his name :p
- no, I mean like they tried to talk to god
  
  How did they know it didn't work? I don't really know how those things work, but I'm pretty sure that one is mostly internal.
- Lol 💯

As it turns out, you can believe whatever you want. Religion isn't something you can really solve with logic. It is called faith for a reason.
- The fact that you can't reasonably and logically come to the conclusion that God exists, pretty much tells you all you need to know about God and religion.
  
  That's not how faith works though

Praying works: "Thank God!111!"
Praying doesn't work: "God works in mysterious ways... 🤷‍♀️"
Like sure if you need that as a way to cope with a depressing reality. But that is the main function of religion: to keep folks complacent, governable and prevent systemic change
(dw am not some kind of "religion bad!! no, I never interacted with organized spirituality, why do you ask?"-person. That's just what growing up with ~~real /j~~ Orthodox Christianity and two hours of liturgy on most Sundays does to a critically inclined mf lol)

Religion has always been nothing more than a way to control people.
"I talked to God and he said that if you don't listen to the rules that I wrote in this book then he's going to torture you forever"
- Abrahamic moment

A similar thought I had ages ago is that if God exists, they would either want us to know about them, or not. It doesn't seem reasonable for there to be this weird in-between where it's possible to believe they don't exist if they want to be known... Or for it to be possible to believe they exist if they don't want to be known!
If I were a god that wanted privacy, I'd simply wipe the concept of god from all mortal minds and prevent it from reappearing.
If god did want worship it would be even easier to get it than just making everyone know about them (certainly an option!) - just manifest physically much more often and perform true miracles, none of this silly water into wine (or walkway) business, I mean like Actually moving mountains or something.
I believe the only case that is consistent with some people believing in a god and some not (or different gods) is there just aren't any, or at least they don't care what we think at all, which is similar to not existing and it's unreasonable that we'd 'guess right' about them without their help.

I’m 14 and this is deep.
- Hey, don't announce your vulnerable age to a bunch of old crusty strangers on the Internet
  
  It doesn’t matter what happens to me—as I’ve learned in this post, there is no god.

Thank you r/atheism

Goddamn, OP. I hope you were ready for walls of text splaying out people's entire opinions about everything on this topic.
- Why do you think they posted it?

- Race

I think if god exists it would design a system that would lead you to it if you wanted to find it. In which case religion wouldn't have to be the only way to find god.
But I suppose I should ask what do you mean by the "way to god"?
- I mean the way to find god, to know if he really exists and if so benefit from his existance
  
  Religion can't do even that.
  
  Ah... Yeah. Idk. If I was god I'd make it so anyone who wanted to find me could find me through any path regardless of where they started at. Assuming "god" exists and is at least that benevolent then there's nothing to worry about regardless of your religion.
  
  Ah.
  That leads into my thinking of why it frankly doesn't matter whether god exists or not. Either way, we would be unable to know one way or the other, and hence concerning ourselves with the question is inherently wasted effort.
  It's like asking what is behind the edge of the universe. It does not matter. By definition we cannot perceive or interact with it, as the very concepts that make up our space of perception and interaction terminate at the edge. Likewise if there did exist a higher metaphysical entity, by definition it would exist outside of our sphere of perception and interaction, and hence it is exactly the same for us whether it does exist or not.
  Or, to quote Futurama:

The more you think about it all, the less sense it makes. Congrats on discovering the tiny seed of free-will we all have inside us.

I know this is just a showerthought, but what do you define as religion? The term religion doesn't necessarily need a God.
Or do you mean the 3 mainstream monotheistic religions? (Christianity, Judaism, Islam)
- God with a capital G usually refers to "the" monotheistic God that we understand in those three Abrahamic religions you mentioned. usually you would say "god" otherwise, as it's just a descriptive feature of other religions rather than the name used to call a specific name of "God".
  
  On the internet? In general I take someone that spells "God" with a capital to be a theist (usually only 2 of 3 monotheistic believes, because Muslims usually use "Allah" probably). Or perhaps raised as a theist, lost their faith, but not bitter against their old faith. while if someone uses "god" they are probably not a theist.
  Makes sense to me too: I as a theist would refer to "Thor" as a "god" because to me it is not an entity that exists. It would only make sense for someone that is an atheist to not use a capital to refer to my "God": They don't believe it to be a real entity after all.
  E: although, I guess fictional characters do use capitals, so maybe I'm wrong.

Do you shower in whiskey?
- Wouldst thou like to live deliciously?

I agree, now how do I get my mom to quit telling me I'm going to hell?
- Well that's where all the sinners go right? And gambling and hooking are a sin... Hell has blackjack and hookers. Sounds like it could be a fun place.
- You can point out the fact her depiction of a divine parent fails the Solomon test.
  In the classic Solomon story, he tests two different claimants both saying they are the parent of a child.
  The false parent was the one that only cared about being recognized as the parent and was willing to see the child harmed and killed to fulfill that desire.
  The true parent was the one that wanted the child to continue to live as their complete unadulterated self, even if that meant the child never even knew they existed, let alone get they were the parent.
  While it should be easy to understand why a church collecting your money promotes a divine parent who demands recognition and is willing to see its supposed children harmed without collecting its dues, it doesn't seem all that wise to believe such a parent represents a true parent and not a false one if we use Solomon's wisdom as a guiding principle.
  
  She's almost 70 now... I don't think there's anything I can say that will change her mind lol

Religion can still be legit IF
the goal is moral good - most modern religions have a similar moral basis, as do agnostics and atheists
non-interference - in this life, it’s all up to you
nobody can speak for whatever supreme being and it has better things to do than speak to us
outside of that moral foundation, it’s all more of a tool than a goal. Rituals and daily rules help you stay on the path but aren’t goals in themselves. For example if you adhere to your variation of communal prayer, you are spending time uplifting your thoughts to the moral foundation, and developing a harmony with your community. It’s a tool, a practice, to develop better habits toward your goal
Compare it to diet plans. There are many variations where the goal is to eat fewer calories but with rituals to help develop better habits and learn portion control. They are all legit approaches and you can reach your goal of a new life with whichever variation works best for you

Also people speaking to the same god being given a different set of rules sounds stupid, so at least most religions must be fake.
Ao is going to put you on the wall, my poor man. You better believe in something!

One of the main reasons the Pope is anti-drag is that he thinks playing fancy dress up times should be reserved for only high members of the Vatican.

What is going on with the votes on here.
Everything is zeroed out. As though there's someone here upset by all the comments.
- Some people noted that the Aussie instance post update a few days ago seemed to not show votes on some other instance content. I wouldn't worry about it, just decide your own view :)
  
  Ah yeah, just the first post I noticed almost everything being zeroed out haha. She'll be right
- Some people noted that the Aussie instance post update a few days ago seemed to not show votes on some other instance content. I wouldn't worry about it, just decide your own view :)

Just tell me: If there is a god, is he a war god and keeps mankind just for entertainment?

Preface: I'm a Christian, so this will be about the Christian view on things. I can't really speak for other religions, since I don't really know enough about them.
On prayer: asking for miracles is not actually the main point of prayer, the main parts are listening to God, and God listening to you. Imagine a perfect parent/child relationship. Sure, there will be the occasional "hey dad, I need some money to make this month's rent. Can you help please?" or similar conversation, but most of the time it will be the child learning from the wisdom of the parent, or the parent helping the child vent. If you want to see an example of what Christianity says is the sort of things to pray, look at the book of Psalms in the bible.
On other religions: yes, of course at least most religions are fake. A false religion could be started by someone who believes they heard from God but got it wrong, or someone who wants to be the head of a religion for their own gain. Many religions warn about false prophets, so this is hardly a surprising thing.
- Other religions are fake, but my religion....
  
  Have you never disagreed with someone? At that point, at least one of you is wrong. You believe what must be true based on what you've seen, so of course you think you're right.
  It's the same with religion. Because there's disagreement between each different belief (including atheism and such), there can be at most one correct option. I believe Christianity, because based on what I've seen that is by far the most sound option.
  
  As it turns out, religion is faith based
- I wish I could bury my head into the sand enough to believe this clap-trap bullshit. Why does God never answer the prayers of amputees?
- In most parent / child relationships, the child outlives the parent.
  
  Why would that change anything? Regardless of who dies when, a good parent wants to bless their child, and a child wants to learn from a good parent.
- It's not that intercessory prayer needs to work 100% to be convincing, it just needs to beat random chance and it doesn't do that.
  Natural processes can describe how those things came to exist without needing to appeal to supernatural claims or gods.
  You've seen things you attribute to a god, but people in other religions attribute the same things to their god and so far I don't think anyone has shown empirical evidence for any gods, and I don't know about you but I use empirical evidence when changing my confidence on whether something or someone exists or doesn't.
  Many people have a negative opinion on organized religion because we can see the negative effects believing things without sufficient evidence can have on individuals and communities.
  
  Can an atheist pray to god to ask for the enlightenment of his/her/its believers?